Sacha Dekker is the VP of Global Go-To-Market (GTM) Enablement at HubSpot. Based in Dublin, Ireland, Sacha is responsible for scaling HubSpot’s GTM Enablement Strategy. Prior to HubSpot, Sacha held leadership roles at LinkedIn and Oracle in Dublin, building and scaling enablement teams from the ground up. Outside of work, Sacha is a twice certified executive coach, a motivational speaker, and a disability advocate who most recently wrote about the importance of celebrating Disability Pride Month.  Read on to learn more about Sacha and the global GTM team at HubSpot.

Tell us a little about yourself and your background. 

I’m originally Dutch and moved to Ireland ten years ago this September (did someone say anniversary?!). I love it here so much that I’m about to give up my Dutch citizenship to become Irish. Professionally I started my career in Sales and then switched to Customer Services, before deciding on my true passion of commercial Learning & Development (aka Enablement) back in 2007.

What attracted you to HubSpot?

I interviewed with HubSpot for the first time back in October 2014 but due to personal reasons, I, unfortunately, had to pull out of the process. The company made a truly remarkable impression on me, though, because of its people and the culture, all throughout the interview process. So when they reached out to me in March 2021 it felt like the universe coming together. I reached out to a bunch of former colleagues from other companies now working at HubSpot to see if it was still such a great company and they all told me I’d love it. They were right, I absolutely do. 

Describe your team's mission

We empower our Flywheel or Go To Market teams (Sales, Customer Success, Marketing) with equitable learning experiences to support maximum productivity and solve for the customer.

What makes HubSpot’s culture special?

It is, without a doubt, the most genuine culture I’ve ever been a part of. HubSpot doesn’t pretend to be ‘the most amazing company in the world’ and you don’t have to drink the kool-aid all the time. Leaders are open to feedback and it’s actually welcomed. I love that because it shows there’s always opportunity for growth. On top of that, the transparency is amazing and, again, very genuine.

What are you most excited about at HubSpot right now? 

We still have so much potential to grow and I’m incredibly excited about that for us as a company. For my team I’m really excited about further building out our role-based learning paths, ensuring every role in Go-To-Market has access to relevant learning, when they need it, in a format that suits their preference.

You’re passionate about supporting women to grow their careers in tech, what advice would you give to other women looking to grow into leadership positions?

Find what you’re really passionate about AND what you’re good at and go for it. Stop doubting yourself. I know this might be controversial but I don’t necessarily think of myself as a female leader in tech. I’m in tech, I’m a leader and I happen to be a woman. Most of all, every day I get to do something I love, and because I’m passionate about it I’ve had the opportunity to become really good at it and I can now do it at a global level, with a fantastic team at a company I love. 

You’re a huge disability advocate both inside and outside of HubSpot. Tell us a little about this.

On 24 August 2015, what was supposed to be a fairly straightforward surgery, to cure me of the epileptic seizures that started in 2009, went wrong and I woke up fully paralyzed down my left side. Three weeks later one of my medical team came to tell me that, based on the results of the MRI earlier that day, it was highly unlikely I’d ever walk, work, or live independently again. He handed me a list of assisted living facilities and told me I could still have some quality of life in there. I told him, right then and there, I wasn’t only going to walk again, I was going to walk on the Great Wall of China. To the day two years after the surgery, on 24 August 2017, I did just that. In 2019 I walked the VHI Mini Marathon in Dublin and next year, on 24 August 2023, I’ll walk into Santiago de Compostela, completing the last 110 km (67 miles) of the Camino. I walk with a stick as a large part of my leg isn’t working and my left arm is fully paralyzed. In the past seven years, I’ve learned the world doesn’t cater to disabilities. When I went back to work, a year after the surgery I desperately wanted a role model. Someone with an acquired brain injury who’d successfully gone back to work and rebuilt their career. I couldn’t find anyone. In fact, I could hardly find anyone at a senior level with a physical disability. And so I decided that if I couldn’t find a role model, I’d become one. 

What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever received?

“Don’t take it personally.” I know that sounds really basic and very logical and yet, it’s very easy to let criticism get to you when it’s about a piece of work that you poured your heart and soul into, or that you’re just very passionate about. One of my main stakeholders at a former company, who later became one of my most treasured mentors, could shred me to pieces in a meeting if she didn’t like my work and then walk out of the room, put her arm through mine, and say “now how was your weekend darlin’?”. She taught me that how she felt about my work had nothing to do with how she felt about me as a person. While it still didn’t feel great, because, like everyone else, I love praise, it taught me to take feedback as it’s intended; an opportunity to grow.

If you weren’t in your current role, what would you be doing?

I’m also a twice certified executive coach with neuroscience, so I’d probably focus all my time on coaching. I’d definitely be doing something that supports people to realize their true potential. It’s what I’m most passionate about and gets me out of bed every morning.  

Learn more about HubSpot’s culture on our careers website, and follow HubSpot Life on Instagram this Disability Pride Month as we continue to share employee highlights, internal celebrations, learnings, and more.