We're back with the second installment of our Q&A series with industry peers and friends!
Last month, we kicked off this series with Kevan Lee and Shannon Deep from Bonfire, diving deep into brand strategy and storytelling. This month, we're switching gears to explore the operational side of growth with someone who's been in the trenches building revenue systems long before "RevOps" became the buzzword du jour.
Today we're chatting with Stacie Sussman, CRO of RevUp Advisory. Stacie brings over 17 years of sales leadership experience across Fortune 500 brands, including Estée Lauder, General Mills, and HBO. She now helps companies from pre-seed to Series B build the operational foundations they need to scale.
Her no-nonsense approach to diagnosing growth problems and systematic thinking about revenue operations made for a fascinating conversation that we know you'll find incredibly valuable.
Thanks for chatting with us at The Growth Stack, Stacie! As the CRO of RevUp Advisory, you've worked with companies across a variety of industries, from SaaS to Construction to Healthcare. What's the one RevOps challenge that shows up consistently regardless of industry?
We worked with a client who was making good revenue, but their executive team literally couldn't take bathroom breaks during the busy season. They were hiring armies of interns and offshore teams just to keep up with manual processes. That's haphazard growth - throwing people at problems instead of building systems.
We spent 2-3 years systematically rebuilding their operational foundation. Now they're making MORE revenue, their team can actually breathe, and their clients are happier than ever because consistent processes deliver better service.
You've been doing this since before 'RevOps' was even a buzzword. How has the market's understanding of revenue operations evolved from your early days at Skaled to running your own advisory now?
Honestly? Even big companies still don't really understand what RevOps means. So we simplify it. You want to grow your sales? Great! We're the concierge growth consultancy team that can do it.
RevOps is just a fancy word for growing your revenue systematically. You achieve this by systematizing your marketing efforts, creating a strong foundation and processes to generate leads through a sales methodology, and then building operational excellence to underpin it all.
The evolution I've seen is that the buzzword has become popular, but most companies are still treating it as a tech problem rather than a growth strategy problem.
How does your time leading Sales teams impact the work you do today?
I spent 17 years leading sales teams across New York, the US, and Europe, working with Fortune 500 brands such as Estee Lauder, General Mills, HBO, Macy's, and LVMH. Working with these big brands gave me a seat at the table in boardrooms with top executives around the world, where I could understand the complexities of how big businesses actually grow. I was always on the sales-generating side, so I understood my piece of the larger go-to-market strategy.
One of my mentors told me the best sales asset was to lean in and listen. That's why we ask a lot of 'why' questions - not to be annoying, but because we're genuinely curious about how you got here and how we need to go further.
That experience taught me what systematic growth looks like at scale - and more importantly, what breaks when companies try to wing it. When you've seen how a $50 billion company structures its revenue operations, you can spot the gaps in a $10 million company immediately.
You've implemented everything from Salesforce to HubSpot to custom API integrations across dozens of clients. When a company asks 'What tech stack should we use?' - how do you approach that conversation?
I call this 'shiny penny syndrome.' Everyone wants to know what other companies of their size are implementing and thinks, 'let's just do that.' Couldn't be further from the truth.
Most companies - spoiler alert - aren't using their tech to its fullest capacity. They probably have duplicative tools, tools that are collecting dust, and little to no Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs).
The question we ask is often 'what are we trying to accomplish?' - spoken like we're talking to a kindergartener. What do you want to do with your business to move it from A to F? Once we know that, we can implement things technically. There's tech for literally everything out there. It's about figuring out the RIGHT tech.
It's not just about picking the right CRM - it's about building the operational foundation that lets your team actually USE it effectively every single day.
Through your work with pre-seed to Series B companies, you've probably seen every type of 'revenue plateau.' What are the telltale signs that a company's growth issues are RevOps problems in disguise?
We call this the 'band-aid method.' It's like when you go to a doctor's office and you have a pain in your stomach, and you've been popping so much Tylenol to mask the symptoms. You don't even realize the pain is actually in your back.
We see many companies band-aiding surface-level issues because they can't address them now, are moving too quickly, or lack the knowledge to move forward. So they band-aid things together until the bleed gets so enormous that their sales don't grow and turn in the wrong direction.
We always get calls with clients that say, 'we need to hire more salespeople' when really their marketing is broken. They can't figure it out. It's non-existent.
Then we say 'you should have called us 6 months ago' and start diagnosing the actual problem with a true growth audit.
What's the biggest shift you're seeing in how companies think about revenue operations in 2025?
Honestly? I still don't think companies actually get it. And with AI being such a big buzzword, everyone's scratching their heads to run to AI - but they still haven't figured out how to put in place a modern-day go-to-market strategy and operational excellence, and then layer AI on top of it.
Here's the thing - AI amplifies whatever processes you already have - good or bad. It's garbage in, garbage out. If your data is messy and your processes are broken, AI is just going to give you faster, more efficient garbage.
Is GTM engineering a real thing? Or Sales Ops in disguise?
Yes, it's a real thing, and we've developed a systematic way to scale companies at different revenue inflection points because there's a crawl, walk, and run to every growth stage - and you need to follow priorities and steps in order.
Most companies want to run while building their foundation on stilts. That's why we see $5MM companies trying to implement enterprise-level sales processes when they haven't even nailed their lead qualification yet.
If you could give one piece of advice to a founder who just hit $5M ARR and is thinking 'maybe I need RevOps help' - what would you tell them?
You can't scale to the next level doing everything yourself. You need outside experts who actually know what they're doing. Stop burning out your employees by asking them to learn RevOps on the fly through Trailhead videos and HubSpot community forums. That approach turns what should be a strategic growth phase into months or years of unnecessary struggle.
What are the top 2-3 qualities you look for in a RevOps vendor and why?
Partnership, not just consulting. Too many vendors hand you a playbook and disappear. They give you outdated philosophies that used to work, but don't innovate on what could actually work for your specific situation today.
Thoughtful partners who aren't assholes. You want people who go the extra mile because they genuinely want to see you win, too. Because winning as "we" feels better than winning as "me."
Accountability to train the trainers. They should leave your company better off - with your talent feeling more polished, educated, and capable of actual growth. You're not just getting processes implemented; you're building internal capability.
This was such an enlightening conversation. Stacie's systematic approach to diagnosing growth problems and her refreshingly direct take on what actually drives scalable revenue were precisely what we needed to hear. Thanks so much for your time and insights, Stacie!
Want to connect with Stacie? You can find her on LinkedIn or learn more about RevUp Advisory's approach to systematic growth through her Substack.