Civic Roundtable

Scaling a US sales team for a complex government market.

Civic Roundtable was preparing for a significant period of commercial growth.

Its sales team was already responsible for large territories across the United States, but the nature of government sales meant adding headcount could not wait until revenue demand appeared.

Typical sales cycles were six to nine months, meaning the people hired today would directly influence Civic Roundtable's ability to generate revenue the following year.

The company therefore needed to expand sales capacity across several strategically important US territories.

But this was not a conventional SaaS Account Executive search.

Civic Roundtable sells primarily into government organisations, including state and county-level agencies, alongside federal and government-adjacent customers.

Salespeople needed to navigate complex stakeholder groups, lengthy buying processes and public sector procurement while still creating their own pipeline and managing territories commercially.

At the same time, Civic Roundtable did not want TalentStack to simply find candidates with "GovTech" written on their CV.

The priority was finding genuinely strong sellers.

Candidates needed to demonstrate:

• Strong prospecting
• High-quality discovery
• Multithreaded deal management
• Commercial resilience
• Ownership of their territory
• The ability to operate effectively in an early-stage environment

Government experience was valuable, but it was not considered a substitute for strong sales fundamentals.

Civic's view was that a great salesperson could learn the complexities of a government buying process. It was much harder to teach someone with public sector experience to become a great salesperson.

Building a search around sales ability, territory and market fit.

TalentStack worked directly with Civic Roundtable's commercial leadership to understand how the business sold, how territories were structured and what separated successful salespeople from average ones.

The search went significantly deeper than job titles.

TalentStack mapped candidates across GovTech, public sector SaaS, enterprise technology, higher education technology and adjacent markets where the underlying sales motion could transfer effectively.

Candidates were assessed against Civic Roundtable's actual sales environment.

Could they prospect without relying on an SDR team?

Could they create opportunities within difficult accounts?

Could they navigate multiple stakeholders?

Could they run complex sales cycles?

Could they operate independently within a startup?

And could they demonstrate the level of preparation and ownership expected from someone responsible for building a territory?

The search was continually recalibrated as Civic Roundtable interviewed candidates.

When the leadership team identified particular behaviours or experience that worked well, TalentStack used that feedback to tighten subsequent qualification rather than continuing to send volume.

That became particularly clear during the search for Michael Pellasce.

Civic highlighted his preparation, research, professionalism and ability to articulate his prospecting approach clearly as indicators that the search was moving in the right direction.

As the partnership developed, the brief expanded geographically.

TalentStack mapped different US markets as Civic assessed where additional sales capacity could have the greatest impact, including the Southeast, Northeast, Midwest and California.

The West Coast presented a particularly specialist challenge.

Civic wanted salespeople who could potentially combine strong enterprise selling skills with relationships or experience that would help them gain access to state-level government organisations.

California was considered strategically important enough that Civic was prepared to assess more senior and potentially more expensive profiles where the candidate could bring genuine additional market access.

This process ultimately developed into a broader US sales recruitment partnership rather than a single vacancy search.

Four commercial hires across the US

TalentStack is supporting Civic Roundtable on a four-hire commercial build spanning the East Coast, West Coast, Midwest and Rockies.

The partnership has gone beyond filling individual vacancies. As Civic Roundtable’s commercial strategy and territory coverage have evolved, TalentStack has continued to map the US market, recalibrate the search and build pipelines around each region.

That has involved understanding the nuances of selling into government, the differences between territories and the type of salesperson capable of succeeding in Civic Roundtable’s environment.

The focus throughout has remained on quality over volume, identifying commercially strong candidates who can prospect effectively, navigate complex buying processes and operate with the ownership required in a growing technology business.

As additional territories have opened, TalentStack has been able to adapt quickly, giving Civic Roundtable access to relevant commercial talent across the country without its leadership team having to run the sourcing process themselves.

Client feedback

“I think you guys have done a pretty good job. It’s been pretty clear you found me the right people at the right price point.”

“We’ve been impressed with several of the candidates... you guys have been finding good people.”

Kraig, Civic Roundtable

Kraig repeatedly highlighted the quality of the candidates TalentStack was introducing and the value of having the sourcing workload handled externally.

As the relationship developed, that confidence translated into a broader partnership. Kraig said TalentStack had been fast, that he was impressed with the profiles being delivered and that the behind-the-scenes sourcing work was particularly valuable because he did not have the capacity to manage it himself. He also confirmed TalentStack was the only recruitment firm Civic Roundtable was using at that stage.