Whispered Hiring with Sanjay Kini, CCO @ 6sense

In this episode of Whispered Hiring, Josh Hanewinkel speaks with Sanjay Kini, Chief Customer Strategy Officer at 6sense, about scaling a customer organization from 5 to 300+ people during 6sense's growth from $5M to $200M in revenue. Sanjay's approach challenges conventional hiring wisdom at every turn, from giving hiring managers final authority even when other interviewers disagree, to deliberately spending more time vetting "will" than "skill" because he believes drive and curiosity matter more than current capabilities. The results speak for themselves: 40 of his 58 managers were promoted from within, creating a self-sustaining leadership pipeline that freed him to focus on strategic transformation rather than constant external recruiting.

Topics discussed:

• The "Who" framework for defining exact organizational structure and role attributes before considering candidates, eliminating the chaos of building org charts around available talent.
• Why assessing "will" (curiosity, work ethic, ability to figure things out) deserves more interview time than validating "skill," since capability gaps close quickly when drive is present.
• The deliberate over-hiring strategy for senior leaders before immediate need, allowing them to build teams proactively as growth arrives rather than scrambling to backfill during hypergrowth phases.
• Giving hiring managers final decision authority instead of defaulting to consensus voting, creating clear accountability since they'll be judged on results regardless of committee opinions.
• Why sales leaders require the most rigorous vetting process because they excel at interviews and know exactly what you want to hear, making data-driven validation essential.
• Avoiding public job postings for VP+ roles to eliminate the 1,000-1,500 application flood of unqualified candidates, relying instead on board networks and systematic back-channeling for vetted referrals.
• The counterintuitive reference check approach: using candidate-provided contacts not to make hiring decisions, but to extract onboarding intelligence about strengths, weaknesses, and optimal working conditions after you've already committed.
• How promoting 40 of 58 managers internally (37 of them women) created a leadership bench that could scale customer success operations without external dependency.

ABOUT YOUR HOST: 

Josh Hanewinkel is a startup builder and operator who thrives at the intersection of strategy, operations, and talent. As a two-time unicorn executive and advisor/GM at Whispered, Josh has spent his career helping fast-growing startups scale by building high-performing teams, creating customer-centric cultures, and leading through ambiguity. He’s held Chief Customer Officer and VP roles at companies including DataGrail, People.ai, and Mixpanel, where he’s rebuilt and scaled teams across customer success, talent acquisition, and revenue operations. From leading customer success teams to 150%+ NRR to transforming recruiting functions into high-velocity talent engines, Josh has seen firsthand how the right people in the right roles can change the trajectory of a business.

Learn more about about Whispered: www.whispered.com