In a recent episode of The Nobel Podcast, we sat down with Rehman Abdur, a sales leader, entrepreneur, and former VP of Sales EMEA at MessageBird. After joining the Amsterdam-based scale-up as one of its earliest sales hires, Rehman climbed the ranks through six promotions before launching his own company, Sabre. Along the way, he developed a clear philosophy on what separates average sales professionals from exceptional ones.
Why Top Sales Performers Think Beyond Their Quota
One of the strongest themes throughout the conversation was the importance of ambition. According to Rehman, too many salespeople treat quota attainment as the finish line. The best performers view quota as the minimum acceptable outcome. Rather than asking how to achieve 100% of target, top performers ask themselves what it would take to achieve 200%, 300%, or even 400%. This mindset fundamentally changes how they spend their time. Instead of chasing every opportunity that comes their way, they focus relentlessly on the accounts that can create the biggest impact. Rehman argues that sales professionals should identify a small number of high-priority accounts and devote the majority of their energy to those opportunities. Success comes from making deliberate decisions about where to invest time, not from being busy all day.
Watch the episode below:
The Most Underrated Sales Skill? Learning the Numbers
While motivation and drive are essential, Rehman believes many salespeople overlook a critical skill: understanding the mathematics behind their performance. The best sales professionals know exactly how much pipeline they need to generate, where deals are dropping off, what their win rates are, and which skills will have the biggest impact on revenue outcomes. Instead of blindly working harder, they identify the specific metrics that require improvement and focus their efforts there. This data-driven approach allows salespeople to continuously refine their process and make smarter decisions throughout the sales cycle. As Rehman puts it, learning to do the math is often the difference between average and exceptional performance.
Great Sales Leaders Aren’t Born, They’re Built
A common misconception in sales is that top performers automatically become great managers. Rehman’s experience suggests otherwise. When he stepped into his first leadership role, he quickly realized that leading a team required an entirely different set of skills. Success was no longer about personally winning deals but about helping others develop the confidence, capabilities, and consistency needed to succeed on their own. His leadership journey involved setbacks, self-reflection, and rebuilding teams from the ground up. What ultimately helped him succeed was maintaining a growth mindset and recognizing that leadership, like sales, is a skill that must be learned and refined over time.
Hiring for Hunger, Not Just Experience
One of the most interesting insights from the episode centered around hiring. Rather than focusing solely on candidates from prestigious companies, Rehman looked for something harder to teach: hunger. He sought people with resilience, determination, and what he calls a “chip on their shoulder.” To uncover these qualities, he often went beyond the formal interview process. Instead of sticking strictly to scripted interview questions, he would spend hours speaking with candidates about their background, upbringing, failures, and life experiences. These conversations revealed far more about a candidate’s mindset than rehearsed interview answers ever could. For Rehman, understanding how someone responds to adversity is often a stronger predictor of future success than what’s written on their CV.
How Modern Sales Reps Can Win in the Age of AI
With AI-generated outreach flooding inboxes, standing out has become more difficult than ever. Rehman believes the solution is not more automation but deeper intelligence. Salespeople must invest time in understanding what is happening inside their target accounts before reaching out. He recommends researching leadership changes, hiring patterns, technology stacks, and strategic priorities. Rather than immediately pitching a product, sales professionals should first gather information from managers and stakeholders lower in the organization. This helps them build a strong point of view before engaging senior decision-makers. By the time they contact a CMO, VP, or executive, they should already understand the challenges the business is facing and be able to demonstrate genuine insight. This level of preparation dramatically increases the likelihood of meaningful conversations.
Why Personalization Still Wins
Perhaps the biggest takeaway from the discussion is that trust remains the foundation of successful sales. The most effective salespeople are creators. They produce tailored videos, voice notes, presentations, and insights specifically for the people they want to engage. They demonstrate that they have invested time and effort into understanding a prospect’s business before asking for anything in return. In a world where buyers are overwhelmed by generic outreach, personalization has become a powerful competitive advantage. The sales professionals who take the time to create genuine value before the first conversation are the ones who consistently earn attention and build long-term relationships.
Final Thoughts
Rehman Abdur’s journey from early sales representative at MessageBird to founder of Sabre offers a valuable lesson for anyone building a career in sales. Success is rarely about shortcuts, scripts, or technology alone. It comes from combining ambition with discipline, mastering the numbers, investing in relationships, and continuously learning.
Whether you’re an SDR aiming for your first promotion, an account executive pursuing enterprise deals, or a sales leader building a team, the principles discussed in this episode provide a practical framework for long-term success in modern B2B sales.
Follow Rehman Abdur on LinkedIn.
Listen to this episode on Spotify.
