Boosting Tech Sales Success: Resilience and Confidence with Jill Fratianne

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Excited?

Yes, we are excited to have you, my friend. It's great to take these LinkedIn friendships and turn them into real friendships and then share the conversation with the world. So how would you get us started? By telling us a little bit about yourself and what you do.

So I'm Jill, also known as Jilly Frat. My last name is Fradiani, so my work name is Jilly Frat. No one calls me Jill unless I'm in trouble after they get to know me. I don't know why, but I'm a Jilly. I've been at HubSpot for going on 13 years. I've been in tech sales, and I'm also a real estate investor. I did go to school for classical music. I'm a professional violist, but ended up going into selling software because, of course, I still play with the Portland Symphony when I can. I'm a mom and. And a wife of an entrepreneur, which makes our household kind of crazy. And when I'm not doing that, I occasionally sleep.

Wow.

Once in a while.

So, Jilly, now I'm thinking to myself, there are so many other things that we should be talking about.

A lot of things on this podcast. That's crazy.

That's so cool. That is so cool. Okay, and so now with the tech sales side of this, which, you know, as we discussed before, that's where we're going to focus. But now my mind is racing to all of these other cool things about you. When we were talking earlier, we were talking about the importance of mental health and the stuff that goes on behind the scenes, because a lot of times when we're having these conversations about how to negotiate better, how to Sell better, how to be a better leader and everything. We don't think about the underlying mental health, basic type of things that we need to have in place to be able to perform effectively. So when you think about your career and you think about performance and the things that impact it, what are those types of things that have an impact on the way that you show up on your sales calls and as a leader?

Well, as my sales career progressed, I realized I had a severe anxiety problem. I think like most, I shouldn't, I don't want to categorize everybody most, but if you're a quota bearing salesperson and you don't care about that number, there's probably something wrong at some point. And I learned early on that the only thing I had to succeed or to win was what was going on up here. That's really it. Right. And I started zoom based selling 13 years ago. So I wasn't even having the benefit of sitting around the room with people anymore, having any type of connection other than what people are hearing, how I'm responding. And hitting that number doesn't happen if you're mad, if you're sad, or if you're anxious because what happens is your ears close, you can't hear the nuances, people's needs, because you're so in your own head, you're not projecting what needs to happen to help people, which is really what professional sales is. Professional sales is about listening, is about follow through, is about confidence, is about gaining trust. I think one of the lines that you said too is like, deals move at the speed of trust, which is such a great line. If people aren't going to trust you, if you seem nervous or if you seem tired, or if you're not following through. And none of that can happen. If you are freaking out, it can't happen. And what happens when you get older, you know, people, people start coping with these things in unhealthy ways. Right. You know, some, some people can, can turn to drinking. You know, there's, there's, there's something called, like a midlife crisis when you're in your 40s and, and that type of behavior that's kind of acceptable, especially in sales, you know, like going to the bar or you know, whatever it is to calm yourself down as you chip away at your career. Those things work less and less and less and you can find yourselves in a real scary kind of anxiety hole. And I am very fortunate to work at the company I work at. We talk about these things in corporate settings, which is really strange. From where I was just grown up, it's like, you don't talk about mental health or anxiety or being scared. You have to be the strong one. You're not scared. Uh, but we encourage hiring professionals around here, whether or not it's a therapist, whether or not it's a coach. I often laugh. People go, you know, how do you do what you do? And it's like, I take a village. I take a village. I now, after going through years of therapy, which I suggest every adult should go through, I thought it was not going to be helpful. It was. I now have a business coach that's more of like a therapist and a business coach. I also have a personal trainer who's like my fitness coach. I just. I have to lean on professionals to make sure that this is working right. Because I can't do it on my own. And the only reason I pay for it is because I want to win more. Right. Like, it's part of, you know, why I want to succeed. A long answer. But it's just, it's. I'm very, very passionate about this, especially with young parents and. Because no one really talks about it.

Yeah. And we. We need to talk about it a lot more because it has an impact. Right. Because when you think about the skills training that we do at ANI or people, the skills that people want to pick up in general, like you said, active listening, paying attention to the different cues, like the buying signals of the other side, you are not going to be able to catch those things if you're not in the right mental space. And so we can't just muscle our way through it. And I think if we think about the brain in. In just like another body part, it'll help us to understand it. So let's say if somebody is stressed out, they're feeling anxious, they're feeling overwhelmed a lot of times, again, the old school mentality is just suck it up and suck it up and work through it. Yeah, just work through it. So let's say then your arm is broken.

Suck it up and work through that. You know, lift that thing you used.

To lift with that broken arm. Just think harder, try harder. It's your fault that you're not be. You're not able to work through this broken arm. That's not the way it works, and we understand that. But for some reason, there's a stigma by the brain that you can just think your way out of things. It takes a lot of effort. Right? It takes a lot of effort and the right kind of effort because Even though we all have brains, that doesn't mean that we're experts in how they work. And so going back to what you talked about, it's important educate yourself on it. It's an. And it's important to get help from experts as well. And we're going to need those tune ups from time to time. But I think it's important to keep it consistently too because I've just like you have gone through therapy. It's helped immensely. Even though my undergrad's in psychology, I.

Was still surprised that what you needed to learn.

Exactly.

And it was, it was really helpful. So the points you make are making are spot on. So important that we need to talk about it more.

We definitely. And that it's okay and normal. And you said something too about the brain. It's a muscle that needs to be trained and it's just not something that is taught in school. It's not a topic of conversation. I remember even in music school I started getting performance anxiety out of nowhere in my twenties where I never had performance anxiety as a child. And, and you know, a lot of musicians start taking beta blockers and you know, you go down a pretty bad path of dealing with performance anxiety. Meanwhile, you know, if you go through years of therapy and you peel back those layers, it's just that you're inner perfectionist making up stuff. Right. That's making up stuff that's never going to happen. But if you don't retrain those inner subconscious thoughts and, and actions and it takes a lot of retraining, you know, you may find yourself quitting something that you love because you don't think that you're good enough to do it. And all you needed was a shift in mindset that had nothing to do with your abilities or your talents or your skills had nothing to do with it. And everything to do with the, you know, your ability to believe that you can and you know, to make it happen.

Definitely. And when you think about mindsets, that's such a powerful concept. Just to reiterate what you just said, a lot of the issues that we face when it comes to performance, they don't come down to the skills. The skills aren't the problem. That's the mentality around your performance. And so when you think about the skills that you need as an effective communicator, what are the types of mindsets that you think are the most powerful to hold? Hello, my friends. Before we get back to today's episode, I want to ask you a question. Have you ever wondered how to elevate your team's negotiation game and how you can help the folks on your team have better, difficult conversations. At the American Negotiation Institute, we offer transformative keynotes and workshops tailored to empower professionals with top tier negotiation and conflict resolution skills. Skills. Whether it's a keynote for your next event or hands on training for your team, we've got you covered. Don't just negotiate. Master the art with the American Negotiation Institute. Click the link in the description to find out more. Elevate, negotiate and succeed.

You know, you really have to just be secure in yourself I think in order to help or be secure in others. So that actually I joined this group called Corporate Women's Unleashed. They now call themselves a good life Institute and we did confidence exercises. Never did a self confidence exercise before in my life. And it's amazing how little confidence most of us have, which leads to a lot of problems. Right. And when you're confident in yourself, I think that's one of the most important mindsets that you can bring to any table at any time on any topic, whether or not it's, you know, a business topic or a personal relationship. But it really comes down to your inner confidence I think is the most important thing. And it takes work. There are things you can do to build that confidence. It's not just I achieve something, so now I feel great about myself. What's wrong with that? It causes this like peak and valley. It's like, well, I'm only, I'll be confident then I'll be confident if I do this. It's like meanwhile you're, you're, you're missing the whole journey of just being confident in yourself and not letting those peaks and valleys control whether or not your self worth is tied to it. That's easier said than done. I still have a huge, you know, being in sales too. We are monitored on a minute by minute basis at who's on top and who's on the bottom and who's, you know, it's constant like that. So. But it's detaching yourself from your self worth in those peaks and valleys which I think gives you that long term ride of being able to make it through. Lasting at the same tech company for almost 13 years for me was one of the most things I'm proud of because there have been many peaks and many valleys. Many, you know, so it hasn't always been great, but how do you stay through? Right. It's, it's learning how to, how to detach your personal worth from your performance and that your confidence is with yourself, not just these peaks and valleys that are external awards. Right. That are great to get. But you can't just feel good about yourself when you win a big award or you have a great sales month. Right. You got to feel good about yourself when you just drop the ball and have a terrible sales month. Like, how do you dig? Most people quit because it's embarrassing and it's scary, and you don't feel good about yourself, and you feel like everyone else is better than you and you should just quit. And a lot of people do. It's like it's almost evening out the confidence that those external things don't drive how you feel about yourself. I haven't mastered it by any means, but that is something that I continue to try to strive on.

Yeah. And Jilly, to that point, I'm thinking about the fact that you said, I haven't mastered it. And now let's pretend you're not here. Now let's just take a step back and we look at your career, and so we look at your impressive resume. The fact that you've been at a great company like HubSpot for 13 years, being successful from the outside looking in. That's what people think. And then they would say, wait, you have trouble with confidence still? They would be surprised. They would be surprised. And they will also then take that surprise and turn it into something more negative and say, well, wait a second. If she has that kind of resume.

And she's still not confident, then what about me?

What about my level of confidence? And this is one of the things I'd love to get your thoughts on this, because I'm slowly starting to come to this conclusion that lacking in confidence and feeling insecure in different areas of our life from time to time is almost like a constant state that you just need to manage. And for me, with imposter syndrome, that's the joke that I've like, the jokey conclusion I've come to is like, this is just a cosmic joke. We always try to get rid of.

Imposter syndrome, but you just can't.

It's like you just never do.

You never do. You have to manage it.

And so we're. I'm realizing that. And based on your answer and just my experience, too, it's. It's recognized, recognizing that you will feel this way from time to time and still pushing forward. Because the flip side of confidence here is resilience. Even if you're not feeling your best, you still know that you have what it takes to Survive and keep moving forward. And even if times are down now, as long as you keep doing the right things, things will start to get better. And so how would you describe the relationship between confidence and resilience in your experience?

You know, the word that came to mind for me was courage, right? That is really courage. Courage is overcoming that imposter and doing it anyways. It really does take courage. And I do think other people externally see that as confidence because it's like you're seeing somebody do something like, wow, that would be scary. That person's probably terrified, you know, or they've practiced so much that they've gotten over that terrified feeling, you know, and it's. It's courage. And you know what else it is? It's learning to be in competition with yourself, I think is what really builds resilience. Taking it back to sales. I know my sales director and VP have heard me say this, but we have dashboards, we have awards all of the time, where you can sit and you can compare yourself to others all day long. I think that works early in your career. While you're chasing something, you're trying to figure out, what exactly do I need to do to be good at what I'm doing? And eventually it's a really negative place. And so there comes a point, especially in a sales career, where you have to step away from what everybody else is doing, and you have to focus on yourself and the courage it's going to take to get your goals in place based on goals that you need to hit, too. But that's hard. It's really hard to do. It's really, really hard to do. And once you get all that negative garbage out of your head, you can. You can really focus on the things that matter to do well.

So like you said, it's tough to battle that social comparison because that's just the way that the human mind is wired. And I love your. Your approach because again, the human mind will constantly compare. And a lot of times people say, hey, stop comparing yourself to other people. Hey, that'd be cool.

Yeah. Yeah, good luck with that.

Yeah. And so I like your idea of comparing yourself to yourself. So what can I do to get incrementally better? What is it that I need in order to meet my goals and live my life in the way that I want to while still being productive at work? And I want to kind of dig deeper into your experience to see what it is that you were able to do just mentally with your mindset shift to be able to pull that off that self comparison versus social comparison.

I think it's, you know, if I had to dig deep, it's. It's an A. I do have this deep inner drive to win. What that winning is, I don't know, but I feel it. And I learned that if that were to be true and I really wanted to do the things, hit the numbers that I want to hit my health goals, have a family that I. That is healthy and happy and thriving, I had to take out the things that would impact that negatively. One of those is comparing yourself to others. So you go down these paths with really good coaches and really good therapists, and it becomes a very bright, bright warning sign. It's like, stop it. Your company says, this is great. You have to be able to function here. You need to be able to take care of your health or we're never coming back to, you know, to a place where you're. You're going to be doing well. So I think, I think it comes down to. I don't think you're ever going to not totally compare yourself to others. But there are instances, like I can see where I've just, I've just tuned it out and I wouldn't have been able to say that, you know, five years ago. So that's a learned skill. I could say that over the course of five years of really rarely working on it, I have gotten to a much more comfortable place of just focusing on me, just writing down my goals. I mean, I've always got like my little visualization board of goals, right? Just like laser focused on me and, you know, not letting the noise of comparing yourself to others as much as you can because you're not going to get to where you are if you're constantly comparing yourself to everyone else. Sports. I don't, I don't know if you love him. Not everybody loves him. I'm a huge Tom Brady fan. I'm not a big football person. Don't ask about football stats. But he's just one of those human beings who constantly talks about only being in competition with himself. He is a machine about himself. What he puts in his mind, what he puts in his body, like how he just can, you know, come back and just. Just win these games that no one would think that anyone could win. And all he is is just doing Jedi mind tracks. It's just, it's so mental with him. He tunes out all of the, well, that's not possible and just focuses on, you know, what he can do. If he thought about every other player that that, you know, botched those games, he would never win, you know.

Yes, I love this. And so to that point, about Tom Brady, there's this book written by, I think his last name is Grover. It's the guy who was the coach or the strength and conditioning coach for Michael Jordan. That's his claim to fame. Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, Dwyane Wade, a bunch of these really star athletes here. And so he talks about being selfish and he says for some reason there is a stigma against selfishness.

Being selfish.

Yeah. But when you think about self care, people think about. Nobody criticizes self care, but when it comes to being selfish, that's a problem. And so he broke it down in a really interesting way because I, you know, I heard that part and of course, my bias against the word selfish, I was like, okay, buddy, we'll see how this one goes. But it made a lot of sense. And so I think about it in terms of positive selfishness versus negative selfishness. There is a version of selfishness that has a negative impact on the people around you. And that's not where we want to go. But then we have to recognize that the person who's best positioned to take care of yourself is yourself.

Is yourself.

Yeah. And there's nothing wrong with doing what's best for yourself. And going back to something you said earlier, you realized that in order to get to where you wanted to go in your mental health and in your career, you could not do it alone. And a lot of people will listen to this podcast and then they will just try to force it. Cool. Hey, Jilly said some amazing things. I'm just going to do all of those things now.

Yeah, no, no.

It takes time and it takes help. And we have to remember that we don't get bonus points for not using the resources at our disposal because you'll probably, if you're with your healthcare, you might have some opportunities to have access to, to some therapy. Through your healthcare you have, you might be able to afford a coach. And if you can't, you can have a mentoring relationship with somebody else or start a mastermind group with people who are like minded trying to accomplish the same things. But we have to realize that there's value in perspective because we live in the echo chamber of our own minds and we say the same garbage to ourselves so often that it sounds correct. And until you take the time to say to somebody else and they're like, oh, hey, Kwame, that doesn't make any sense. Think better.

Like, oh, okay, I should make some changes.

But you need to use that help. And there's nothing wrong with getting help.

No. And I'm the biggest proponent of saying there's nothing wrong with it. And guess who still has an issue with asking for help when I needed it? We was talking to you that we had this week of rest here at HubSpot, and a week ago, I mean, I was just depleted to a place where I was like, this is a little scary. I haven't felt this in years. Why? Like, I'm not mentally there. I don't have any energy, you know, and. And I didn't want to reach out to my coach. Why? That's so, like, that goes against everything that I preach to people, to myself. Like, why wouldn't I want to ask. Ask Amy for help? Like she would.

That's.

That's why I have, you know, and so I heard all of the things that, you know, we talk about a lot, and a lot about it is, you know, that. That concept of resting before you need rest, you know, these are signals, right? And she. She helps me with that all the time. It's like I forget on my own that you need. You need to rest before you need the rest. When you need the rest, you're. You're really far gone at that point. It's going to take a lot to unravel, you know, and kind of get back to a centered place. Um, but again, someone who. Every working professional that I work at HubSpot, I work alongside me in sales. I always suggest coaches, therapist, whatever. And here I was in a place where, oh, geez, I needed to reach out and I didn't want to. Why? Why? And I was like, that's. I literally had a conversation with myself, like, why you pick, like, you have sessions to go. Like, this is why you have the sessions. Ask for the help. What? What? I don't know what that. I don't know what that is either in us human beings. I don't know. It's like some side of strength that we, you know, feel that if we're not always at the top of our game or somehow failing, I don't know, but we do that.

If I were to guess, I would assume it's some kind of ego, right? So think about when. And this might be a bit of a logical stretch, but we'll see where it goes. Think about when people. Let's stick with sports. When people are acting really cocky, when they're showboating, they want to make everybody looking, make it seem as though it's easy.

It's easy. I can do it.

Yeah. I could do this easily. I'm beating a great team, and it is no problem for me. This is actually easy. Right. And so the. You don't want to admit that it's very hard. And so there's something, like, deep within us where our ego wants to demonstrate to ourselves and for others that it is possible for us to do this, number one. But not only that we can do it, but it's easy and easier relative to other people. Insert social comparison here. Right. And so what I've realized is that, for me, the times where I say, you know what? I could go to my therapist, but I'm not going to. You know what? Maybe I should meditate because I'm stressed. No, I'm not going to. Right. The times where I think of a good thing and then I actively reject it, in my mind, those are the times where I actually need it the most. Like, hey, you thought about that? You should probably just pull the trigger and get it, because, again, we don't get bonus points for doing it. Yeah. And so I think it's our ego that gets in the way. But we don't want to admit that either, because nobody wants to admit that they're egotistical.

No. Because if I even break it down to myself, last week, I was like, why do I need to. Why do I need to schedule a session with Amy? I already know everything. We've already been down this path. She's already told me everything I need to do. I know what I need to do. And it's like, what? That's exactly right. And she would laugh because it's like, here we go again. Right. You're just going to work through it yourself and not reach out and ask for some perspective outside of yourself. Yeah, it's totally ego.

It's definitely ego. And it can be very humbling. And humbling is what we need. I remember when my therapist one time said, well, Kwame, this is really a textbook case.

I said, textbook. My degree is in psychology. I read textbook.

How do I need one?

Yeah, exactly. I am textbook. Oh, my God. Right.

But again, I think it's just important you have to have that outside perspective, because sometimes we're too close. I have a business coach, too, and my business coach has a business coach.

Because she wants to be successful as well.

Blind spots. We have blind spots. We have limiting beliefs. Right. We have blind spots. We have limiting beliefs, and we have conversations that, you know, we just don't want to have with our families anymore and our friends anymore. Like, it's just, it's just not the place. Right. And we, we have blind spots. I don't know too many successful people, not just speaking about money, that do not have coaches. I don't. And the older I get, the more I see it more. Right. The more successful people I see, the more I see them investing in people to coach them in whatever it is that they want to do. Right. These are not people who are doing it alone ever. They have advisors, they have people, they have coaches, they have, you know, from every angle from nutrition to health to mental. And if we don't have those things as we age in this life, it is very difficult to hit any goal of any sort because it's. All we have is like our health and our. What's going on up here. And it's very, very important. And it's hard sometimes to fork out money and time for it. It's really, really hard. But it, you know, I don't, I can 1000% say, you know, my sales career has lost as long as it has because I did really invest in help.

Yeah. And that's a good thing. Again, it goes back to what we said at the beginning. You need the help, get the help to get better and to get better at what it is that you do. Right. And so again, somebody might be listening to this and say, hey, wait a.

Second, I didn't learn a single persuasion technique or negotiation technique. Exactly.

You know, the negotiation technique that you would have learned in this episode, you wouldn't have been able to execute on.

If you're stressed out.

Right. So we have to get the foundation in place so we can then achieve the higher levels of communication skills that we come to this podcast for. But again, we don't do it enough, in my opinion, on this show, talking about this so we can put people in the right mental state to be able to negotiate effectively. We have to talk about that too.

Yeah. Could you, could you see any of. I watch you dissect all of, you know, the Supreme Court nominees. You think any of them could go in there and handle any of that in a non confident mindset? I mean, you gotta, you gotta be in it at that point, you know, like, you're, you're not gonna be able to negotiate, you know, and I'm sure they're dying inside. But I, I would guarantee every single one of them had coaches telling them how to speak, how to answer questions, you know, how to focus on the phrase that pays. Right.

Exactly. Exactly. I would almost, if I were in a position where I was trying to promote like a Supreme Court nominee or something like that. Or if I were in a political party and there was somebody who was who I want to be the up and comer, up and coming nominee. I wouldn't choose that person if the person wasn't willing to get help. It's like, do you have a comms team? Oh, no. You think you're going to. No.

You think you're just going to go up there and.

We'll pass, thank you. Thanks.

Yeah. No, no, no, no.

Who is your team Would be one of those big questions that we ask.

Who would you say is coaching you through this?

Exactly.

And what are their credentials? And they better be better than your credentials, you know?

Exactly. Exactly.

Oh, this is great. This is great. And again, I think this is really important. And again, it shows just how important it is to take care of yourself. No shame in that. And I'm pumped that we got somebody that has such a successful career like yourself being humble enough and vulnerable enough to come on and say, hey, the reason why I'm so good is because I take care of myself and you should too. So I appreciate you sharing your sake, your secret sauce with us.

Happy to do so, yes.

And listeners, Jilly is quite active on LinkedIn, so we'll drop a line to her LinkedIn profile here. Any parting words before you go?

Be well. Just be well. Everyone. Anyone who's listening to this, just be well. Do what you can to be well. And you have to be well to be great.

Oh, I love that. That is a great line to end on.

Jilli, really appreciate it. Thanks for joining us.

Thank you.

Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.

Now, before you sign off, I have something to tell you that I've never told you before.

Just kidding.

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