Gartner, Inc. (NYSE:IT) Q2 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Operator: And our next question coming from the line of Seth Weber with Wells Fargo.

Seth Weber: I wanted to ask just about the implied EBITDA margin raise for the year. Is that just a function of mix? Or is there something else that’s supporting the stronger margin outlook for the year?

Craig Safian: On the margins, as we’ve talked about, the margins can pop around a little bit from quarter to quarter, depending on spending trends and where the revenue is trending as well. And so, our margins were a little bit higher than we had initially anticipated in the first half of the year. And I’d say it’s really just a combination of revenue modestly exceeding our expectations in the first half and expenses modestly being a little bit below our expectations. Or said another way, we’re just more prudently managing our OpEx as we work our way through the year. So, again, margins can pop around. There’s no mega trends there, I would say, other than a little bit of modest revenue upside and us making sure that – again, we talked about, in our prepared remarks, really carefully calibrating our headcount levels and our OpEx levels to ensure that we deliver consistently strong margins.

Seth Weber: Just on the big ramp in the quota-bearing headcount, can you just talk to where you think you are from an efficiency perspective for the new hires? Are they kind of on track or any kind of metrics that you could call out as far as efficiency or productivity goes with the new hires?

Gene Hall: To your point, we’ve ramped up our sales force with the lowest number of opens we’ve had in a long time. And the talent that we’re hiring, if you look at kind of how we track the quality of the talent, is very, very high. And we ramped up hiring the most last year. So these people are starting to get a little bit of tenure under their belt. And we expect over the next three years, as they get up to full tenure, that actually the productivity will be very good. And we’re seeing the ramp we’d expect at this point.

Operator: And our next question coming from the line of Manav Patnaik with Barclays.

Manav Patnaik: Just on the margin front, Craig, I think on the call, you mentioned T&Es back to normal or something of that effect. So I was just curious, are we at those normalized levels where you’re talking about kind of the long term margin being in the low 20s? Or is there more normalization to occur still overall with all the different moving pieces?

Craig Safian: We are back to what we believe to be roughly the new normal from both T&E perspective. And last year, in particular, we were playing catch-up on hiring throughout the course of the year. And so, as you look at our operating expenses now, I think we’re at pretty “normal level” of operating expenses. And so, what we’re looking at from Q2 through the end of this year is normal seasonality from an OpEx perspective with our new normal levels of T&E minus headcount growth and make sure that we’re investing for the future, et cetera, kind of baked in. So I think it is a good, normalized, if you will, OpEx level that we’re working off of this year.

Manav Patnaik: Just on the second half, a little bit more specifically, can you just talk about, I suppose, the hiring expectations. It may be even just on the cost side, it seems a little conservative, but maybe there’s some things we’re missing here.