Marty: Welcome to another episode of Not Your Typical Leadership Coaching with me, Martin Kettelhut and my good friend and colleague, Bill Tierney. Today we're, we want to talk about sales. Oh, no, not

Bill: sales.

Marty: Rare is the human being that we go. Yay.

Bill: We get to

Marty: talk about sales

Bill: today.

Marty: Of course, there are people that will say, oh, that's my forte. I love sales. Yeah. But they're probably some of those people, the people that we're trying to not be like, oh gosh, it's a fraud. It's a fraud. Dimension of the world that we live in.

Bill: Well, and it's so necessary, really. I think I've said this in episodes before that when you're in business, you got to do two things. You got to get the business and then you got to do the business.

Marty: Yeah,

Bill: exactly. And getting the business is what sales and marketing is all about.

Marty: It's so funny when I'm having an off day in sales, I always think like, you know, I'd like to do something like work in a used bookstore where you just sit there and if people want to come and buy something great, otherwise you don't have to sell anything.

Bill: That's right. I, the 21 years That I spent in the retail grocery business, the closest thing to sales for me was it's an aisle 7 on the bottom shelf, about 30 feet down on the left.

Marty: So, the reason that would the way that this topic came up for us today was, I was talking about a young man with whom I'm helping with. With his sales as his coach so there was some questions that I sent to him, that I think give a sense of how I would approach this. The 1st thing that I asked this guy was to consider what sales means to you.

Marty: Like, what's the significance of making a sale? Right. What do you make it mean? Because there is a mechanics to it, but the first thing to get, you know, if it's not working, the first thing you want to look at is, well, what's the significance I'm giving that.

Bill: So I, I want to just clarify. I understand that for the listener, the problem that you're trying to address for this young man is that he's not getting the sales that he wants to get.

Bill: He's not getting the success in sales that he'd like to have. That's right.

Marty: He's like a B, B plus student at sales and he'd like to be an A plus student.

Bill: I see. Okay. Okay. And so you provided him with a set of questions that you hope he will consider and that by considering and reflecting on them, it'll help him improve the sales.

Bill: Is that right?

Marty: Right. We might need to discuss his responses to these questions, but I think out of those discussions, He will get freed up to be in his full power as a salesperson.

Bill: Yes. And I'd love the idea that we might dive into these questions. And explore them a little bit and see what happens when we even consider them for ourselves.

Bill: And I'm also curious before we get into that, how the topic of sales and this particular example of the topic of sales, that being, there's a problem that a, one of, one of the people that's in the sales business is encountering and we want to discuss how we might address that for ourselves and for someone like him.

Bill: And how does that relate to our central and core topic of leaders and leadership?

Marty: Great question. I mean, as I said to this gentleman in my communication sales, I mean, being a salesperson is being a leader. You're leading person in a sales conversation. And, you know, my basic thesis about sale about, sorry, about leadership is that it is to lead is to empower, right?

Marty: It's not to do it yourself. It's not to be the, the loudest or, or fastest or smartest leadership is empowering others. That's my basic thesis. And so in this, in a sales conversation, the salesperson is leading the person to. Make the right choice about whether or not to buy.

Bill: And as the buyer or potential buyer, I've got to trust that that leadership that's being provided is trustworthy.

Bill: In fact, that it takes into account as maybe even the most important piece of the decision. What I feel is best for me rather than what you feel is best

Marty: for me. And that's exactly why I asked the first question. What does it mean to you to make a sale? Because if what it means to you is that you're getting somebody to do something or that you're going to get something for succeeding at selling.

Marty: So all of that, then the eye is no longer on the ball, which is to empower the prospect to make a wise choice.

Bill: I want to throw another word out that ties right in with this. I believe you and I both share a background with landmark education. I think that you probably have been involved in it quite a bit more than I have.

Bill: If I'm not mistaken, I've attended the landmark forum and the advanced course. And in fact, I think I've attended the forum twice. And one of the words that they use their landmark is big on words and and on the precise and correct use of those words and and then they're great about digging into what the what does the word mean and now that we understand what the word is, how do we use it?

Bill: And how do we understand it? So the word I'm thinking of is enrollment. Are you seeing the tie in here between empowering others, enrolling others? And when it comes to sales.

Marty: Well, I'm actually taking a step back from that whole paradigm here.

Bill: You are. Okay.

Marty: I am because I'm not necessarily trying to enroll the prospect into making the purchase.

Marty: I'm coming from a different paradigm, which says empower the person to make a wise choice.

Bill: Not to buy my product or service. Especially primarily you're empowering them to make a wise choice, whether they buy your service or product or not. Exactly. Beautiful. I love that and so I still want to just tag on the word enrollment.

Bill: However, and I really appreciate where you're coming from with that because that's how I approach it as well. I don't want somebody to buy something to because I've convinced them that they should buy it. I want someone to buy something if they're going to because it makes sense then to, to them to do that because they're enrolled in what they believe that buying that service or product is gonna do for them or help them to accomplish.

Marty: Might very well be. I'm not speaking for landmark here, but that might very well be the way a landmark leader would put it.

Bill: Yeah. Yeah. Enrollment, by the way, was a word that only meant. Education for me, I was enrolled in a course or a class before I attended landmark education forum.

Bill: And of course I walked away from that experience with a much different idea of what enrollment meant. Essentially what I understand it to be now is I'm really in, I'm really buying into this concept of this idea or this belief. I'm enrolled in whatever this is. Okay, that first question, I'm ready for that if you are.

Marty: Well, as I say, what does making a sale mean to you? And so I'm suggesting that, if it's that you, if what it means to you is that you've got to convince. You've got to make this happen, no matter what, by any means, whatever, if it means anything other than empower this person to make a wise choice, then you're not going to, you're going to have a harder time of it.

Marty: And you probably won't succeed because what they want to know, as the prospect purchase here is that they can trust you that you're you're really empowering them. So that's, that's why I asked that first question. That's a

Bill: really great question. And where it takes me is I'm thinking about the way I've structured my business. Within that structure, when it is that I have what might be considered a sales conversation and how I go about that and how I set that all up.

Bill: So if I could talk about that, just a moment, that may, may help me to kind of address. What and actually answer your question. What does it mean to make a sale? Is that what do I understand the question accurately? What does it mean to make a sale?

Marty: Yeah, what does it mean to you to make a sale? Because that's what you're doing here.

Marty: What is the meaning of what you're doing?

Bill: So in my business, all of my marketing is created so that I can have a conversation that could result in a sale. Okay. So that's part of the meaning for me is when I think of selling my services, I also think of the marketing that's gone in the marketing that's gone into into selling those services.

Bill: And my marketing culminates typically in a 30 minute discovery conversation that I'll have with someone that's interested in what I'm doing and how it might be able to help them in accomplishing what they're trying to do. So by the time we have that 30 minute conversation. What it means to me is asking questions that help me to know, first of all, for myself, do I believe that the services that I offer can help them accomplish what it is that they want to accomplish?

Bill: Because if I don't know what they're trying to accomplish, and I just jump right in to look how great I am and look how great these services are and look what other people are saying about it, it's not going to hit the mark. There's going to be a complete disconnect. There potentially could be a complete disconnect.

Bill: It means asking questions that help me to understand what the prospective client is trying to accomplish and then determining for myself, do I believe that the services that I offer can help and support them? And if so, how can I help them to see what I see so that they can make a decision about if they agree?

Bill: Yeah, well, the services that I have to offer match what it is that they're trying to accomplish and do that better than anything or anybody else.

Marty: I think that word that you just summarized it with their match that, that really sort of it summarizes it. What you just said, you're the sales making a sale to you means making a match.

Marty: And if it doesn't match, then the site should be made. Is there a match here between what you're trying to accomplish and what I'm offering here?

Bill: Yes, absolutely. Yeah, and so it might be, let's just assume that in my own mind, given what I've learned from, let's say you're the prospective client, what I've just learned from you, I believe that I can support you.

Bill: Now I've determined that in my mind, like a decision tree, now the path that I will go down in this conversation is to begin, with your permission, to tell you what it is that I do, how I do it, and how I see that it might be able to help you. And in that way, my hope is that I can provide you with enough information, now that I've gathered enough information from you to know what you're up to.

Bill: To help you make a decision and if I'm not attached and I It's been a long time since I've been attached to the outcome in these kinds of conversations but there was a time when I was so attached to them saying yes that I became the salesman that I Didn't ever want to be and never wanted to be seen as where I was kind of trying to convince someone that By working with me they were going to get greater value than by working with someone else You

Marty: Yeah, well, I think that, you know, matching takes all of the attachment energy out of it.

Marty: Like, well, let's just see, is this a match or not? You know, if it's not great, if it is wonderful. And so I like that very much.

Bill: Now, some other, what are some other possibilities of, of what, what it might mean to someone that might make sales difficult?

Marty: Well, I've had, I've coached people in the past and I quote one of these in my book, it was a woman and she was like, well, I got three kids to feed.

Marty: She, that she came to the coaching call of, you know, wanting coaching on her sales process. And she said, I, this is what it means to me. I got three kids to feed like that. Well done. I could feel the urgency in your voice, you know, and the fear. I could feel it.

Marty: Yeah. She was panicking.

Bill: Yeah.

Bill: And it's too bad that desperation is not attractive or else she would have, her cells would have been through the roof. By the way, that reminds me too, that sales doesn't always mean I have a product or service to sell that you're gonna give me money for, or exchange of value for. Sales also shows up in families.

Bill: It shows up in relationships. It shows up in any exchange of services or products that even if there isn't a monetary exchange for them. So anytime there's a negotiation, I want to go to this particular restaurant on Thursday night. We've talked about going to dinner on Thursday night. I want to go to this particular restaurant.

Bill: Now, you and I are the ones that are going to dinner together, Marty, and you might have to sell me on a different idea. I know you want to go to that restaurant, Bill. However, here's a different idea. Would you consider this? You're in sales right now, as soon as you engage in that kind of a conversation.

Bill: If when I'm in that, let's just say negotiation of where we're going to go have dinner, if, if I resort to bullying or some tactic or technique, that's just going to wear you down so that you'll finally say yes. That's not very workable. There's that disconnection again.

Bill: Mm-Hmm. for me, there needs to be a connection made and retained in order for a sale to happen.

Marty: This is exactly what my next question to him was. When in the pro, in the sales process, or where in the sales process do you lose connect?

Bill: Oh, great question. Maybe that's the reason that I'm thinking of that word connection is because I did scan through your questions before we hit record here.

Bill: I love that you have that as part of the consideration there.

Marty: Right? Because if you're being of service in empowering this person to make a wise choice. Which again gets a little bit away from the model that you were just speaking about, which is selling right? Convincing or enrolling in that restaurant versus another 1.

Marty: It's a fine line, but it's an important 1. I'm not trying to say which restaurant I'm trying to bring out the best in you to choose which restaurant to eat at so again, it's so we have to kind of keep that in front of us. But if that's what I'm up to, then whenever I go, I lose connection with you.

Marty: I'm no longer being of service, but that's right.

Bill: That's right.

Marty: And it could be for very innocent reasons. Like, I get self conscious. Like, how am I doing at this? Oh, you lose connection. Now you're with yourself. You're not with them. Oh, did I remember to say I'm supposed to do it a certain way?

Marty: Did I say the right thing? Are we getting into this too much? Now you're thinking about the process. You're paying attention to that rather than to the person that you're talking to again. Another typical one is that you start judging either yourself or them and, and since we, you know, like it could be like, why, why is this guy taking so long to decide?

Marty: Doesn't he see the brilliance in what I have to sell him? Like that, that sort of judgment or God, this guy is really picky or, you know, like those sorts of things. Now you're disconnected.

Bill: Or judgment of yourself. Like maybe I'm a fraud here. Maybe I don't know what I'm talking about. Maybe what I'm asking for what I offer is too much that self doubt gets in there and creates a disconnection as well. I want to just share It's relevant here because it's my first ever sales experience and it happened almost 40 years ago. I mentioned earlier that I was in the grocery business the retail grocery business for 21 years You Well, that was a culmination of probably, um, I don't know, a dozen different times that I was in the business, got out of it, and got back in again.

Bill: I learned how to be in the grocery business starting as a 15 year old in Kansas City, Missouri, delivering groceries for Joe's Trading Post. 1970, Joe's Trading Post was wood, hardwood floors with sawdust back there in the butchery, butcher department. I was racking bottles at that time. What that meant is people had to pay, like in Oregon and some of these other states, where you have to pay for a deposit on a bottle and then you get that deposit back when you return it.

Bill: So I was racking bottles, Coke and Pepsi and Sprite and all those, and, and delivering groceries and sweeping sawdust floors and stocking shelves. And I learned how to do all that stuff. And Marty, I loved it. I loved, loved, loved the grocery business until I hated it. And, uh, there was plenty to love and plenty to hate for me.

Bill: I loved being busy. I love being productive. I loved being able to, for example, build later on 17 years old. I go to work for a local chain in Great Falls, Montana. And every single thing that I learned every single day, I just got so excited about. I learned how to, you know, put the eggs and the bread on top and the cans on the bottom.

Bill: And I learned how to use a pallet jack. And I learned how to face the shelves where I pulled the cans forward and made sure the labels were showing. And I learned how to make signs. And every, everything I learned, I just was so excited about. I love, love, love that. And what I didn't like was criticism. I didn't like when somebody would say you did that wrong.

Bill: I didn't like that I was expected to be friendly with the people that, that were buying the groceries from us. There was a lot I didn't like because I was scared to death about people. And I was expected to smile and connect and connect and connect. And I didn't want to connect.

Bill: I just wanted to be busy and I wanted to learn new things. So thank, thankfully the grocery business taught me a ton. And when in those moments, because I was so emotionally immature that I couldn't take criticism or that I got scared, I got my feelings hurt, I would quit. Instantly, I would just quit without thinking at all about the consequences of quitting.

Bill: I would just quit. And apparently I must have been pretty good in the grocery business because I would quit and then either the next day or the next month or the next year, I'd come back and say, can I have my job back? And they'd always say yes. So it was at least a dozen times that I was hired and then quit and then hired and quit and hired and quit.

Bill: So in the in betweens, I was always looking for something else that I could do. And I had no college education, just a high school education. And one of my friends, in fact, it was a 12 step sponsor said, Hey, I'm selling cars. Why don't you come sell cars with me? I did. That was all hate. I hated every minute of it, every single minute of it.

Bill: And there was a lot to hate there. But what, what I, it was my first sales experience. I did not get paid unless I sold a car. Yeah. And I didn't sell a car. Unless I followed the system for the car dealership that I was working for. And their system was that once I got somebody interested in buying a car and they would answer the question, what would it take for you to buy and drive this car home today?

Bill: Once they answered that question and gave me any conditions whatsoever to meet, then my, my line was to say, so if we could meet those conditions, you'd buy this car and drive it home today. And the answer would be yes. Okay, well, come on in. Let's see what we can do. Okay. And, and then when I would sit them down to see what we could do, I gave all, I did, I had no power.

Bill: My job was just to do the four square. The four square is, this is how much the car is, this is how much down payment we need, this is how much, your payment would be, something else. And this is how much we'll give you for the trade in. And we were trained to give ridiculous numbers. To shoot for the moon, this car is 120, 000 and that's ridiculous, but I'm just an exaggeration and your down payment on 120, 000 would be 30, 000 and your payments every month would be 10, 500 and we'll give you 200 for your car.

Bill: Oh, everything was extreme. And of course, it just blows the potential customer completely out of the water. And then I'd say, Oh, no, no, don't get excited. Let me have somebody appraise your car. Maybe we can get 300 for it. And, and let me go talk to the sales manager and see if we can get, Oh, I see.

Marty: The technique is to make it so it's super big so that you can come back and save them by making it.

Marty: Oh,

Bill: yes, exactly. So exactly. So, and then we would keep them for hours and hours and hours. As you can tell, Marty, I mean, I just hated it. I just hate it. It was so deceitful, so dishonest, so manipulative, right? So that's where I learned sales. And can, and no wonder I hate the idea of sales. Because it just means being dishonest, it means, you know, being manipulative, it means, creating conflict, pissing people off, all of that stuff.

Bill: So now, as we're talking about sales all these years later, I've either been self employed or in sales now for, I think, 35 years. And I'm pretty comfortable. The word itself still has a stinger in it for me, but I'm pretty comfortable now knowing that the products and services, I don't sell products.

Bill: The services that I offer are valuable and they make a difference and I believe in them. And what sales means to me now is to help people make, as you say, to help people make the best decision for themselves. And that feels great. I just wish there was a different word for it. Sorry for the little sidebar there, but I just think, you know, sharing my history of sales might, might shed a little bit of light on where I might be coming from with my responses.

Marty: Well, and it also brings up the last two questions that I gave this gentleman, which have to do with where you're not in love with the process and where and and where it rubs up against who you are, like, what feels right and good and natural to you. Right? So. These bring up the two from many episodes ago, the two polls of my coaching, which is your purpose and your inner critic, right?

Marty: Mm

Bill: mm-Hmm, .

Marty: And so, you know, because if you're doing, you're, if you're being your purpose. Then you're going to love it. It's what you're naturally birds love to fly and chirp because that's what they're born to do. And so you're if you're going up against that, you're not going to like what you're doing.

Marty: And so, you know, you want to use whatever it is that you were born to do. You know, maybe you're a born. Well, I'll just think of some clients of mine. One of my clients I've talked to today. Her purpose in life is trust. She is trustworthy. She, um, trusts others. She builds trusting relationships. So, you know, if she's not doing that in sales, it's going to work against her and the person that she's working with.

Marty: I've talked to another client today and his purpose is generation. Transcribed He's a generator. He generates energy. He, he's like, he likes to talk of himself as like a tree and you, you plant him as the seed in the right soil and he's going to produce lots of ripe fruit for everybody.

Bill: Um,

Marty: that being the seed.

Marty: So that's that his purpose is to generate. And so if he's not generating, then he's, you know, he's going to be off his purpose. And it's not going to feel good to do what he was doing. Like, you felt good as a grocer and didn't feel good as a car salesman. Right? And then the other, the other pole is the inner critic, you know, like, if it brings that up, my inner critic says, I'm worthless.

Marty: So that if, if, if something triggers that in a sales conversation, then I'm not going to be affected because I'm going to think, oh, I'm worthless at this. I've got nothing of worth to sell them. Right? If you're in a critic is, you know, I'm bad. Let's say this is a, I have a client who's that's his inner critic says, you're just bad.

Marty: You're bad. You're a bad person.

Bill: So,

Marty: if that gets triggered, then he's, he's, you know, he's gonna feel awful about what he's doing in the sales conversation and he's gonna be bad. So. Those are the 2 other questions that I sent this gentleman. They were about identifying like, where you're not in love with because it's not aligned with who you are and where your inner critic gets triggered and you're, you're, you know, trying to hide it or work against it.

Marty: And, and, and it's going to make the whole process very unsatisfying. That's a great

Bill: explanation. I love that. Two poles, the purpose. And the, would you say the inner critic or the inner judge? Yeah. Yeah. Which is similar to positive intelligence. The newest book that I've been reading about saboteurs and sage, influences inside of each of us.

Bill: So you're talking about sage. What do you love and what is your passion? What is your purpose? And then saboteurs the judge. So what triggers what are you doing when, when the, when you're in your purpose, when you're on, when you're living and live and living on purpose?

Bill: What is that?

Marty: Right? It's like, how can you. You basically align what you, what you're up to here, which is selling something with being who you're naturally meant to be.

Bill: So if I'm a leader, let's just say I'm the person in a corporation who's in charge of selecting my sales committee, my sales crew.

Bill: And I'm interviewing for a sales position. I'd be really wise to be listening for those two, to the answers to those two questions. Yes. What do you love? What, what have you sold in the past? What have you enjoyed selling the most and, and where have your struggles been? Where did, where do you break down?

Bill: What's predictable about how, what's going to break down for you in, in, in a sales challenge goals?

Marty: Yes.

Bill: Wow. That's really good. And then if I'm the actual person that's responsible for, for getting those sales, I need to answer the same questions for myself. I don't want to set myself up by going to work, in a corporation that's selling a service or a product that I don't believe in that doesn't resonate with my purpose.

Bill: And I don't want to go to work in a situation where I'm likely to be getting poked constantly in my, in my inner judgment. If I'm constantly being poked and to be told or to have it implied that I'm bad or wrong or, um, dishonest. Yeah. Yeah. Those judgments that we have about ourselves. Yeah. So that's 1 side of that decision, um, making process.

Bill: The other side would be, so how do I go about really leaning into purpose? Yeah. And then coping with whatever it is that that might stop me in the sales Position. So as coach, what do you do? What's your philosophy there? And how do you approach that.

Marty: Approach what in particular?

Bill: Well, let's just say that you've got you've got a client who is not happy like the client that you're talking about right now.

Bill: I'm not happy with their performance Yeah, maybe because they're comparing to somebody that does better or just simply because they know they can do better And don't know quite how to get there You. So, these questions is I

Marty: was talking to a gentleman today and his, his inner critic is that he's just done.

Marty: I'm just not smart enough. You know, like, that's what keeps thinks this about himself. And the point is that it's your inner critic is. You know, it got formulated when you were young, somebody said something to you or something happened that gave you this impression and you just have never let it go.

Marty: And we all have these, and his was, you know, that he's stupid. Well, it's clearly not you spend 2 minutes with him. You could tell he's not, but that's the nature of these things is we're, we're convinced of something. That's not really true about us. Like, mine is that I'm worthless, like that's clearly not true.

Marty: People pay me lots of money just to have a conversation. I couldn't be worthless. Right. But we have these ideas. So the 1st thing that this might sound counterintuitive, but what I had this guy do. I had him get a little statue at the novelty store of Homer Simpson.

Bill: You were going to say Gomer Powell.

Marty: Gomer Powell would have worked, right?

Bill: Right.

Marty: And he put it next to his computer where he works all day. And after about three weeks, he's like, you know, I'm not that. It's so clear. I am not Homer Simpson. I, I know that I have, I can see the difference between the two of us. And, and so now he doesn't need to have that anymore, but just having that reminder in front of him, that that's what he thinks of himself, the neural system rocks on its own that I'm not that it's over there.

Marty: I'm over here. He got freed up from that just like that. It's very simple. Yeah, you cannot the, the thing that people try and do is to convince themselves that it's not true. and you can't convince yourself because it's in at a subconscious level and so all the rationalizing about it is not going to change it.

Marty: You have to either just check, put it in check whenever it comes up and say, Oh, there's that belief. I have that. I know it's not true and not subscribe to it take actions that would defy it or you use this little technique that I've learned. Actually, I'll tell you where I learned it from too. and get your neurology to see I'm not that.

Marty: I learned this from the book called Taming Your Gremlin. Can't think of the author's name right now. Car Carson? Carson I think is his last name. I'll

Bill: look it up while you're telling me.

Marty: And you know he, he's, his terminology for your inner critic is your gremlin. Rick Carson. Rick Carson, that's it.

Marty: Yes, exactly. And so it's in that book that I learned this. He advises you to draw a picture of your gremlin or to get something that looks like how you would imagine that inner critic would look like in front of you. It doesn't take long before your mind just sees Oh, that's not me.

Bill: And again, this reminds me of the little bit that I've read so far about positive intelligence or PQ. It's very much the same. And of course, as you know, and if anybody's been listening to this podcast, they know too that I'm completely into internal family systems. What I'm noticing with positive intelligence is that so much is aligned in terms of understanding where the parts of ourselves that, Unintentionally sabotage us, come from, and this is shirzad shahmeen is the author of this book.

Bill: He too is teaching techniques for when what he calls the saboteurs show up and bring their influence that would make it difficult for us to do the kinds of things that we need to do in order to produce the results that we want to produce. He's got techniques for, um, what he calls weakening

Bill: saboteurs and strengthening the sage. So I've got all kinds of my own parts that are up about that. It sounds like what he's trying to do is go to war with what's happening in there. Whereas with the IFS model, which is so compassionate, it's more like recognizing there's a war in there and let's see how we can end it in a, in a more of a diplomatic, compassionate way.

Bill: So these two concepts are kind of buttoned up against each other. But here's the thing. That whatever we can do to tame the gremlin, is that the name of that book? Yeah, whatever we can do to, calm the water so that we can clearly and confidently go about, speaking from our, as Terry Grill would say, from our wise adult from this age.

Bill: Then the better we're going to be in the world where IFS comes in is with the IFS approach. We can not just tame them for the moment. So we can actually help heal them so they go from feral to tame.

Marty: Another way that it's happened. I love what you just said, that inner critic does need the gremlin does need not to be battled with because that'll just strengthen it.

Marty: It'll get stronger. If you do that, it has to be. Addressed and placated and resolved and and given another job or something. Right? One of the ways that it happened with a client. What I was so interesting, through irony through humor and his was I'm bigger than my britches. That was great.

Marty: You're just you're bigger than your bridges. Those are his words for it. We could put it in a different way, but that's the way it occurred to him. And so whenever he would do something bold or courageous, I would make fun of it. I would say like, Oh, so you're getting bigger than your britches, huh?

Marty: It'd be something silly, like, you know, set up a date night with his wife and he started to, and then he got offered a different job that paid more. And I said, well, you wouldn't want to do that because you'd be bigger than your britches. Wouldn't you? And he would just smile, like, okay, I get what you're saying.

Marty: And after a few times, He started realize that is such a ridiculous idea that I have that I'm big that and it disappeared for him then.

Bill: Wow. That's so great. I really like that. Yeah. Marty. I think we're running out of time here. Ah, okay. I really enjoyed this conversation that there's so much more to say.

Bill: Any final words from you about leadership and sales and the questions that you've designed.

Marty: I would just summarize by saying, you want to really get in touch with, reflect on journal about what is this that I'm doing? What am I really doing here and align with what's really in your truth, you know, if it and because we, we all do buy things from each other.

Marty: We all are out to sell things. If you can't find a way to be aligned with your truth about it, then you better not do it.

Bill: And I would say that

Bill: I've been in a position often where I didn't have to sell that example from the grocery business. And when I didn't have the luxury of not being in a position of needing to sell to make my living. And when I've been faced with that, those have been some of the scariest moments of truth for me.

Bill: Because I've come right up against whatever it was going on inside that says you can't do this. You can't do this because if you try to do this, it'll mean this, this, and this, and this, and if you try to do this is what's going to happen. And so many of my protective parts that have been designed to keep me safe, don't have any defenses that can stand up against what could happen.

Bill: If I'd be so bold as to get involved in a conversation where I might sell you something. I see. So for me, it's taken a ton of work, a ton of, and it is work for me. It has been work. There are times that it doesn't seem so hard. The work doesn't seem so hard, but other times where it's just been, there's been so much fear present.

Bill: There's been so much pain present and there's been so much concern present around if I put myself in this position to be judged in the way that I don't want to be judged and then that might stir up conflict or might get someone to not like me, then, then maybe it's maybe I need to just go go to work and retell again where somebody else has done the job of getting the people in the door so I can just ring them up, take their money and get paid.

Bill: Be safer. So I've had to challenge myself to get bigger than my britches and, um, and tame my demons. And for me, the most efficient way to, to do that and the most lasting and permanent way to heal all of that's going on inside is through the internal family systems model or some other version of parts work.

Bill: Mhm. Mhm. Marty. Great conversation again. I've enjoyed it. Me too. Till next time. All right. Bye.