Growth talks with Thomas Bailly on transforming growth strategy from good to unparalleled
And here we go with another inspiring Growth Talk!
This time, we’re featuring Thomas Bailly, director of agency development at Utiq, and a commercial transformation consultant with a proven track record of helping organisations drive growth and building unstoppable sales teams. With nearly two decades of experience at leading companies like Pinterest, Twitter, and Microsoft, Thomas has worked on deals ranging from $5,000 to $300 million, while also mentoring countless professionals to excel in the field.
Thomas combines his deep knowledge of sales, partnerships, and strategy to craft clear, actionable plans that deliver real results. Over the years, he’s seen firsthand how sales organizations need to reinvent themselves to stay ahead — adapting to macro trends, balancing strategic trade-offs, and navigating changing priorities.
His expertise is now distilled into a proprietary framework that helps businesses transform their operations, negotiate smarter, and upskill their teams. What began as a passion for technology and people has evolved into a career dedicated to solving complex problems and helping organizations grow stronger every day.
Get ready to dive into Thomas’ journey, hear his insights, and learn how he turns big challenges into even bigger opportunities, and don’t miss out on checking Utiq’s website and his own!
What does growth mean to you, and how has your perspective on it evolved during your 18 years at companies like Pinterest, Twitter, and Microsoft?
There is no sustainable revenue growth without people growth. As a sales leader, you can and should increase your short-term revenue through promotions, incentives, and (gently!) pushing your team to meet objectives, but over the long run I found it much more efficient to commit to a strategy that sets a shared objective for your team, empowers them to make the right decisions, emulate their peers, learn from failures and move on quickly.
At the end of the day, people stay within your company and sustain unreplicable relationships with your clients and one another, because they see a clear path for growth within your team.
That’s the reason I joined Utiq — I wasn’t an expert in the ad identity space, but the company’s very clear mission, unique approach to respecting users’ privacy and clarity in the value exchange meant I had the opportunity to learn from the best in the market and grow.
Utiq launched in mid-2023 offering a unique, purpose-driven service to the market that solves the consent, privacy and addressability issues of an increasingly fragmented and disconnected internet. We empower brands and agencies to adopt a fully-consented addressability approach, fostering stronger, deterministic consumer relationships, while safeguarding their privacy.
You’ve structured deals ranging from $5,000 to $300 million. What’s the key to making successful deals across such diverse scales?
As always, it’s a team effort — you might be carrying or supporting the deal but there’s always other team members contributing to it or making sure it doesn’t fall on the wayside. Getting an alignment on the goals and stakes across different internal teams is a prerequisite.
In terms of structure, it begins and ends with the client and understanding their needs, at a number of levels — for their organisation, their team, and for them as an individual. Sales methodologies (MEDDPIC, consultative, gap, SPIN etc) are all valid, and share one fundamental truth: at some point, as a salesperson, your job is to ask the right open question, stop talking and listen intently.
Larger deals have more variables and stakeholders, and often involve your counterpart committing someone else’s budgets (for example, an agency handling their clients’ advertising spend), but the principles remain the same. Understanding the various incentives and motivations, and designing a solution that creates value for all parties is key. It also helps to map out different stakeholders, based on how influential and supportive they are.
How do you approach building and leading sales teams that consistently deliver exceptional results?
Good people, good culture, clear objectives — much easier said than done. You want to hire someone who’s smart, humble, has integrity, ambitious, energetic, collaborative… It’s harder than finding a good date!
But to me it boils down to two things that go hand in hand — can I trust that person, and do they have a mindset of curiosity and growth? If their comfort zone is a square box with sharp edges, we’re probably not a match. But if I can rely on them to give their all, even in an uncomfortable situation, for example covering for me in an important meeting — welcome to the team. They might not nail it perfectly, and that’s OK. What matters is they’re willing to do their best and grow from the experience.
What’s the most challenging part of reinventing sales organizations to stay ahead of trends, and how do you tackle it?
I would say getting people to embrace change. Working in the media & adtech industry, the relentless pace of technological innovation and steady inflow of young talent made this somewhat easier. But generally, equipping managers with the tools to conduct change within their organisations takes patience, commitment and an unwavering, shared vision coming from the top management.
What macro trends do you think businesses should prepare for, and what’s one growth prediction you believe people might underestimate?
AI taking over our lives has become a cliché at this point so I’ll spare the reader.
At the geopolitical level, I think people underestimate the growing influence of bilateral relationships between nations, at the expense of multilateral bodies and agreements. For better or worse the world is becoming more economically fragmented, and people’s confidence in negotiation frameworks like the WTO and broad trade zones has diminished. Brexit is a prime example of this broader trend.
Businesses must take that into account for the next wave of international trade expansion — namely, the global South.
If you could go back in time, what’s one thing you would do differently in your career, and how has that shaped your current approach?
There is a fine line between confidence and arrogance, and I can think of a couple occasions when I regret not practicing more humility and restraint.
The French have a proverb about turning your tongue seven times in your mouth before speaking — a reminder to think carefully. Nowadays, I spend three or four turns wondering if what I’m about to say will make me sound like a jerk.
What’s the best piece of advice you’ve received about driving growth, and what common mistakes do you see businesses make when trying to scale?
A former manager used the jellyfish metaphor — these beautiful creatures are the ocean’s most efficient swimmers, expending the least amount of energy for each movement and using every bit of momentum before their next stroke.
This frugality goes a long way into driving sustainable growth. Unfortunately, a lot of businesses try to sell everything to everyone all the time, wasting energy on unstrategic pursuits and burning their teams out in the process. What you decide NOT to do is equally important as what you decide to do.
What advice would you give to businesses in scaling stage about further growth?
Take your best client out for lunch, and bring along your most knowledgeable product person.
The economic buyer knows what you need to build before you do, and magic happens when your technical teams can translate that into their own language.
Can you share a story of a time when you took a big risk in a deal or strategy? How did it pay off, and what did you learn?
After presenting strategy to a client:
“Okay. Do you have any alternatives to present?
No. What we presented is what we’re convinced you should do.”
Followed by several seconds of dead silence. I could see my colleagues getting red in the face already, their eyes darting “Thom, what have you done? You always come with a plan B!”. We ended up closing the deal in the end, but that day was a roll of the dice!
To wrap up with something fun, what’s one thing about you that people might not know but would find interesting?
I’m a terrible cook but an excellent sous-chef — as in, the ideal culinary foot soldier who can julienne carrots with military precision. But put me in charge of the entire meal, and… well let’s say the smoke detector has been my most used food timer.
Thankfully my wife is a natural executive chef who is always there to oversee, and fix my abstract art into actual dinner — and gracefully never makes me feel bad about it!
