Is Sales Ops the New Sisyphus?

In the Greek myth, Sisyphus was condemned to an infinite loop of pushing a giant boulder up a steep hill, only to have it roll back down again. When it comes to participating in the annual strategic planning process, those of us in the sales ops field can relate. Too often, the strategic considerations we have so carefully raised to leadership end up at the bottom of the priorities list.
As an example, the CSO Insights 2017 World-Class Sales Practices Study asked sales leaders to identify the top issue or challenge they faced over the previous 12 months. Overwhelmingly, their #1 answer was “transforming my sales organization.”
When asked how they translate that challenge into strategies, their top 3 answers were:
Improve value messaging
Improve sales skills
Hire more salespeople
 
The lowest-ranked answers were “Implement more technology” followed by “Improve sales tools.”
We see this play out in operations on a consistent basis. Sales leaders verbalize long-term