Benchmarks of Commercial Leadership in Growth-Stage B2B SaaS, DACH
We mapped all commercial leaders of 100 DACH SaaS companies, from C-Suite to VP-level to uncover what the talent pool looks like.
We've created the report on commercial leadership benchmarks for growth-stage B2B SaaS companies in the DACH region. Our goal: examining the composition of the GTM talent pool at the leadership level, breaking down who’s making it to the top, what their career trajectories look like, and what it takes to reach senior commercial leadership roles in this space.
Whether you're a founder scaling your company, an investor backing one, or a commercial leader eyeing your next move, this research piece is built for you. You'll find specific data-driven insights from structure and seniority to gender, geographic roots, years of experience, career path, timing, tenure, churn, education, and compensation. If you're trying to hire, invest smarter, or lead, we hope you find these benchmarks useful.
This report was compiled by the Commercial Practice at The Big Search. If you're interested in leadership and talent trends, looking to hire a commercial leader, or simply want to discuss the findings, feel free to reach out: ilya@thebigsearch.com
💡 Why DACH Matters
The DACH region is home to 101.5 million German speakers, making it one of the most populous and economically significant areas in Europe. The region stands as one of the most vibrant hotspots for B2B SaaS growth, attracting founders, investors, and clients. With VC investment in the region reaching $2.8 billion in Q1 2025, DACH is the second-largest recipient in Europe, just behind the UK.
Similarly, DACH is a popular destination for PE investors. The region ranks as the second most valuable market in Europe by total EV managed by PE firms, with €304B under management. To give you a sense of the region's pulling power, some leading firms like Permira and Advent International allocate over 30% of their European assets to the DACH market.
Last but not least, the region is the top choice for many B2B SaaS companies wishing to expand into Europe, and its robust ecosystem is setting the pace for innovation and growth.
🔎 The 100 B2B SaaS DACH Companies Mapped
We analyzed 100 B2B SaaS companies in the DACH region with 200–1,000 FTEs, each backed by at least $10 million in venture capital or by private equity. We tried to map the full leadership market to provide a representative sample and identified 269 individuals at C- and VP-level across Sales, Marketing, Customer Success, and Revenue Operations. We excluded Head-of and Manager-level positions to maintain a clear focus on senior commercial leadership.
We also chose to exclude Customer Support roles. Unlike Customer Success, which drives onboarding, product adoption, and expansion, Customer Support is primarily a post-sale function. It handles break-fix issues and product-use inquiries, playing a key role in customer satisfaction but not directly contributing to growth. As such, we’ve classified Customer Support outside the core GTM organization.
👥 A Stark Gender Gap
79.9% of all GTM leaders and 85.7% of the C-level are male.
Female leaders are most represented in marketing, making up 37.1% of leadership roles. In contrast, their presence drops to around 20% in customer success and revenue. The gap is the starkest in sales, where women account for just 8.6%.
It aligns with previous findings, underscoring the underrepresentation of women in GTM leadership roles, particularly within B2B sales contexts.
📍 How Many are German Speakers and Where Do they Come From?
Language, proximity, and market familiarity shape the talent pool for GTM leadership in the DACH region, and the numbers prove it.
76.2% come from within DACH, with 64.7% being Germans.
63.2% of leaders are employed by companies that match their nationality.
Note: We also examined where companies source their leadership talent from. Instead of simply mapping leaders' current locations, which often just mirrors the company's headquarters*, we focused on the origins of that talent. This approach provides deeper insight into how companies cast their nets to find the right leaders.
*~50% of the companies are headquartered in Berlin, Munich, Zurich, or Vienna, while the others are located across the DACH region.
86.2% of leaders joined from companies already based in DACH. Unlike markets where capital, ideas, and talent are concentrated in a major city, the DACH ecosystem thrives across multiple innovation hubs. According to Dealroom, 13 cities across DACH are home to unicorns, compared to 11 in England and just 4 in France.
Berlin and Munich stand out, accounting for 37% of total leaders’ prior workplaces.
45.7% of leaders have worked outside the DACH region previously at some point in their career, where international hubs like Boston, New York, and Dublin stand out, accounting for 8%, 13.5%, and 13.5% respectively of leaders’ previous work locations.
While this local focus helps build strong initial traction, it can later become a constraint on international expansion. As companies scale, continuing to prioritize German-speaking individuals with limited leadership experience outside Germany, Austria, or Switzerland may limit access to global talent and slow down growth into non-German markets. There’s clearly untapped potential in broadening that lens. Importing talent from the rest of Europe, Asia, or the U.S., which alone accounts for 44% of the global SaaS market, could offer DACH-based companies another string to their bow in scaling internationally.
🧑💼 Role Distribution
We see a clear lean toward the Sales function, which represents 34.6% of the total leadership mapped, followed by Marketing (26%), Revenue (20.4%), and Customer Success (19%).
12% of the companies only have or had a Sales leader at the VP or C-level, with no equivalent leadership in Customer Success, Marketing, or Revenue functions. This clearly underscores the primary focus on new customer acquisition at this stage, with Sales leaders often additionally overseeing Marketing responsibilities. Interestingly, these 12% of companies were distributed across the whole growth curve of the 200-1000 FTE range.
In our sample, CROs outnumber VP/SVPs of Revenue. We assume this is largely because overseeing all revenue is a very broad scope, typically requiring a highly experienced leader.
📊 C-level Leadership Presence
36% of the companies we analyzed had no C-level GTM leadership at all.
Among those that do/did have C-level commercial roles, the CRO is the most common appointment, present in 29% of companies. Following closely are CCOs at 27% and CMOs at 21%.
The Chief Customer Officer remains the rarest title, appearing in just 13% of companies. That figure highlights a broader under-investment in customer-focused leadership during the scale-up phase.
This data doesn’t just reveal who’s in the room. It shows which voices are missing. As the product matures, investments shift toward building out GTM functions, particularly in Sales, Marketing, and Revenue Operations. Conversely, Customer Success, while crucial to retention and long-term value, often remains underrepresented at the executive level. During the scale-up phase, it’s far more common to see a VP leading Customer Success than a dedicated Chief Customer Officer. GTM leadership still reflects traditional priorities: growth first, retention second.
📈 Years of Experience to the Top
GTM leaders have highly experienced profiles, boasting an average of 16.5 years of professional experience before joining their company.
VPs average 15.1 years of work experience before joining, and SVPs bring in slightly more, averaging 15.7 years.
C-level executives are the most experienced, with an average of 18.5 years before joining their company.
We attribute the gap in average experience between VPs of Revenue (lowest among VPs) and CROs (highest among C-level leaders) to the nature of the role and the size of the company. While the VP of Revenue role implies ownership of all GTM functions, this scope is realistically manageable by less experienced leaders only in early-stage companies. Thus, you can only hold the VP Revenue title, with oversight of all three functions, in a smaller company or startup where it's more feasible to take on such broad responsibility with fewer years of experience. In contrast, leading all three functions at scale demands significant experience, which is why CROs tend to be the most seasoned executives.
⬆️ How Long Does it Take to Reach the C-level Title?
We also examined the average journey to a C-level title and found an average of 17.9 years to reach executive leadership.
Not exactly a shock, is it? CROs face a steeper climb, not just because of the role's scope, but because it requires broader knowledge and significant prior experience across the entire revenue engine (Sales, Marketing, Customer Success, Pricing, and Partnerships).
📜 The Professional Background of GTM Leaders
40.1% transitioned directly from a startup or scaleup environment, 48.3% from corporate settings, and 11.5% from other contexts, including small agencies, universities, or institutions.
Regarding industry backgrounds, 35.7% arrived directly from B2B SaaS companies, 20.4% from consulting or finance/banking sectors, and 10.8% from B2C industries.
Similar patterns emerge at the C-level specifically, where 40% came directly from B2B SaaS companies, 23.8% from consulting or finance/banking, and 10.5% from B2C industries.
Looking at career-wide experience, 64.7% of leaders have built prior startup or scaleup experience at some point in their career, 85.5% possess corporate experience, 53.5% have experience in both environments, and only 3% have experience in neither.
Most leaders bring a blend of startup and corporate experience because many transitioned from large organizations to fast-growing ventures at some point in their careers. What is interesting is the relatively low share of leaders who came directly from B2B SaaS companies.
SaaS didn’t exist two decades ago, and its early growth depended heavily on importing from diverse backgrounds. Today, that need hasn’t gone away. SaaS continues to grow, and the demand for talent remains just as strong. Of course, it remains to be seen how AI will change this trend.
📅 Timing - When Do Companies Hire GTM Leaders?
66.7% of initial C-level hires occurred during later funding stages (Series B or beyond).
24.2% of GTM leaders were appointed within three months before or after a funding round.
It's not uncommon for companies to make their first C-level GTM hire around the Series B stage. The cost of hiring top-tier executive talent is significant, and many companies choose to delay this investment until they enter a true scaling phase. Prior to that, they often rely on the experience of the founding team or more junior roles such as VPs, Heads, or Directors. We've also included a compensation benchmark for C-level leaders in B2B SaaS companies that you can find at the end of the study.
🤝 Internal Promotion vs. External Hiring
50.9% of leaders appointed into their role were internal moves.
Interestingly, we observed distinct hiring strategies for VP/SVP and C-level appointments. Companies are more likely to hire internally for VP and SVP roles, reflecting a preference for leaders who have grown within the organization and understand its culture and operations. In contrast, C-level positions are more frequently filled through external recruitment, likely indicating the involvement of executive search firms and a desire to bring in specialized experience at the top.
Speaking of … if you're looking for a commercial leader, our expert Ilya can help you 👉 ilya@thebigsearch.com
🚀 Career Trajectories of GTM Leaders
67.7% of appointments (both internal moves and external hirings) involved individuals moving up from more junior roles. For VP-level hires, they often transitioned from a Director position; for C-level roles, they typically came from a VP or SVP background.
More specifically, 67.4% of external hires got promoted upon joining their company.
26.4% of leaders came from similar seniority levels, with 62% of those being vertical moves within the same functional track.
5.9% of leaders (exclusively at the VP/SVP level) were downshifts, often from a previous C-level role.
There are several reasons why experienced leaders might choose to downshift in title, and as an executive search firm, we’ve seen a few that come up repeatedly:
Strategic company choice: Some leaders accept a VP/SVP title in a larger, faster-growing company because the new role offers greater scope, bigger budgets, and more impact, despite the lower title.
Org structure dynamics: In some organizations, the VP-level is the most senior role within the function, with C-level reserved for later-stage.
Lifestyle and flexibility: Others make a deliberate choice to reduce pressure, improve work-life balance, or focus on areas of the job they enjoy most. It’s a conscious, strategic lifestyle decision rather than a step backwards.
➡️ Lateral/Vertical Moves
While cross-functional mobility within GTM exists, most leaders still advance within their specific discipline, with only 21.2% of leaders transitioning into their role from a different GTM function (e.g., from Sales to Marketing).
Additionally, 15.6% entered directly from functions outside the GTM. These leaders often came from more generalist functions/roles, consulting, or from other C-suite positions like CEO, COO, or Chief Strategy Officer. Others transitioned from more specialized functions such as pricing, product, or analytics.
An exception to the broader trend is among Revenue leaders, with 50.9% coming from a previous Sales function. In scaling companies, Sales is typically the most established GTM function, making it a natural launchpad into Revenue leadership. Some former sales leaders bring a deep understanding of pipeline dynamics, forecasting accuracy, and deal execution at scale, having proven their ability to close $10M to eventually $50M–$100M+ in revenue. This hands-on experience makes them well-equipped to drive end-to-end revenue strategy.
⌛ Tenure - How Long Do Leaders Stay?
On average, leaders remain in their roles for 2.4 years
VP-level: Average Tenure of 2.1 years
C-level: Average Tenure of 2.8 years
Next, we examined whether previous experience in B2B SaaS had an impact on leadership tenure. C-level leaders coming directly from B2B SaaS companies stay an average of 3.3 years, while VP-level leaders with similar backgrounds average just 1.8 years in tenure.
~ 30% of both current and former GTM leaders remain in their roles for more than three years. Given the fast-paced nature of these growth-stage companies, this is a pretty good number, suggesting a good fit between leadership and organizational needs, as well as the ability of these companies to retain top talent over time.
No doubt, this also reflects cultural preferences for stability and structural employment practices such as strong labor protections and longer notice periods, contributing to longer tenures, especially in leadership roles.
👋 How Long Does it Take Before a C-Level Moves on?
While the previous section examined tenure across both current and former leaders, we wanted to zoom in specifically on those who have left their positions. Thus, we're only looking at the tenure of PAST C-level leaders. Our goal here is to clearly understand how long they typically stay in their roles before moving on.
We attribute CCOs' and CROs' longer tenures prior to departure to the nature of the German sales cycle, which is typically longer than its North American counterpart. German buyers tend to be risk-averse and prioritize stability, preferring stable, long-lasting products and services.
Yet, Chief Customer Officers have the shortest tenure, despite operating in a region where customer loyalty is considered stronger than in the U.S. While buyers may value long-term relationships, the internal prioritization of customer success roles still lags behind.
❌ GTM Leadership Churn Rate
Since 2020, 40.2% of leaders have left their roles, with an average annual churn rate of 9%.
40% were at the C-level.
48.8% were external hires.
68% transitioned from previously held junior roles.
64% didn't directly originate from B2B SaaS backgrounds.
These numbers reinforce our earlier findings, highlighting how important domain and industry expertise can be in influencing churn among leaders. Collectively, these insights emphasize the strategic importance of thoughtful executive hiring and onboarding practices.
Our findings also highlight the volatility and sensitivity of GTM leadership roles to external market disruptions. Since H2 2022, the SaaS market has gone through significant changes (valuation pressure, sales pressure, AI…), so it’s no wonder that the churn rate also spiked.
💶 Compensation Study: Who Wins What?
The Sales function offers the most competitive compensation at the C-level, with a median base salary of €250k and OTEs of €400k. At the VP-level, the Revenue function offers the highest compensation with a median base salary of €200k and OTEs of €350k.
Unsurprisingly, the Customer Success function offers the lowest compensation across both VP and C-level roles, with median base salaries of €150k and €160k, and OTEs of €198k and €230k, respectively.
This compensation snapshot highlights the perceived value of different functions during a company's scaling phase. There is a clear emphasis on customer acquisition, reflected in higher compensation for Sales roles, while customer retention receives comparatively less investment.
🥊 Conclusion: Key Takeaways
Experience Matters: On average, GTM leaders bring 16.5 years of experience to their roles. C-level hires top that with 18.5 years, underscoring the high bar for executive appointments.
Churn is High: Since 2020, 40.2% of GTM leaders have left their roles, with an annual churn rate of 9%. Notably, external hires and those without prior SaaS experience had the highest turnover.
Tenure is Shorter Than Expected: Leaders stay in their roles for just 2.4 years on average. VP-level leaders with prior SaaS experience stay even shorter—just 1.8 years.
Hiring is Local: 76.2% of leaders come from within DACH, and 63.2% work at companies matching their nationality. This local-first mindset may limit international growth potential.
Promotion Dominates: 50.9% of all leadership moves were internal promotions, and 67.7% of all appointments were step-ups in title—especially among VP and C-level hires.
Sales Still Rules: Sales accounts for 34.6% of GTM leadership roles and commands the highest compensation—€250K base / €400K OTE at C-level. In contrast, Customer Success has the lowest pay and shortest average tenure.
Gender Imbalance Persists: Only 20% of commercial leaders are women—and just 8.6% in Sales. Marketing shows the best gender balance at 37.1% female.
The dominance of internal promotions at the VP/SVP level, versus external hires at C-level, underscores a clear bifurcation in how companies manage succession: grow your own mid-level leaders, but look outside for executives
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