Reflections from an Aging Warrior

The movie, “The Odyssey” is out.  It made me reminisce.  Grandiose expectations, even when achieved, can be a mistake…

Much has been studied and even more written about men of my generation, “trying too hard.”  We were modern warriors in a battle for treasure over ethics; victory over compassion; fame over family; intimidation over cooperation.  I wonder if that affliction afflicts today’s younger, working men.  Women, too.  

Speaking from experience, there can be a “burden of self-sufficiency” and “compulsive work ethic” in our warrioring years.  Some have suggested this can lead to “carrying sadness alone” when warriors fail to meet grandiose expectations, or even achieve them as Odysseus did.  It’s actually worse than that. 

I remember the day a former sales rep of mine, John, called.  Years previous I hired him into the technology sales field when other managers wouldn’t.  He was considered “out of profile”.  I took a chance.  I promoted him onto my Major Accounts sales team at ADP.  I trained him how to hunt.  He became a better hunter than me. 

After outgrowing that position, John left to seek fortune and glory.  He wound up as the #1 rep at Salesforce.com for multiple years.  We stayed in touch periodically; celebrating his victories.  

Then one day, John called.  I hadn’t heard from him in a while.  His voice was different.  I can’t pinpoint it.  He called me to share his most recent victory – or was it.  John just received his first $1 million W-2.  WOW!  What a grandiose achievement! 

Instead of joy however, John somberly asked me, “Gary, is that all there is?”  He was not consoled when I replied, “Yes. As a sales hunter, it’s just the money.”  We haven’t spoken much since.  I think we resigned ourselves to the reality that in our profession, hunting was “all we know”. 

No shame, though.  In the B2B sales profession there are very few true hunters.  Just being a consistent, 100% of quota performer, year-in and year-out, is rare.  I know elite performance is found in many professions.  I don’t know what makes the difference:  

Not every man is built to be in the arena.  

Scottie Scheffler 

Older now, I can finally say that growing up I and others placed too much emphasis on making money.  Pursuit of grandiose expectations, even when achieved, can create disappointment.  In my career, I did things that can’t be undone – can’t be “fixed”.  They are not “learning experiences” because as an elderly man there will never be a next time to “do better”; “do it differently”. 

Can self-forgiveness be found by acknowledging unforgivable deeds?  Did Odysseus find peace?  I hope so.  It’s not because we Aging Warriors have to “live with it”.  It’s actually worse than that.  We have to die with it. 

GAP

When life gets tough we could get a helmet… or… we could leverage the peace and share the power of a positive perspective.

Who’s to blame!

Ah yes, the age old blame game.  It’s being played to the max these days, true?  Those political pundits that promote negative campaigning argue it’s what “we” want.  Really?  I won’t speak for you but I prefer someone standing up and explaining how he or she is going to solve the problem vs. standing up and shouting who’s to blame for it.

I get it.  There are some days where I just want to blame someone else for my issues.  Some days, I don’t want to be a “responsible adult”, or as my friend and former colleague explained: 

It’s hard to be a responsible adult.  It’s much easier and sometimes more fun to be an irresponsible adult. 

 Adam Katzenmeyer 

Take the other day.  I bought the wrong size replacement sprinkler head I needed for a repair.  When I got home and discovered it was too long, I had to drive back to Home Depot, return it, and then buy the correct size.  When I looked at the bin of the size I needed I saw someone had stocked the wrong size in that bin.  “That’s why I picked the wrong size!” I said to myself.  I really wanted to blame someone. 

Back home, when I screwed in the sprinkler head – following a handyman’s step-by-step instructions on YouTube - it didn’t work!  After watching and re-watching the YouTube and removing and re-installing the sprinkler head multiple times, I (finally) realized a little mud had clogged the water pipe the head screws into.  The handyman on YouTube didn’t say to clean out the pipe.  Is he to blame? 

Do you ever feel that because people don’t do their jobs correctly, your level of inconvenience (and cost) goes up?  It seems so common - people make data entry mistakes; they’re too busy to answer the phone; they’re clueless when they do answer the phone… does it seem to you that we have to do our jobs and everyone else’s jobs, too?  Is everyone to blame? 

Unfortunately when it comes to that darned sprinkler system, I know who was to blame.  The clean-out step wasn’t in the handyman’s YouTube because it’s obvious, Duh!  If my wife was supervising, she would have spotted that oversight right away, but she wasn’t supervising me (this time).  Wait - could I have blamed it on my wife?  Hmm... Maybe not.

GAP 

When life gets tough we could get a helmet… or… we could leverage the peace and share the power of a positive perspective.

 

Breaking horses…

I saw a young man wearing this on his shirt: 

Break horses, not hearts 

Truthfully, I’m not a fan.  I (think) I understand the intent.  But I don’t believe people should take out their frustrations on animals (or other people for that matter).  Do you? 

Besides, professional horse trainers “start” a horse, they don’t “break” it.  On Reddit we find: 

“Breaking" a horse — more commonly known today as "starting" a horse — is the process of teaching a young or inexperienced animal to accept a saddle, bridle, and rider. Modern training emphasizes patience, pressure-and-release, and building trust over several months to ensure a safe, willing, and responsive riding partner. 

“… patience… building trust… willing partner…”  That makes horse sense to me; for the horse and for horse people, too.  When it’s done properly, horses can be as gentle as Big Mike was:

It’s that way with people, true?  Creating a safe environment can build trust at work, at home, within the family, within the neighborhood, wherever our herds gather.  Lose patience and we lose that trust.  It happens with people just like horses and when it does, we have to start over.  We can still succeed – it just takes time. 

I remember to this day when my wife’s mustang, Taz, wouldn’t load into our 2-horse trailer.  He had loaded countless times before but on this particular day he wouldn’t.  We’d walk him up to the back of the trailer and instead of stepping up and stepping in, he’d just stop.  We’d walk a circular go ‘round and return to the back of the trailer where he’d stop; over and over.  Seems we somehow lost his trust. 

We were told, you never let the horse win so we continued.  Oh, we tried a little bribery – hay in the trailer’s manger; treats; grain.  Nope, not that day.  Taz decided he didn’t want to load.  At 1,100 pounds we couldn’t push him in; gorillas either: 

But one thing for sure; when you wrestle with a 500-pound gorilla, you rest when the gorilla wants to. 

Unknown Sage 

Cowboys would tell us to lock our arms or hold a rope around his rear and pull him in.  Some say it was a test of the pecking order.  We had to show the horse who was boss.   

I’ve had that happen at the office, as well.  At both ends.  Taz might have been familiar with Rodovic: 

Rodovic's Rule 

In any organization, the potential is much greater for the subordinate to manage his superior than for the superior to manage his subordinate. 

Turns out, that was a great exercise to help me build patience.  It was a nice day.  We didn’t have a deadline, so we simply spent a couple of hours circling Taz until he finally agreed to load up. I don’t know why.  Maybe we demonstrated patience along with a pressure-and-release technique that re-confirmed our worthiness of his trust. 

Whatever the reason, Taz never resisted loading in our trailer again.  And at work, I tried my best to stop trying to show my people I was the boss. They weren't broken-hearted.

GAP 

When life gets tough we could get a helmet… or… we could leverage the peace and share the power of a positive perspective.

 

How much?

I had a lady come up to me at my book-signing table recently and asked that infamous question – “How much?”  “Wow!” was her response when I answered.  That’s a challenge with certain ways buyers respond to sellers, true?  If you think about it, her “Wow!” was vague.  On its own, you couldn’t tell if she thought my book was a lot, or a little. 

Being the trained sales professional I am, I clarified, “I'm curious. Is that a good Wow!, or a bad Wow!”?   Turned out, it was a good Wow! in her opinion and she bought my book.  Crisis averted, LOL! 

In sales, that’s the thing about the “money question”.  I’ve learned that the definition of, “How much is a lot” is client-defined.  My job as a sales professional was to address the money question in a clear and confident voice and then clarify my prospects’ reaction.  You see, when our prospects ask us the money question they already have a number in mind.  They have already decided what is a lot or a little.  We might as well find out, yes? 

In his book Let's Get Real or Let's Not Play ©, Mahan Khalsa put it this way: 

If you walk out of qualifying meetings with clients and do not know how much they are thinking of spending, and they do not know how much you are thinking of charging, you will both be guessing.  This is mutual mystification. 

Many salespeople say they’re uncomfortable addressing price up front.  They’ve been trained to “develop trust & rapport” first.  They’ve been trained to say, “Oh, I’d have to do a thorough analysis of your needs before I could possibly hazard a guess.”  And that’s called the money flinch.  Unfortunately, here’s the reality of flinching. 

When the prospect directly asks you the money question, “How much does something like this cost?”, if you don’t respond to their direct question with a direct answer, then the prospect notes your flinch and draws their own conclusions.  We as sellers won’t like their conclusions, either: 

Sounds complicated

Sounds expensive

I think we’ll stay status quo 

and they're gone.  Now, before you go…  

… please realize, in B2B selling I’m advocating that the salesperson answer a direct question with a direct answer to avoid creating doubt.  I’m prepared to discuss money with my prospects early, late and throughout their buying process.  It’s my favorite topic! 

I rely on the skill of clarification.  What I’ve given them is an “answer; it’s not a “quote”.  There’s a difference.  But we can get close enough money wise quickly to determine if it makes sense to move forward.  We still need to complete a thorough needs analysis to clarify exactly what the prospect is buying and correspondingly what we will charge, aka give them an actual quote. 

I agree with Mahan.  Let's avoid “mutual mystification” starting out. 

GAP 

When life gets tough we could get a helmet… or… we could leverage the peace and share the power of a positive perspective.

Make the best of it…

It was the county fairgrounds in Vernal, Utah in 1999.  I was with my son’s Westernaires’ team.  They’re a traveling, equestrian, performance, drill team of teenagers and we were there for the Vernal Dinosaur Days Rodeo.  It was July and it was hot! 

Temperatures in Vernal, Utah can reach 110º and even higher during July.  I’m pictured along with 3 other Dads.  We were volunteer “Barn Men”.  Our job?  Sleep in the barn overnight with 75 or so horses that traveled with my son’s team.  We were making the best of it. 

Throughout the day, in between performances, we stayed out of the sun and tried to stay as cool as possible.  The barn wasn’t air conditioned.  Maybe horses are used to 100+ degree heat.  Dad’s?  Well, thankfully, we found a kiddy pool at the local Walmart to soak our feet and decided to follow Charles L. Bromley’s advice:

Why not make the best of things?  Any fool can make the worst of them.

During the kids’ were performances, we were out there in the sun with them.  Helping with costume changes; being in the arena if a horse spooked; making sure the kids (and the horses) stayed hydrated in the heat. 

When they asked me to be a volunteer, Barn Dad, I said, “I don’t know anything about being with horses in a barn overnight.”  Their response was, “That’s OK.  The horses do.” 

So, there I was.  Sleeping on a cot in a barn with a herd of horses overnight.  It wasn’t hard.  The kids made sure the horses were fed and watered before they turned in.  They slept in the gymnasium at a local school.  My wife was one of several parents who chaperoned the boys and girls on the Westernaires traveling team.                                                                                   

I bet you’ve been in those situations, too.  Maybe a company dinner with your spouse.  You don’t know anybody and all they talk about is business.  But there you are – smile on your face, beverage (or plural) in your hand, making the best of it. 

It’s very satisfying to look back and remember doing something nice for someone you love, true?  It could be as simple as cleaning the bathroom, making the bed, running to the grocery store, or emptying the dishwater.  All those little things can make a big difference. 

And if you’re asked one day to sleep in a barn with your child’s horse, don’t worry.  Just make the best of it.  The horse knows what to do and it will be worth it! 

GAP 

When life gets tough we could get a helmet… or… we could leverage the peace and share the power of a positive perspective.