FIVE BIG TAKEAWAYS
1. Collaboration and communication is the biggest challenges Sam is facing.
2. Typically, there is a company-wide set of OKRs (Operational Key Results), and each team is contributing their part to the larger company rollup.
3. OKRs help employees share the same vision and same goals.
4. An OKR ezample is to have 8 million interviews per time period on Indeed.
5. It's important to work for a mission-driven company. Sam helps job seekers get new jobs everyday, which is satisfying.
Sam Pannuzio has worked in the oilfield for over 15 years before joining tech in 2020. He is currently Senior Operations Manager in the SMB marketing team at Indeed. He has an MBA from Rice and a BS in Chemical Engineering from the Colorado School of Mines.
Connect with our guest, Sam Pannuzio, on LinkedIn
[00:00:20] Islin Munisteri: Hi, this is Islin Munisteri, your host of the Rev Ops careers podcast. Sponsored by Theia strategies. Today, we have Sam Pannuzio on the podcast with us today. Welcome, Sam.
[00:00:36] Sam Pannuzio: Great to be here, Islin so
[00:00:39] Islin Munisteri: Sam has worked in the oil field for over 15 years before joining tech in 2020. He is currently the senior operations manager in the SMB marketing team at indeed.
[00:00:51] He has an MBA from rice and a BS in chemical engineering from Colorado school of Mines. It's great to be here. So tell me when did you start out in the oil field and wind up in tech and doing rev ops?
[00:01:04] Sam Pannuzio: yeah. Interesting. Interesting journey as many people have in their careers. Started off from my undergrad in Colorado school mines and all roads led in and out of Houston, Texas.
[00:01:18] Ended up taking a job in oil and gas, offshore, and really med managed operations. Globally with a few companies both domestically in the us Gulf of Mexico, as well as overseas in eight different countries. Over those 15 years, and then the pandemic came along and like many of us.
[00:01:40] There was layoffs that were linked to the price of oil that were linked to commodities, as well as downturns and main industries. And through that I decided to get my MBA and pursue some different career choices. And in that pursuit [00:02:00] of looking out there, I found technology, I found indeed.
[00:02:04] Great company that hired me for marketing and primarily operations in marketing, and that's where I transitioned and made those transferable skills from running offshore operations to running operations in a marketing company of 12,000 people globally as well and trying to drive revenue through SMB, which is our small and medium business employers.
[00:02:32] All while helping people try to get jobs.
[00:02:36] Islin Munisteri: Oh, that's exciting. And I guess to make that transition, did you have any like career coaches or anyone, or you did a lot of
[00:02:43] Sam Pannuzio: research or? Yeah I had a few, mentors and people to help me You're right. From the rice side of things, while I was getting my MBA, I had some help through their career development office really looking at my resume, fine tuning it.[00:03:00]
[00:03:00] And then indeed is a pretty. Open culture of learning and training, and they're definitely willing to work with people and they have a lot of great training material within their organization, but yeah, really linking the two and learning what you've learned and then trying to pivot that towards a different industry like tech and marketing.
[00:03:25] That sounds great.
[00:03:27] Islin Munisteri: And. I guess what right now, what's your biggest challenge in your
[00:03:32] Sam Pannuzio: current role? I would say my biggest challenge right now is probably communication and collaboration. The big CS. Definitely. In an organization of 12,000 people and even on our team of just three, we have so many more people in SMB marketing, we have around 200 people and just making sure that we have that sort of communication.
[00:03:56] Everybody's all on the same page as far [00:04:00] as OKRs executing those OKRs and then not only collaborating within S and B marketing. Within marketing as a whole collaborating with enterprise SMB data analytics, and then collaborating with indeed as a whole with the rest of the organization. Communication and collaboration are definitely some of the biggest challenges that I face.
[00:04:25] And then my specific role is. So I have to deal with both people that are in an office that are hybrid and people that are remote. So having that dynamic as far as communication, again, it all comes down to that.
[00:04:44] Islin Munisteri: Wow. And what's, I guess what's your single source of truth in your tech?
[00:04:48] Sam Pannuzio: My single source of truth would be primarily relying on marketing, enablement, marketing technology.
[00:04:55] Those are our organizations within the company to [00:05:00] ensure that we are getting the right data that we're using the right. Programs and that they are up to date. So that's the single source of truth as far as my tech stack, but you're right. Like as far as really where do I go towards my leaders, MLT, SLT definitely has some very good information.
[00:05:20] We. All hands, quarterly meetings and really trying to stay up to date with a virtual office in essence.
[00:05:29] Islin Munisteri: Why don't we go deeper into what you said about the OKRs. So you talked about coming up with the OKRs in the first place and then executing against them. So in an organization that's fairly new to OKRs.
[00:05:41] Can you tell me more about, about them?
[00:05:43] Sam Pannuzio: Yeah. Operational key results. It's definitely ensuring that we all share the same vision and results. As you're probably aware Indeed's biggest vision is to help people get jobs. So taking that and [00:06:00] ensuring that. Everybody out there, job seekers can get jobs on our website involves a lot of OKRs.
[00:06:07] And when it comes to OKRs, we want to drive product adoption for those OKRs. For example, trying to get our employers on the employer. To adopt interviews and interviewing on our platform, not just being a place that they can find job candidate, but actually taking them through the entire process.
[00:06:32] So around product adoption, primarily interviews on our platform, we have OKRs. And in order to drive those, setting a number. For example, 8 million interviews on our website would be a good example, and then managing those OKRs and ensuring that we reach those on a monthly, quarterly basis and tracking those and making sure that [00:07:00] collaborating between different teams that we can all be aligned.
[00:07:04] In that OKR and that we know what we need to move around levers wise, if, and when things don't work out to the way that we want them. And maybe we learn something along the way and we need to pivot a little bit as well.
[00:07:23] Islin Munisteri: Gotcha. And I guess, so what's an example of a good OKR. I know you said earlier, there's try and get 8 million interviews on the website in a quarter or something like that.
[00:07:33] But what's an example of a good OKR for
[00:07:35] Sam Pannuzio: marketing. Yeah. So a really good OKR for marketing is a part of that larger OKR. So we're trying to drive employers to use. Interview on the indeed platform, virtual interview and driving those interviews through up sale [00:08:00] reactivation retention of mid-market of our S and B customers in order to reach that larger goal, but our smaller goal incrementally By each month or quarter in order to achieve that goal, if that makes sense.
[00:08:19] Islin Munisteri: Gotcha. So there's like like a global OKR that you're trying to reach within the company. Yep. And then you map like certain teams OKRs to that global O KR and then
[00:08:31] Sam Pannuzio: track. Exactly. And it's really a collaborative effort between each team from enterprise, from S and B marketing to really contribute to that larger goal of the organization.
[00:08:45] And ultimately, as you're probably aware that larger goal drives revenue, because if we have more employers on our. We make more money, but really at the end of the day, our goal [00:09:00] is to drive job seekers to our website and to create jobs for those job seekers so that they are able to get jobs.
[00:09:11] Islin Munisteri: Gotcha. So it's like a full circle,
[00:09:13] Sam Pannuzio: Exactly. That you're constantly
[00:09:15] Islin Munisteri: iterating against.
[00:09:16] And so with, as far as like the marketing team goes do you have a certain click for rate or do you have like what's your, what? What's the metric, right? That you're. Like the metric is to get to 8 million interviews.
[00:09:30] But what other goals are leading up to that? Is it like a certain impressions or certain click for rate or is it like certain customer acquisition rate or I
[00:09:41] Sam Pannuzio: don't. Oh yeah. You're right. So you're, there's a lot of different metrics to that. Primarily like impressions, click through rates that add up to that.
[00:09:54] And ultimately what we're trying to drive is LTB right? Long term value [00:10:00] of those employers, which are coming. In this instance, though, we're actually attributing from sending out emails from sending out direct mail to our SMBs. We can actually track from that and attribute that to. A specific interview that has occurred through opening click through rates, et cetera, et cetera, ultimately getting towards those interviews.
[00:10:31] But you're right. There's a lot of things and a lot of metrics, a lot of different ways in analytics to record and keep track of that.
[00:10:41] Islin Munisteri: And I guess do you guys have like a specific software you're using to track your OKRs? Or is it like mostly Excel spreadsheets or,
[00:10:49] Sam Pannuzio: yeah it's mostly we use kind of SQL or IQL is internally, and then from there we'll use keeping track of that within [00:11:00] Google sheets.
[00:11:02] Cool.
[00:11:06] Islin Munisteri: That's exciting. And what I guess, pivoting back onto to RevOps like do you have a philosophy on how rev ops and marketing how your team should interact?
[00:11:18] Sam Pannuzio: Yeah, just, as far as like interaction goes, in terms of rev ops, it's really trying to gain alignment. With sales marketing and customer success, we call it CS operations all across.
[00:11:33] Like the full customer life cycle, ultimately to, to drive, growth through operational efficiency and then to keep all teams accountable for revenue. That's the bigger picture, but yeah, accomplishing that. Is making sure that we do collaborate and have common goals within our teams.
[00:11:55] We have regular meetings to talk about those goals and then as well as [00:12:00] plan for those goals, for the future for growth and ultimately, making sure that we understand where the revenue drivers are for those goals.
[00:12:15] Islin Munisteri: And I guess what's your what do you think of when I say the term rev ops roadmap?
[00:12:19] Sam Pannuzio: To me it would be like, I don't know a flow chart diagram to show kind of OKRs in alignment, in planning for the future. What that revenue looks like for the next three to five years, what are those drivers to that revenue?
[00:12:35] And then how, as far as rev ops, can we move those levers that we are in control of and S and B marketing to accomplish that?
[00:12:48] Islin Munisteri: Cool. And I guess, what are the levers you're in control of when you say that you're just talking about like pure activity levels, like as far as like email marketing, sending direct mail, that, that type of
[00:12:59] Sam Pannuzio: thing. [00:13:00] Yeah, exactly. Within SMB marketing, both acquisition and experience being on the life cycle, up sale retention model, and then growth being on, the acquisition side, whereas that comes to play with.
[00:13:15] Offline, whether that be podcasts, advertisements, TV ads as well as emails, there's a lot of different levers that we can choose to drive that incremental revenue and ultimately get more jobs, seekers, more jobs on our website to help our employers out our job seekers out.
[00:13:36] Islin Munisteri: Awesome.
[00:13:37] And what is the best piece of career advice you would tell your younger.
[00:13:42] Sam Pannuzio: I would've told my younger self, probably not to be so serious when it comes to work and have a little bit of fun. I've put in a lot of hours throughout my early career and really, look back on that.
[00:13:57] I know I had a lot of fun at work, [00:14:00] but I could have had a little bit more of a work life balance. So I definitely would tell my younger self have a little bit more fun and really focus on that work life balance. Not so much about making work your life.
[00:14:16] Islin Munisteri: Oh, make work your life. oh, that is so true.
[00:14:20] That is so true. Yeah. You can't make work your life. That is definitely I would say difficult. I remember working in the oil field and you could pretty much stay at the office as long as you wanted . Yeah. And they wouldn't say anything, the managers would be like, yeah, no, go for it.
[00:14:38] But like it's really up to you as the individual define that work life balance, like your manager. Cannot give it to you.
[00:14:46] Sam Pannuzio: Yeah. And you're right. The manager can support that work life balance and encourage it. But at the end of the day, it's up to you to figure out how that works or how that happens.
[00:14:58] Cuz you could have all the [00:15:00] time off in the world. You're still working and your time off you're really not detached and you're still caught up in that. So I would really just reiterate that to my younger self, take the time to have some fun and look forward to those fun times because.
[00:15:18] If you just work all the time, then really, and I've seen this with a lot of people, primarily in oil and gas since their whole career is pretty much coming to the end and they're, they're stressed because they're like, what am I gonna do now? And it's sad to see that. But on the other side of it, you need to learn to have fun and have a life outside of work.
[00:15:40] Islin Munisteri: Yeah. I definitely. Definitely agree with that. Well, cool. Is, is there anything else you wanted to share with our listeners?
[00:15:48] Sam Pannuzio: No, I don't. I don't think anything else. Definitely appreciate the opportunity to meet with you and Yeah I definitely enjoy my career and working with the great people of [00:16:00] indeed have a great team many smart people and it's very challenging.
[00:16:05] There's always new challenges every single day. and just enjoy really having, being a part of a company that's really mission driven. I think we tend to forget and some companies, when it comes to revenue or driving money at the end of the day, what are we really trying to accomplish?
[00:16:23] And indeed, that's very clear. We're trying to help people get jobs. And it's a large vision that I think you can fall back on it at the end of the day. It's Hey, although I may have made some money off of employers. At the end of the day, I helped you. X amount of people get jobs today, just one person.
[00:16:42] It's so empowering to say that, and I think that's so important, especially, during the last couple of years, a as well as people's lives, because we are often even as Americans, as, a global workforce we're defined as where we work and what we do, right? [00:17:00]
[00:17:01] Islin Munisteri: Yes. I agree.
[00:17:02] Thank you very much, Sam, for thank you. Being on the podcast and thank you everyone for listening. I look forward to tuning in next week. Thank
[00:17:10] Sam Pannuzio: you. Have a great one. Thanks Sam.
[00:17:15]