Head of Sales

The Head of Sales is a senior leadership role responsible for scaling and strengthening Northwoods’ sales organization. Reporting directly to the CEO and serving on the core leadership team, this person will raise performance standards, improve forecast accuracy, strengthen pipeline generation, and lead a more enterprise-oriented go-to-market motion across public-sector accounts. Success in this role will come through disciplined execution, strong talent development, and the ability to build a commercial engine capable of supporting the company’s next stage of growth.

This leader will establish greater accountability, urgency, and pipeline discipline across the sales organization while advancing more consistent enterprise-style selling. The Head of Sales will assess team capability, develop and strengthen talent, and develop a high-performing organization positioned to win beyond legacy selling patterns and more complex state-level opportunities. This role also partners closely with Product, Marketing, Delivery, Finance, and executive leadership to align market strategy, commercial execution, and revenue predictability.

What You’ll Be Doing

Build and Lead a High-Performing Sales Team (45%)

• Recruit, coach, and develop a high-performing sales team aligned to Northwoods' public-sector strategy across current and target geographies.
• Set clear expectations for activity, pipeline creation, stage discipline, forecast quality, and quota attainment, and hold the team accountable through a rigorous operating cadence.
• Conduct regular 1:1s, pipeline reviews, and account reviews to strengthen rep performance, sharpen execution, and accelerate momentum.
• Build a culture of accountability, ownership, and execution where high performance is recognized and rewarded, and where gaps are addressed directly and constructively.
• Develop the team's capabilities in state-level and enterprise-style selling, navigating multiple stakeholders, longer buying cycles, and formal procurement requirements, while preserving productive customer relationships and market credibility.
• Evaluate team structure and make talent decisions as needed to ensure the organization is positioned to meet the company's growth targets.

Build Pipeline, Improve Forecasting, and Win Complex Deals (40%)

• Drive consistent pipeline creation across the sales team, ensuring opportunity development aligns with the company's 12- to 18-month sales cycle and revenue targets, while actively looking for ways to compress timelines and accelerate when possible.
• Improve forecast quality by refining stage definitions, strengthening inspection rigor, enforcing qualification standards, and driving evidence-based deal management.
• Partner directly on select strategic opportunities where executive engagement, deal strategy, or cross-functional coordination can materially improve win probability.
• Use data and operating discipline to identify opportunities early, strengthen conversion across the pipeline, and improve overall bookings performance.

Serve as a Core Leadership Team Member (15%)

• Contribute to company strategy as a core leadership team member by bringing market insight, sales signal, and commercial judgment into executive decisions.
• Partner with Product, Marketing, Delivery, Finance, and executive leadership to improve go-to-market execution, messaging, pricing alignment, and customer feedback loops.
• Help shape growth strategy by identifying market opportunities, capability gaps, and the commercial priorities required to scale.

First-Year Expectations

First 90 days: Build relationships across the team, establish operating cadence, identify quick wins, and make talent decisions where needed.

Within 6 months: Strengthen pipeline quality, tighten stage discipline, improve forecast reliability, and show stronger early-stage opportunity creation consistent with a long sales cycle.

Within 12 months: Improve bookings trajectory, advance state-level and enterprise-style selling, and build an organization capable of sustaining larger quota targets.

You may be a good fit for our team if you have the following skills…

• Proven success leading and growing sales teams in B2B SaaS, public sector technology, or other complex enterprise environments.
• Demonstrated ability to build accountability, coach performance, strengthen pipeline creation, and increase forecast rigor in long-cycle sales motions.
• Experience leading teams that sell into complex buying environments with multiple stakeholders, formal evaluation processes, or regulated-market dynamics.
• Strong executive presence, sound commercial judgment, and the ability to partner effectively across functions and at the leadership-team level.
• Experience recruiting and developing high-performing sellers and building teams aligned to ambitious growth goals.
• Working knowledge of CRM-driven sales management and pipeline inspection; experience with HubSpot or similar platforms is helpful.
• Direct experience in human services, child welfare, or adjacent public-sector domains is helpful but not required.
• Must be authorized to work in the U.S.

What We Provide

• Medical (includes H.S.A. option with employer contribution), dental, and vision insurance
• Short- and long-term disability
• Company paid basic life insurance
• 401(k) with 4% company match and immediate vesting
• Wellness program that helps you earn lower premiums
• Robust EAP program that includes free therapy sessions, lifestyle coaching, legal/ID theft services, and more
• 12 weeks fully paid parental leave
• Up to $5,000 adoption fee reimbursement
• $500 wellness reimbursement after 60 days of employment
• Generous PTO policy and 10 company paid holidays
• Company paid cell phone plan

Find yourself checking a lot of these boxes but doubting whether you should apply? Studies have shown that women and people of color are less likely to apply to jobs unless they meet every qualification. At Northwoods, we are dedicated to building a diverse, inclusive, and authentic workplace, so if you are excited about this role but your experience doesn’t align perfectly with every qualification in the job description, we encourage you to apply anyway. You may be just the right candidate for this or other roles. Northwoods is committed to diversity in its workforce and is proud to be an equal opportunity employer. We are excited to work with talented people, period. All employment decisions are based on business needs, job requirements, and individual qualifications, without regard to race, color, religion or belief, national or ethnic origin, gender, age, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity and/or expression, marital or civil status, political affiliation, family or parental status, or any other status protected by the laws or regulations in the jurisdictions in which we operate.

Who is Northwoods?

Northwoods is a health and human services software company dedicated to reducing friction for frontline workers and turning complexity into clear, meaningful action. Part of the Banyan Software family, we build technology trusted by state and county agencies across the country, helping caseworkers and social workers spend less time navigating systems and managing paperwork and more time serving the families who need them most.

Our solutions span child welfare, childcare, child support, economic assistance, and adult & aging programs. Through products like Traverse and Compass, we give frontline teams easy access to case files, intelligent insights, and streamlined workflows, simplifying the administrative burden so workers can make better decisions and achieve better outcomes for the families they serve.

Beyond software, our managed service Grove embeds experienced child welfare professionals directly into agency teams. Grove handles the administrative heavy lifting, referral and records requests, court document preparation, and case file organization, so frontline workers can stay focused on fostering healthier families without sacrificing their own well-being.

At Northwoods, we're recognized as one of Columbus's top places to work, and we've built a culture grounded in curiosity, community, resourcefulness, and stewardship. We believe in hiring passionate, driven people who hold themselves accountable, to their craft, to their teammates, and to our mission. Northwoods is an equal opportunity employer committed to building a diverse and inclusive workplace, and we are happy to provide reasonable accommodations throughout the recruiting process for candidates who need them.