Welcome, or in some cases, welcome back to our meet the team series. We use this series to introduce some of the faces behind the Spiff brand– that way, you can put a face to the name so to speak. Without further ado let’s jump into the latest edition and meet some of our favorite Spiffers:
Rachel Cravit, Marketing Content Writer
Rachel is an experienced content writer/marketer, specializing exclusively in B2B SaaS for the past 4 years. She’s also an unapologetic B2B content nerd who *strongly* disagrees that B2C should have all the fun — one of her favorite pieces she got to write was a lead nurture guide styled after an IKEA manual. Mostly recently, Rachel was Content Marketing Manager at PathFactory, a content experience platform (sort of like Netflix for B2B). She’s also worked with companies like G2, Hypercontext, and Bonusly.
When she’s not writing, Rachel loves getting out to explore Charleston, where she recently moved with her dog Louis. A proud “Americanadian”, Rachel grew up in the US but hails from Toronto. She’s excited to join Spiff’s marketing team!
What excites you most about your role?
Connor Shlatz, Front-End Software Engineer
Connor grew up in the Burlington, Vermont area and has stayed in the area. He loves the outdoor opportunities the state affords him. Connor is a die-hard skier (and is also a former instructor), an avid disc golfer and spends most of his summer on the beaches of Lake Champlain. Connor is also a multiple time Vermont pinball champion (seriously) and is currently ranked #1 in the state.
What excites you most about your role?
AnnaMarie Dallimore, CS Coordinator
AnnaMarie was born and raised in Sandy, Utah. She is currently studying Psychology at Brigham Young University, hoping to become a counselor in the future. She loves being able to help people and get things done. In her free time she loves to bake, play tennis, watch movies and play board games!
What excites you most about your role?
John Arsenault, Sales Engineer
John hails from Halifax Canada where he lives with his wife Megan and 1-year-old daughter Eleanor. Prior to joining Spiff, John was Director of Finance for an education agency in México City. John knows too well the inefficiencies that come with using the awkward combination of Excel and screenshots from accounting platforms to explain commission payments, so when he learned about Spiff’s game-changing software he knew he had to join the team!
Solving problems and having fun while doing so makes him happy, and he’s excited to showcase Spiff to finance and sales teams. Prior to joining the finance and tech worlds, John was an instructor in South Korea where he taught what would come to be his students’ favorite class; ice cream and coloring to the music of Michael Jackson.
What excites you most about your role?
Dustin Carpe, Sales Development Representative
Dustin was born and raised in Massachusetts. Dustin’s former company was a client of Spiff so he’s seen firsthand how awesome the product is from the user’s side and he’s excited to be a part of such an awesome company!
During the winter you can find Dustin snowboarding in Vermont and New Hampshire or attempting to ice skate at Boston Common. The rest of the year Dustin spends hiking, biking, taking brewery tours, and seeing as many live bands as possible.
What excites you most about your role?
Sarah Alaguretnam, Security Operations Engineer
Sarah grew up in Salt Lake City and loves to travel. Some of her favorite places to visit are Lake Powell and Sri Lanka. Sarah is married to her high school sweetheart and has a five-month-old baby boy. Sarah loves spending time with her family, boating, exploring new places, and taking her dog on walks. She got her bachelor’s degree in Computer Information Technology from BYU-Idaho and has been working in cyber security since then. Working with technology has always been a love of Sarah’s.
What excites you most about your role?
Rob Thompson, Mid-Market Account Executive
Rob grew up in St. Louis, MO and lived there his whole life until he took off to South Carolina for college at Clemson University. Since then, Rob has stayed in the area and has enjoyed living near the beach in Charleston and currently in the mountains of Greenville.
Rob’s professional experience started with a five year stint at Enterprise Rent-a-Car where he worked his way up their corporate ladder– ultimately managing multiple locations. Rob then jumped into a more outside sales oriented role at Paychex and then, later, with a Series A startup as the first sales hire. Rob loves the SaaS startup space and is always excited to take on another challenge and opportunity!
In his free time Rob loves to play and watch sports. In the fall, Clemson football games definitely take over his weekends with the occasional basketball and baseball games in the Winter/Spring. Rob loves getting out and exploring downtown and outdoors in Greenville and looks forward to getting out to Utah one day to do the same!
What excites you most about your role?
Sarah Barlow, Learning & Development Coordinator
Sarah is a lover of books, brownies, people, repelling, anything and everything that has to do with water, some good dad jokes, and of course Thai food. Sarah is from Farmington Utah, where she grew up with her five siblings. Sarah has also lived in Arkansas and Missouri. She is passionate about people, learning, and growth. This led her to take steps toward a career in People Operations, and ultimately finding her way to Spiff. She’s currently pursuing a degree in Applied Communications from Utah Valley University.
What excites you most about your role?
Felicity Jones, Customer Account Executive
Felicity was born and raised in Utah after her parents moved from Amarillo. TX. Felicity received her Bachelor’s Degree in Business Admin and started her first big girl job in HR. After four years in the HR world focusing on benefits, compensation, equity, and retirement she wanted to finally take a chance and join the world of sales.
Felicity is an ex college basketball player who loves to share her knowledge and experience with the next generation by coaching at a local high school and competitive teams. Besides spending time on the golf course (her new hobby) she spends her free time traveling, hiking, cooking, and eating with her wife Chak, 3 year old daughter Quentin, soon to be new born son August, and their two dogs Jovi and Simba!
What excites you most about your role?
Gabriel Portis, Talent Experience Coordinator
Gabriel grew up in Alameda, CA and moved to Colorado when he was ten. Growing up in California led him to become a passionate Oakland sports fan. The Athletics, Raiders, and Warriors are his favorite teams. Gabriel now lives in Longmont, CO and went to college at Western Colorado University in Gunnison, CO, where he studied English, Psychology, and Business Administration.
Gabriel is passionate about people, which he’s grown and developed by studying psychology, traveling, and learning about different cultures. His favorite hobbies include working out, hiking, watching sports, playing video games, going out to eat, traveling, reading, writing, and cooking. Purple is also his absolute favorite color. Lastly, Gabriel loves spending time with his family and friends.
What excites you most about your role?
Mindy Tolbert, Executive Assistant
Mindy has lived in Utah her whole life. She often thinks she should live on a beach where it’s always warm but loves the mountains too much. Mindy has two kids– a 22 year old daughter and a six year old son and (almost) never needs a break from them because they are hilarious and fun to be around. She also has two dogs, a Goldendoodle and an Aussiedoodle who both love hikes in the mountains as much as Mindy does. Outside of work, Mindy loves home projects and has a hard time finishing one without starting another.
What excites you most about your role?
Brandyn Bennet, Software Engineer
Brandyn lives in Spanish Fork, Utah with his wife Lilí, their 3-year-old Shane, and 6-month-old Bryce. He enjoys building Lego sets, eating popcorn, watching the Marvel Cinematic Universe, reading books, and listening to podcasts. Brandyn believes that everybody is different and enjoys working on software and teams that embrace human nature and seek to enhance human potential.
What excites you most about your role?
Brent Showerman, Customer Success Manager
Brent grew up in a small town in southeast Michigan, before heading to Grand Valley State University for college. He ran cross country and track throughout undergrad, and went on to do a Master’s in Social Work and Public Administration thereafter. Brent enjoys building relationships with coworkers and customers alike, and always strives to bring positive energy, enthusiasm, and a personal touch to his work.
He spent a brief time living in Los Angeles after graduate school before moving to Denver, CO, where he currently resides. Brent loves to run, hike, and otherwise spend time outside. His favorite television shows of all time are Survivor and LOST, and he loves talking to other fans about them.
What excites you most about your role?
Alison Varney, Sales Development Manager
Alison grew up in the heart of Silicon Valley, but currently calls Raleigh, North Carolina home. Alison, who is also a licensed Esthetician and makeup artist, started her sales career in retail as a manager at Nordstrom, managing a cosmetic brand and a team of makeup artists.
After stumbling into the tech world as an SDR years ago, Alison has found her passion in all things Top of the Funnel. Alison is passionate about helping professionals young in their career achieve their personal and professional goals, which is reflected in her coaching/management style.
Outside of work, Alison spends her time on adventures with her Bernese Mountain dog (Gus), painting, seeing live music (House music especially!), practicing yoga, volunteering at a therapeutic horse facility, watching crime documentaries, and doing makeup.
What excites you most about your role?
Byron Garvin, Solutions Engineer
Byron has a broad and unique background that has allowed him to connect with people of all different backgrounds. His early career as a hardware engineer transitioned into sales and business development roles where he traveled all around the world and got to interact with many people and cultures.
More recently Byron was the general manager of a hardware/software tech company before founding two companies in the construction industry. Byron loves to write music and play guitar and also loves playing sports – especially volleyball and basketball. He is married with three children and feels passionately about helping people see the best in themselves!
What excites you most about your role?
Jason Pearson, Solutions Architect
Jason comes from a public accounting background, but he never intended to be an accountant. Jason’s goal was to leave the big four and enter a role like the one he now holds at Spiff. He has always enjoyed learning coding languages, systems, and data visualization. Jason and his wife have 7-month-old twins and they recently bought their first home in Saratoga Springs. Outside of work, Jason enjoys rock climbing and golf.
What excites you most about your role?
Diego Cardona, Solutions Engineer
Diego grew up in northern Utah in the Cache Valley region of the state. After living in a rural environment for most of his life, Diego decided to go to college and seek out new experiences. He moved to SLC and has lived there for 14 years.
Although Diego loves to travel, the wilderness in Utah keeps him from straying too far from his home state. Diego considers himself an avid outdoorsman, a bit of a foodie, and a passionate music lover. After several years in accounting positions, Diego wanted to join a growing team full of similarly driven folks who want to see something grow and succeed. After that, Diego dove into the FinTech industry, and hasn’t looked back.
What excites you most about your role?
Samuel Blanco Santana, Software Engineer
Samuel was the youngest of four brothers, born in Chihuahua, Mexico. He was introduced to the tech world by his brothers in elementary school when his brothers were studying software at college. Samuel has been very interested in programming ever since and has graduated with a degree in the subject in 2017. Sam has worked in the Mexican FinTech space for four years now and is eager to learn from an international organization like Spiff. Lately Sam has been really interested in 3d printing and the blockchain.
What excites you most about your role?
Jeffrey Robertson, Sales Development Representative
Jeff grew up in the town of Barnstable on Cape Cod, MA. He recently graduated from the University Of Massachusetts Amherst this past May with an Economics degree. The bulk of his experience comes from working behind the bar at an extremely busy restaurant on the water in Hyannis.
Jeff quickly realized that his hustle mentality and passion for fast paced environments would make him a good fit for sales in the booming tech industry. Outside of work Jeff enjoys spending time with friends and family out on the boat relaxing or fishing. In the winter Jeff spends most of his weekends skiing at mountains in the Northeast and is looking forward to getting some fresh tracks when he visits Utah!
What excites you most about your role?
Matt Gahr, Chief Revenue Officer
Matt was born to a nomadic Air Force family, living in Taiwan, Seattle, Michigan, Alabama, Massachusetts and Denmark, all before going to undergrad at University of New Hampshire. Moving around that much gave him a passion for travel and appreciating how different and unique each of us are.
While working on the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta (yes, he’s that old), Matt met and married Kelly Gandhi, after which the two relocated to Carlsbad, CA in 2001. Shea (daughter, born 2003) and Cade (son, born 2004) came soon, and so did a loving, busy family life, an MBA, and a career in SaaS technology. Matt comes to Spiff from Emburse and CSOD ($450M ARR when he left) and is “fired-up” to support the Spiff sales team as we scale ARR to $100M and beyond!
In addition to enjoying traveling, hiking and sunny pool days with his family, Matt plays dive bars with a cover band in San Diego and has been known to strum, sing and record music in his spare time.
What excites you most about your role?
Final Thoughts
And there you have it! Another installment of Meet the Team in the books. If you haven’t already had the chance to check out our previous Meet the Team posts, you can take a look here:
- Meet the Team: Chapter One
- Meet the Team: Chapter Two
- Meet the Team: Chapter Three
- Meet the Team: Chapter Four
- Meet the Team: Chapter Five
We’ll see you next month to introduce you to the latest and greatest batch of Spiff team members.
About Spiff
Spiff is a leading sales commission platform that automates commission calculations and motivates teams to drive top-line growth. With a combination of an intuitive UI, real-time visibility, and seamless integrations into current systems, Spiff is the first choice among high-growth businesses. The platform enables finance and sales operations teams to self-manage complex incentive compensation plans and provides transparency for sales teams.
