Preparing for an interview at Xero requires a balance of strategic sales preparation and cultural alignment. You should focus on demonstrating a human-centric, consultative approach to sales rather than a high-pressure, transactional style.

Consultative Selling & Discovery – Xero values sales professionals who prioritize listening over talking. You must demonstrate a structured methodology for asking open-ended questions, identifying operational friction points, and mapping product features directly to business outcomes.

Resilience & Objection Handling – During roleplays and presentations, interviewers will deliberately push back, challenge your assertions, and ask difficult questions. They are evaluating your composure, active listening, and ability to pivot without becoming defensive.

Product & Technical Aptitude – You do not need to be a certified accountant, but you must show a strong willingness and capacity to learn Xero's platform. Showing familiarity with cloud-based accounting ecosystems and partner-led sales models is highly advantageous.

Cultural Alignment & Values – Xero looks for team members who embody their core values: Human, Challenge, Beautiful, Easy, and Initiative. Be prepared to share examples of how you have supported teammates, challenged the status quo constructively, and simplified complex processes for clients.

The interview process at Xero is designed to be highly interactive, thorough, and collaborative. It typically spans several weeks and moves through multiple stages, ensuring both you and the hiring team can evaluate mutual fit. The process emphasizes real-world scenarios, including practical roleplays and sales presentations.

You can expect a supportive and warm atmosphere from the recruiting team, who will often guide you through each step. However, the assessments themselves are rigorous, simulating the actual pressure and environment of pitching to busy accounting partners and business owners.

The visual timeline above outlines the typical progression from the initial recruiter screen to the final leadership conversation. Candidates should use this roadmap to pace their preparation, focusing first on high-level experience and gradually shifting attention to product research and presentation design as they advance. Note that while the sequence remains consistent, the exact format of the sales presentation may vary slightly based on the seniority of the role and the target region.

To succeed in the Xero hiring process, you must excel in three core evaluation areas that directly mirror the daily responsibilities of an Account Executive.

Consultative Discovery & Instantaneous Roleplay

This stage evaluates your ability to think on your feet, build rapport quickly, and execute a structured discovery process under pressure.

Be ready to go over:

• Active Listening – Confirming your understanding of the prospect's pain points before proposing any solutions.
• Open-Ended Questioning – Asking deep, probing questions about workflows, software integrations, and business goals.
• Value Mapping – Connecting Xero’s features (like automated bank feeds or cloud accessibility) directly to the prospect's specific challenges.
• Advanced concepts (less common) – Multi-stakeholder alignment, partner-channel dynamics, and co-selling with accounting partners.

Example questions or scenarios:

• "An interviewer stops you mid-conversation and says, 'Let's do a quick roleplay. I am a traditional accountant who has used the same desktop software for 15 years. Convince me to spend 30 minutes looking at Xero.'"
• "How do you handle a prospect who refuses to answer discovery questions and demands to see the pricing sheet immediately?"

Product Presentation & Deck Design

For mid-to-senior roles, you will be required to build a slide deck and deliver a formal sales presentation based on a Xero product or a simulated customer scenario.

Be ready to go over:

• Visual Clarity & Structure – Creating a clean, professional deck that flows logically from problem identification to solution.
• Presentation Flow – Managing your time effectively to ensure you leave room for questions and a clear call to action.
• Design Decisions – Explaining why you structured the presentation the way you did and how your design choices support the narrative.

Example questions or scenarios:

• "Present a 15-minute deck demonstrating how Xero's invoicing and payment solutions can solve cash flow issues for a trade business."
• "Why did you choose to highlight the reporting features over the inventory management tool in this specific slide?"

Objection Handling & Resilience under Pressure

During your presentations and mock sales calls, panel members will adopt client personas and challenge your pitch. This evaluates your emotional intelligence and resilience.

Be ready to go over:

• De-escalation Techniques – Acknowledging the client's concern calmly before addressing it.
• Reframing – Turning a perceived product limitation or pricing concern into a strategic advantage.
• Confidence and Poise – Maintaining a professional, helpful demeanor even when faced with repetitive or challenging objections.

Example questions or scenarios:

• "Your presentation is interrupted with: 'We tried cloud software before and it was a security nightmare. Why should we trust Xero with our clients' sensitive financial data?'"
• "How do you respond when a panelist repeatedly rejects your answers and continues to push back on the same objection?"

As an Account Executive at Xero, your primary responsibility is to drive revenue growth by bringing new partners and customers into the Xero ecosystem. This involves a mix of proactive outbound sales, partner enablement, and strategic account management.

You will spend a significant portion of your time engaging with accounting and bookkeeping firms. Your goal is to help these partners understand how scaling their practice on Xero can improve their own operational efficiency and unlock new advisory revenue streams. This requires you to act as a trusted business advisor rather than just a software vendor.

Collaboration is central to this role. You will work closely with Partner Consultants, who provide technical product expertise during complex implementations, as well as Customer Success teams to ensure smooth onboarding. Additionally, you will feed market insights back to product and marketing teams to help shape future product updates and campaigns.

Your performance will be measured against key metrics, including new partner acquisition, subscriber growth, retention rates, and pipeline generation. This is a dynamic position that demands strong self-motivation, excellent organizational skills, and a genuine passion for supporting the small business community.

Successful candidates for the Account Executive position must demonstrate a strong track record of sales performance, excellent communication skills, and alignment with the collaborative culture of Xero.

• Must-have skills

  • Proven experience in B2B SaaS sales, ideally within a consultative or solution-selling framework.
  • Strong presentation skills, with demonstrated experience creating and delivering customized slide decks to business owners or executive stakeholders.
  • Excellent active listening and discovery skills, with a proven ability to uncover complex business pain points.
  • Resilience and the ability to handle objections and high-pressure situations with composure.

• Nice-to-have skills

  • Direct experience using, selling, or teaching Xero or other cloud-based financial software.
  • Familiarity with the accounting, bookkeeping, or financial services industry.
  • Experience managing sales cycles within a partner-led or channel sales model.
  • Strong numerical literacy, with the ability to confidently discuss financial metrics, KPIs, and return on investment (ROI).