I think a lot of people here don't realize how lucrative the sales roles in tech companies are - if you're good at it. Top sales reps often make more than than top level managers.
I estimate the top sales people are the highest compensated people in a company. It is true meritocracy, however. You are judged on a single metric more or less and the bottom of the group is dismissed without second thought.
You can make a great living on the engineer side of the operation and it's steady but you'll never see the highs of the top sales people even when you're at a point with stock and salary being many hundreds of thousands.
It's not a life for me but I have nothing but respect for the effort, time and relationship building great sales people put in. It's a hard, competitive ladder but if you make it work you'll hit high 6 figures and at times 7 figures for many years.
