SDR vs AE: who should do what in a small sales team

Define roles around the buyer's journey

A sales development representative usually focuses on finding suitable accounts, starting conversations and establishing whether an initial meeting makes sense. An account executive usually owns deeper discovery, solution evaluation, commercial discussions and closing.

These are operating choices rather than rules every company must follow. In a small team, one person may perform both jobs, but each activity still needs an owner and a clear standard.

Keep early qualification proportionate

The SDR should establish enough context to justify the next conversation without running a full purchasing assessment on an interruption call. Confirm account fit, relevant responsibility, a plausible business issue and agreement on the meeting purpose.

The AE should validate those assumptions and explore business impact, stakeholders, constraints and the decision process. Avoid making the buyer repeat basic information that the SDR has already captured accurately.

Write a working agreement

Agree who owns account selection, contact research, outreach, scheduling, preparation and post-meeting updates. Define how quickly a booked meeting should be reviewed and who handles rescheduling.

Specify what happens when an opportunity becomes inactive or returns to nurture. Without this rule, the SDR and AE may either contact the same buyer independently or each assume the other is following up.

• Assign account and contact ownership
• Define initial meeting criteria
• Set handoff requirements
• Assign rescheduling responsibility
• Agree on recycling and nurture rules

Measure cooperation rather than competing totals

Review SDR activity together with held meetings, acceptance feedback and downstream opportunity quality. Evaluate the AE's follow-through as well, because a strong handoff cannot compensate for an unprepared meeting.

Do not attribute every lost opportunity to prospecting quality or every weak month to AE execution. Inspect the evidence by stage and adjust the shared process before changing compensation or adding another role.