Building a Demo Engineering Team with Micah Joel - Part 1 скачать в хорошем качестве

Building a Demo Engineering Team with Micah Joel - Part 1

In this episode, Jack Cochran and Matthew James sit down with Micah Joel, GTM leader and demo engineering pioneer, to explore what it means to build a dedicated demo engineering function from scratch. Micah shares his journey from theater kid to SE to leading Salesforce's legendary Q Branch, and unpacks why demo engineering might be the most underutilized lever in presales today. They cover the difference between deal-focused and infrastructure-focused demo engineers, how to structure the team, why blended teams fail, and how a mature demo engineering org can swim upstream into product strategy to reduce time-to-revenue. This is part one of two. Part two will focus on measuring and proving the value of a demo engineering team. Follow Us • Connect with Jack Cochran:   / jackcochran   • Connect with Matthew James:   / matthewyoungjames   • Connect with Micah Joel: (  / micah-joel  )   /     Links and Resources Mentioned • Join Presales Collective Slack: https://www.presalescollective.com/slack • SoulCon 2026 (Chicago, August 2026): (https://www.presalescollective.com/) https://www.presalescollective.com/so... • Presales Collective Podcast: https://www.presalescollective.com/po... Key Topics Covered 1. Micah's Background: From Theater to SE to Demo Engineering 2. What Is Demo Engineering and How Is It Different from Being an SE? 3. When Does an Organization Need a Demo Engineering Team? 4. The Two Sides of Demo Engineering: Deal Support vs. Infrastructure/Scale 5. How to Hire and Structure the Team 6. Demo Engineering as a Talent Pipeline and Retention Strategy 7. Swimming Upstream: Demo Engineering's Role in Go-to-Market Strategy 8. Common Mistakes and How to Avoid Them Timestamps 00:00 Welcome 02:48 Intro Micah Joel 05:42 Demo engineering definition 08:33 When do you need a DE team? 11:13 Deal side vs. infrastructure/scale side 15:48 Demo engineering as SE retention 23:55 Swimming upstream 27:11 Final advice