Account Executive
Sales & Business Development · Full-time
New York Metropolitan Area, USA
POSITION OVERVIEW
The Account Executive is a quota-carrying seller accountable for new and expansion ARR within an assigned territory, vertical, or partner set. This role sells KnowledgeLake’s intelligent document processing (IDP), workflow automation, and enterprise content management (ECM) platform, and is expected to self-source pipeline alongside partner-generated and marketing-generated demand.
KnowledgeLake replaces manual, document-driven processes with automated ones, so this is a consultative, multi-stakeholder sale. A successful Account Executive can hold a credible conversation with a CFO or budget owner, a records and compliance owner, a line-of-business process owner, and a director of IT within the same sales cycle, and can quantify the cost of document handling, cycle time, exception volume, audit exposure, and legacy platform ownership.
KnowledgeLake sells with and through system integrator (SI), reseller, and solution partners. While partners frequently own the end customer relationship, the Account Executive owns the number. The role is accountable for territory and partner planning, pipeline generation and coverage, deal progression, forecast accuracy, and closed revenue, and is measured on quota attainment, self-sourced pipeline contribution, pipeline coverage, win rate, and forecast accuracy.
FUNCTIONS OF THE JOB
Essential Functions
Revenue Ownership and Pipeline Generation
- Own and exceed an annual quota for new and expansion ARR across an assigned territory, vertical, or partner set
- Build and maintain a written territory and partner plan that identifies target accounts, priority use cases, and named opportunities by quarter
- Self-source pipeline through outbound prospecting, installed base expansion, partner-generated leads, and marketing qualified demand
- Maintain pipeline coverage of at least 3x quarterly quota, and take corrective action when coverage or deal velocity falls below plan
- Run structured discovery into document-driven process pain, including manual handling volumes, cost per transaction, cycle times, exception and error rates, retention and audit exposure, and staffing constraints
Selling in IDP, Workflow Automation, and ECM Markets
- Position the platform against specific document-centric processes, including accounts payable and accounts receivable, contract and vendor onboarding, HR file management, claims and case processing, permitting and licensing, and records management
- Translate platform capability into business outcomes across document capture and classification, OCR and data extraction, machine learning model training, straight-through processing, human-in-the-loop exception review, approval routing and workflow orchestration, content migration, and records retention and disposition
- Sell the value of a cloud-native, Microsoft-aligned architecture, including integration with Microsoft 365, SharePoint, Azure, Power Platform, and customer ERP and line-of-business systems
- Build, present, and defend ROI and business case models covering labor reallocation, cycle time reduction, rework and error reduction, audit readiness, and the total cost of retaining or replacing a legacy platform
- Lead competitive displacement of legacy capture, imaging, and ECM systems, with clear differentiation on architecture, time to value, and total cost of ownership
- Coordinate demonstrations, technical validation, pilots and proofs of value, and security and architecture reviews with Presales and Product
Partner Co-Selling
- Develop, activate, and co-sell with SI, VAR, MSP, and ISV partners, including joint account plans and committed joint pipeline targets
- Enable partner sellers on qualification, positioning, demonstration narrative, and pricing, and hold partners accountable to committed sourcing and progression activity
- Serve as the primary KnowledgeLake point of contact during active partner-led cycles, and maintain deal registration accuracy and clear rules of engagement
- Represent KnowledgeLake in partner reviews, joint marketing activity, customer meetings, and industry events
Deal Execution and Forecast Discipline
- Multi-thread across the economic buyer, process owners, IT and security, records and compliance, and procurement, and avoid single-threaded sales cycles
- Apply a consistent qualification methodology such as MEDDICC to validate metrics, economic buyer, decision criteria, decision process, paper process, identified pain, champion, and competition
- Build and maintain mutual action plans with defined milestones, owners, and dates through signature
- Structure pricing and subscription terms within approval guidelines, negotiate commercial and contractual terms alongside Finance and Legal, and protect ARR quality and discount discipline
- Manage public sector and enterprise procurement requirements, including RFP, RFI, and RFQ responses, cooperative and state contract vehicles, security questionnaires, and fiscal year timing
- Maintain accurate opportunity stages, deal values, close dates, next steps, and contact roles within the CRM (HubSpot)
- Forecast commit, upside, and pipeline categories accurately each week and quarter, and escalate risk early rather than at quarter end
Cross-Functional Execution
- Work with Presales, Product, Services, Customer Success, Marketing, Finance, and Legal to align on scope, deliverability, and terms before close
- Hand off closed business to Services and Customer Success with documented scope, success criteria, and stakeholder map
- Provide structured feedback to Product and Marketing on competitive activity, win and loss themes, pricing pressure, and capability gaps
- Follow defined sales process, methodology, and CRM standards to support predictable revenue outcomes
POSITION QUALIFICATION REQUIREMENTS
The following are the minimum qualifications an individual needs in order to successfully perform the duties and responsibilities of this position. The requirements listed below are representative of the knowledge, skill, and/or ability required.
Education
- Bachelor’s degree in Business, Marketing, Communications, or a related field, or equivalent practical experience
Experience
- 10+ years of quota-carrying B2B software or SaaS sales experience, including enterprise or mid-market deals with average annual contract values of $75K or greater
- Documented record of meeting or exceeding annual quota, with the ability to speak to specific attainment by year
- Experience selling complex, multi-stakeholder solutions that require both line-of-business and IT or security approval
- Experience selling with or through partners, resellers, or system integrators in a co-selling model
- Experience selling into document-intensive functions such as Finance and accounts payable, HR, Legal, Records and Compliance, or Operations
- Experience owning territory planning, pipeline generation, opportunity data, and forecast accuracy within a CRM
Highly Preferred
- Direct experience selling intelligent document processing, document capture, workflow or business process automation, or ECM and content services platforms. Relevant competitive and adjacent experience includes Hyland and OnBase, OpenText, Laserfiche, Tungsten and Kofax, ABBYY, DocuWare, M-Files, Nintex, UiPath, and Automation Anywhere
- SLED experience across state and local government, K-12, and higher education, including budget and fiscal year cycles, cooperative purchasing and contract vehicles, public records and retention requirements, and security frameworks such as StateRAMP, FedRAMP, and CJIS
- An established partner network across SIs, VARs, and MSPs, with a track record of generating and closing partner-sourced pipeline
- Microsoft ecosystem selling experience across Azure, Microsoft 365, SharePoint, and Power Platform, including co-sell and marketplace motions
- Vertical depth in one or more of healthcare, financial services, insurance, manufacturing, or legal
- Formal sales methodology training such as MEDDICC, Command of the Message, or Challenger
Skills/Abilities
- Consultative, outcome-based selling skills, with the ability to lead discovery and quantify business impact
- Business and financial acumen sufficient to build, present, and defend an ROI model to a CFO or budget owner
- Technical fluency to credibly discuss integration, deployment, data security, and platform architecture without a solutions engineer present
- Executive presence and comfort selling to VP and C-level stakeholders in both public sector and commercial accounts
- Strong written communication for business cases, RFP narratives, and executive summaries
- Negotiation skills that protect price integrity and contract terms
- High accountability for quota attainment, forecast accuracy, and CRM discipline
- Ability to influence outcomes and create urgency without direct ownership of the customer relationship
- Comfort holding partners accountable through data, process adherence, and direct communication
- Strong organizational, prioritization, and time management skills in a fast-moving, private equity backed environment
- Collaborative approach with internal teams and partners, with a bias toward action
- Analytical mindset with the ability to identify deal risk and take corrective action
Physical/Visual Activities or Demands:
In general, the physical demands are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job. These include extended periods of sitting, working at a computer, participating in virtual meetings, and frequent communication with partners and internal teams.
This role may require occasional travel (up to 25%) to support partner meetings, joint sales activities, and key business initiatives.