Shari Begun 00:00
Well, two things come to mind, Bob. One is I like to say enterprise sales isn’t a solo sport. And secondly, I’ve been in the industry almost 30 years now, and things have changed a lot. Customers can now get a lot of information online, through social media, through AI, and we’ve had to approach things differently.
Bob Woods 00:24
Welcome to the Making Sales Social podcast, featuring the top voices in sales, marketing, and business. Join Brynne Tillman, Stan Robinson Jr., and me, Bob Woods, as we each bring you the best tips and strategies our guests are teaching and using so you can leverage them for your own virtual and social selling.
Brynne, welcome to the show. Shari Begun, it’s so great to have you here with us today.
Shari Begun 00:51
Hi, Bob. I’m looking forward to it. I love talking about sales.
Bob Woods 00:55
Good, good. That helps us out a lot here, too.
Shari is here to take us inside the world of sales in the global semiconductor sector, which is a little different for me, but sales is sales. She’s Vice President of Sales at GlobalFoundries, one of the world’s leading manufacturers of essential semiconductors powering everything from smart mobile devices and cars to communication infrastructure—and I’m sure plenty of other things those little suckers go into.
Her career has included leading large, multicultural sales organizations at Dialog Semiconductor, Texas Instruments, Cypress, and now GlobalFoundries. She’s also a recognized industry voice and advocate. Shari has been honored as one of the Silicon Valley Business Journal’s Women of Influence and was nominated for Electronic Weekly’s Leader of the Year. She speaks regularly on leadership, sales strategy, and diversity in tech.
We’re honored to have you here, Shari. Welcome to the Social Sales Link virtual studios and the Making Sales Social podcast.
Shari Begun
Thank you.
Bob Woods
You’re very welcome.
So, Shari, as our podcast is named Making Sales Social, what does “making sales social” mean to you?
Shari Begun 02:16
Two things come to mind, Bob. One is I like to say enterprise sales isn’t a solo sport. Secondly, I’ve been in the industry almost 30 years, and things have changed a lot. Customers can now get much of the technical information online—through social media and AI—so we’ve had to approach things differently.
I’ll start with the first point. The deals my team works on are often in the tens or hundreds of millions of dollars. I’ve even closed a billion-dollar deal before. When you’re dealing with numbers like that, there are a lot of people at the customer and within your own company who need to be involved. As a sales professional, you have to understand multiple stakeholders at your customer’s organization and the problems they’re trying to solve. You have to build trust externally and internally, especially with long sales cycles of two to five years where you’re investing significant time and money. You need to be skilled not only at selling but at navigating complex decision-making and building trust on both sides.
As for what’s changed, many customers can now access technical information online that they once relied on us for. So you have to be creative about how you get face time, because that’s often where you uncover the real issues—walking to a conference room, after a meeting, or over coffee. We do that by discussing roadmaps, sharing our perspectives on industry trends, and helping connect the dots within large organizations.
When I started my career, if customers needed something, they called you. You drove over, gave them a data book, and walked them through it. Now much of that information is online, and they don’t necessarily need to talk to a salesperson. So you have to be creative and resilient.
Bob Woods 04:27
Definitely. And you’re probably the first guest who has tied “making sales social” to internal relationships. That’s really important. You have to get along with people and understand where they plug in and how they can be most effective as you advance and close deals.
Shari Begun 05:07
Exactly. That’s what I mean by it not being a solo sport. I’ve never closed a deal in the tens of millions without a team involved from day one.
Bob Woods 05:22
I couldn’t agree more.
Looking across your career at TI, Dialog, Cypress, and now GlobalFoundries, what has most shaped your sales leadership philosophy?
Shari Begun 05:52
It probably started when I was a kid. My mom owned her own business—she was a hairdresser and owned a salon. She was the most senior person there and was always open about teaching her skills to others. Whenever they hired someone fresh out of school, my mom trained them. Sometimes she even gave her clients away. Watching her share knowledge rather than hoard it shaped how I lead. I learned early on that leadership isn’t about holding onto knowledge—it’s about developing your team.
Second, I’ve worked with many different cultures around the world, both on my teams and with customers. I’ve always been curious about how people think. I love traveling, personally and professionally. When I travel, I often arrive a day early or stay a day late. Customers and team members appreciate when you take the time to understand their culture. The way we operate in Silicon Valley or New York is very different from how business is done in China or Germany. Being willing to adapt your style while still being authentic—and genuinely appreciating local cultures—has been a consistent theme in my leadership.
Bob Woods 07:53
Can you give an example of how you adapted in a culture very different from your own?
Shari Begun 08:10
In my first management role, I led a global team that included members in China, Singapore, and Malaysia. I hadn’t worked in Asia before and didn’t fully understand the hierarchical culture. They saw me as “the boss,” and if I proposed an idea, they wouldn’t directly tell me it wasn’t a good one. In American culture, we’re generally comfortable challenging our bosses.
In my first few months, I’d suggest something and hear, “Yes, great idea,” but then it wouldn’t get implemented. As I traveled and built relationships, I realized they needed to trust me first. Instead of directly disagreeing, they might reference how “someone else” approached a situation differently. Over time, I learned to recognize those cues. Eventually, we were able to have very direct conversations, but that trust took time.
I learned to travel early, spend time there, ask questions, brainstorm collaboratively, and explicitly invite their input. That helped build trust and encouraged more open dialogue.
Bob Woods 10:00
You’ve worked in a highly innovative and competitive industry. How has that environment influenced how you lead your sales teams?
Shari Begun 10:35
When I started, sales was more tactical and very in-person. Now, especially with large customers, we’re thinking three to five years out—sometimes even 10 in automotive. What we win today is often about future alignment.
I focus on what I call five fundamentals: where the money is, where the power is, what the next big idea is, who’s making the decisions, and how we align internally. We’re often talking not just to engineers but to marketing leaders, business unit heads, or even CEOs about where they’re taking their companies.
We also have a unique vantage point across multiple verticals—mobile, automotive, infrastructure. We sit on technical committees and develop strong points of view on where the industry is going. We have roadmap discussions and paint a vision of where we can take customers in a few years, even if we can’t fully meet their needs today. That vision often gets us in the door.
Bob Woods 13:04
You’re truly selling into the future. How does that affect your sales process?
Shari Begun 13:04
With two- to five-year sales cycles, you have to make smart bets. Not all of them work out. We focus on whether we’re aligned with customers’ premier products—the ones generating the most revenue—and whether those products will still matter in the future. Think about iPods. They don’t exist anymore. You have to anticipate obsolescence and what replaces it.
I encourage my team to spend about 80% of their time on core, high-probability opportunities and 20% on experimental or emerging areas. And we prioritize customers who want to be true partners—those open to roadmap discussions, reasonable contracts, and long-term collaboration.
If you get it wrong, you’ve invested years and potentially hundreds of millions of dollars. The stakes are very high.
Bob Woods 15:22
A lot of that must come down to trust. How do you and your team build trust in relationships with such high stakes?
Shari Begun 15:39
I think a couple of things. One is doing a great job on the business you already have. If you don’t have much business yet, treat what you do have as if it’s going to grow. Treat every single opportunity as a priority.
Second, have a very transparent relationship with your customers. Because we’re dealing with innovation, development can sometimes be rocky. Something might go wrong. You may think you’ll have something available in April of next year, and it gets pushed to May. Typically, you know that before it happens. Have a transparent conversation early with the customer: “We’ve run into this issue. We’re delayed a month. Here’s what we think is most important to deliver in April, and here’s what will be pushed out.” That can even create an opportunity for them to say, “Actually, this is more important.”
I also think it’s important not to be a gatekeeper as a salesperson. Instead of having everything flow through you, introduce customers to the people designing the product. Make sure executives are involved and hearing directly that the business is important to you—possibly even from the CEO. Let them know they have a team to work with, but also your phone number if anything goes wrong.
And actually listen. I’ve seen so many salespeople hear a customer say, “This is what we want,” and then go in and pitch their deck anyway. You don’t build trust by not listening. Present information in a style and format that’s comfortable for them.
In big deals, it takes time. It starts with the little things. Early in my career, I left some customer meetings with zero business. I’d say, “I know you’re happy with your current salesperson, but if you ever run into a shortage or don’t get good service, please call me.” They started giving me small opportunities. Eventually, they had me quote their entire business twice, and I finally won it. Over a two-year period, we built trust by reacting to every small request as if it were the biggest opportunity. That’s how we earned the business.
Bob Woods 18:18
It’s almost like a snowball effect—small snowball rolling down the hill. I’m guessing you’d say trust is a foundational behavior you’ve instilled in your teams. What other foundational behaviors should sales teams have?
Shari Begun 18:42
Backing up to something I mentioned earlier—knowing where the money and the power are. When you’re working with large enterprise customers, you should know where the big pieces of business are. If you don’t, you’re gambling with how you spend your time.
Second, understand how decisions are made and who has to approve them. In my world, if you’re only talking to one person at the customer, things probably aren’t moving in the right direction. You should have a relationship map of the right people at your company and theirs who need to align. As a sales professional, you may quarterback that, but you don’t have to own every relationship.
Also understand the sales cycle—how long it is and what the milestones are. With established customers, I know when they start new designs and when things ramp. You can work backward from that. With new customers, you may not know, so you ask multiple people and piece the puzzle together. If you start hearing the same answers, you can say, “We need to be talking to them now. It may be two years before we see revenue, and here are the key milestones.”
If you don’t understand that in enterprise sales, you’re probably just getting lucky when you win.
Bob Woods 20:41
What tools do you use to track that? A relationship map at a big company isn’t just two or three people. How do you keep track of discovery within that network?
Shari Begun 21:06
In most places I’ve worked, we’ve had vertical teams—sales or marketing people responsible for specific end markets. They help with data from Gartner reports, spend data, and other research. It’s not always perfectly accurate, but it’s directionally correct.
For relationship mapping, I focus the team on what really matters. I don’t want an org chart of 100 people. Who are the top 20 people at that customer who can move the needle? That’s easy to track in a CRM or even an Excel document. Don’t try to boil the ocean.
We’ve used CRM tools like Salesforce, Oracle, or Microsoft to track key dates and milestones. But a lot of it is old-fashioned discipline—putting reminders in your calendar, sending meeting notes, updating stakeholders, and following through on actions.
Twice a year, I do deep account reviews with internal stakeholders. We revisit our goals: Do they still make sense? Has the competitive landscape changed? We get busy in the day-to-day, so stepping back once or twice a year to reassess—by account or territory—is critical. Are our goals still relevant? If so, how are we tracking? If not, what needs to change?
Bob Woods 23:43
I read about your use of associative selling strategies and how you grew your funnel 25% in four months. What does that look like in practice?
Shari Begun 24:04
When I was working with home appliance customers in semiconductors, I noticed something interesting. If you open a computer or phone, you’ll see many chips on a board. Customers often come to you for just one component.
I saw that one team was selling a lot of power products while we were selling processors. No one else was doing both. I asked them how they were doing it and had them present to my global team—how they discovered the opportunity, who the competition was, what customers were saying, and how they closed the business.
Associative selling means selling across a broader portfolio. Learn from colleagues or marketing teams how to position multiple offerings in a way that’s quick and easy for customers to understand. Often customers say, “We’re happy with who we have.” Hearing how others generated interest and turned it into revenue is powerful.
It’s also important strategically. If you’re only selling one product and the competition wins elsewhere, you’re exposed. But if you’re in multiple products—say, 10 SKUs—you’re less dependent on one area of their business. As their business fluctuates, your revenue is more stable.
Bob Woods 26:15
That sounds scalable across industries.
Shari Begun 26:34
Absolutely. In my industry, we may offer services—some we charge for, some we provide for free. That’s one area of associative selling. Some companies have subsidiaries or complementary offerings that can be bundled.
A great place to start is identifying what customers consistently ask for and find valuable. Can you charge for it? Or does it differentiate you and make you “stickier” with that customer? Even if it doesn’t generate direct revenue, it strengthens the relationship.
Bob Woods 28:21
You mentor high-potential employees and lead leadership development initiatives. What are one or two overlooked skills in developing future leaders?
Shari Begun
Curiosity is a big one. Many people I work with are academically brilliant, but not always curious. As a leader, you need to understand what makes people tick—what drives them, how they prefer feedback, and what motivates them.
Resilience is another. Sales and leadership are challenging. People who have navigated tough situations—whether in sports, personal life, or work—tend to make stronger leaders. I look for people who can course-correct quickly and who ask a lot of questions. Curiosity and resilience are fantastic indicators of leadership potential.
Bob Woods 30:39
What does scalable culture mean to you?
Shari Begun
First, be open and transparent in sharing knowledge. Don’t create single points of failure. That’s critical for scalability.
Second, as a leader, you can’t always step in and fix everything. Early in my leadership journey, when something didn’t get done, I would just do it myself. That works when your team is small. It doesn’t scale.
I once went into my boss’s office exhausted, expecting praise for keeping our number-one customer afloat. He said, “The reason that’s happening is because you’re letting it happen.” That shaped me. I learned to have tough but respectful conversations and hold people accountable.
If you’re constantly stepping in, your organization isn’t scalable. People need to own their responsibilities and communicate early if they need help.
Also, be collaborative. I was just on a call with someone on my team who said, “I’ll implement your vision.” I stopped him and said, “You know this better than I do. I’m brainstorming ideas, but I need your input.” Leaders can’t dictate everything. Often, the best ideas come from people deeper in the organization.
Scaling is hard, but with curiosity and resilience, it works itself out.
Bob Woods 34:29
It sounds like expanding others’ boundaries while limiting your own at times.
Shari Begun
Exactly. I love traveling and taking vacations. I tell my team, “I’ll be in a different time zone. You make the decision, and I promise I won’t complain—even if it’s not the one I would have made.” Giving people that grace builds confidence. If something goes wrong, we’ll fix it.
And sometimes you have to set boundaries for yourself. Otherwise, you’re working 24/7, and that’s not healthy.
Bob Woods 35:43
What’s one immediately actionable takeaway for sales leaders?
Shari Begun
Ask your team regularly—and even skip-level employees—two questions: “What’s going well?” and “What’s keeping you up at night?”
You can gain a lot of insight from your team, internal stakeholders, and customers just by asking those two simple questions.
Bob Woods 36:22
Where can people connect with you?
Shari Begun
The best place to find me is on LinkedIn.
Bob Woods
It’s spelled S-H-A-R-I B-E-G-U-N—Shari Begun, VP of Sales for GlobalFoundries. It’s been great speaking with you today. Thanks so much for being on the podcast.
Thank you for streaming this episode of Making Sales Social. When you’re out and about this week—or any week—be sure to make your sales social.
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