Leading PreSales · 2026-06-22 · 7 min
Key moments - from our scoring
Substance score
40 / 100
Five dimensions, 20 points each
When account executives skip pre-call briefings, solution engineering leaders often blame the sales team - but Nate and Eva argue the real problem is that SEs and their leadership haven't created the expectation or mechanism for information exchange. Rather than treating briefings as an AE obligation, smart SE leaders frame them as a tool to help AEs close deals faster. The episode walks through a practical six-question pre-call checklist covering deal purpose, customer pain, attendee roles, and competitive context, then shows how to deploy it tactically via low-friction Slack messages asking simply for pain points and attendee names. The data-driven insight: when SEs ask directly, 70% of AEs respond with useful context, 10% realize they need to prep themselves, and only 20% stay silent - already better odds than hoping. For chronic non-responders, SE leaders should escalate patterns to sales leadership with deal impact data rather than having individual SEs confront AEs, preventing burnout and making the conversation structural rather than personal. Ideal for SE managers and directors struggling to get their team the information they need to perform, especially in deal-heavy environments where sales and engineering aren't naturally aligned.
The SE should send a brief, casual Slack message before the call asking one or two key questions like 'What's the pain point?' and 'Who's in the room?' framed as wanting to show up ready to help the AE close. If the AE doesn't respond, the SE still joins the call and does their best, then reports the pattern to their manager for escalation to sales leadership rather than confronting the AE directly.
The six questions are: What's the purpose of this meeting? What problem are we solving? Who's on the call and what are their roles and seniority? What does the AE want the SE to accomplish? What pain did the customer mention? And what's the context, history, competition, and potential landmines?
SE leaders should track patterns of non-responsive AEs across multiple calls with deal impact data, then escalate the conversation to the VP of Sales or sales leadership as a process issue rather than having individual SEs confront AEs. This keeps it structural and fixable at scale rather than creating personal friction.
According to the episode, approximately 70% of AEs respond with useful context when an SE sends a casual Slack message asking for pain points and attendee information; 20% go silent and the SE wings it; and 10% realize they need to prepare themselves and ask for more information.
Briefing SEs before calls should be part of the agreed SE-qualified criteria established between SE and sales leadership, making it a standard that both sides can be held accountable to rather than an informal expectation that gets skipped.
Our reviewer’s read on each dimension, with quotes from the episode.
For a 7-minute episode the content is reasonably packed - reframing the briefing problem as an SE ownership issue, a 6-question checklist, an escalation model, and a lightweight Slack alternative. However, most ideas are incremental rather than novel, and the core logic (create demand, track patterns, escalate with data) is standard ops thinking dressed in SE clothing.
Most SE leaders frame this as an AE problem. AES don't brief us, AES don't respect our time and some genuinely don't care. But the majority aren't malicious. They're juggling 12 things before the call.
the interesting 10% some AES respond with. Actually, I'm not sure. Let's me find out. The question forced them to prep too.
The reframe that SEs must 'create the demand for the briefing, not just expect it' is a useful inversion of the usual blame narrative, and the observation that the SE's question becomes the AE's prep trigger is genuinely elegant. Everything else - checklists, escalation paths, leader-to-leader conversations - is conventional playbook material.
We built a pre call checklist. Six questions.
So the SE's question became the AE's preparation trigger. That's elegant and free.
There are no real guests - the hosts Nate and Eva are explicitly AI-generated personas, and the underlying practitioner (Tim, the founder) never actually appears in the conversation. Coaching experience may be genuine, but the format strips away any ability to interrogate a real operator or verify credentials through dialogue.
We use AI to bring these stories to life through our, uh, two hosts, Nate and Eva. But the insights come straight from the trenches.
Welcome to Leading Presales. I'm, um, Nate.
The episode drops several concrete figures - 6 checklist questions, 70/20/10 response breakdown, 11 calls in a month, 12 SEs vs. 40 AEs - which lifts it above pure abstraction. However, these numbers read as illustrative constructs from coaching composites rather than verified empirical data, limiting their evidential weight.
70% of the time. The AE sends back two sentences. Enough to prepare 20% silence. The SE wings it.
three of your AES skipped briefings on 11 calls this month
The scripted dialogue does engineer useful objections ('But what happens when the AE just doesn't respond?' and 'I can't have my SEs refusing calls'), giving the appearance of pushback. But since both voices are AI-generated from the same coaching source, there is no genuine tension, no real follow-up on unverified claims, and no risk of the host being wrong - which caps the ceiling significantly.
But what happens when the AE just doesn't respond? Because I've tried checklists. Some AES fill them out diligently, others ignore them completely, and you're back to square one.
I don't have a formal escalation path.
Computed from the transcript - who did the talking, and the words that came up most.
Stop waiting for the briefing. The SE team creates the demand for it - one Slack message at a time. An SE Manager complained her SEs weren't getting briefed before customer calls. The honest follow-up question: "Did they ASK for a briefing?" They hadn't. They just showed up and hoped. There's a better playbook - light from the SE side, structural from the leadership side. What Nate and Ava discuss The six-question pre-call checklist - and why the framing matters more than the form The lightweight Slack version that works 70% of the time without any process Leader-to-leader escalation for the chronic non-briefers - and why ground-level confrontation makes it personal Why the SE's question often becomes the AE's preparation trigger The move Give your SEs one pre-call question - even just one. "What's the pain and who's in the room?" Make it casual, make it Slack, make it thirty seconds. Track which AEs go consistently dark. That pattern is the conversation you bring to sales leadership - with data, not complaints. Resources & Links: paths.to/presales Book a Discovery Call: calendly.com/serockstars-tim/discovery-call
Transcribed and scored by The B2B Podcast Index.
Tim: Hey there and welcome to Leading Presales, the show for solution engineering leaders who want to build teams that drive revenue and not just demos. My name is Tim and I'm the co founder of SE Rockstars. And together with Jan, we've coached over 350 solution engineers and their leaders across several dozens of companies. Every conversation you hear on this show is based on real coaching situations, real challenges, real problems that SE leaders like you are dealing with right now. None of this is made up. We use AI to bring these stories to life through our, uh, two hosts, Nate and Eva. But the insights come straight from the trenches. Each episode gives you one actionable takeaway you can apply immediately whether you're already leading a team or working your way into that role. Alright, let's get into it.
Nate: One of my SE managers came to me last month with a complaint. I've heard a hundred times my SES aren't getting briefed before customer calls. The AES show up, expect the SE to wing it, and then wonder why the demo fell flat. Sound familiar?
Eva: Very. I've had that exact conversation with my own SES more times than I want to admit.
Nate: So I asked her a question she didn't expect. What did your SEs do about it? Did they ask for a briefing? And she paused because the honest answer was no. They just showed up and hoped for the best.
Eva: They complained about it afterward, but didn't fix it beforehand.
Nate: Welcome to Leading Presales. I'm, um, Nate.
Eva: And I'm Eva. Every episode. One idea, five minutes today. What to do when the briefing never comes.
Nate: Here's the thing. Most SE leaders frame this as an AE problem. AES don't brief us, AES don't respect our time and some genuinely don't care. But the majority aren't malicious. They're juggling 12 things before the call. They don't think about what the SE needs because nobody told them what to ask for.
Eva: So you're saying the SE team has to create the demand for the briefing, not just expect it.
Nate: Exactly. We built a pre call checklist. Six questions. What's the purpose of this meeting? What problem are we solving? Who's on the call? Roles and seniority. What does the AE want the SE to accomplish? What pain did the customer mention? Context, history, competition, landmines.
Eva: Six questions. And your SEs send this to the AE before every call.
Nate: Before every first call. For ongoing deals, the SE usually knows enough. But for that first engagement where the SE is walking in cold, they send it. And the framing matters. Not Fill this out instead. I want to show up ready to help you close this. Five minutes of context.
Eva: Make it about helping the ae, not policing the ae. That's smart. But what happens when the AE just doesn't respond? Because I've tried checklists. Some AES fill them out diligently, others ignore them completely, and you're back to square one.
Nate: That's where accountability comes in. And this is a leadership problem, not an SE problem. When I aligned with my sales counterpart on the SE qualified criteria we talked about last episode, 1M of the agreed standards was AES brief SE's prepare. If either side doesn't hold up their end, the other side has the right to flag it.
Eva: Flag it how? I can't have my SEs refusing calls. That destroys the relationship.
Nate: Not refusing, escalating. If the pre call questions get ignored, the SE still joins, does their best, and afterward tells their manager. The manager tracks the pattern. One AE consistently not briefing. That's a conversation between SE leadership and sales leadership. Not between the SE and the AE leader to leader.
Eva: Not ground level friction.
Nate: Because when an SE confronts an AE about preparation, it becomes personal. When I call the VP of sales and say three of your AES skipped briefings on 11 calls this month. That's a process conversation, fixable at my scale.
Eva: I don't have a formal escalation path. I'm, um, one person leading 12 SES. The sales leader I'd need to talk to manages 40 AES. So I built the habit from the SE side first. My SES send a short slack message before every first call. Not the full checklist. Just. Just, hey, quick context before tomorrow's call. What's the pain and who's in the room? Casual, low friction.
Nate: And that works?
Eva: 70% of the time. The AE sends back two sentences. Enough to prepare 20% silence. The SE wings it. Which is where they were anyway. But the interesting 10% some AES respond with. Actually, I'm not sure. Let's me find out. The question forced them to prep too.
Nate: So the SE's question became the AE's preparation trigger. That's elegant and free.
Eva: No process document, no leadership alignment meeting, just a slack message that takes 30 seconds to send.
Nate: I'd argue you still need the leadership alignment. Eventually the slack Message fixes the 80%. But for the chronic non briefers, the AES who never respond never prep and then blame the SE when the deal stalls. You need an escalation path, otherwise your SES burn out absorbing someone else's lack of preparation.
Eva: Fair. The slack message is the first move. The escalation path is the structural move.
Nate: What's the move?
Eva: Give your SEs a pre call question, even just one. What's the pain? And who's in the room? Make it casual, make it slack, make it 30 seconds. Start there, then track which AES consistently go dark. That pattern is the conversation you bring to sales leadership, not AES. Don't brief us instead. Here are 11 calls this month where we had no context. Here's what happened to those deals.
Nate: Data beats complaints every time. I'm Nate.
Eva: And I'm Ava. See you next episode.
Tim: Thanks for listening to leading presales. If you've got a question, a topic you'd like us to cover, or you just want to connect, reach out to me@timrockstars um.com and if what you heard today hit home and you want to talk about how to develop your SE team, feel free to book a discovery call@serockstars.com no strings attached. The link is of course also in the show Notes until next time and keep leading from the front.
Other episodes covering the same guests and topics, from across The B2B Podcast Index.
Thirty Seconds That Sells [45]52 / 100Garbage In, Confidence Out [34]88 / 100I Don't Know - And That's the Right Answer [30]54 / 100Stop Hiring Resumes [29]52 / 100Follow the Breadcrumbs [44]
