Creating Distance

Jake Dunlap is the CEO of Skaled Consulting and easily one of the best voices in the world of modern B2B Sales. He's a true practitioner, he has fresh takes and he has really "done it" and been successful in a number of different industries. The side of Jake I appreciate most is his perspective to choose growth, not short term financial success, as your guide. I'm a strong believer in that. In thi...

Marcus Chan is the Founder and President of Venli Consulting Group. Marcus has an intriguing come-up story. Being raised by Chinese immigrant parents, Marcus worked full-time at his family's restaurant - in elementary school. That hard work has propelled him to a successful career in sales, selling anything from speedos to 7-figure deals. In this conversation, we talk about: Marcus' upbringing and...

Kyle Coleman is the VP Revenue Growth and Enablement at Clari. Prior to that, Kyle joined Looker as the 6th employee and first sales hire. In 6 years, he helped to grow the Sales Development team to 60+ people on their path to a $2.6B acquisition from Google.  We had a wide-ranging conversation, where we discussed: Kyle’s career path from financial advisor to poker player to salesperson  The bigge...

Ralph Barsi is the VP Global Inside Sales at Tray.io. When I think of the gold standard for Servant Leadership within the sales community, Ralph is the first person that comes to mind and I was thrilled to have him on the show. Ralph has spent nearly 3 decades in sales, including recent runs at ServiceNow, Achievers, and InsideView before landing at Tray in late 2019. We had a wide-ranging convers...

“I have always lived my life by making lists: lists of people to call, lists of ideas, lists of companies to set up, lists of people who can make things happen.” - Richard Branson   It’s likely that you keep some sort of to-do-list.  A laundry list of items that you “should do”, that constantly gets procrastinated until you have the time.  Things are just so busy.   I’m not telling you to rip that...

The true man is revealed in difficult times. So when trouble comes, think of yourself as a wrestler whom God, like a trainer, has paired with a tough young buck. For what purpose? To turn you into Olympic-class material.”  - Epictetus We all go through tough times.  Even if you’re not victim to the illness or unemployment sweeping the country right now, things can still be hard.  You might be work...

"The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way.”  - Marcus Aurelius    We’ve all stood at the bottom of what appeared to be an insurmountable mountain.  Maybe it’s a sales quota that looks astronomical, a pile of work that has been building up for weeks or a frayed relationship that needs mending.   The mountain seems so high that we’re not sure we can climb it. ...

“Circumstances don’t make the man, they only reveal him to himself”  – Epictetus   We all have different stories and circumstances that define our history.  We’re from different parts of the world, our families are different (but all crazy), and were raised differently.   At some point, you have to play the hand you’re dealt.  You may play it differently if you have pocket aces versus having a two...

“The more I help out, the more successful I become. But I measure success in what it has done for the people around me. That is the real accolade.”  -- Adam Grant   Even in a quarantined world, we have dozens of interactions with other people each day.  From the grocery store worker to our boss to the emails you send your clients, we’re in a constant state of giving and taking.   Here’s an idea: t...

If you’re reading this, you want more.  You want more money, a better job, a healthier body, a deeper relationship.  You want something.  And if you’re anything like me, you could use a little kick this Monday morning.   Check out this 3-minute interview between Jim Carey and Oprah.  Carey describes his days as a broke, struggling actor. He thought about quitting.   Instead, he decided to write hi...

“Your progress is wrecked or preserved by a single day and a single event”  – Epictetus The stories are in the news seemingly every day.  A successful person who has built their brand for years or even decades has let it slip.  They said something unspeakable in front of a microphone, they mistreated their spouse, or maybe they had been hiding some dirty secrets for years.  They fucked it all up. ...

Have you ever been in the middle of doing something important, got distracted by a flashy notification and then got stuck down a rabbit hole? Me too.  We've all become like Dory from Finding Nemo.  In a world currently full of notifications and instant gratification, one of the most difficult things for me (and many others) is to stay focused on the task at hand.  I had a great conversation with J...

I’m surprised by how few people I’ve seen reference Henry David Thoreau during the quarantine of COVID-19.  For the unfamiliar, Thoreau spent a few years intentionally quarantined to get more in touch with himself and nature while removing himself from the busyness of the normal world.   In his words:  "I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately and see if I could learn what it had...

Last week’s tip was to send people handwritten notes.  Coincidentally, I came across this podcast that shows this strategy in motion.  Buzz Williams, Head Coach of Texas A&M’s basketball program, is a handwritten note maniac.  He’s used it to build up professional relationships and wouldn’t be where he is without them.   On Jon Gordon’s podcast, Williams said he wrote a handwritten note to everyon...

The whole point of all of this personal development is to become successful, isn't it?  And maybe we all have different definitions of success but they probably all relate to a combination of financial, professional, health, relationship and spiritual aspirations. This article by former president of Y Combinator and current CEO of OpenAI, Sam Altman is one of the best I've read on the topic of pro...

I recently saw the below quote from Farnam Street (link) and wanted to share it with you all.  "A great leader, I think—that a great leader walks into the room and you feel bigger. You don’t think, “Wow! What a great leader.” You think, “Wow! I’m willing to say this thing. I feel more comfortable on my own skin. I’m just having ideas I haven’t had before.” A great leader makes other people better....

You can usually tell in the first few minutes of a podcast how well it’s going to go.  So when David Cancel, CEO of Drift, answered my first question around learning with “Yes, this is my obsession…” I knew I was in for a good one.   I mean, how often do you hear that someone’s obsessed with learning?  You’re more likely to hear of someone's obsession with Tiger King than with learning.  But Cance...

"Beware the naked man who offers you his shirt"   Put simply: you can’t give what you don’t have.  It’s hard to be a good leader, partner, significant other or friend when you’re grouchy or feeling off.  They say that you can’t pour from an empty cup.  What they don’t say is that the cup is refillable.   Find what fills up your cup.   For me, it’s getting my morning started off on the right foot. ...

Imagine someone sending you a really nice message.  They’re thanking you: for your hard work, for being a great employee/boss/customer/mother/whatever you are.  The note is kind, it’s thoughtful, it makes you feel good. It shows up as an email on a Tuesday afternoon. Pretty cool.  Now imagine that same scenario, except it’s an actual handwritten letter.  You go to your mailbox expecting a Bank of...

“Success breeds complacency. Complacency breeds failure. Only the paranoid survive”  – Andy Grove, Co-Founder, Intel   Just a few months ago, times had never been easier.  We were riding a decade-plus long bull market. It seemed as though everyone and their mother had joined or started a company that received hundreds of millions of dollars in funding.  There were teenage kids in Lamborghini’s (se...

"Realizing that the other person is also just like me is the basis on which we can develop compassion, not only toward those around us but also toward our enemy. Normally, when we think about our enemy, we think about harming him. Instead, try to remember that the enemy is also a human being, just like you." -- The Dalai Lama A few years ago I interviewed former Lead Hostage Negotiator for the FBI...

Rich Roll was the All-American guy.  He was an especially talented student-athlete, as he earned several NCAA Swimming Championships while at Stanford.  After graduation, Roll dove head-first into work and was on the fast-track to becoming a Partner at his Law firm. On the outside looking in, it appeared that Rich had it all.  On the inside, he was miserable. His purposelessness led him deep into...

Have you ever met someone that’s so stubborn, so stuck in their ways, that they’re difficult to reason with?  They wouldn’t consider new ideas because “this is how they’ve always done it”? These people are everywhere.  Maybe you work with them. Maybe you are one of them in a certain area of life. It’s understandable.  Once we gain familiarity or mastery in a subject matter, we gain confidence.  Th...

Tomorrow starts a new month and the 2nd quarter of the year.  Can you believe we’re 25% through 2020?   Some people will spend today doing their normal things.  They’ll work, exercise, eat dinner, watch TV and go to bed.  They’ll wake up tomorrow without a plan and go through their next month in a daze, with no plan and no strategy.  The top 1% will approach this differently.  They’ll spend some t...

In one of his articles for The Player Tribune, Kobe Bryant opened up about his competitive relationship with Allen Iverson.  Iverson had a hot start in the league, as Bryant was struggling to make a name for himself.  In 1999, Iverson scored 41 points and dropped 10 assists in a game where Bryant was guarding him.  Bryant was mortified.  He became obsessed, fixated on anything he could find to hel...