The Best RevOps Teams Don't Just Support Growth. They Prepare for It.

I recently sat down with Lauren Davis, VP of Revenue Operations at BuildOps, to talk about revenue operations, scaling organizations, and what makes great go-to-market teams work.

What became clear almost immediately is that she thinks of RevOps as a business function, not a reporting function. 

Throughout our conversation, she reiterated the idea that great RevOps teams are looking ahead to the business problems of tomorrow, not just solving what’s happening right now.That mindset showed up in almost every topic we discussed.

Here are a few key takeaways from our chat. Or you can watch the full interview here. 

The Best Operators Stay Close to the Front Line

One thing I really appreciated about Lauren's approach is how intentional she is about staying connected to the people actually doing the work.

She told me she always has a handful of sales reps she can call and ask, "What's actually happening?"

I love that. Dashboards and forecasting and pipeline all matter, but numbers only tell part of the story. If your understanding of the business only comes from Salesforce, you're probably missing something.

The best operators are constantly validating what the data says against what sellers and customers are actually experiencing to get to the real insights. 

Every Process Should Improve the Customer Experience

Lauren also challenged something I've been thinking about for a while.

Revenue organizations spend a tremendous amount of time optimizing internal processes like lead routing, discovery, handoffs, implementation, forecasting, and on and on. 

And again, those things all matter. But… the customer doesn’t experience your process diagrams. 

What they do experience is the transitions between teams as they move through the sales and customer lifecycle. 

Lauren talked about making sure implementation teams inherit everything learned during the sales process so customers aren't forced to repeat themselves after signing a contract.

It's a simple example, but it reflects a broader philosophy—that every internal process should be designed to make life easier for the customer. When it doesn't, it's worth asking why the process exists in the first place.

Great RevOps Teams Are Already Working on Next Year's Problems

One of the most illuminating parts of the conversation was Lauren describing the different time horizons for sales and RevOps. It boils down to this: 

Sales should be focused on this quarter.

RevOps should already be thinking about the next several.

For example: 

• If a company plans to expand internationally next year, the infrastructure work starts now.
• If pricing is going to change, the systems need to be ready long before launch.
• If the sales team is expected to double, hiring plans, territory design, and enablement should already be major conversations. 

That perspective really changed how I think about the function. Rather than reacting to growth, the best RevOps teams are behind the scenes making it possible—often before anyone even notices.

Good Operations Make Great Teams Better

The conversation eventually turned to AI (as they always do!), but Lauren made a point I don't hear often: As AI becomes more capable, strong operational foundations become even more important.

To put it plainly, bad processes don't magically become good processes because AI is involved.

Messy data just produces bad answers faster. And that's true well beyond AI.

After talking with Lauren, I was reminded that great RevOps isn't measured by how many dashboards it builds or workflows it automates, but by how much easier it makes it for the entire business to grow smoothly.