Coaching, collaboration, cold weather: Inside the Smartsheet Nordics and Netherlands team

What do golf and sales leadership have in common? For Alex Fearns, Regional Director for the Nordics and Netherlands, it’s all about coaching the swing. He’s building a team that’s not only hitting targets, but changing the game.

Tell me about yourself and your background. What’s your role at Smartsheet? 

I joined Smartsheet in 2020 as part of one of the first EMEA expansion sales teams in London. I started as an Account Executive, then spent 18 months helping to establish a Sales Enablement function in EMEA, which was a great experience. After that, in 2023, I moved into a Regional Manager role and took on the challenge of building out the Nordic and Netherlands expansion team. I am currently Regional Director and responsible for the growth and development of the region.

What brought you to Smartsheet?

Well, it’s kind of a funny story! I was visiting my parents and shared with my mum that a recruiter had reached out to me from Smartsheet. I started explaining what the product was, and my mum, who at the time worked for the National Health Service (NHS) in various PMO and Operations leadership roles, was immediately interested—sharing with me that her team was still using pen and paper and would love a tool like Smartsheet! That conversation pushed me to reply and accept an interview.

After my interviews, I remember walking out of the office building and thinking, I have to work here. Everyone I met genuinely enjoyed their work and believed in what they were doing. I also appreciated interviewing with people I’d actually be working with, and with members of the senior leadership team. When I was evaluating what I wanted in the next chapter of my career, I knew I wanted to be a part of something that was meaningful, something making a real difference to customers and people, and Smartsheet made quite the impression on me. Five years on, I still feel we’re making a big difference today.

What did your mum say when you joined?

She was happy, but her first question was, “Will you be the NHS account manager?" I shared unfortunately no, and she laughed. It all worked out. Today, the NHS does use Smartsheet and our UK team has done a fantastic job supporting and growing the NHS’s usage of Smartsheet.

Read more about how the NHS uses Smartsheet to improve patient outcomes.

What was it like building the Nordics team? Can you tell me a bit about the people on it?

We’re still fairly new, we’re just over two years old! Our members have a wide range of tenure: one member has been at Smartsheet for longer than I have, another just over 10 months, and then we have members who fall somewhere in between. This diversity of experience has really worked in our favor. New perspectives and ideas have brought fresh energy to the team, it’s invited a lot of collaboration and creativity. The one thing they all have in common is the entrepreneurial spirit, you have to have that.

What’s the culture like within the team?

I prioritize creating psychological safety and a culture of enablement. I want the team to understand their strengths, know where they can grow, and feel confident supporting each other. We foster a culture of sharing, whether that’s ideas or simple, tactical things. For example, when someone returns from a business trip, they share how it went and what they learned. It’s not just about me enabling them as their manager, it’s about building a culture where we enable each other and grow collectively. We also enjoy having fun together outside of work. Whether it be racing each other on a Formula 1 simulator, navigating the Crystal Maze, grabbing some breakfast, or as we learned recently, playing a very poor game of shuffleboard.

How would you describe your leadership style? 

Every leader I’ve loved working for was really good at one very specific thing, coaching, and I’ve always tried to lead with that. I think about it like this: if you’ve never seen your team hit a ball, how can you help them improve their golf swing? I could attempt to tell them why their ball slices to the right and how to correct it, but ideally, they’re already thinking about that and then we can figure that out together. Coaching should be about feedback and empowerment, not criticism. When people feel safe and confident to identify what they want to work on and where they can improve, growth is far more powerful. Helping my team develop and get better at what they do every day is something I really value and guides a lot of the decisions I’ve made to date. If we all seek and value progression instead of solely chasing perfection, we can celebrate and win more often; and who doesn’t like winning?

Finally, what do you look for in a candidate? 

The entrepreneurial mindset is critical. Understanding the Nordic market, establishing relationships and recognising value selling isn’t just about uncovering metrics, it’s also about the positive impact technology can have on people. That plays a big part. Given the flexibility of our platform, you also need to be able to connect to a wide variety of people in different roles and departments, and this creates a lot of opportunity to make a real impact.

One of the biggest qualities I look for is a candidate to demonstrate their ability to be a disrupter—how can you introduce a new way of working when a company may not know what collaborative work management is or the outcomes we can help them achieve? It’s still very much an emerging industry in our region, so you have to be ready to help customers think differently about their way of working, educate them and work with them to help them achieve their goals.

And of course, speaking a Nordic language and being okay with the cold helps too. It can get quite chilly!

Thank you to Alex and his team for showing us what it means to lead with intention and prioritize coaching. From building new markets to building each other up, their work is a reminder that great teams make space to focus on targets and people.

If you’re looking to make an impact in an environment that values growth and grit, the Nordics team might be the place for you. Explore our open roles.