Kassie Leach’s background in accounting helped land her a technical support role at Procare Solutions back in 2015 — a move, Leach recalled, that brought with it some trepidation early into her tenure.
“After my first week of training I realized I had to learn the ins and outs of Procare, which was far beyond my accounting knowledge,” Leach said. “I said to myself, ‘There is no way I can do this job.’ Well, almost six years later, the joke’s on me!”
Why’s that? Because, despite that initial doubt, Leach has carved out a years-long tenure across a handful of different functions at the software company, which provides child care management tools for daycares, child care centers, preschools and after-school programs. An interest in working with Procare’s customers propelled Leach into client services. A software consultant role in which she had a sales quota followed next.
And, most recently, she built off the knowledge and experience acquired over nearly half a decade by becoming a sales operations coordinator, where she helps train team members, manages key processes and performs other responsibilities crucial to sellers’ success.
“The impact sales operations has on the sales team is often overlooked. A streamlined sales process allows sales reps to do what they do best: Get clients to say, ‘Yes!’” Leach said. “It also sets the tone with the client as they move from the sales cycle into onboarding.”
As Leach’s tenure shows, finding a fit at a company doesn’t start and end with the first role — rather, when professional curiosity is paired with an environment that’s receptive to team members exploring new opportunities, it can yield a fruitful career. Built In Colorado caught up with Leach to learn how she’s found different ways to leverage her strengths in different capacities.
You’ve held a handful of different roles in your time at Procare. What prompted you to pursue these new positions?
While in my first role, I soon found out that I really enjoyed working with our clients and the challenge of fixing or solving their problems. As the company began to grow, new opportunities opened up. I was fortunate enough to be considered for a new Procare role, and I helped create the client services team. My focus was on reaching out to centers that hadn’t used the software they had invested in. This soon evolved into assisting sales reps with software orders.
Shortly thereafter, I mustered up the courage to ask our-then vice president of sales to consider me for a software consultant role. I will never forget his response. In true sales leadership style, he said: “The job is yours. I was waiting for you to ask for it.” Sales requires constant improvement and the ability to be agile and adaptive. This further honed my skills. I spent almost five years in a sales role and cherish the years of experience and connection built with my clients.
In 2020, Covid-19 hit and life changed. That season caused me to pause and reset. I found myself searching for more work-life balance while, at the same time, Procare migrated from our in-house customer relationship management tool to Salesforce. I loved the challenge of learning this software and its capabilities. I found myself spending time helping other reps use the new tools and showing them how they could impact their sales goals.
The sales organization was also poised for growth. It felt like a natural progression with my years of Procare knowledge. I looked forward to merging our history and being a part of creating a new trajectory for the future.
How did your managers at Procare — both your old ones and the new ones to whom you were reporting — support you each time you moved into a different role?
It was often our leadership at Procare that directed my role changes. True leadership draws out a person’s natural talents and coaches them to success. I am thankful that those leaders chose to help me grow.
Did any of your new roles require you to learn new hard or soft skills?
Every role change has required a level of hands-on training. That being said, this has been a year of learning to embrace change. I recently completed my SalesLoft certification and am currently working toward a Salesforce admin certification, all of which are supported by Procare.
True leadership draws out a person’s natural talents and coaches them to success.”
You’re currently a sales operations coordinator. Why did you want to go in the sales ops direction? And how have the skills, experience and expertise in all of your previous roles at Procare prepared you to be successful in this role?
I find that I have a high level of intellectual curiosity and am naturally skilled with processes. I have an accounting background, which requires a lot of detail and structured process. Because of my natural inclination, this move made a lot of sense for me. During my last year as a quota-carrying sales rep, I had one foot in sales and the other creeping into operations. This move also allowed me to position myself for greater career opportunities outside of being an individual contributor.
How do you think Procare management encourages employees to find their fit by exploring new opportunities within the company?
True leadership is driven to see employees be successful even if that is not in their current role. Two of Procare’s core values are “grow together” and “elevate one another.” My belief is that Procare would rather keep an internal employee and move them to a new role rather than to lose them all together.
How do you think that type of culture — in which employees can explore different areas of interest — ultimately benefits Procare clients?
Happy employees make for happy customers. The more an employee is versed in their role and has understanding of other teams, the better we can serve customers. When we work cohesively with other teams, we all benefit.
Lastly, how do you wish to continue growing at Procare?
I have my eye on a few roles that might interest me. I am really intrigued with Salesforce and see myself growing into a product owner or working toward a project manager role. Perhaps director of sales operations? Check back in another six years and who knows what I will be doing here!
