Going From Start-Up to Acquisition | Matt Volm, CEO & Co-Founder at RevOps Co-op

My route into Revenue Operations was unplanned. As VP of Biz Ops at Ally.io, I was among roughly the first ten employees. I covered finance, accounting, legal, board meetings, and Revenue Operations.

RevOps became shorthand for marketing, sales, and customer success operations, though my background was in finance and strategy. The company grew beyond 150 employees before Microsoft acquired it, and its product became Microsoft Viva Goals. I later started RevOps Co-op, which had almost 10,000 members worldwide. My path began with qualifying as a CPA, showing that routes into RevOps are rarely linear.

Revenue Operations involves data analysis, insight, and KPIs, so finance and accounting knowledge offers practical value. It helps practitioners interpret recurring revenue, period-on-period growth, net revenue retention, and customer lifetime metrics. They can see how operational inputs reach financial statements.

That knowledge also brings discipline to routine commercial details. An agreement signed on 1 September but dated 31 August should not be recognised as August revenue. Understanding journal entries, financial reporting, and revenue-recognition timing connects sales activity with reported results. It also prevents teams from designing operational processes without considering their financial consequences.

I saw the function take off roughly three to three-and-a-half years before this conversation. Before starting my company in July 2020, I asked investors whether they had seen Revenue Operations emerge. Most had not. LinkedIn later identified RevOps as a fast-growing job category. The model spread from US technology companies to international markets and sectors beyond SaaS.

That growth creates a development challenge because people rarely earn Revenue Operations degrees. They often enter after receiving related responsibilities or using an existing strength. Many inherit broad remits without experienced colleagues to guide them. Communities and courses let small teams or sole practitioners test ideas, ask questions, and close internal skill gaps.

The scope should follow the name: every operation supporting the revenue engine. That includes marketing, sales, and post-sales teams such as customer success and support. Responsibility spans the people, processes, and technology behind them. Existing customers drive much of a recurring-revenue business, so retention and expansion belong within its remit.

Technology requests, including integrations, reports, and data fields, often dominate. However, RevOps must examine how people work and whether processes produce intended commercial results. Its end-to-end view can connect churn with acquisition channels, sales representatives, geographies, or other shared traits. Those findings guide investment and reveal unsuitable channels or teams closing weak deals.

Look for someone who has tackled unfamiliar challenges, including attempts that failed. Strong candidates accept discomfort, enter new areas, learn, and take ownership. Their experience can come from finance, sales, or another operations role. Someone who independently learned a system or repaired a neglected process demonstrates what the role requires.

Company stage determines the balance between breadth and specialisation. An established organisation with defined processes can need a specialist who owns a platform such as Marketo. An earlier-stage company building its first RevOps team generally benefits from broad skills, then narrower roles as it grows. I would favour an adaptable learner over someone limited to one system.

RevOps often starts with technical work because it owns tools, systems, and data across marketing, sales, and post-sales. To avoid becoming an order-taking function, keep asking why. For an integration or Salesforce field, identify the desired outcome and assess the underlying process. For pipeline figures, explain why pipeline changed and recommend how the business should respond.

Building that mindset takes deliberate practice. Practitioners should extend their work and seek opportunities to learn how commercial leaders operate. Ask to attend relevant go-to-market meetings instead of awaiting an invitation. External peers, communities, courses, and specialist resources can complement internal exposure. Continued learning develops the business acumen needed to connect daily activity with company results.

Start by speaking with people, investigating operations, and documenting problems. Prioritise them by business impact, develop solutions, and tie each proposal to revenue growth, retention, or churn reduction. Map the process behind system requests. Sending free-trial sign-ups into Salesforce can reveal lead-scoring needs, inefficient navigation, and missed enquiries.

Deliver early value through low-effort fixes that remove friction, such as a neglected validation rule, Salesforce view, or report. Spread wins across marketing, sales, and customer success instead of favouring one stakeholder. Resist solving everything. Completing a few major projects well builds more credibility than executing a long list poorly.

Reporting lines should preserve RevOps’ ability to serve the whole business. It should not report to one departmental leader when supporting marketing, sales, and post-sales. Under a VP of Sales, it is likely to become sales operations. A Chief Revenue Officer, COO, Biz Ops leader, or CEO can oversee it. The manager must prioritise revenue work across functions without favouring one team.

Revenue sustains operations, while growth can support further funding. A dedicated operations team can focus on efficient revenue growth, standardise working practices, and support consistent results. Separate departmental operations teams cannot offer the same unified view of acquisition, conversion, retention, and expansion.