Pipeline anxiety is real—but it's not permanent.

The current market is hitting every revenue department—sales, marketing, and customer success alike. Between layoffs, budget cuts, and aggressive goals that are harder and harder to reach, revenue teams face many concerns.

This creates pipeline anxiety across revenue teams.

Pipeline anxiety has existed for years. Take this post from Frida Ahrenby, CMO at GetAccept, for example:

Revenue leaders have dealt with pipeline anxiety for years. Sales and marketing teams know stretch goals well.

The difference here is the goals many of us set for our teams in January 2022 have become impossible to reach in some cases. They're impossible-to-reach goals in some cases. That's what makes pipeline anxiety so acute right now—it's not just pressure, it's a gap between targets and reality.

Leaders must keep revenue goals in perspective

When leaders misjudge what's possible, they add pressure on teams to hit unreachable targets.

Executives and leaders want to know how other companies are doing. Right now, comparables are hard to find.

I recently talked to a group of other CEOs, and they all report the same:

• Decrease in the pipeline

• Decrease in bookings

• Increased churn

And sometimes, all we need to know to get rid of that feeling of helplessness is others share our struggles right now. The conversations reminded me of Y Combinator group office hours—15-minute meetings that became candid peer support sessions.

As with any major market shift, we're seeing overcorrection—and we're in that phase now.

The biggest source of pipeline anxiety right now is the difference between expectations and what's achievable

Pipeline anxiety often comes from not knowing where to focus. When you can identify which accounts are showing real buying signals and coordinate your team's outreach around those signals, you replace anxiety with clarity and action.

And so, it's important for leaders to step up and fill in the gaps between expectation and reality and prioritize efficient growth over growth at all costs.

Our goal at UserGems is to make sales and marketing more effective and less stressful.

That's why it's especially important for us to address pipeline anxiety right now: to make a hard situation less stressful, and to help teams find sustainable ways to hit their targets.

Markets stabilize. Teams adapt. This phase will pass. As we navigate this market, we'll share the insights and playbooks that help you reach your revenue goals. Now is the time to adapt and build resilience.

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