From being a bikini athlete to becoming a Senior National Account Manager at Indeed, Daniela Stamm shares her story of ups and downs, and how a positive mind set helped her overcome obstacles.

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Many might be surprised to know this, but Daniela’s background is in fitness – in fact she is a certified gymnastics coach and was an active bodybuilder and award winning bikini athlete. She has worked in the fitness industry for several years, even as a managing partner of two fitness studios. Fitness is her passion, however back then it was also her profession. 

“I was often giving fitness classes in the evening, although I spent all day in the office taking care of the business matters. This led to the decision to drop out of the business,” Daniela shares. “What I wanted was a job that I considered to be a ‘normal job’ in an office, working from 9 to 5. So I got my first job in sales in an international chain for fitness studios.

Later, I turned my back on the fitness industry and was able to demonstrate my sales talent in a cargo company.”

After a few years, the cargo company went through an internal restructuring process and as a result Daniela lost her job. “It was the first time that I was laid off and I was in shock.” Nevertheless, during that time, she took some time for herself to reflect on what happened and decided to reposition herself and get back on her feet.

“This is something that I learned from my life as an athlete. If you fail, you have to come up with a plan instead of burying your head in the sand. You have to be consistent and never lose sight of the goal that you pursue and so I used this experience to pick myself back up.”

Daniela knew of Indeed as a jobsite but wasn’t fully aware that they offered jobs inside Indeed too. She started scrolling through the site looking for anything but sales roles as she wanted to begin something completely different. “I decided to see the job loss as an opportunity for a new start, outside of sales.”

But regardless of her search criteria, there was one job advert that constantly popped up: Account Executive for Indeed. 

“I kept seeing the job over and over and thought: ‘What I need is a new job, maybe this is a sign.’ So I decided to apply.” Daniela didn’t hesitate any longer and submitted her CV. She instantly received a call from the recruiter, and two weeks later it was her first day as Account Executive at Indeed! Everything happened very quickly and it was in April 2016 that she found herself in Dublin for the onboarding and training process.

“I was super excited to take myself to new heights with my new job at Indeed, but I began to struggle right away,”

Daniela admits. “The training sessions in Dublin were conducted in English and my English back then was poor. There was loads of Indeed terminology and sales jargon that made it even harder for me to follow. On top of that, I was overwhelmed with all the different Indeed products and their technical comprehension.”

Back in Düsseldorf, she was determined to defy the initial difficulties and put into practice  what she had learned in Dublin. Daniela had the full support of her team and a colleague was assigned to her as a buddy to take care of onboarding and training. “Without my team I wouldn’t be here today.” Daniela reckons. “We practiced the course of the sales dialogue over and over again. We supported and motivated each other, even recorded ourselves on video,” she remembers.

Shortly after, she realised that clients were responding positively when she called. “Suddenly I was able to sell them our sponsored jobs and the other products,” Daniela says. “It gave me a real lift and I thought, ‘Wow, I can do it after all!’”

The most important learning for Daniela from this time:

“Give yourself time. Even for experienced sales reps like me, it was a process. It took me about six weeks to master the products well enough to be successful in sales.”

“Initially my plan was to be a sales director one day, but over time I was more and more fascinated by becoming a National Account Manager,” she says. “The large customers and enterprise accounts seemed to be exciting and I liked the idea to negotiate with decision makers on a top level and to handle huge sums of money.

I was ready for a new challenge and applied as National Account Manager.”

That was exactly two years after Daniela’s first start date at Indeed in April 2018. Another year and a half later she was promoted again and is now a Senior National Account Manager. She believes a big part of what has really helped her along the way was the mindset of an athlete.

 “What matters is to be consistent when it comes to pursuing a goal and not to be discouraged by setbacks. Nevertheless, fitness is now just a hobby for me on the side.” she shares.

“My top priority is my job at Indeed. Indeed is my everything and means the world to me. I love my job and that’s the reason why I am so successful.”

Interested in becoming an Indeedian? Check out our open roles on www.indeed.jobs

Read more Indeedian stories on our #insideindeed culture blog.