5 questions with John Vikas, Adobe’s head of commercial sales

When John Vikas joined Adobe, he was just starting off his career. He remembers wanting to work for an innovative company, and with Adobe’s creative products, that seemed to fit the bill. He joined the company as an account executive for the Inside Sales team, eager to grow his career. Flash forward to today, and after ten years at the company, John is now the Head of Commercial Sales for the Australia and New Zealand regions at Adobe. To learn a little more about his career journey, here are the 5 pressing questions we had for John.

You’ve been at Adobe for 10 years now, and have been able to grow your career a lot since joining. What made that possible?

I joined young in my career, and it was my first sales role in the tech industry. But what I noticed early on was that Adobe does particularly well in nurturing its talent. I’ve been part of so many training courses—including ways to effectively value sell, and courses in digital marketing. Not only that, I’ve been part of some amazing leadership courses that have taught me invaluable skills, such as how to break bias and really genuinely listen. These trainings have been instrumental in helping me build my career and becoming a leader.

Not only that, what’s kept me here for two decades is the fact that the company has changed so rapidly. We’re constantly innovating and evolving our technology. When I started, it was all about digital media, and soon after we acquired Omniture, which kicked off the revolution around data and analytics. All this transformation naturally leads to new opportunities within the company.

What excites you about your role?

What excites me the most about my role is the Magento Commerce Cloud—it’s a very disruptive and innovative space. Our company vision is to make every single piece of content an experience, and Magento enables us to make that content shop-able. This Commercial organization is still a new business for Adobe, and it’s allowed me to build out a team and unique culture with this organization, and work with customers that Adobe hasn’t historically been dealing with.

When hiring for your team, what do you look for in ideal candidates?

I look at different tenants. One of the first things is culture. Adobe has a unique culture—we’re the second most valuable software company in the world, but we’re not arrogant. We have a fun, open, and collaborative culture. We don’t micromanage—we give autonomy to our employees. We need people who work well in this setting.

Secondly, we’re looking for A-players. People who are experienced in value selling, and have a strong professional background and a strong aptitude to help their customers be successful. These people are also not afraid of change. People who are looking to develop their careers and be innovative really need to embrace change, which happens a lot at Adobe.

What does leadership look like at Adobe?

To be a leader is all about empowerment, and Adobe takes leadership training very seriously. You can tell in the way that managers interact with their teams—there’s a major focus on unlocking untapped potential and to support others to be the best in their career. Like my mentors before me, I work hard to cultivate my team to give them the resources to enable them to be leaders.

How do you describe the culture at Adobe? Any favorite things about the Sydney office?

We have an amazing work environment, and a beautiful office in Sydney that overlooks the water. What I love about the culture is that everybody is passionate about delivering amazing standout customer experiences. Everybody shares that goal, and it shows in the high-performing individuals that work here. There’s a maniacal focus for people to be the best in their field. It’s a welcome sight when you work with people who come from unique backgrounds, but are all working hard towards a common goal.

Outside of that, some of my favorite perks around the office—definitely the kombucha and the ping pong tables. What can I say? I was the unofficial ping pong champion of 2018.

Interested in joining team? Apply today!