S5E11 - JR Butler - Transitioning to Sales with Purpose and Identity

Greetings, everybody. Welcome to episode 11 of season five. It's been five seasons of the surf and sales podcast. 400 plus episodes. I think we're getting close to 500. My partner in crime, Scott Lease, is not here today. He had a family matter to attend to. But I am excited, really excited for this conversation. I hope he is too. Not Scott. He's not here. But welcoming the CEO and founder of the Shift Group, Junior Butler. Junior thanks for coming on, man. I appreciate it, Richard.

Thanks for having me. I'm really, I am really excited about this conversation as well.

Yeah, let's give people some context. So what is Shift Group? What do y' all do? What are the pains you solve? Let's let people understand where you're coming from as we chat.

Yeah, we, we, we kind of solve. We solve two big, big pains. Athlete and veteran transition to the real world and sales hiring, particularly early career sales hiring. So what we have is we have a platform that helps athletes and veterans transition post uniform, do some self discovery, do some career discovery, do some career upskilling, and get access to companies that understand the value they bring to corporate America without corporate experience.

And then we have a platform. That same platform allows these folks to create profiles. And then we have about 200 companies that log in on a weekly basis and they can actually interact with these, with these candidates and watch videos of them showing the skills that we've trained. We've trained them on that.

That's amazing. So go ahead. Sorry I interrupted.

I was, I was just going to say, you know, you asked like, what problems do we solve? Yeah, the transition is, is very painful. I went through it myself as an athlete. I have many friends and family members that have been through it as a veteran.

And, you know, having somewhere where you can kind of re. Rediscover who you are when you're. When you're not in uniform and understand where that's applicable in corporate America. And then on the, on the entry level sales hiring, I've hired thousands of sales reps. I just think, you know, an interview and a resume is really hard to dig in on someone's intangible characteristics. So, yeah, what we've seen is faster ramp time and lower attrition in terms of the problems that we solve on that side of the market.

Well, that's cool. I also, you know, the other thing I think you're helping, you know, and I love that it's athletes and service members.

Is you're skilling them up, right? Like, you're not just sort of a Recruiting agency. So when you. Well, let's. Let's come back to what kind of things do you teach them? But I want to dig in a little bit on that mindset. Right. First of all, what kind of athlete are you? What. What did you transition from?

I was a Division 1 college athlete. I played ice hockey.

Okay, gotcha. Okay. Well, of course you're from Boston. Of course you would. You would play ice hockey.

Do you have all your teeth or just some of them?

It looks like I have all my teeth. Whether or not which ones are real and which ones are fake is going to stay between me and my dentist.

There you go. That's awesome. We should. We should. We should talk about, you know, how do you pick a fight? So. And I'll go on a side note, did you watch the thing on Netflix about the Danbury Trashers? That was like, oh, my God, that was the best people. If you don't know, it's. It's. It's literally like this alleged Mafia guy buying a. I wouldn't even call it a farm team, like a private team. And he just. You know, they're called the Trashers, and they were just brutal. It was hilarious.

So I had multiple friends on that team, actually. So all those stories are very, very true.

Yes. That's awesome. All right. We'll leave it at that, because we don't. We don't need the FBI rating us.

So. What. So talk about that transition, though, right? Like, what is. What's the hard part? I mean, there's more than one, whether, you know, I'd love to hear from both the angle of a. Of a athlete and then similarities or differences with someone coming out of the service. What's the mental game they have to sort of pill they have to swallow or what is that? Generally, there's.

There's two sides that are tough to the transition. There's the internal and the external. And an internal is, like, really deep. Really deep stuff. Like, it. It's about purpose and identity. For me and what I've seen with. With my friends that either played sports at a high level or served in the military, your purpose is, like, really, like. Like, much bigger than yourself when you're competing at that level. Right. Like, your. Your purpose is to be the best athlete you can be. In the case of veterans, your purpose is to serve the country and fight for our freedoms. Like, that's. That's pretty big stuff. Right? And a lot of your identity gets tied up into what it takes to be great at those things. So that's like, the internal side of it, that. And when you lose the uniform, you lose that. Like, you can't. If you're not a soldier anymore, you can't say, your purpose is to fight for our country, Right? If you. If you're not an athlete anymore, you can't say, my purpose is to. Is to, you know, play in the NHL or whatever.

And all the stuff that comes with the identity side of that, that's the internal. That's really hard. We've figured out some good ways to kind of pull that out of people. The external is why we actually focused specifically on sales. Because what you miss is you miss team camaraderie, right? You miss. You miss being accountable to other people. Like, that's. I think when we talk to former athletes and former veterans and we. We ask them, like, what's your best memory from your sports career, your military career? Almost inevitably they all say, I. I miss my teammates. Right? And that. That applies in the military, and it applies in sports. And you miss having to be. Having to show up every day, be prepared and execute because you're doing it not just for yourself, not just for your bigger purpose, but because of the person sitting next to you. And then there's. There's all the other stuff, right? There's the competition of it, right? Like getting better than your peers and being compared to your peers on a depth chart every single day. And then I think generally.

You look at, you know, sports and military have a lot in common in the sense that they're. They're really meritocracy. It's like you rise through the ranks in sports, in the military, based off your development of skills, your effort, and the results that you can drive only like nothing else really matters. So they miss that. They miss being able to control their own destiny and having that pressure to perform. So, like, those two internal, external things are really the. The hard part of when you wake up one day after, in my case, 24 years of somebody asked me who I was. I was a hockey player. And then one day you wake up and. And you can't say that anymore. It is. It is brutal experience.

Yeah. And because it's interesting too, right? Like, you talk about, you know, the. The missing of teams and teamwork. You talk about being compared, right? And so as a salesperson, right. We naturally think, oh, well, there's a leaderboard and there's all these things, and. And I'm, you know, I'm kind of like, oh, my God. People don't realize that. Like, they don't get that there's so much of these things is, is and is it when you share this with them, do they get it? Do they like, oh, cool, I didn't know that. And that helped. Like, what's their response?

Yeah, I think, you know, sales. Sales is interesting. Like for the most part, I would say, minus a little blip kind of post Covid sales did has done a really bad job on, on primary.

Right.

Like when we, when, when you talk to the average human being, whether they're 22 year old, you know, new to work person or a 45 year old person that's like a teacher, when you say the word sales and you tell them what's the first thing that comes into your head? The first thing inevitably is a used car salesman.

Right.

They're thinking high pressure tactics, lying and pitching products.

Yeah.

So that's the stigma that almost 90% of the folks that sign up for our program come in with. So we have to, we have to do a good job of drawing the parallels between the environment that you were in and the environment that you would be in if you chose the sales profession.

Yeah.

We also have to show them why the characteristics they developed in their experience in uniform is actually going to serve them really well and in this new environment. Yeah.

It's funny, I've been preaching this the last couple of weeks. Like, you know, you know, you're right. Like the mindset that we have is like, so what do you do? Oh, I'm a doctor, I'm a lawyer. And you're like, I'm in sales. Right. And I, and I, you know, I've, you know, I need to, I, if I haven't sent you one, I'll send you my book. But the first chapter is called yes, I'm in sales. And, and it's, you know, it's interesting. You could go and you could be at a party and you could talk to someone and they can say they're a doctor or lawyer and it'll be like, oh, you're just like me junior, you're in sales. Right. And lawyers will be like, I'm not in sales. I'm like, are you kidding me? What are you talking about? You're selling the judge, the jury, you're selling your client. Like, don't tell me like that. And the same thing with doctors. Like, don't tell me you're not in sales. Don't tell me the hospital's not looking at how much you bill on a regular basis. Don't give us that stuff. Right. And, and it's kind of like, you know, and then on top of that, I love to turn around and tell them, like, by the way, I have more positive effect on the entire world than you ever will.

Right, right.

I, I help, I help hundreds and thousands of peoples improve their livelihood. Sure. If you're a brain surgeon, I want you. You're that smart, I'll take you. But don't sit here and pretend like you're that much better. Like, that's. So I've gotten, I've gotten very angry about this topic myself. And I don't know, you know, the whole used car salesman. Best I can trace it to is back to the Grapes of Wrath by Steinbeck. I read a couple of years ago, reread it, and there's a whole chapter dedicated to the car salesman trying to sell all these horrible cars with terrible tires to get everybody to go from Oklahoma to California. And I'm like, oh, well, if everybody in America's read that book, right? Because we were forced to, like, that's where that stigma comes from.

So I, I, I think it's that. And I, and I do think, like, listen, like, 30 years ago, Richard, like, you had this, you had this asymmetry of information where a seller had access to a lot more information than a buyer did. Right. And over the last 30 years, it's actually kind of gone the other way, where the buyer typically comes into the conversation with more information than you do. So your job is to really consult and understand, like, one, what are you trying to accomplish? And like, how are you, what information are you pulling from and what are you getting from that information? And I'm an expert in my solution. Let me tell you, like, what you should be paying attention to. You're truly now a consultant. And I don't care if you're selling, I don't care if you're selling software or you're selling cars. Like, the person who walks on the car lot now knows a lot more than they did 20 years ago. You know what I mean?

Yeah, yeah. And I agree. You know, in that B2C world. Right. In the B2B world, though, I feel like we have, and again, it depends on the company you're working for, but we have probably more access to more information about our buyers than they have about us. Right. And it's not to say they couldn't get that information. We're just trained to have that information. Right. There's so many tools out there. There's so many. You know, even before AI, there were, you know, personnel analysis of your LinkedIn profile. So. And it would tell you how to communicate with someone. So there's actually more out there. I think the, the challenge I'm seeing, and I'd love your opinion, is there's so much information.

That the, the sales team and even the sales leaders, through no fault of their own, they don't know how to actually use that information. Right. I, I lost a deal the other day to someone who sales trainer is going to do a disc profile. And I'm like, oh, that's cool. I, you know, I'm like, by the way, as a manager, are they teaching you how to interpret an I versus a D and how to negotiate a high I versus a high D. Right. Or an S? They're like, no. And I'm like, then what do you need the personality test for? You can go get it online. Like, like, don't, like, like. But again, that's through no fault, you know, that's, you know, in the startup world where you and I swim the most. Right. At least I think you're in the startup world the most.

Yeah, we're, we're definitely heavily weighted towards the startup world. Yeah, definitely. We also have the big publicly traded software company.

Yeah, yeah. You know, they don't invest in people skills training. Right. You know, the had an advisor once tell me the, the soft skills or the hard skills, nobody teaches you that, you know. You know, and I would assume, I'll ask you this question.

What are the challenges you think that top rep has to go through internally and externally when they become a leader and a manager? Because I would assume it's a, it's a similar experience to someone transitioning into sales, but nobody's training us on this. Like do you, and do you guys focus on that? Like do you focus on like not just salespeople, but you know, we can help them career pathing wise too.

Oh yeah, yeah, we do a lot of career pathing stuff. We have a lot of like, we've only been around for two years, but we have about eight or nine folks that went through our program, you know, in the last 18 months that are now BDR managers and we have some training around that. And like, to answer your question, I went through that myself. I was a individual, like a top individual contributor for seven or eight years before I got my first leadership position. And the biggest challenge I had was like, super rep Itis Richard. Right. Where it's like, I'm just, I'm just going to like, I know how to do this. Just let me do this. Like I got it. I got it. Right? Like, I got this deal. And that's not leadership, right? Like, that's not, that's not what you're supposed to be doing. You're supposed to be like, you know, not to use an old cliche, you're supposed to be teaching them how to fish, not giving them a. And I, and I think any top rep that I've ever, that I've ever promoted into leadership, that's the first and hardest thing to get over, is to realize, like, your job is not to super rep every deal. Your job is to turn your reps into super reps, essentially. Right? Like, you got to let them fail. You got to, you've got to, like, put them in uncomfortable situations. Like, that's how they're going to learn. And you have to be okay doing that. And I think it's hard.

I love that. Yeah, I agree. Super repitis. That's pretty. If you haven't written about that, please do. Like, that's a, That's a good, That's a good topic. Like, I know you're. I want to talk to you about social and building your brand in a second, but that's a good one if you haven't done that. And by the way, people, if you haven't followed Junior Butler on LinkedIn, you should. His content's great, it's humorous, it's fun, and he's got a tremendous following. So why did you choose these two niches? Was it just, you know, I get the idea from the athlete side because that, that speaks to you.

What made you decide and, you know, thank you for doing this, you know, helping, helping the people coming out of the service. Where did that come from?

I think similar to sports, like, it's, it's close to me personally and like my, I have two grandfathers that served Right. And, and that, and that. But I also, being from the area of Massachusetts that I am, I had a lot of friends that enlisted and out of high school. So when I was getting out of sports at 24, 25, they were getting out of the military. Right. And, and this is like post 9 11, so most of these folks saw combat. And I just, I saw so many similarities in two things in, in the characteristics that we had developed while we were in uniform, but also the pain of, the pain of that transition. Right. Like, I've been sober for 13 years and a lot of the issues I had with substance abuse were related to the personal stuff I was going through in my transition. And I had friends that dealt with the same thing. Some of them came out like I did, stronger and better and sober. Some of them, like, you know, I got cards on my, in my car from their funeral. Know what I mean? So, like, that, that was what really drove me. And, and candidly, at the core of it, Richard, it's, it's because I do believe there's a lot of characteristics shared in common between people who serve in the military and people who play elite sports.

Oh, I totally agree with you. I, I was, I was curious to, to how you got to that. And, you know, thank you to your friends and, and I'm sorry for those who have struggled so much. You know, I'm, I, I don't, you know, I don't, you know, we've slowly gotten to know each other. I'm a big mental health guy. And, you know, for those listening and even for you, the 20, 23, 24 state of mental health and sales report is officially out.

So it's free. So anybody who's looking at that, and you know, to a certain extent, you know, we did the survey, sorry for the plug, but not really sorry, you know, we asked questions like this, you know, hey, Junior, you know, when you were at peak performance, how was your manager helping you? Right? So we were trying to measure where's the peak performance coming from? Rather than.

Okay, so what do you wish your manager did? Kind of stuff, right? And so when people were at their peak performance, we saw things like their leaders were vulnerable. That doesn't mean coming in and talking about your substance abuse issue. That means coming in and saying, hey, I just recorded my gone call team. You tell me what I could have done better. Like, that's vulnerability, right? That's leadership, right? But we talked about that. We talked about certain level of autonomy, talking about, you know, having purpose. One of the key pieces you talk about. So anyway, so. And mental health is, it's actually gotten worse the last three years. The study is showing that about 70% of salespeople are struggling. You know, so, so feel free to, to digest that one. Anybody, please, and give us your feedback on it, but appreciate you doing that. Opposite question for you.

You know, you found your niche, you found the athletes, you found the, the service people, right? Discipline, you know, competitive, fiery spirit. Need to win, have to win. Sometimes it's actually life threatening to not win.

What's your approach? And, and if you're like, well, I don't really spend time there, what about the introverts? You know, the last few years we've been talking, you hear people Saying, hey, you know what? Not everybody has to be an athlete. Not everybody has to have that, that level of external fire. It doesn't mean it doesn't exist. Right. What have you learned about, or do you know about these introverts sort of moving into that space and maybe are some of these athletes and military people actually introverts underneath it all?

Oh, yeah. Oh yeah, for sure. I mean, what's really cool that we get exposed to is like the, the difference in personalities across sports, across positions, across military branches, because across like MOS's in the military, which is like your specialty.

Like what's mos? Because, you know, we're, we don't know these acronyms, you know. What's mos?

Military Operating Specialist or something.

Yeah, it's, it's, it stands for like the role or job someone had. I actually don't even know what MOS stands for.

But it's, it's.

Anyway, go on. Sorry, go ahead.

So, yeah, military operate, Military operating specialty.

Yeah, there you go. Yep.

But to answer your question, like we see the whole entire spectrum of, of different personality types and things like this. I actually, and I'm sure you could agree with me on this, Richard, some of my best reps I've ever had were introverted people.

Totally.

You know, because, because with it, with introversion usually comes empathy and usually comes curiosity because they're just kind of paying attention, like they're just kind of watching people. Right.

Yep.

So what, what we find ultimately like beyond the, there's like a level below personality that's really about like, like mindset and like what drives you. So if you're driven specifically in sales, I think, you know, being motivated to make a lot of money is going to drive you to get good at what you need to get good at in order to do that.

Yeah.

So even if you're introverted, you're going to suck it up. You're going to get in front of a room and do a presentation and then you're going to learn, like me and you can both close, you know, a big seven figure deal. You're going to approach it differently than I'm going to approach it because we're different people. But at the end of the day, as long as we're driving, the result that we need to drive, that's really what matters, both for us internally in terms of hitting our number, but also for the client. So I think it's about my opinion and I manage many introverts. It's like me trying to figure out like why Is it important for you to close this deal? Like, what matters to you? Do you want to be a leader someday? Do you? Like, I grew up very blue collar. I was always very financially motivated because I didn't grow up with a lot. So if my leader understood that at my core, that's how they're going to talk to me, that's how they're going to kind of point me in the right direction. So I think, you know, personality traits aside, that, that internal why is really what we try to pull out of every kid that works through our program.

That's great. That's great. What are off the top of your head? You know, if, if I'm for those who are leaders, right. Or, or maybe even those early stage founders doing founder led sales, what are one or two things I should be asking my potential sales reps coming in? Right. Because I think you probably have a, a deep dive into the interview process. Right. So I'd like to ask that question, what should, what are a couple of questions that are not the generics that a leader could ask to figure something out about a salesperson? And on the flip side, what are a couple of questions a potential candidate should ask? Because I feel like that's where there's a lot of.

Ms. Would, would it, would it be for like, are we talking for like an entry level? Like.

Yeah, just call it. Yeah, just a sales role. Yeah, just a sales role. Like what should I look for as I'm trying to figure out someone who's competitive and smart and insightful.

You know, what kind of things could I ask that that might be different than, you know, tell me about the last time you closed the deal. Right.

You know, I mean, I think, I think the three most important questions that people should be asking.

Sales reps that are taking potentially their first sales job. And you're making, I mean, listen, even at a BDR level, you're making a six figure bet on somebody.

Yeah.

If you're gonna hire somebody that, that, that hasn't done it before, you need to know why they want to do sales, why they think they're, they're like well suited for it and are going to be successful. And then you also want to ask them why do you want to do it at my company? And the third, the third question, like, nobody is going to be as passionate about Shift Group's mission as I am. Right. I'm the founder. And the same goes for a technical founder that has, you know, an abstraction layer across, you know, cloud, a cloud database. Right. Like nobody cares Right. I always tell people like, you don't have to be passionate about the product. I sold storage, networking and infrastructure technology for 16 years. I was not passionate about it. But the why the company question is to see how prepared they came into the conversation. How much reading did they do? Do they understand your value proposition? Do they understand the problem you solve? Do they understand how big that problem is? And do they, and are they excited about the team they're going to join? Because you can do all of that before a first interview. The first two, the first two are about like, why do you want to do sales? Like you, it's getting down to that purpose that, that, that why of like what drives this person. It's also showing you whether or not they actually understand what sales is. Right. Because if, if you tell me, oh, like I'm a people person. The most common answer to why you want to do sales.

I like to help people.

Yeah, yeah. You don't get it. Like you don't get what the job is yet. Like you need to go do more research and make sure that this is what you want to do. And then the, and then the why you question forces them to give you receipts about the characteristics they've developed in their life that show them they have what it takes to be successful. I think those three questions for entry level sales should really be like, that's all I asked for seven years as a VP of sales and a CRO for BDR interviews, I asked those three questions. If I didn't like the answers, it was a hard no for me, full stop.

And what about so now let's flip it. Right. So I'm a candidate, right? Yep. You know, what kind of question should I be asking in addition to tell me about a day in the life.

Yeah, it's tough in an early stage company. Right. They don't, it depends on like where they are in the product market. Fit, you know, continuum. But I think generally like understanding, trying to understand like what type of coaching you're going to get and ask like again asking for receipts like, yeah, you know, what's the cult? What's the culture around training and development and coaching? Can you give me some examples that you've helped other people in your organization get better? Because that's what I want to go to your company because I don't know what I don't know and I'm here to improve every single day. So tell me how you're going to do it and give me examples of it. I think that that plus like, you know, what's the growth trajectory of the organization? Like, what do we have to do to execute? How are we going to grow? And what does that mean for me personally? Because, like, early. Early stage, like picking a job in your. In your early stage. I think a lot of people get wrapped around the axle of, like, going to a big company with a structured onboarding.

That's not for everybody. Like, I. If I went to a big company, my first job, I probably wouldn't be in sales anymore because I would have been like, this is brutal. I don't want to do this.

Like, yeah, I couldn't play politics. Yeah, I can't. I can't. I can't play nice in the sandbox with others, as you and I both know from some personal experience. So we'll talk about that in a second. But I love those questions. I agree with you on the coaching one. I agree with you on. On, you know, you know, sort of. Well, what's in it for me? It's kind of like getting, you know, it's kind of like, you got to sell me now. Right? So now I'll just. For those who are listening, because I know it's. Look, It's March of 2024, and people are still struggling. You know, some of my favorite questions to ask, too, are to say, hey, you know, aside from hitting the goal, what do you need this person to do to support your goals? Right? So now you're. That's. That's like showing, hey, I know what my. I will be to your point. I will be accountable. Also, I want to be a team player. Right. Which is, you know, what you were talking about. So just. I always like to give tactics when we can for. For. For people who are listening.

Let's.

I got. Yeah, we got time. So what made you go do. So you're two years in. It's 2024. What happened in 21 or 22 that you're like, all right, I'm done with this rat race. I'm going to go. I'm going to bet on me.

That's a great, great question. I. So shift group, like, the general concept of shift group was built on a slide deck. In 2016, when I was on a flight to London, when I was a VP of sales, I had a call with a. With a kid.

Another hockey player. So my brother played in the NHL and in the Olympics. My other brother played college hockey. My dad is a. Is a Hall of Fame hockey coach in Massachusetts. Right.

And. Oh, so. So junior, you're in sales. Like, is that Is that, is that what your brother do? Your brothers, you know, look, you're from Massachusetts. I'm sure they're, they're ribbing you hard to time all the time.

Oh, they bust my chops for first, for sure. But, but like you said, I remind them they're in sales too. Yeah, My dad's a coach. That's a sales job. My other brother's a mortgage broker. That's a sales job. Like, they're all in. Yeah.

But like, so net. Net was like this, this, this concept was always something that I wanted to do because I did it on, on, like free time. Richard. I help hockey players, like, make this transition. But I would say, like, ultimately where. What gave me the confidence to go do it is like, as a high level sales leader, I sat in board meetings, I sat around other executives. I delivered a lot of enterprise value as a VP of sales and a CRO. And what I started to realize was like, the people in this room are not smarter than me. They don't, like, work harder. They don't work harder than I do. And I'm working my butt off and creating enterprise value for these investors, these founders, these executives, and I can do what they're doing. Like, yes, they have more experience. But I'm like, now I'm at the point, I'm almost 40 at the time. I'm almost 40 years old. I've seen enough that I think I can build something for myself. Right. And like, and be in the seat that they're in. So, like, it really came down to, like, I, I think I'm ready for this. Right.

Right.

I'm ready to execute.

Got it, got it, got it. And was there. Did you have the fear that so many entrepreneurs have of, oh, my God, where's my bread and butter gonna come from? You know, how am I gonna. I don't know if you're married or have kids, you know, so if it's, if you're single, it's a little bit easier.

Like, did.

How did you get through that fear? And granted, I understand your athlete background. It might be like, you know, you learned how to bury that years ago. Yeah.

Yeah. I think it was partially the combination of being an athlete and an Irish Catholic. Like, we don't talk about feelings, so.

Right.

We can.

Worry about that later. Yeah. When I initially, when I initially started the company, I was dating my current wife, and I do now I have a 10 month old.

Congratulations.

And, and I think, like, listen, like, you know, like, you need a great partner. She's been amazing yeah. Process. But I, I also, like, I don't have, like, expensive tastes because of how I grew up. Right. Like, I'm a simple guy. Like, I could stay at a Motel 8. Like, I don't care. Right. Like, I'll, I'll eat. I'll eat tuna. Like, I'll eat tuna out of the can.

Like. Yeah.

And my whole thing was, like, I was fortunate, Richard. Like, transparently, before I started the company, the company I was at for seven years was acquired and it was acquired for a lot of money. Was acquired for $2 million. And I had equity and I made. I made a good amount of money.

Right.

And so I like, candidly, I had, like, I had a pretty comfortable.

You had a cushion.

Cushion, right. Yeah, exactly.

That's. That's.

Had that not happened, would I have done this at the time I did? Maybe, maybe not. I don't know.

Right. Yeah. Well, let's shift over to branding, right? Because, you know, let's talk about your personal brand. Right? Yeah.

Where did that start for you? When did it start for you to kind of go, oh, and I've only known you for six months or so, right. From your brand and my brand and stuff like that. How long have you been sort of pushing on the brand? Have you been doing it since you started the company? Did you do it even as a CRO? Like, when did you. When did you get it that this is important?

I think, like, internally, my. My brand on LinkedIn was internally my brand as a sales leader, my whole career. Like, kind of the things I talk about, what I think is important, the reality of, like, you know, kind of nobody cares. Work harder. Right. Like, that's at the core, at the core of my brand. That was always who I was and who I, who I showed up to as. To work for my team.

But I wasn't public about it, like, on LinkedIn or social media because my. The people I was selling to were chief information officers and VPs of infrastructure and directors of IT. Right. So, like, I kind of separated who I was. And like, any posts I did prior to starting shift group were really business focused about, you know, new products or whatever, or solving problems uniquely. But when I started ship group, I inherently understood that my new audience was salespeople and sales leaders. So I kind of just brought who I was to life a little bit through what I post on LinkedIn. And it's not always popular, but I think that's actually part of building a brand. Right, Right. You want to be contrarian to certain things because otherwise you're just another person that agrees with everybody, you know.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Nobody wants that. Right. For those, you know, I don't know, people would never know this, but you know, we're here today because, you know, J.R. wrote something once and I sort of called him out on it and then he called me out on it and then I called him back out on it and you know, egos, egos got involved and you know, if, if we were playing hockey, I'd probably be dead at this point because I'm not a hockey player, you know, but that's, you know, so, so, you know, you know, just because you troll on somebody doesn't mean you still can't turn around and create a relationship. Right?

So I totally agree. I think, I think healthy, healthy debate is a good thing for the world. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And, and look, both, both of us know that sometimes we, we, we, we poke the bear a little bit because that's more interesting for the readers anyway. Like, they're like, they don't need to hear everybody going, great, that's fantastic, Richard. Oh yeah, you're so right all the time. And you know.

So, so do you coach people on this? Like, so again, you bring in these, these athletes and you, and these, these, you know, service members.

Do you coach them on social media and how to post and what to post or is it. Yes, but we kind of wait until they get past this hump before they do that because there's, you know, there's, there are more important things when you're first getting in. Right? You know.

Yeah, we, we tell them like during, during their job search process. Like, we advise them and we actually even call this out in the training. Like, listen, it's a free country. If you want to say something publicly, you're more than welcome to. But here's how, here's how posting certain things are going to be taken. You know, like we, we don't use like hardcore examples. We say like, if you put on your LinkedIn that your favorite color is blue, the hiring manager's favorite color might be green. And that's going to create conflict that's unnecessary. So like, Right, just stay away from like opinionated based stuff while you're going through the job search. And then our advice on like, generally the. One of the things that kind of, you know, grinds my gears not to sound corny, is when you have like an entry level salesperson that's selling to a specific Persona, like a chief Information security officer as an example or the security team, and they're Posting sales advice, like, that's, that's one thing that we advise against. We say you can do it if you want, but like, that doesn't send a great message to your organization. And it also, like, if ultimately LinkedIn is a tool for you to build a brand, which I agree with, but you want to build a brand that you're a professional. And you know, as a professional, if you're a security salesperson, that's the professional professionalism you want to show, not that you know how to write a cold email. So that's like, I think, and not everyone agrees with me on that, but that's just my opinion. And, and I happen to believe, and I know you've seen me post this, like, I do think that LinkedIn is a little bit of an echo chamber of sales people.

Oh my God. Oh, we're terrible. We're. Our egos drive this. It's terrible. And I, I actually, I do disagree with you on this one because I feel like you can do both, right? You can write. Because the challenge I have, and maybe it's because I'm not good at it, is if I were, I just don't think that if I were selling to it and security. That's the example you brought up. One, I'm not sure how much they're reading on LinkedIn number 100%. Number two, I don't know that it would. I already know it's not going to get the visibility of the game that you and I want. Right? Like, we're in a different space. On the other hand, I think there are ways for new sales people to actually write about their current experiences and their current learnings and those things. And they don't, I mean, I don't know, anecdotally, I don't think they would hurt you if my customer went to go look at my profile.

You know, I think that's, you know, and there's, there's, there's lots of ways, you know, we're not going to get into it, but there's lots of ways you can position your profile and then position your, your posts and stuff like that. So I don't, I don't see a reason why you can't do both.

And, and I also think too, that, I mean, I think you know, too is like the emotional stories you tell connect right to the point of, like, I've seen you talk about your sobriety and things like that. And it's like to a certain extent, if I were an IT person and I saw that, you know, Junior was interviewing with me and, and he was, you know, discussing. He's been sober for 13 years. I, you know, I would think that it person would be like, okay, this person's face one of the biggest challenges in their life now.

Right.

If that IT director. Right. That that hiring manager is like, I don't want to deal with that in case he falls off the wagon. Well, you don't want to be there anyway. Right. So, so, and so I agree with you that there's a balance between how you do what I, what I encourage people to do is a let your voice find you.

Yeah.

Share particularly early. You know, this is what I tell every person. You're an expert at something. So you're 22, coming out of college, and you've never had a sales job. Guess what? You're an expert at that. Compared to Richard Harris, I don't know what that's like. I sure as heck didn't have social media for it. Right, right, right. So you can share that and you can ask for advice. And I think to. Again, my belief is that if you show your willingness to learn and your willingness to be vulnerable, your potential hiring managers will see that as a positive more than a negative. Right.

I think that's fair. I think that the way you said that is definitely fair.

100. That being said, you know, I'm not sat through your training and don't know. And I'd probably be like, oh, I would consider it that way because, you know, you and I are both, you know, we're bear pokers and instigators. So it's probably something I would write if I were in a job search that probably wouldn't hurt me.

You know, like, I, I know my. I'm like you if you don't get it, that kind of stuff. So.

So, so I want to, I want to flip it a little bit. I got one or two more questions. But, you know, one of the things we do in our podcast is, is, you know, if you have a question you'd like to ask, feel free. Like, I want to sort of turn it back to you.

You know, while you think about that.

What'S the state of the hiring right now? Right. It's 20, 24, it's March. You know, 23 was like a crazy show. Different, you know, every time. It's a crazy show. Everything's different every time. So, you know, people who bring up, you know, oh, well, we went through Covet, and I know, no, you don't like, oh, in Covet, I remember what the Recession was like in 2008. No, you don't. Like, they're not the same. What do you see the status? Because I, I hear, I see and hear both. Like, I still see companies doing layoffs, but then I'm starting to see people actually promote that they're hiring. Where are we? You got your finger on the pulse of this one.

I, I see it coming back. Like we had, we had our best, our best back to back quarters ever in Q4 and Q1.

Right.

You know, obviously coming to a close here and what we saw. So we started the company at the beginning of 2022 and a lot of our revenue that first six months, if you remember the beginning of 2022 was still that, like, ridiculous.

Right. You know, and then in June and July, people started late, started the layoffs. Yep.

We ran into a brick wall and we pivoted. Like we said, okay. We did a lot of our revenue with big publicly traded companies. They're done. They've, they've let go of the talent we were working with. Let's pivot. Let's look for venture, venture backed firms that have capital that we know need to grow. And that's kind of where we spent all of our time for the next year to probably 15 months. And then in Q4 we had like multiple, multiple large publicly traded companies that approached us and did deals with us. So we're starting to see that come back. And I think, you know, I think people are kind of over, like they're over the downtime. Like they just want to be optimistic and stay positive. And I think we're seeing that in hiring, at least from our perspective.

Yeah. Do you.

You know, you know, it's job security when they're not.

Do you see the hiring managers getting better at hiring? Like, I, I, you know, this is what I hear. Right? There you go. There's the answer. Right? Because it's like, oh, we, we, you know, in 23, we figured out we had the wrong seats in the butts. Right. Like, we had the wrong butts in the seats or whatever. And so, you know, we're going to go hire this, you know, different kind of people. I'm like, great. What makes you think you know how to hire them? Like, do you, do you find that.

Yeah. I mean, it's a, it's a Jimmy. And like my dad always says, it's, it's Jimmy's and Joe's and X's and O's. Like they're struggling with both of them. Right.

Like, yep. And that's A great way to look at it.

Yeah. There's definitely. There's a gap. I mean, it. Let's. Let's face it. It is like the. It's the most important thing that you do, and it's the hardest thing you do is hiring correctly. And it's. You know, I don't. I don't know that anybody's, like, fully figured it out, to be honest with you.

I got it. Well, I wanna. I wanna pause because we're getting to the end of time. Is, you know, is there something you'd like to ask? I'm more than happy to, you know, answer any question you have.

I am. I. So I'm reading your book right now, Richard, and I'm curious, like, what. Like, what motivated you and prompted you to take, like, all your experiences that you've had in your life and put. Put it between on pages? Like, what. What drove you to write a book?

Selfishness. Like a selfish level of validation. Right. It's. I'm not going to hit the New York Times bestseller list. Like. Right. Like, I didn't write that kind of book. It becomes a calling card. Right? It becomes this. This thing where people are like, oh, wow, he's written a book. Or, you know, it. It helps with the brand and all those kind of things. So that's. That's what started it. It took me forever to actually get serious about it. I started. I've got drafts of this thing from 2017. Right. And if I were. If I were more disciplined, I would have done it in 2017.

For whatever reason. I didn't. And this is what I came up with. And. And to a large extent, this is better than what I would have written in 2017, because I have newer thoughts that. That are. I feel, are more.

I don't know if cutting edge. They're. They're just different. Right. Like. Like things like asking about the skeptic or negotiating with procurement. You know, some of the tactics that are in there, I didn't know in 27. Like, I hadn't figured those out. So that's. That's what made me do it. So are you gonna write one?

I. I'm thinking about it. That's why I asked. No, I. There's. I got. I think I have two books in me. One would be, you know, I'm. I'm pretty passionate about my sobriety journey, like you said.

I talk.

I talk about my recovery publicly because I w. I wish more people that I admired were more public about it when I was struggling. And, like, knowing Knowing that someone like me who, like, externally, it looks like, oh, this guy's had some success, really. Struggles with mental, mental health, substance abuse, I think is important.

That's one thing. And then obviously, you know, talking about mindset and successful transitioning because, because life is, Life is a series of transitions.

Yeah. Yeah.

I just went through a huge one. I just became a dad 10 months ago, and it's completely changed my world. Right. And there's certain, there's certain things that I think, because I've gone through a lot of changes in my life, prepared me for this massive change. So I, I, I'd love to write about the mind, the right mindset to bring to a life transition in general.

I think you could combine those two. Like, I, I, you know, I, I talk a lot about my struggles with depression and mental health, and I tried to incorporate it in the book, but it's different.

It couldn't, it didn't flow well. I could easily see, though yours in that process where it's a little bit of both, and it's a little bit about the mindset and, and the transitions. And then, you know, sales is all about transitions. Right. So. But, But I could, I could see those being two books or one book, but those, Those would be good. And I would, I would sincerely love to read it and sincerely suggest you do it. And don't. I mean, you know the deal, right? Nobody cares. Just start. Right? Don't trust me. Like, look, I got, I got 20 versions from 2017 that sucked, you know, but I think you're further along. You have, I think.

Of what I know about you. I think you have, You've got your arms around how to tell that story differently than I did when I first started in 2017. It took me a little longer to find it. So.

Cool. What else? Anything else I can, I can ask for you before we get out of here? Or answer.

I was gonna say, I, you know, I think we both share this passion for mental health, and it's super important. Right? Like, you know, you are, you are who you are when you show up to work. So, like, business, Business relies heavily on, on your ability to be healthy mentally and physically. And listen, some substance abuse is a symptom, not a. Not like the disease, in my opinion. So, like, talk about depression, talk about anxiety. Those are the things that led me, and I just happen to lean on drugs and alcohol. But, like, so I think it's, I think it's great that you talk about it on here and publicly. Like, I think it's really important that people understand. Like, you know, it's like the, the plain analogy. You got to give yourself the oxygen mask before you help anyone around you.

Yeah.

So, you know, if you need an oxygen mask, don't be afraid to grab it. If that's the message people take away from this, then we did our job, Richard.

Yeah, no, I, I agree. I agree. And thank you. I appreciate the support on it, too. Well, cool. Well, how can people get a hold of you, Junior? So what's the easiest.

Yeah, you can find me on LinkedIn. Just Junior Butler. And then our website is www.shiftgroup. we're actually launching a new version in May that I'm really excited about. I just saw the first version. It's going to be awesome. But it should be easy to. Easy to find a way to get in touch with us on there. Whether you're an athlete or a veteran or a company that's looking to hire those types of people for their team.

Good deal. Good deal. All right. Well, Junior, thanks, man. Nice to. To finally meet you in. In almost real person. And if you're on the west coast, look me up. And likewise, if I. When I get to Boston, I'll look you up too, man. So it's been a pleasure.

You too. Thanks, everybody for listening to the Surf and sales podcast. And don't forget, the event is coming up in November. It's late March, so you know, when you get your bonus check in April, go ahead like you're not even going to miss it. And I promise it's worth every penny. So thanks, Junior.

Awesome. Have a good day.