Survive Downturns by Providing Certainty with Todd Caponi

Every company has breakdowns in their revenue process. Sure thing. Deals slip into next quarter, competitors creep in and swipe deals away at the last minute. And deals getting single threaded that don't get to power. These are just a few examples of revenue leak, but there are a ton more and they're preventing your team from reaching their sales targets. That's why I'm such a big fan of Clary's Revenue platform is the only tool that actually helps leaders take control of their revenue and thrive through any market conditions, especially when things get tough. You can't afford to miss a single detail, but you also can't be leading by gut. Clary combines the science and the art of sales and sales leadership. So go to clary.com if you want to answer the most important question in your business. Are you going to meet, beat or miss on revenue? Welcome to the live Better Sell Better podcast with your host Kevin Dorsey of Inside Sales Excellence, the number one Patreon group and YouTube channel for tech sellers and tech sales leaders, where we dive in deep for tactical advice on how to book more meetings, close more deals faster, and lead sales teams to success. But we don't stop there. We also focus on the person in salesperson. We talk about mindset goals, time management and so much more. So thank you for listening and if you're interested, head on over to patreon.com InsideSalesExcellence now with that, grab a notepad, get ready and let's dive into the good stuff. What up everybody? Welcome to another episode of the live Better Sell Better podcast. This is Jamie your host, Kevin Dorsey, AKA kd. And we're gonna go back to the future today. We're going back to the future because a phrase that's been said a lot recently over the past couple years is during these unprecedented times. Unprecedented. And we lean into that like this has never happened before. When in reality, society and our cultures go through very similar cycles over and over again. And when we say unprecedented, what we actually tend to do there is not look back to see when has this happened before and how did people get through it. And that is why I'm so pumped to have Todd Capone on the show today. Now, if you don't know Todd, you gotta go to LinkedIn right now, follow him, go to Amazon, buy his book, the Transparency Sale, and be on the lookout for his next book, Transparent Sales Leader. But Todd has been in the game, but more recently has been studying the game. What has happened before, what can we learn from it and how can we apply it today in these Unprecedented times. So, Todd, my man, welcome to the show.

This topic, man, I cannot wait to dig into. I'm such a nerd for this stuff. But, man, this is. This is right on.

So that's kind of the angle I wanted to go, right. The idea of unprecedented. Right. Of like we've. And we've never dealt with a pandemic, or we've never dealt with a downturn, We've never dealt with some of these things. And so I actually want to give you kind of this opening point of like the things that we're dealing with right now. How and where have you seen them happen before?

Yeah. And you and I went back and forth on this because as I've been digging into the history of sales, I was reading about something that happened in 1921 and 1922, and I affectionately call it the great salesperson purge of the early 1920s. And what I mean by that is in 1921, the sales community experienced 77% turnover. And that's involuntary. And you thought that was bad? 1922, 85%. And so that struck me and I looked at it and started digging in and realized that the run up to that is exactly the eight year run up to today, like almost to a T. And what I mean by that is there was a period of kind of slow and steady growth from 1914 to early 1918. Right. And that that was kind of what we were experiencing here. Things were good. There was no recessions, everything was growing. Then all of a sudden there was a hit and it was a short term strike to the economy. Now in 1918, what happened? Well, that was World War I, actually. There was a run up to World War I. And then we jumped in it. We weren't in it for long. Oh, and there happened to be a pandemic called the Spanish flu. I was just gonna say as I.

Get there, because there was a pandemic.

What's amazing about that, just side note is I go through all my books, all my magazines, all the. No, but there's not one, like business Philosopher magazine, which was the foremost thought leader in all of business at the time. The term Spanish flu doesn't even show up. The term pandemic doesn't show up. Like there was no mention of it, which is amazing to me. But World War I was everything. And so the economy takes a strike for a short period of time. Sounds a lot like March, April, May of 2020. And then all of a sudden we come out of the war and it's freaking like party time. Their Companies are growing like crazy. There's a ton of manufacturing going on, super high demand for salespeople, super low supply. Sound familiar? Right? So we go through this massive boom period and then there's a massive inflation spike that happens late 1920, early 1921. Huh? When did that just happen? And then the strike. And the strike was what? It's a depression. It was a depression that nobody talks about. We always talk about the Great Depression of 1929, 1933, but 1921, 1922, it caused all sales leaders to practically purge their entire sales organizations when just six months earlier they couldn't find enough salespeople to hire. They were hiring random people off the street. And so that, that's, you know, and you're opening salvo there. The way you and I were talking about this back in late January, early February, where I'm looking at this and I'm like, oh, there's a train coming. Like, are people watching that light at the end of the tunnel? That's a train. That's not like a panacea. Like we gotta prepare for this. And sure enough, we're digging into it. And I'm still kind of worried about how deep this will get.

So question pops in my head. There's other questions I want to unpack there because there's so much there. But I don't want to miss this because I'm also add. And I'll forget this question is, how do you help people notice these things? Because I've. The way I've described the sales industry often, right? We all know like the, the made up analogy, right? If you throw a frog into hot water, it jumps out. If you heat up the water around it, it doesn't. It's not true, by the way. They've actually like defaulted that. But we get the concept and I feel like sales oftentimes behaves that way where it's like the water is heating up around us, but we just, we stay in it, right? Like we're not paying attention to the outside factors. So like how, I guess, how do you do that? Or how would you encourage leaders to like take that step back or to step back and look at the macro things that are occurring and then go back into the pot to figure out how to fix it.

Well, yeah, I mean there should be obvious things. Like for example, when we think about unicorn value organizations, like new unicorns every year these companies receive funding and evaluation. If it's over a billion dollars, they're considered a unicorn. Right? And the average from 2017 to 2020 is you've got 140 to 170 new unicorns every year. As a matter of fact, in 2020, that was a record year. It was 167 new unicorns. Right. So that's, that's considered a big year. 2017 to 2020, there were 569 new unicorns. 2021 alone, there were 586. Like, did you hear that? 167 was the record in 2020. 2021 new record. Hey, it's more than the four years previous combined of 586. Now that should strike in any logical person's heart a image of a bubble. Like I.

So okay, but real quick on that because this is that it's the opposite though. Where most people look at that is not risk of bubble. They actually see it as a sign of yes, like everything's great, look at all the unicorns. Right? So tap on that a little bit more of like, okay, when things are going this way to look at the opposite, potentially just unpack that a little bit more. Cause I don't want people to miss that because generally we see that and we go look at how great things are.

Yeah.

Not look at the risk that this is setting up.

Well, yeah, I mean look at the late 90s, right? Like I was selling for a company called SAP that you probably have heard of. In 1999 I did 800% of my target. It wasn't because I was great, right. It was like working at a drive through window back then. Because for anybody who's old enough that's listening is there was a concern that once the clocks would hit midnight on January 1st of 2000, all of the systems, the old systems, there was a concern that most of those were designed based on two digit year instead of four year, right. Y2, Y2 1999 would flip to 1900 in the systems and like planes would fall off the sky and like it would be complete terror. Right? Like that was the concern. And as a result we're going at SAP, companies are like, here, fix everything, here's millions. And like that was the way it was. And we thought that that would continue forever. And you know, when your buddies are getting on this barge of millionaires, we just tend to do that, right? And like, so in January, February of 2000, I see all these buddies of mine that are on this barge of millionaires of all these startups that are garage based startups that are getting massive valuations just based on. Oh, that's a cool idea. And so In March of 2000, I went running for that barge, but it had already left the dock. And I went like. I Swam for, like, 18 months of crap. My perception here is, like, when we look around and you see all your buddies taking in all this money and all this cash and getting these opportunities, yeah, some of the strong will survive, but we can't just believe that we are all going to be strong. Now, back in 1920, 1921, it was the exact same story. It was revenue at all costs, right? Just go, go, go. The U.S. we've got an incredible opportunity to really establish ourselves as a world superpower by being the manufacturing center of the world. Like, throw everything at it. And then you Fast forward to 1924 and 1925, and companies were like, you know what? We should really focus on profitability. We should really focus on systems and processes that are going to allow us to scale smart and be a ongoing concern. Right? And we keep doing that. It's just like, wow, spend, spend, spend. Wow. Don't spend on anything. Wow. Let's spend smart. And we're going through that exact same.

Cycle again now as it's so interesting. As a species, we are incredibly complex, but also shockingly simple. The same patterns show up generation to generation, millennia to millennia, dynasty to dynasty, superpower to superpower. Like, the patterns are almost identical. Right. And so now let's talk about, you know, we're in this interesting situation right now. Like on. Are we on the bubble? Is it about to pop? Is the bubble leaking? Because that's also. People always think a bubble pops, bubble leaks for a while, then it pops. How can a leader lead through this? Because I think that's where I want to focus now. Is that all right? So, yeah, a lot of shit's going on right now, and we might be going a certain direction. How can leaders lead through this? What are things that you've seen work for yourself, but also patterns. You see, you're a pattern guy. Like, I'm a pattern guy. So that's what makes this fun. What patterns have you seen across similar situations that led to coming out the right way?

Well, here let me start with a bit of an analogy that I see companies doing today. And, you know, in Japan, if you're on death row in Japan, the way that they do it there is they don't ever. What's that? It's hard. Sorry.

I know where this is going.

The most harsh part about it, oddly enough, is uncertainty, meaning they don't tell those individuals when the day is coming. Right? They go to bed every night going, huh, Is tomorrow going to be the day? And as a result, back in 2021, they there was a class action lawsuit amongst death row inmates who got their lawyers to file suit in claiming that that treatment is inhumane. Right? The uncertainty of when I go to bed at night, I don't know whether tomorrow I'm going to be killed. Now, let's take this to the kind of the world we're living in right now. The first thing I want everybody to understand is uncertainty is like a kryptonite for our brain. Like, literally when things, when we're uncertain, we don't sleep, we don't perform well, we're less creative. And at its core, our IQ literally goes down in those situations where there's uncertainty. Now, I want as a leader, for you to think about your, your team, your sales team. And they're looking around, they're talking to their buddies and seeing layoffs happen. And you're sitting there not saying anything. Now, you might not be saying anything because you think things are great. And hey, there's no layoff coming here, which is cool, but your reps are going to bed every night with that same type of feeling that the Japanese inmates do where they don't know, like, am I just going to all of a sudden get swatted? And so, number one thing to realize is have empathy for the uncertain brain. And as a leader, create certainty in every possible way you can. And where there is uncertainty, like, obviously you've got uncertainty in that. You can't predict how hard it's going to get, how deep it'll go, how long it'll go, how it'll direct. Embrace those things. Cards face up right with your team, like, hey, here's what we know, here's what we don't know. And during this period, every Thursday at 10, every Tuesday at 2, whatever, pick a time and go. We're going to do a quick half hour Q and A update for you so that you can predict when the updates are coming. Right? Create certainty wherever you can within your teams. Right. Right now. Like, even if things are fantastic for you, you've got to do that because your teams are looking around and they're feeling like, is tomorrow going to be the day? So that's. I've got others, but, like, that's number one that I love to hear your reaction to.

No, it's something I've talked about at a different scale. Just even around, like, compensation and income. It's like waking up every day and not knowing if you're going to get to your number not knowing if you're going to be able to pay your bills, not know you're going to keep your job. Same concept like that uncertainty, that's what burns people out is like every day waking up and going like am I going to get there or not? And people tend to hear that and go like, well if you're a top performer, you don't think that way. Yeah, the top performers are the top performers. It's the rest, it's the 80% that are not that make or break. Whether a company gets to their number makes or break whether or not you can grow. And so I love this concept of create certainty. Could you give a couple examples of like what creating certainty. So I like, like okay, you know, when we're going to have the talks, I like that. But what would be another place to, you know, as a way to create certainty across the team?

Well, you know, March of 2020 was really a case study in the behavioral science of intrinsic inspiration. And I call it intrinsic inspiration. Like I got a whole half of the new book that's digging into like what really drives individuals but salespeople specifically to show up every day to do their best to stay and then to become advocates for you, your organization, your company and the job. And when you look at what happened In March of 2020, we all went into a mass period of uncertainty, right? And if you need proof that uncertainty drives people's brains crazy, like go find some pictures of March 2020 outside the local Costco or Walmart and watch people hoarding toilet paper, right? Like, you know, the comfort of two ply is an uncertainty that I'm not willing to bear. So like we load up the carts with that. But you know, the best companies at the time, everybody went home, they were doing regular check ins with everybody right out of the gate and saying, hey, here's what we know. You know, we know that our solution is really, really strong in industries that do well in downturns. And so that's, that's kind of a side tip for any sales leader sales organization is I believe that during downturns, the time to really strongly hone your focus on verticals that do well in downturns has really two benefits. Number one, they keep spending. But number two, and I can't remember the term, but it's like the bader made off like I can't remember the term, but it's a term that once that you get focused on a certain vertical, a certain industry, you see all things to support that you become stronger in that vertical, you build confidence in that. Confidence is contagious. That was something that I did with my team back in 2008 and 2009 is we could call on anybody who built anything. But for short bursts, we focused on aerospace and defense and oil and gas because we've got reps down in Texas, like just that for a couple of months. And the results were we grew 400% year over year when everybody else was falling apart. So, like, number one is when you think about even March of 2020, the companies that did best were the ones that were getting on the phone going, hey, here's our strategy, here's our priorities, here's what we know, here's what we don't know. And next week we're going to give you an update as we go through this and all learn together.

I love that because that's also getting into the how a little bit. Like, the team needs direction, right? And so, like, that direction gives clarity, clarity gives confidence, confidence builds momentum. I'm like, hey, here's what we're going to do now. Is it going to work? Who knows? But that direction is important, right? Like, they're looking to you as the leader of like, hey, like, are we going to be okay? And. And you can say, like, I don't know. But here's what I do know. Here's what we're going to do. This is what's going to give us our best shot. This is what's going to give us the opportunity. So. So I love that. So let's keep going down this path, right? So leading through tougher times, leading through uncertain times. So the first obvious, if you're in uncertain times, where can you build uncertainty? What would be the next thing you'd look for? You're leading a team through tough times. You don't know what the market's going to do. Maybe you already are missing your number. What's another thing you can do as a leader to help your people through?

Well, yeah, I mean, I think again, if we look at March of 2020, we as human beings did really three things. The first thing that we did is we cut out the discretionary spending, the nice to haves, right? Like, hey, I probably can do without that personal trainer for a couple of months. And hey, that new couch, our old couch will do for a little while, right? We cut out the stuff that really didn't matter a whole lot. So that's number one. Number two is we focused all of our spending on the must haves, right? The things that were going to give us certainty, right? So that's number two. And then number three is that we sought ways to remove risk and extend Runway, right? So we do those three. Like, we do that at home, right? Like, we're my family, we're doing that, right? Like, hey, we can put off that, you know, that cruise or whatever we were thinking about doing. Hey, let's spend on the things that we absolutely know we need and we're going to need long term, term, especially trying to get ahead of if inflation gets worse. And then, like, what ways can we remove our risk in case something shuts down? Now, it turns out all your buyers are human beings too, and they make decisions for companies through that same exact lens. And so you know the person. The most important thing you can do is look at your. First of all, look at your website. Like, when you go to your website, is the headline feel like something that talks to me today, or is something cool and nice to have? Because, like, that's a big one. One of the companies I work with is a company out of California called Envoy. Envoy does the technology that when you go into an office, there's a little iPad. You go, hey, I'm here to see kd. It'll ring, you go, hey, tacopone is here. And then you come out and it prints a badge and all that kind of stuff. Well, the pandemic hit. Nobody was going to an office anymore. What is Envoy to do, right? And they were immediate about taking down all of that, changing all their imagery and all their messaging instantly to talk about how to make interactions within an office safe, right? And like creating touchless experiences and all of that. All their pictures on their website, they immediately changed all the cartoons to people with masks. The website spoke to everybody, right? And they, they had a dip and then they shot right back up right through the roof. And right now they're doing fantastically well. Think about your messaging, right? Is it focused on must haves versus nice to haves? Is it focused on helping companies extend their Runway? Is it focused on removing risk wherever there might be some, and removing that uncertainty? Make sure your reps are speaking that same language right out of the gate too. Like that's anything that sounds cool or nice to have, you got to eliminate yesterday. And I'm still here. I'm getting emails from companies that are like, hey, wouldn't it be cool to be all like. Like, yeah, that would be cool. Maybe next year.

Maybe next year, right? Like, novelty is not a need to have something just to be Better, right? We have to talk about what's wrong now. Funny enough, our company didn't use Envoy before we signed up for it. Really?

That's awesome.

We used it at patient pop for that exact reason. How to check in, how to make sure people had, you know, whatever taking their tests, anything else, like who was in tracking for tracing and all that sort of stuff. So fun. It's funny you mentioned. I was like, we actually didn't buy it until. Exactly the fact.

Better than anybody.

Yeah, it's. It's funny. And I'll tell a real quick story on this. We'll keep going down this path. But, like, I got some grief when, like, you know, we. What really hit the fan. What, like 3-25-ish. Like end of March, right? Like, that's when everything just went. And I publicly went out and I had said, I told my team to stop cold calling. Like I said, hold on. But I was listening to these calls and I was like, yo, it's different. It's different right now. We need to take a pause. And I got a message from senior leadership saying, hey, like, could you take that down? Like, we don't want people thinking things are bad. And I was like, all right, fine, whatever. I'll take that down. But then the key. I was like, but the problem had changed. The problem that we solved. Change. We. The problem we used to solve was, you're not seeing enough patients. Well, the new problem is doctors couldn't see any patients. That's different messaging. That's a different problem. That's a different way to approach things. And we had to shift our entire messaging to match the new problem. Right. So now let's go another layer deeper here. Okay? Things are getting a little shaky. Things are a little bit.

All right.

You know, our customers are cutting costs. Our customers are cutting. So that number's getting harder and harder to reach. The team morale starting to dip. The team, that fear starts to set in. What can leadership do there outside of, like, certainty? Like, how do you support your people through this a little bit. Like, almost more on the personal side than on the business side?

Well, yeah. If you look at the most successful companies in the world of all time, they did an incredible job of getting all of their team to align around the aim of the business, the mission, the purpose, the impact. That's something that I still have seen wrong for 20 months since the pandemic hit, right? Where if you believe that sales reps are coin operated, you're right. If you're doing it wrong, you create an Environment where your reps want to show up every day, want to stay, want to do their best, want to become advocates. And the variable compensation is the reward, not the motivator. That's when everybody wins. And so there's a couple of questions that I want all the leaders to ask themselves and then make sure that their teams have this. And number one is, do your reps know what their work means to you and your organization? First of all, like, beyond their number. If they're just a number with a number, who cares? But do they know what their work means to their customers and their customer's customer? Right. Like, all the way down. And not just like, oh, we helped them achieve an iri, prove the roi. Right. It's like, let's take, I mean, for example, and this is a really cheesy example, but, you know, there's a medical device company that they've got a bunch of people that go into a warehouse every day and basically stack screws. Like they're putting together, like all they do eight hours a day. They just sit in a lab with their lab coats on and putting this stuff on. Like, you probably know this space well. And their turnover is almost zero. And like, how, like, just like, probably low wage, tough job. Well, every couple of weeks they bring in somebody during, like during lunch who's wearing that medical device. And they get up there and they're like, hey, listen, if you didn't do that stack of screws, I wouldn't be here today. And then all of a sudden their kids would come running in like, I wouldn't have a mommy. And like, these people, they all bawl their eyes out and they can't wait to get back and stack those screws again. Now that's an extreme example. But like, my last role, I was the chief revenue officer of Power Reviews in Chicago. Reviews for retailers and brands. Who gives a crap? You know who gives a crap? The consumer who's using their hard earned money to make really smart decisions on how to spend it. And we're helping them make those smarter decisions so they're not screwing it up. They're spending their money wisely and they're making their own lives better. And our team members that really live that, man, they freaking went to bed every night and woke up every morning, can't wait to talk about reviews. Who cares? No, consumers care. And when those reps care, they run behind it and they don't care. Downturn or not, you need this. Here's why. Here's the impact that I'm making And I can go to bed every night feeling good about it, whether or not I made $700,000 this year or 250 or, you know, a hundred, whatever it is, when you've got that mission, that purpose, that aim. And the problem I see is that we're not driving that enough, or we think it's too cheesy to do. But, like, right now, get cheesy.

Yeah, it so. It's so funny, man. Like, listening to you talk. Because these are some of the things that, like, definitely rolled out on the team during this time. Like, I think it was like, May. So, like, we went through a massive round of layoffs in April. The worst thing I've ever had to deal with as a. As a leader. And in April, the team that was left, I've also never been more proud. Like, the way we rallied and the way they did things and the way they came together was amazing. The hangover hit in June. That's when it really started to wear on people. And that's really when people started to go down. And that was also then I was like, okay, y', all, like, we need to remember what we do. And so actually I was like, I want, every day, I want you to read one of our testimonials. Every day, I want you to watch one of these videos of, like, what we actually do for people. Because also in our space, similarly, it's funny you talk about reviews. That was a big part of our business, right? I was like, we're in the medical industry. Picking a doctor is a scary thing to do. And so not only are we helping a small business, right, we're helping Joe at Joe's Podiatry, but we're also making sure that Todd finds the right podiatrist for him so he doesn't have to get two ankle surgeries, you know? And so we did. We focused so much more on just the messaging around, like, who we help and what we go through. But the other thing I want to touch on real quick is coin operators. I always love when coin operated gets mentioned. What I always say to people when they talk about it is I think we forget how a coin operated machine works. If I go to a vending machine and I want a bag of chips, do I have to give it the coins first to get the chips, or do I get the chips and give it the coin?

Yeah, it's a good point. I got.

I got to give it the coin first. And that's not how we pay our salespeople, right? Is we act like they're coin operated, but we ask them to give us the chips before we give them the coin. And that was my number one ask during this downturn. I was like, pay them. Pay them. Give them some coverage. Back to your point around certainty. Give them some certainty. Let them know that they're going to pay their rent, that they can pay their mortgage or they can pay for, you know, like, their bills. Like, give them certainty. Unfortunately, it was never approved. And I fought it the entire year. Every single meeting brought that up because I thought that was so important. So, okay, we've got mission. Actually, I want to unpack that one level before we start to wrap this up. How do you do it in an uncheesy way? Because I like, I don't want people like, oh, like customer stories like, how do you actually do it? Because this is not just downturn advice, by the way, y'.

All.

We're not just talking. These are things you should be doing all the time. Right? But like, unpack that just a little bit more of like, I'm listening to this. I go, you know, that's actually a good idea. How do I start? Is it invite a customer to a call? Like, I have case studies, Todd. Isn't that good?

Yeah, I mean, most of the case studies I read to your point are like, we achieved a 208% ROI, but what you're talking about is taking it a level deeper. One of the things that we used to do, our client success team, when we would do a renewal, we'd always, after the renewal sign is ask them why. And like, it sounds crazy. Like, hey, you've got 100 different priorities. You've got 100 different technologies here. You decided to renew with us. There's other options. Like, why? And I think I know the answer, but tell us. And like, they're like, oh, because it's easy. And like, okay, cool. Well, there's a second question that we used to ask a lot and the answers would shock you is, hey, what's one unexpected benefit you've gotten from working with us? Like, one thing that when you signed up for us, you thought X and then Y happened. And like, I equate that to the tennis ball analogy. Meaning, like, in junior high, I remember being in class and like, we're sitting at these round tables, teacher comes out and gives us a couple of tennis balls and is like, hey, I want all of you to brainstorm around, come up with as many uses for a tennis ball as you could possibly come up with. And we'd come up with like, 30 of them, right? It's like, hang it in your garage, make sure you don't pull in too far, put it on the bottom of a walk or make a coin purse out of it. Like, there's a hundred of them. I think there's a huge opportunity within organizations to think beyond. Like, tennis balls are sold in sporting goods stores, but most of their uses are for other things. When you think about your solutions, get those answers from your customers, especially when they just renewed, right. You know, and ask them, like, why did you renew with us? And like, what's the benefit that you got beyond us? And if you've got a great relationship, like, what does it mean to you to like to work with us? But then ask that last question about, like, hey, what's the impact of what you sell on your customers? Like, why aren't we asking that question? Like, you know, you sell X to Y, why does Y care? And how do they really value or benefit from this? And you'll start to see themes, and those themes can become a part of your impact. I mean, there's some companies are literally selling software that saves their customers, customers lives. Sometimes it's saving money, just sometimes it's making lives better. Sometimes it's, you know, there's a million different things. But do you know, I don't think most companies do. And when they do know they're not driving that into their sales team to create that momentum.

Yeah, we just forget it. It just never gets brought up enough. Funny enough, actually. A positive and a negative example of this was when I was at Service Titan. So when you walked out the elevator Service Titan, the first thing that you saw were like this wall of logos. And it used to be like a big deal, right? Like you got a new customer up and like they got their logo up on the wall. It was all like the small businesses. But then also it stopped. Right? So there were a lot of like the OGs, but then it stopped becoming a thing. And it actually got brought up often in some of the, like, even like surveys. Like, we don't. We used to, it used to be a big deal, like, and we, you know, people would send a picture of it and then we stopped. We don't tell those stories anymore, Right. Simply because we ran out of space on the wall, you know, and so I saw you get excited on this. So what, what does, what pops in your head?

I wrote, I wrote something that's a bit controversial on the new book. And I did, like, based on what you just said, it like it punched me in the face. You know Dan Ariely. I don't know if anybody who's listening knows who Dan Ariely is. He's a professor at Duke University, neuroscientist. His stuff is brilliant. He tells the story of a experiment that they did where they brought a group of people into a lab and they're broken into two groups. Group number one sat down at a table, and they were given what's called a bionicle, which is a version of lego. It's like 40 pieces, and they're like, hey, build this, and we're going to pay you to build it. So the person builds it, and then the proctor takes it, puts it behind them on the shelf, and says, here's another one. We're going to pay you a little less than the first one. They build it, same thing, right? And they see how many they build before the price. They're like, I've had enough. I'm going to stop. So that's group one, group two, exact same task, build, pay. But when they get done building number one, like, they get paid. They're like, hey, you want to build another one for this amount? Like, sure. They start doing it. The proctor takes it and disassembles it and puts it back in the box. Same task, same exact dollars, right? Group number two did half as many before they gave up. I believe that, like, part of one of those things like you just talked about is we have to see the fruits of our labor, right? So that mission, that impact, that aim, I believe that we do a horrible job of that with salespeople, especially when you think about this starting over at zero every year. Now, I'm not saying that, like, we should stop that practice, but if you're a top performer and a bottom performer who benefits from starting over at zero at the beginning of the year, the bottom performer, you're rewarding your bottom performers. You're punishing your top performers by starting over at zero. We've got to do better to show those people that have made an impact on our own organization the fruits of their labor, not just during the fiscal year, but forever. So that those reps that have been here for three years and four years can walk by and go, I did that, right? Like, I got a buddy of mine who's a plumber, and he was just joking with me about the fact that his kids are annoyed as he, like, he does, like, remodel reconstruction for, like, mansions. And, like, as he's driving with his kids, he's like, I did the plumbing in that House. I did the plumbing of that house. Like, he's so proud of it. But for salespeople, we go, oh, new fiscal year. That was last year. Start over. And I think there's opportunities, and it doesn't necessarily mean we don't start people over at zero, but there's ways to create mission, impact, purpose in your team around the impact they've made on your organization.

Yeah, well, because we're talking about two different things, right? A target starts back at zero. Impact is not. Right, Right. It's so funny, as you mentioned this, because one of, like, requests in 2020, before everything got jacked, is I wanted dashboards built, and I called them impact dashboards. How many customers have you signed up? All time. How many new customers have your customers gotten? How many new reviews have your. I wanted the visualization of the impact you have had on the company, but also on the customers. So your quota, that. Yeah, the quota does start over again. That doesn't take away the fact that you've signed up over 75 different businesses over the last two quarters and they have generated more revenue because of you. So I wanted impact dashboards if I can. We show the impact you're having for customers, the impact you're having on the org and everything else to make it visual. And that's, again, we just don't do that enough. Like, reps have no idea. Right. But also, sometimes companies hide it because also, if I sit back and I go, wait a minute, I've generated $10 million in ARR and that money's still coming in, and I don't get paid on that anymore. Wait a minute, what's. What's going on here? So I know, like, some people are afraid to share, but so I do. There's no way I was going to keep this under 30 minutes. There was no way. I knew this. I knew in this conversation. So, as we wrap here, I got two final questions for you. Right? So the first one's just like, what's the main takeaway? Right. If you're speaking to a leader, you bumped into him at a bar and they're like, yo, like, I'm leading a team. Things are getting dicey out there. Like, what. What would be that parting advice you'd give to them to say, hey, make sure you focus here?

Well, yeah, I think it goes back to that idea that uncertainty is literally like our brains kryptonite. And make sure you've got empathy for your team and what they're going through. They're talking, they're reading, they See what's going on. Create certainty everywhere you can. And where there is uncertainty, cards face up. Be humble, be transparent, but give them a plan or ability to predict as to when updates will be coming, so they can look forward to that every week. Because again, uncertainty lowers our iq, lowers our performance. And if your team right now is uncertain, worst case scenario will happen to you, right? You've got an opportunity just by creating certainty to minimize the risk of worst case scenario happening to you and your team.

I love it. I love it. Okay, and my final question, my man, name of this podcast is Live Better Sell Better. This really weird idea that, you know, if we took better care of ourselves, if we had more energy, joy, happiness, fulfillment in life, that the sales improve a little bit, what would your live better advice be for people listening?

Well, can I just tell it from a personal lens. I was a CRO of what was considered by Deloitte, the fastest growing tech company in Chicago, from 2014 to 2017, 2018. Like a lunatic, I quit to go write a book. Now here we are, three, four years later. I've replaced most of that income. Like, I made more money as a CRO and with the stock, like, absolutely. But, man, I save on the amount of Advil I have to take every day. I go to bed and I sleep well every night. I'm, you know, I'm a little over 50 now, so I'm aging like guacamole here. But, man, I feel better than I have in 15 years. And so for me, it became this idea of, like, really following my passion. And when you do that, when you wake up in the morning and you can't wait to get to it, I think I was killing myself as a CRO, right? And, like, there's. I'm never going back to that. I just, I love this too much. And I think there's opportunities for all of us to figure out what is that beacon that I want to go to and rally the troops. Get a mentor to help you get there. And, you know, five years, maybe shorter, you'll be doing what you love, sleeping better, and maybe you won't make as much money, but, man, life is good, brother.

Man, that makes me happy. Like, I love hearing good shit happen to good people, man. And you are definitely good people. Like, what you share, what you commit to, your passion around the salesperson and the sales leader is just phenomenal. Where can people find more of you? Where can they get your book? Where can they get the content? And before we wrap, like, let's talk about this New book coming out real quick. Because, like, I actually didn't even know you had a new book coming out. So I was prepping for this, this podcast. I was like, oh, there's another one coming. So where can people get more of what you're putting out?

Well, yeah, so, I mean, the first book was the Transparency Sale. When I wrote it, I thought there was a 5050 shot that it would suck, right? That I would get it out there. Three months later I'd be croing again. But it's taken on a life of its own. The new book is called the Transparent Sales Leader. This economy is crushing my ability to get the book printed quickly. So we're going to do a soft launch on July 5, which will be the Kindle, and then we're going to do a short run of print on demands, and then we'll do the big blast in September. But it's called the Transparent Sales Leader. It's based on this idea of when I first got promoted into sales leadership, I was used to having a process, a structure, and then all of a sudden I'm a sales leader and I'm a dog chasing a car down the street, never knowing what direction it's going. And so I created a structure and over the years built in all the behavioral science around it. And the Transparent Sales Leader is literally a structure that once you ingest it, which you can do in the first two chapters, you're already going to be 99% ahead of everyone else because you've got a structure for strategizing, communicating, planning, and your one on ones, your due diligence, everything kind of rides on that. And it's super easy. I hope you'll love it. But Transparent Sales leader coming out July 5th. And then like you said, you can find me anywhere. I'm pretty annoyingly easy to find. Let's go.

Let's go. Well, count me first in line for that soft launch, man. Like, so excited for that. Obviously, Sales leadership is what I'm super, super passionate about. Trying to level up and improve. So, Todd, my dude, this was phenomenal and I knew it would be. And also, we can't be done here. We need another session for sure. So we'll keep going. But I appreciate you, dude. Thank you so much for your time, energy and insights, man.

Oh, this is fun. I've been looking forward to this this one for a while and it didn't disappoint. Let's go, my man.

Good shit, dude.