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Even the most prominent voices in Sales were crap at Sales once.
Join bestselling Author, Founder and Sales Coach Mark Ackers as he speaks with successful Sales professionals about their early Sales struggles, and how they overcame these challenges to become the people they are today.
Art, like, absolute beginning of my career. Useless, you know, like a 2. Right. The the on ability, work ethic was probably more of a strength then, but on ability and, you know, actual CL skills, if you like, I was a 1 or a 2. Like, I I knew nothing.
Mark:How crap here are we talking? Blissfully ignorant. The hell crap
Stuart:I was. There was long periods where we didn't sell anything. It was hard, really hard. You tied to your desk. The time how long you go for a wee, that beats you down.
Stuart:Every month or every quarter, there's a minute where I just think, sick of this. Am I just gonna be a postman?
Mark:Do you think you knew how bad you was? There was
Stuart:a culmination of things that really like, a perfect storm that really screwed. Like, mental health, whatever you wanna call it, it wasn't even really a thing. I really struggled. It was more than just work, but work was a big thing of it. And I remember, like, being at work one day, and I actually went on sick.
Mark:Hello, and welcome to another episode of I used to be crap at sales. I'm Mark Aikooz, your host, the cofounder and head of sales of my sales coach. And today, I'm joined by sales leader at Allego. A sales author, maybe co author would be a fairer and more accurate reflection of the number one bestseller, problem prospecting. It's someone that I've worked with in 3 companies, arguably 5 arguably 5.
Mark:If you've not worked out who that person is by now, then let me introduce them. It's Stuart Taylor. Stuart, welcome to the big orange chair on the podcast.
Stuart:Thanks for having us, mate.
Mark:Good to have you here. Stu, let's kick off just with a yes no question. Did you, at some point in your career, used to be crap at sales?
Stuart:No. Probably the end of this interview, isn't it? Yes. Of course, I did. Yeah.
Mark:Fantastic. How crap here are we talking? Pretty shit. Pretty shit. Blissfully ignorant.
Mark:The hell crap I was,
Stuart:but looking back now, pretty shit.
Mark:Yeah. Let's get into sales then, how you feel about sales. First of all, most people don't wanna be in sales. Right? They fall into it.
Mark:But what about you? How did how did you end up in sales?
Stuart:Like a lot of people this is a common story probably for a lot of people here. I just fell into it. So I left school at 17. I went ahead with my a levels. Done some ridiculous a level, chemistry, physics, law, and IT, I think, were the 4, and really struggled.
Stuart:Like, I kind of blagged my way through my GCSEs and done alright, and then I realized how hard you had to work at your level. And at the time, you know, I was enjoying myself and having a good laugh, and I was playing rugby pretty seriously at that time as well, and my education suffered. So I left school, and decided to do something different. I started working. I had various different jobs, which I don't know if you wanna get into.
Stuart:It would be 1st sales job, as I call it, was working for Barclays Bank, in that outbound call center. So I used to ring people from 1 on the afternoon until 9 at night, selling them PPI, sorry, Martin Lewis, and and all the other things that used to come with it. So I fell into it. It was a I had a friend who worked there who was making good money, at the time, and, you know, that piqued my interest. And I thought, well, I'll give it a go, see what happens in 15 years on or whatever it is, the the rest is history.
Mark:So you fell into it, but it was a conscious choice to take that first sales role, I suppose. You you're hearing the money that your friend's making. Yeah. It but
Stuart:if you if you'd said to me, like, I think I was probably 17 then or or whatever I was at the time. I didn't really even understand what sales was. You know? Like, I had no idea what a professional sales career was. I was at that stage where I'd left school.
Stuart:I literally had 2 options. I come from Sunderland. So if anybody lives in Sunderland, like, Nissan is one of the biggest employers in Sunderland working in their factory, and that they get paid well. And as a 17 year old lad, I was looking to earn money, you know, weekend millionaire going out. I wanted a nice car and all the things like that.
Stuart:And it was either go and work in Nissan in a factory, or me mate was working in sales, making decent money. And I thought I was more I was more naturally leaning towards doing that. It felt like the easier option rather than working in a factory in the middle of the night to earn money. So that was literally my options pretty much. It wasn't, but that's that's the the part where I felt I was.
Stuart:And, yeah, I applied for the job at Bartlett's, and I've got a start there.
Mark:I was gonna ask what would you have done if you wanna set the sales up. It it sounds like, yeah, we'll we'll obviously live in the northeast and know about Nissan, so maybe work in the factory there.
Stuart:I I still don't think so. I think I would have always tried to do something else. I really didn't fancy of working in the factory. Yeah. I I just just didn't appeal to me, you know, No disrespect to anybody.
Stuart:I've got lots of friends who work in the factory and things. It just wasn't what appealed to me. I think if I would didn't work in sales, I would do something cars. My dad's a mechanic by trade. I think I'd have probably got a trade in either, you know, being a motor mechanic or an electrician or something like that.
Stuart:I think that probably would have been the route I went down.
Mark:I I could see you with cars based on on on what I know of you and, obviously, your love for cars, etcetera. I suppose we get to be a car salesman, but in between was our first job where we met was at Sunderland Football Club. Yeah. What talk to me about how sales changed, and I'm gonna do all 3 here. But from Barclays to Sunderland, you know, Premier League Football Club Yeah.
Stuart:To selling
Mark:cars. How did sales change for you across those 3 roles?
Stuart:Oh, all very different. I think I changed sales at Sunderland Football Club a lot more than what it changed me, and I'll explain what I mean by that because I come from Barclays where it was 200 calls a day on a dialer. You literally got a ping in your ear and you got the name of somebody and you had to speak to them, and that was it. And my job then was to sell them loans, insurance, whatever. You can imagine the catalog of things that I was selling.
Stuart:So I didn't know anything else other than kinda high volume outbound. I walked into Southern Football Club, and, you know, the people who were there didn't have that same mentality. It was very much reactive. It was nurture your customer base and, you know, wait for the phone to ring. And I come from a completely different world where I walked in in pretty much day 1.
Stuart:I made a 100 phone calls. And I look back now on people there who probably had quite a cushy job been in been enjoying and probably thought, what on earth is he doing? Like, he's making us look bad because I just brought what I'd learned at Barclays, which was all I knew. I didn't know anything else, and I brought that into the football club. And I think I was hired for that, to be honest, to try and shake things up because it was it was unusual for somebody from a call center background like I had to start working in the football club.
Stuart:But I was hired by 2 people who had, you know, got a lot of advice from Lesley Callahan and Christine Linden. And I think they brought me into ShakeOut. They wanted a bit of that kinda hunter mentality to bring into the football club. So I think I changed that more than what it changed me. But alongside bringing that into the the company, I also learned how to, you know, have more long term relationships, how to do face to face meetings, and all the things from us kind of relationship building.
Stuart:Because it wasn't just purely new business there. It was, you know, account management or whatever you call it as well at the football club. So I had a little bit of both. So very different, in terms of the 2.
Mark:So before you go into the garage then, what's interesting there is, I think, first of all, Barclays' customers, Sunderland, is it fair to say all fans you were calling up? Because I'm assuming you only call people up that you believe to be fans. Is that not different?
Stuart:No. That's that's not that's not that's not true. No. So we would have it was it was businesses. So I saw hospitality and advertising at local business.
Stuart:Well, not local businesses. Just businesses in general. So it was it was a lot were fans. Don't get me wrong. There were Sunderland fans, but it was a lot of businesses that done it for commercial reasons.
Stuart:You know, they might actually have a Sunderland fan who's one of their big clients, or they might use a friend at him in hospitality, all those types of things. So while it is mainly true, it wasn't all Sunderland fans. And I'd also would just ring local businesses. Like, the most common thing I would ring and say, hey, Mark. It's Stu from Sunderland Football Club.
Stuart:The most common response I would be get, I haven't got my boots. I can't play this weekend. Or you'd get a Newcastle fan who were like, don't ring me ever again. So it wasn't necessarily all Sunderland fans. We just used to ring local northeast businesses.
Stuart:You know, if I've seen an article in the paper where a company was doing really well, I'd pick up the phone and ring them and see if they would come along with a game. So the majority, definitely, but it wasn't exclusively people who were selling funds.
Mark:Okay. Fair enough. What motivated you to keep doing that? Because here's here's what I'm picturing. I, obviously, I know what that sales floor used to look like.
Mark:You're sat there. First of all, I I don't think it's unfair to say a lot of the people were a little bit older than you as well. Yeah. More experienced, for example. Yeah.
Mark:You're sat there. They don't have that work ethic or mentality. I appreciate you might have come in day 1 and gone, let's get to it. But 6 months, 9 months, 12 months in, I don't think they really changed with you, did they?
Stuart:No. And I think maybe I changed as well. I don't think I constantly done that. I think when I first started, maybe I've done that at a higher volume and and a bigger degree. And I think part of it was was the success because I didn't have any clients.
Stuart:I didn't have any people I could speak to.
Mark:Right.
Stuart:You know, I had to make some some things happen. And then when I started to get some clients and I started to get more face to face meetings, couldn't do that all the time. But what I did do was make a conscious effort where it continued always. It wasn't at the same volume or same intensity as what it was when I walked in, but I always made sure that I did some kind of that outbound prospecting. I that's been the constant throughout my career, outbound.
Stuart:I've I've never known anything else other than outbound sales.
Mark:What about the car garage then? So you you you left Sunderland football club. You went to the car garage. That's obviously very different.
Stuart:Very different. And, again, I took my what I knew best to the car garage, and I was seen as a little bit of anomaly. I remember saying to my boss, a lot of the time, if somebody walks into the pitch, you have a conversation with them. That's it. I remember getting a customer list from my boss, who was the manager, and he was like, what do you want that for?
Stuart:And it was a customer list who people who had cars with BMW already that bought in the past. And I just went through ringing them to see how they were with the car. I'd run some dummy figures. So you're here, Mark. I've just had a look at your finance.
Stuart:You've had your 3 series for 2 and a half years now. Did you know we could get you a brand new car and it might cost you £10 a month more, or it might cost you this or this? And, like, that was the success I had in the car game. So, again, I used what I knew best, which was the outbound to bring it into the car garage. That was even worse received by the people in the car garage.
Stuart:Like, the car industry is very traditional. Like, I I think people see me as a big threat in the car garage because I was doing something very different that they weren't. But then it was starting to be successful. It was about 10 or 12 guys. And within 3 to 6 months, I was the 2nd top performer in the car dealership.
Stuart:It was one guy who was a brilliant guy, but he'd been there for, like, 10, 15 years, and he had clients always coming back to him. And it was difficult to get on par with him. But it's it's kind of people say in the motor trade, you need to build it up, build up your customers and things. And I just did something different. But, again, it wasn't anything genius.
Stuart:It wasn't an idea I had. It was just the only thing I knew what to do was try and make something happen. So I brought that kind of mentality and what I'd done in the past to a different industry, and it it worked pretty well.
Mark:But how did you know to do this?
Stuart:Because I didn't have an option. I didn't really know anything else. Yeah. I didn't really know anything else, and it was just an idea. I was thinking, like and and, obviously, after you we've already touched on that.
Stuart:I was a big car fan. I love cars. I know people buy cars. And and I just it just seemed crazy to me that Pete was sitting here just waiting for something to happen. But I was like, well honestly, in in the card game, like, people would just play tricks and just have a have a joke around and that was like 90 90 percent of your day you'd be really busy towards the end of the month when you delivered cars but on a on a on a freezing Tuesday morning or afternoon you'd just be winding each other up and having a laugh and that's what most people did and I just I wasn't there for that like yes.
Stuart:I'll have a laugh. And, you know, I've always felt like I'm part of the team and I'll have a big crack. But I also want to make money. Like, car sales, if you don't sell cars, you get paid. I think it's less the minimum wage.
Stuart:I don't even know if it's it's actually allowed, but I was paid something like 10 grand basic salary when I've done that. And then you get bonus for selling the car. So if you don't sell cars, you don't make any money. I've never had a car salesman call me up.
Mark:I I mean, I've had one of my cars, for maybe sleut across all of them. Years.
Stuart:Like, every car dealership will have a list of people they sold cars to. Right? Yeah. Because they do. They've got those lists.
Stuart:They'll send them reminders saying your service is due. They'll send them this and that, but they never ring them and say, you know, have you considered changing your car, mister Douglas?
Mark:No. That's what I mean.
Stuart:Like That's what I mean. No nobody does it. That that was my one thing that made me successful.
Mark:So here's what I'm hearing though, Stuart. It sounds like you were just really good from the off. Like, Barclays, you had success there.
Stuart:Set for football club's not true. I think Sunderland Football Club and and and BMW, I was. Barclays, I was awful when I first started.
Mark:Well, how did you get from there to being good at Sunderland then?
Stuart:It's like you set this up, but it was coaching. Like, what Barclays did was give me caution, but the caution wasn't letting me think for myself. It was almost teaching me what to say and what to do. It wasn't giving me the ability to kind kinda, like, make the decisions myself. But there was one guy there was one lady at Barclays, sorry, called Michelle, and she used to, like, be always top of the awards and things and win everything.
Stuart:And I used to ask my team leader, like, if we could we used to do team coaching sessions where we'd listen to calls, where we'd come back. Very rare. But, again, and I'd ask if we could listen to her calls, and I'd ask if we get and I listen to things that she don't and just try to get better. But when I first started Botliss, I was really poor. Like, I was the 1st 3 months or 6 months or whatever it was, like, it was probably touch and go whether I passed my probation because in truth, I pissed about.
Stuart:You know, you used to go out all the time at that age. It was like a collection of 18 to 25 year olds who it was great fun, but then it come a point where I was like, what are you doing with your life, Stu? I've seen people who've been at Barclays and gained no disrespect to them, but people who are highly educated with degrees and god knows what to this isn't for me. Like, I need to knuckle down, get successful at this, and either try and move up and do something else in Barclays or go somewhere else and do something else. So but I had to learn the hard way.
Stuart:When I first started Barclays, I was poor. You know, like anybody, I didn't really have a clue what I was doing.
Mark:Do you think you'd like, deep down when you look back at the point, do you think you knew how bad you was?
Stuart:None. Not a clue. Not a clue. I was an also run. Like, I was just one of the most people were like that.
Stuart:You know, That was just the majority. It was all kinda the mentality was that it's a numbers game. Make more dials. Guess what? You didn't have a choice.
Stuart:The dials were made for you, but get through as many people as you can. If you get through to more people, then you'll ultimately get the result. And that was what Barclays focused on. They focused on, like, how long you went for a toilet break and how long your times were. Everything was controlled with those metrics.
Stuart:But where they dropped the ball a little bit was the improvement in the quality of the conversations. Like, if they had to put equal emphasis on the number of calls as they did the quality of the calls, I think that would have been a a massive difference.
Mark:So how how good do you think you thought you were in Barclays on a scale
Stuart:of 1 to 10? 10 being excellent. At the end, when I left, I thought I was a 10. Would you okay.
Mark:That's great. What do you think you were in this dark period at the start though? At the time, if you are hard to think back.
Stuart:Yeah. Average, if 6, 7 I know you don't like people picking sevens, nor do I, but I was ban average slightly now. I probably thought I was just normal. And what now now you look back, what do you think he was? Oh, like, absolute beginning of my career.
Stuart:Useless. You know, like a 2. Right. The on ability, work, I think, was was probably more of a strength then. But on ability and, you know, actual sales skills, if you like, I was a 1 or a 2.
Stuart:Like, I I knew nothing. Even when I say I was a 10 when I left Barclays, really on sales skills, I was still a 2 or a 3 at best. You know? But, again, the work ethic and getting a little bit better, it it helped me excel. But there there wasn't that culture of coaching and getting better.
Stuart:The culture was APIs and compliance. That's all calls will listen to for. It wasn't to try and help you be better at what you did. It was just to make sure you're, you know, you're compliant. So, yeah, I was I was blissfully ignorant of how poor I was probably throughout the first 5, 6, 7, 8 years of my career.
Stuart:Long time now. But but the the thing is, it is a long time, but I also think I'm fortunate because I think most people have 30, 35 years of the CMEO repeating itself, and they do that for all their career. There's a lot of people I speak to now, and and I speak to sale sales leaders, and they'll see how my team are too experienced. Those are the guys and girls who probably need them on anybody because they are experienced, because they've been doing it for 30 year, but they've probably never got any better. They've just been on deja vu having the same year over and over again and done the same things they've always done.
Stuart:So, yeah, I think that's a long time, but I'm fortunate that I realized I didn't even it wasn't even me. I'm trying to this wasn't about me. I didn't realize. It was really refract when when things started, and we started selling the kinda VPs of sales in software. And I realized, like, how good some of those guys were and how, you know, how seriously they took the art of selling.
Stuart:And that's the first time I really become, you know, relatively proud about sales as a profession. But also I tried it as something, you know, that I wanted to get better at and I want to excel at. And without starting with refracs 8 years ago, whatever it was, I don't think I probably still will be treading water and and doing the same things, in all honesty.
Mark:So it's obviously really humble the way you explained that. We definitely had a jump here in time. So we've had Barclays, Sunderland, the car garage. You then did get into SAS. Yeah.
Mark:And this is arguably the 2nd business we started working together at Yeah. Totally compatible. Then we had the test factory.
Stuart:Yeah.
Mark:And so you could count that as 1 or 2 businesses. Right? But you also about the business after that, Refract. Yeah. Let's just talk about your entrance into SaaS and tech then, where how long were you at TechCompatible and Refract together?
Mark:3, 4 years?
Stuart:Yes. Between 3 or 4,
Mark:probably, I guess. So you're saying even at that point, another 3, 4 years, you were still crap?
Stuart:I think so. Yeah. I think I think I learned a little bit more, you know, about SaaS and maybe it's more the email side of things as we can we can have a few jokes about and things like that. And and I I definitely improved, but I didn't accelerate anywhere near the rate of what I did when I started refract. Again, a little bit of mentality.
Stuart:When I first started, I didn't know anything else. Picked up the phone and made some calls. And I and I did improve. And, you know, I've I've said this to you before. My first year technically compatible was like Disneyland.
Stuart:But if you think of the industries I've been in, outbound sales, hospitality, and then selling cars, like, they are 3 hard industries. Like, you know, they they don't take prisoners. It's like higher or higher mentality. You've gotta get stuff done, and and I had kinda just made stuff happen. I started in Disneyland, and there was more support.
Stuart:Disney. I started in Technically Compatible and there was more support. There was more of a coaching culture. But I don't think, really, even as a business, we truly understood or appreciated what what coaching was and the impact it could have, are technically compatible until we got to Refractant. You know, we we opened our eyes and seen what what impact it could have and the difference it would make.
Mark:How do you think you survived so long in the sense of when you look back now, you're saying, effectively, I wasn't very good, right, at sales for for for years we're talking about. You thought you were good Yeah. But you look back now with everything you know, hindsight is obviously a wonderful thing. How do you think you survived in those roles for so long not being very good?
Stuart:The truth is, Mark, like, not very good compared to what? Like, compared to the population, I was bang average. I was probably a little bit better than most, if I'm honest. Like, not blow me on trumpet, but I probably was. But that was work ethic.
Stuart:Whatever you wanna call it. I can think quickly on my feet. We've discussed this before, but I've got that kinda let's get shit done mentality. Like, I I try to make things happen. And I think that's what got me through.
Stuart:But I wasn't very good. But it wasn't like my peers were all good. Like, the average was now I look back really poor. It didn't take much to excel above that average. And I somehow managed to do that.
Stuart:So although I was poor, I was probably still better than a lot of people who I was working alongside. Certainly in, you know, the first three jobs, I think the test factor was maybe more of a leveler, you know, working with yourself and and a technically compatible and such. But, yeah, it doesn't take much to stand out from the crowd. That's the uncomfortable truth for sales as a profession. The bar is really low.
Stuart:Like, most sellers are poor. I get sold to. You know, I coach people. I work in a sales organization. 90% of seller sellers are shit.
Stuart:Alright? And that's a bold claim, and that's my experience. Because people don't treat it seriously. They don't listen to their own calls. They don't get coaching.
Stuart:They don't have a coach. They're not passionate about getting better. The average seller on the street is very poor.
Mark:Why do you think that is?
Stuart:It's I think it it's the whole profession. Mosier goes back to the beginning where people fall into it. They don't really wanna be into it. But I also don't think they realize what a fantastic career this can be. Like, it's afforded me some amazing opportunities, you know, to work with people like yourself, to to start to do all the things outside of sales, you know, obviously, the money that comes with it and and all those things.
Stuart:I I think sales is that job where you don't know what else you wanna do. Nobody really wants to be in it, and they don't really see what it could be. I think that's one thing. But I also think, as leaders, whether that be organizations or sales leaders, we let people down. But I've worked with tons of people who had the right work ethic, who had the right attitude.
Stuart:We just didn't give them the tools to be successful, and they went on to do something else. You know, they they were let down because it weren't helped to be better. I think it's a big problem in our industry. You know, I bang this drum as as you have for a long time. People just don't get a support coach and they need to be successful.
Mark:And what about you then? Let's we're we're at test factory days here, tele compatible, and and all before it. Sounds like you had a great coach at Barclays for for compared to everything else.
Stuart:Possibly. Possibly. Yeah. The coaches it's hard to say because I think a coach lets you, you know, find your own solutions and I think I was more prescribed what to do. I think it's like a script.
Stuart:I was, you know, told what to do. So maybe it's a manager rather than a coach, I think, a decent manager.
Mark:Okay. Someone that tried to help you
Stuart:Yeah. Yeah.
Mark:Get better. Yeah. What about the rest? Up until that point before you leave the Task Factory, who who did help? Was this all just self sufficient learning, and and luck, and hard work?
Stuart:I didn't do anything though in terms of learning, Mark, in truth. Like, I didn't read sales books. I didn't listen to podcasts. I didn't know podcasts were about them, but I didn't really do anything. The word you used earlier, which resonated with me, was survive.
Stuart:Like, oh my early career was surviving. How do I just keep the lights on? How do I get by? How do I keep the salary coming in so I can pay the mortgage or the rent or whatever it is? Like, that was the first big chunk of my career, you know, 6, 7, 8 years, whatever it was.
Stuart:But I didn't really do anything, nor did I have a court who did anything.
Mark:And, I mean, it's it's obviously great that you're able to reflect back and be so open about it. Feels mad, doesn't it? Really, man? Your career, what was paying your bills, funding your lifestyle.
Stuart:I said one thing to you about the car trade, and I tell everybody this. Right? I just I think of things. Like, I'm an over thinker. I think of things and I try things.
Stuart:That that's, like, just in my head. Like, everybody would walk on the pitch and they want a car. Right? A pitch is just where all the cars are and a a person would walk in. And I'd walk up and I'd most of the most of the the salespeople would say, can I help you, Mark?
Stuart:Initially, salespeople, customers are like or prospects are like, oh, it screams sales. They're like, no. You can't. I'm just looking. That 90% of the time is what people said.
Stuart:So I just changed the question. I just said, hey, Mark. How are you doing? What what you what you driving at the moment? And it just decreased, like, people weren't as resistant to having a conversation with you.
Stuart:So I've always tried things, but that was just trial and error myself and little things like that. And that worked, and I used to get more conversations, and then people were like, should you just talk to everybody? Because I wasn't trying to sell them initially. I was just trying to see what they wanted. I was genuinely curious in what they wanted.
Stuart:And I love cars, so I I talk about cars all day. So it just changed that, and that that was just me tweaking things that I always used to do. And, you know, what worked, I'd stick with it and and try and do it from there. But I never really had anybody saying, Stew, you should do this, or you should try that. My manager, all he would say is get out there and talk to them.
Stuart:That's literally all you would get. There wasn't any, oh, you should say this or you should try that. Nothing like that. Right.
Mark:So you shared a lot about how you struggled in sales. What sort of a dark period for you? Like, when you reflect back during your time there where you're not having the success that, you know, you want or need, you haven't got the support and guidance there, Surviving being the word that we've used. Yeah. I've always admired you from like a mental headspace aspect.
Mark:Like, you've always been mentally quite strong to me, an exterior person. But what about you? How have you found those areas in dark parts of your career?
Stuart:Yeah. I guess that probably is why I am mentally quite strong. I I do consider myself to be mentally quite strong. But that is something, like anything, I've worked on. Like, I think sometimes people think, you know, you are mentally strong where you are, or you are this or you aren't that, and I'm not a believer in that.
Stuart:I think you can get better at anything. And I worked on kind of resilience mental toughness through a lot. And I think it comes from a sporting background. Like, you know, I said as a kid, I wanted to be a professional rugby player. I played rugby at a decent level for a long time, and that sport and background, you know, instills.
Stuart:I didn't knew that kind of mental toughness. But if I go back to Barclays again, like, there was a culmination of things, not really, like, a perfect storm, not really screwed, like, mental health, whatever you wanna call it. It wasn't even really a thing then. Like, it wasn't wrongly, and it's great that it's more in the public spotlight, but I struggled. Like, I I had a I had a bad injury.
Stuart:I hurt my ankle. I've done the ligaments in my ankle. I couldn't play rugby. I was working in what was a dead end job. Like, I was 2 or 3 months in.
Stuart:I wasn't doing particularly well. You know? But when you're not doing well in anything, you don't enjoy it. You know? Like I said, I was an all tool runner.
Stuart:I was surviving, getting by. I split up with a girlfriend. Like, a perfect combination of things happened when I was I don't know. I was probably 18, 19. This time, I'm trying to think of the timelines.
Stuart:I really struggled. It was more than just work, but work was a big thing of it. And I remember, like, being at work one day, and I actually went home sick. I I said, I'm I've got a really bad air. I just need to go home.
Stuart:I can't concentrate or anything. It was a bit of a white lie, really. I wasn't really sick. I just I got to this kind of point in my mind where I was just like, what the fuck are you doing? Like, what are you doing here?
Stuart:You're sitting, watching the clock waiting for things, like, waiting to go home or waiting to go for a pint or whatever it was after work. And I thought, what are you doing? Like, if you're here, like, do something with this. Like, give it a good go. Like, I've always been okay at most things.
Stuart:I turn me on the things. I just thought, what are you doing? And that's when botters were giving it a real good crack. Like, I had a good crack. And like I said, I started thinking, like, who is successful?
Stuart:Michelle, who I cast. I can't remember her surname. Michelle, who was there, was was the top performer. I started looking at what they had done. I started looking after myself as well.
Stuart:Like, this isn't a self help podcast or anything, but I started to go to gym a bit more, and I started doing things other than drinking all the time. And I try I turned the corner, but, yeah, I was fucking really shitty, really hard. And I think, you know, being poor at what I did and being in sales was was one of the reasons. And if I'm honest, I was looking for a way out at the time. I was looking at things I could do.
Stuart:What other careers could I do? What what things could I do to get out of this? And I think I said to myself, you know, give it a fair crack of the whip. See what you can do with it rather than just walking out the door. Don't quit.
Stuart:See if you can be better at this. See if you can be successful and see where it goes. And I did. And, you know, I was successful at Bartlett's, like, really successful. I I won their premier club, as they called it.
Stuart:They took us to Las Vegas when I just turned 21. Like, taught us how to gamble on the strip and flew us down to the Grand Canyon and all those kind of amazing things, and I was massively successful. Like but that was the turning point for me. But I still didn't really have a coach or anything. It was more just me thinking, what can I do?
Stuart:How can I try and get better? Kinda trying to take things on your own toes a little bit. But that that was probably the darkest time I've had in sales where I easily could have left and went and done something else.
Mark:How many times do you think you sat there thinking, can I just get home? Can I be sick? Can I make an excuse out?
Stuart:Every day, multiple times a day. Very bad, it was it was hard, man. Like, really hard. You tied to your desk. The time how long you go for a wee, like, it was really hard.
Stuart:You think I'm ringing people in the middle of EastEnders at 8 o'clock in an evening, trying to sell them a current account or a lawn or whatever. You're getting sworn out all the time. Like, people talk about cold call and now b 2 b. I reckon in my professional career in software, I've heard of somebody being told the fuck off 2 or 3 times. Like, never personally, but I've heard of, like, people in my team, or not even now, they've been sporting talented.
Stuart:That was like an hourly occurrence, like, working there. I had people say they were gonna wait outside the building for me when I finished work because I like, loads that was just common, though. It was just normal. Like but that beats you down. You know?
Stuart:So you get those times where you just say, pfft. Hard, man.
Mark:I reckon if anyone did come and wait for you outside Barclays, they'd quickly change their vibe.
Stuart:Well, the tough thing is I didn't even know where it was. You know, I was in a call center. I can imagine some bloke is probably waiting outside his local brunch for me to walk out at 8 o'clock on an evening. So it never actually happened. But, yeah.
Stuart:But that was really tough. Like, but I think going back to your point, like, that's why I say in software is like Disneyland because I'd been through that. I'd I'd understood what a hard job was and almost, like, earned me stripes there. And then when I got something that was completely different, like, I grasped it with both hands.
Mark:So it's interesting. One of the things that I think I've noticed in my career is when someone's had a shitty job, they do grasp Yeah. Their SDR, the AE role differently. Yeah. And I I know I thought a few times there are people that have come in, this is their first role.
Mark:You don't know how lucky you are. Yeah. At the same time, you do get used to your climate, your customized. Let's talk about now in SAS. Let's focus at tele compatible, test factory, refract.
Mark:Talk to you about when I say to you, what was your darkest period across those 3? What would it have been?
Stuart:See, I I can't put my finger on, like, a dark period like that. Like, it was tough. Like, technically compatible, we come in, and it was, I'm taught when ground 0 startup like the product wasn't finished. I was the 1st salesperson then obviously you Don't get the deals, but you come across as well like there was there was there was slide decks to sell the product from. It was really ground zero.
Stuart:It was tough. There's long periods where we didn't sell anything. And it was bought. I think because I had such a difficult time, I always say it to myself, like, well, you know, it's not Barclays. It's not making 200 calls a day and getting told f off every 5 minutes.
Stuart:So I haven't really had that dark paper. That said, I reckon every month or every quarter, there's a minute where I just think, sick of this. Am I just gonna be a postman? I genuinely have those conversations, but I think that's what helps me know when I've got a way out. And I know I have, and it really gets up.
Stuart:But I can't just do something else. You know, like, anybody can. You don't have to do this. I do this, and I know it's a conscious choice why I work in this profession. And I know it's tough, and I know we're gonna lose big deals, and I know we're gonna get hard times.
Stuart:But I make that choice. This I'm not a victim of this. I made this choice. That's why I'm here. I have got a way out if I want it.
Stuart:But my mentality is, like, I've made my bed. Lie in it. Like, if you're really not bothered, do something about it, Stew. So I don't really feel like I've had those times where it's been that dark. But I think that comes from my mindset now of, like, I'm not at war.
Stuart:I'm not getting shot at. Like, I'm it's not life or death what I do. I think I probably detach myself from the outcome better than what I used to and just realize I can do my best. I can control what I can. And the rest will what will be will be.
Stuart:And because of that, I don't really think I've had that many dark days.
Mark:And you say, even now, though, every month, every quarter, you'll have that, what we're doing. She's gonna be a postman as an example. What's happening to make you feel that way? Could be
Stuart:many things. Good member of staff leaves. It could be you've lost a big deal you've been working on for 12 months or the team's been working on. It could be your target's increasing, and you think it's unfair. Like, the truth is, right, the only thing that's consistent in sales is you're gonna get changed.
Stuart:Things are gonna change, and you're gonna get knocks. Like, that is just part and parcel of it. So I've just learned to adapt to them and just, like, suck it up because I know I've always got that choice. If it's really that bad, Stew, do something else. Like, that's always in my head, and I've never got to that point yet.
Stuart:I might wonder where I just think, you know, listen. I've done this enough. I've done this 15, 20, 25 years, however long. That's it. I'm done.
Stuart:Check out. But at the minute, I'm I'm fine, but there's constant knocks. And I think that's what you need to be aware. This career is never gonna be smooth sailing. Like, it is gonna be ups and downs.
Stuart:You've gotta understand that. And if you can understand that, it helps you deal with it better. It's the people who come in and think, you know, they'll swing for the fences and be great every month. Like, I've never met a seller, an honest seller, who says they've been brilliant month in, month out. It just doesn't happen.
Stuart:You know, you rich people who work with some of the best salespeople in my career, it's never all roses. You have bad moments. Things happen outside of life. The product might not be doing what it was. There's reasons why things won't be what they are, but you've just gotta learn to deal with them and cope with them.
Stuart:And and if you can, then that's how I think you're successful in sales. If I was having an honest conversation with anybody, if anybody's struggling with those ups and downs, then my my go to is, are you sure this is the career for you? Because that's not gonna change. That's always gonna be the same. It doesn't matter how good you are.
Stuart:I'm not the finished article nowhere near you. I'm still trying to get better. But as good as I might get or I hope to get, I still know that in the future, there's gonna be peaks and troughs. There's gonna be bad moments. There's gonna be good moments.
Stuart:Like, that's sales. That's life. Like, just gotta crack on, I guess, is the motto for me.
Mark:How real are those thoughts every month? If if 10 is, I'm literally gonna type my notes up and and see if I
Stuart:can typed me notes. I'll put it that way. So that might give you a shout. That's a 10. I've never typed me notes.
Stuart:And again, like, it depends on the month, mate. Right. You know, on how big those knocks are. And sometimes it's cumulative. There's 2 or 3.
Stuart:They have a habit of being like buses, you know, when you get bad news and it just hits you one after the other, and you're just saying like, how real are they? Not very. I think it's just I know I've got that exit door where I can do it if I want. So I don't think they are real. At Barclays, probably 9 a lot.
Stuart:Like, really thinking what what am I gonna do? I looked at I remember when I was at Barclays, I looked at gonna be a gas engineer. I thought, well, why don't I get a again, one of my friends was a gas engineer who's doing pretty well. I thought I could do that. I I looked and you could get, like, 6 months intensive course or something to become a gas engineer.
Stuart:And I thought, well, why don't I do that? So it was real. I was looking for things. I can never see a hand on heart I've went on the Royal Mail website and looked at being a postman, or done anything like that. It's just kind of it gives me that out if I need it.
Stuart:I hopefully never take that exit door, but I know it's out if I need it, if it gets that button. I I think, mentally, that helps me cope with things because I see it as a choice rather than being a victim of what's happened.
Mark:Tell me this is unfair. It feels like it could be linked, that the longer you've been in sales, the better you've got at sales. When you were crap, it was a 9 out of 10. This isn't for me. As you've got better, maybe it's not as real.
Mark:Do do you think those feelings are linked to going from being crap at sales to being where you are now?
Stuart:Truth is, you've got to go through those hard yards to get good and get confident. And I think when you're good and confident at anything, you enjoy it more. It's just natural in it. When you if you're good at something, you enjoy it. I think and that's why it's so important that sellers try and get better.
Stuart:Because once you do get good at it, you can enjoy it way more.
Mark:And is that linked though to wanting to be in the profession at all? Like, you say No. No. Times. It's taken
Stuart:pride in what you're doing it. It's not being embarrassed about what you wanna do. If you're a solicitor or you're a doctor, you wanna be the best, don't you? Like, they'll do courses. They'll do they'll they'll wanna learn from the peers.
Stuart:Like, that is norm the norm in all the profession. They'll have a coach. They'll have, a you know, they'll get support. They'll have a professional qualification. But the majority of sellers have nothing like that.
Stuart:Like, I think if you if you hand on heart ask more salespeople, a lot of them would have some level of embarrassment about their profession, wrongly in my opinion, because it makes the world go around selling things. But I think a lot of sellers, especially maybe junior ones, you know, who are early in their career, would have an element of embarrassment because they feel like they didn't know what they wanted to do when they're grown they were grown up or they didn't the path didn't work out the way they want and they ended up in sales. I don't know if you you've had more of these conversations, but I can imagine you haven't had many conversations with people who have made the decision to wanna work in sales. Who grows up thinking I wanna be a salesperson? Like, nobody.
Stuart:But we need to change that stigma because you and I and plenty of people we know, like, it's afforded us amazing careers. We've done really well out of it, you know, financially. But also from an enjoyment point of view, it is hard. Right? But it's great as well.
Stuart:Like, honestly, I think I'd be bored as a postman just doing the same thing day in, day out. Like, if I if I truly think about it or if I was working behind a computer doing admin or whatever, I just I'm just not that person. I'd be bored. So arguably, the bad days and the hard things make the the good days better.
Mark:So we we we what we're building up here then is the better you get at sales, the more committed you are to sales Yeah. The better you'll be mentally prepared to deal with sales. Let's talk about where you were crap then and and what you did to develop it. So let let's let's pick the the sass part of your career. That's where most of our listeners will be.
Mark:You're at the test factory or maybe even early stages of Refract. What will you crap out?
Stuart:Everything. Like, in terms of sales. Like, everything from particularly, like, demo 1, I think was the big thing. Discovery and demo 1, the 2 big things, especially if, like you say, in SAS, like, it it the test factory, my demo would literally be a deck of slides, which I'd just press the arrow key and talk through it. This is the test factory.
Stuart:This is how amazing we are. Here's all the clients we work with. I didn't really ask any questions. I just kinda put up and showed up and hope that something would resonate with a prospect, and they had a problem big enough and they are seeing how we could fix it. I wasn't actually trying to find out what customers needed, what what help they needed.
Stuart:I just used to go through a slide deck, almost on autopilot. And then I don't know when the point was, but at the at the at Refract when we started, we, you know, we had the luxury of analyzing sales conversations for a lot of organizations, a lot of sales leaders who are passionate about development and coaching. And just kinda through rubbing shoulders with OARS, it it kinda rubbed off. And I was like, shit. We're doing a lot of things wrong here.
Stuart:There's a lot of things we can do better. And, genuinely, that was like it was like a eureka moment. Like, it was like, I've been doing this all this time really shitty and done alright. Like, what can we do if we actually get serious about this and try to get better? And that was the big thing when we did that and and started to get better.
Stuart:And we I don't think BRAFRAK would have survived. And I'm not just saying me. I'm, like everybody at the company if we didn't have that mentality about trying to get better at what we did. We, like, went head to head with some big, well funded competitors. And one of the common themes we always used to get was, you know, we outsold them or we did a better job through discovery and those type of things.
Stuart:And that was the only way we could win. We we couldn't outspend them. We couldn't have better market. And, you know, arguably, we couldn't have have a product that did everything they did because the budgets are hard. So we had to get find a way where we could try and beat them, and it was by outselling them.
Stuart:And that was from reason realizing how shit we were, but also seeing what that opportunity was. The good thing about realizing how crap you are is realizing how good you could be and and what the opportunity is there. And I think we realized that, and then we just lived and breathed coaching. Like, we've done coaching sessions all the time. I listened to podcasts.
Stuart:I read books. Like, I just become quite obsessed with it, about getting better, certainly for the 1st 2, 3 years. Like, we lived and breathed, and that's all I did for 2 years. And, like, I learned more in that 2 year period than what I did in the previous 7 or 8, tenfold.
Mark:That is mental. That is all
Stuart:I know. But that's that's the point that I'm saying to you before. I I feel most people in sales just live the same year over and over again. They never really get any better. They never really change.
Stuart:They do what they've always done, and you get by. They survive. But they don't realize what kind of that potential could be. You know, how good could you be if you really took this seriously and, you know, took pride in it? And but, again, I'm convinced from my it's anecdotal, but from my personal experience, 90% of sellers, unfortunately, are in that category.
Mark:So we're about are we saying then you're 9 years into your career when you've started to have a couple years of coaching and had that impact?
Stuart:I'm a 9 years if you take it all the way back, so I'm 39 now. So, yeah, probably a late about 9, 10 years, something like that.
Mark:So 9 9, 10 years until you started getting the coaching?
Stuart:Yeah. The first real question was at refract. Yeah. That was when I got real consistent coaching.
Mark:And just just talk to that about the impact that had on you to today. If if you didn't have that moment, let's do a sliding doors moment. We all know what you've gone on to achieve since. Sliding doors moment, you didn't get that realization that you were crap. You didn't realize, wow, actually, my demos are poor.
Mark:My discoveries are poor. No one helped you. There wasn't a coaching culture. You didn't listen to calls. You didn't have a coach.
Mark:Sliding doors moment, really hard. But where do you think you are today? What's that journey been like?
Stuart:A mereism. Like, I I the things I've done, like you said, probably
Mark:voiced you. Made the other way. You didn't No.
Stuart:No. I mean, it's a mereism what I helped you, but if I didn't, like, let try to cast my mind, but, like, it's been amazing what we have done that. And I dread to think because I feel like I probably would have been in some mid position still demoing some software in a very similar way, getting by. And I've got friends who are in the industry who are similar age to me who are still pretty much doing that and, you know, still in that root of just doing the same things and just surviving. So I don't think any of those things that I've, you know, been fortunate enough to be involved in would have been a reality without that because it's it it opened my eyes to what's possible.
Stuart:Let's say it was that eureka moment. It was like, shit. There's there's so much more we can do with this and so much more we can get involved with. And without that, you know, like I said, it's it's it's a guessing game, isn't it? But I I don't think any of that would have been possible.
Mark:Yeah. I I don't I don't disagree. It's it's hard to imagine. Obviously, we're still learning. Like, we're getting you you're getting your coaching now.
Mark:You're getting the help. I wanna hear about one deal that bothers you still that you feel I I know there'd be a few.
Stuart:Right? But Well, he's trying to say them why.
Mark:I just I just know sales. Right? But if I said to you there's one deal that you lost that really bothers you and you feel like you could've done better, what deals?
Stuart:Like, if you say I could've done better all of them, do you know what I mean? Like, I've never run a perfect deal. I've never run a perfect discovery. I can definitely do better in all of them. But any that bother me, like, I can't really hand on heart say some that really bother me.
Stuart:You know, your mind immediately goes back to the big deals that you've lost. One that actually, I've got one now where you there's a company based in the US, and at the time, it was refracting. It would have been a huge deal for us. It would have been I don't know. It was something like a quarter of our MRR.
Stuart:They were an outsourced sales agency. And I felt like I've done everything right, and I felt like there was a connection. I felt like you you get a you get a hunch as a seller. I didn't do everything right, but I felt I'd done a lot right. And we're getting a good position.
Stuart:And they just went radio silence. I never heard anything back, And I and I didn't for years. And then later on down the line, this company acquired one of Refract's customers. Alright? So I actually emailed the guy who I was dealing with, which was a cofounder and CEO.
Stuart:And I was like, oh, I see you've acquired such and such. It's good to finally have you part of the Refract family. And he messaged me back saying, oh, like, oh, I I put I think my subject line was blast from the past, and I said, oh, I don't know if you remember me. Email me back saying something like, of course, I remember you. You're probably one of the best salespeople I've ever spoke to.
Stuart:To be transparent with you, you were never in the running. My good friend was CR or something of this company. We were kind of using you as a as a benchmark, as a comparison tool. So that's the one that's always stung. I got away, and that bothered us for ages.
Stuart:And then I actually got a conclusion of the story at the end, and we're actually speaking to them about potentially becoming a customer now. But, yeah, that one that one definitely stung at the time because I had a hunch that we were getting somewhere. But little did I know that I could never actually win that.
Mark:Feels like that was largely out of your control then, like never in the running, so to speak.
Stuart:Yeah. Yeah. I think so. I didn't know at the time, though. I've only now found that out.
Stuart:Like, I'm taught in 3 or 4 years down the line, so I didn't know that at the time. Yeah. And I guess more sellers wouldn't. But that is the truth of a lot of deals as well. You know, don't beat yourself up because a lot of the time, your members weren't really under serious contention anywhere.
Stuart:You know, they might have the chosen provider already or the CEO's got a friend, an exec sponsor they used to work with. Like, that is probably more true than what we ever realized. It's not all on you. There's so many different factors outside of your control as a seller that can impact the result, and that's a prime example. But at the time, that that stum that was that was a hard pill to swallow about.
Mark:So today, obviously, you're a sales leader, but you still sell, don't you? Yeah. If I was to say to you now, scale a 1 to 10, 10 being elite, how would you score yourself as a seller now? Yes. Why not 6 or a 7?
Stuart:Because I think, again, it depends on what I'm comparing myself to, doesn't it? I think I I think I'm I'm better than average. I think 7 is a pretty average number. I think 6 is probably a little bit below par, so I think I'm I'm good. I think there's people we are better than me.
Stuart:There's people late. I don't think anybody's ever a 10, so I don't think you'll ever be a 10. You know, the day you attend and you think the finished article is the day you're going backwards and slipping. So I I think an I think an it's a fair representation of where I am now. I think I'm better than a 6 because I've worked hard.
Stuart:You know, I've I've put 8 years into this now of learning, coaching. I also coach other people. Like, there's no better way of coaching yourself somehow by coaching other people. Like, it's a selfish thing, but I learn tons by coaching other people. And you get so much from it as well.
Stuart:So, yeah, if if I picked a number, I'd I'd say I'm solid 8.
Mark:What are you still crap at today that would make you a 9?
Stuart:Everything. Like, not crap at. It's it's marginal gains for me. I don't think there's one real area where I think if I could just do that, I'd be a 9. But I I think it's I can get better in every area, with whatever that might be.
Stuart:Like, everything can always get better. So I don't think there's one area where I think I'm shocking at that. I think it's just each individual area can can always get a little bit better.
Mark:Give me one area, though. The the one if I could give you the silver bullet to improve one thing. Discovery.
Stuart:Like, I think a discovery is everything for me. Like, that that's as close as the silver bullet you get in sales. If you can become really competent at discovery and get better at that, I think that helps every other area. If you've done a great discovery, the demo is easy, isn't it? Like, it's it's a piece of cake.
Stuart:If you know what somebody's problem is, the demo is just showing them the good news. And I know you've used this on LinkedIn, and and I use Richard Hammond instead of you know, exactly what I'm gonna say. I know it already, but there's the Jurassic Park moment where they drive up in the car and it's Richard Hammond, isn't it? Is that right?
Mark:No. Richard Hammond's Top Gear. Richard Hammond's Top Gear.
Stuart:John Hammond. John Hammond. That's the fella. Okay.
Mark:So Richard Attenborough. That's why that's
Stuart:why I'm confused as Timmy Richards. So he drives them up in the car in the kinda convertible 4 by 4 and shows them those brachiosauruses or whatever they are in the field. Like, Vassy demo, it's the wow moment. Like, that's what you want in your demo. There were archaeologists who dug dinosaurs up all the life.
Stuart:Like, dreaming of probably seeing 1. He's just shown them what their dream is. That's what your demo should be. The discovery's all a bit in the background trying to find out what the challenges are and then showing them that wild moment. But most people don't do that.
Stuart:The demos, they're just a harbor tour or a session of everything in the platform, and your prospect is asleep. So if I could get better at anything, the short answer is discovery.
Mark:I I so yeah. Obviously, I think it's a great analogy like yourself. I've shot shared it before. And I think you're right. He takes these 2 archaeologists straight to the to the dinosaur.
Mark:Only after do you get that moment where he stands up, twists their head, shows the dine. Only after that do they go to the lab, do they get the instructions of Yeah. How we do it, the DNA. Only then do they see the eggs and the dinosaurs be, Start with a wow. Exactly.
Mark:Okay. So discovery, what we're looking to improve more than anything. What what do you do on a regular basis to try and improve your discovery?
Stuart:Oh, all sorts. We've literally, this morning before this session, done, we call it getting to pain. So we've just done as a team, the account executives, we've just done role play sessions where we time each other in a role play session. You've got to try and get surface level pain, business level pain, and a personal pain. So in a role play, and we time each other.
Stuart:And we there's a record. It's 3 and a half minutes. 1 of the team have got personal business and and the three levels of pain in 3 and a half minutes. We role play that, and we go through and try and get to pain and role play it. We listen to calls.
Stuart:We've got podcasts. We obviously are, you know, big big advocates of my sales coach. Everyone in my team, myself included, have got a coach from my sales coach. You know, Nigel, my coach is awesome. So you name it, we do it.
Stuart:Like, hopefully, the team, we all encourage extracurricular things, reading books, podcasts. There's budgets there for people to spend money on books and podcasts and stuff. Like, you know, any more ideas, I'm all ears. But we I I feel like we do a hell of a lot to try and improve because we understand, like, what difference that can have.
Mark:What impact have you seen all this happen on sellers in your team?
Stuart:Lots of people. Like, 2 people immediately spring to mind, completely different ends of their career. Like, one person in particular went from 2022 to making something like less than $10 commission. And this last year, 2023, they've made closer to £60 or £70,000 commission. Like, that that's the difference.
Stuart:And I think one of the big things is is coaching how to run a deal better and and all the things that come with that. Again, marginal gains every area. Like, that that's, like, life changing for somebody, you know, somebody in their early twenties, mid twenties like that who's gonna achieve that. We've had people who've come to us where this might be their first job, and, you know, they they don't know where they're going a little bit like I was. And we've given them coaching and feedback and and helped them get better.
Stuart:And they've got, you know, gone on to have amazing careers and achieve things that probably they never really thought were possible as well. So it it's probably the most satisfying part of my job at Allego, but also outside of Allego. You know, I I coach people myself, and I do that as, like, as a consultant. It's really satisfying seeing somebody get better, start enjoying things, start to mix more money, start feeling better about themselves, and and probably seeing what I see in terms of, like, how good this career can be. That's probably the most satisfying part of my job, and it's why I'm so passionate about being a coach, receiving coaching and and everything that it brings.
Stuart:So it's it's it's class. It's it's it's definitely one of the highlights of, you know, this job and why I do it.
Mark:So I want you to imagine, therefore, that someone's listened to this podcast, they are you 15 years ago in sales. They think they're good, but they're not. Yeah. They're definitely struggling. They're contemplating taking time off to be sick just to get out of it.
Mark:They're thinking about being a postman. What would you say to that person?
Stuart:Just stop and assess and give it a real good crack. Like, have a go. Set yourself a time period and give it a go, which is what I did, but get help. Like, it's amazing how many people will ask you when you will help you when you ask for help. Like, get a mentor.
Stuart:Get a coach. There's your scholarship, which is amazing. People can apply for and get a scholarship if that's still open at the door. Time stamping this interview. But there's things that are that you can do.
Stuart:You know, LinkedIn now, follow people on LinkedIn, listen to podcasts. You don't necessarily need a coach to get started. You can do that yourself. YouTube videos. There's so much advice out there, but do something.
Stuart:Like, just understand where you are. Listen to your own calls. Coach yourself and realize the things that you can do better, but do something. Don't just tread water. Don't just continue doing what you're doing now because you will either leave, or 12 months down the line, you'll be in exactly the same situation as what you are now feeling fed up.
Stuart:So just take action, do something, and try and get better. And, you know, hopefully, I'll be confident if you do all those things that it'll it'll help you be happier about your job, be more successful, and, you know, in a better place.
Mark:So early on, Stuart, you talked about how many people in the profession of sales are embarrassed to be in sales. Do you feel like sales is a profession to be proud of?
Stuart:Yeah. Now I do. 100%. What changed? Taking it more seriously, realizing, you know, the the things that can afford you and and and taking pride in it in what I do, and seeing, you know, the impact it can have on people's careers, change people's lives.
Stuart:You know? Like, it genuinely can, especially software. Like, it it can be really lucrative. You can make a lot of money in software sales if you get really good at it, and it can change people's lives. You know?
Stuart:Now it's all about my kids. I'm trying to, you know, do things out so they can have a you know, the life that I couldn't have, and it being a salesperson helps me do that. Good salespeople learn more than doctors and solicitors, and that's the truth of it. If you get really good, you will earn more than most professional people out there. Gives you that opportunity.
Stuart:But it's more than just the money and the urn, and it's it's a really good career. It's hard, but the the ups are really high, and you make great people. And, yeah, I I'm I'm super proud of what I do now. I don't have any qualms about telling anybody what I do if they ask.
Mark:Would you do it if the money wasn't there? Or Would
Stuart:you do anything if the money wasn't there?
Mark:Let's just say an average salary.
Stuart:Would I do it if it was an average? It's a really good question. I've never asked myself that. Would I do it if it was an average salary? As opposed to what?
Stuart:Like, yes. I think I would, because I don't know anything else, and I enjoy it. Like I said, you know, I don't think just put mail I'm not trying to underestimate, you know, the importance of somebody's job, but, like, putting mail through somebody's door every day or data admin or whatever that might be. I just don't think that's me. I I I need something to to get my teeth into and and work towards.
Stuart:So I I think I would because I don't think I could really do much else. I think I'd get bored doing most of the things.
Mark:Remind me again, what did you study at college? Criminology? Law, physics, chemistry. Did I say criminology?
Stuart:Yeah.
Mark:You so chemistry, law, and physics. I want you to imagine in sort of 15 years' time, whatever the time frames would be, your daughters have got qualifications in those things. So chemistry, physics, law. And they say to you, I'm not gonna do that. I'm gonna go and get a job as an SDR.
Stuart:What would you say I I'd be totally behind it like I've all and I me and leah my wife always have this conversation what I want to do is give my girls the opportunity to do what they want and what they enjoy. And if that's what they feel they naturally wanna do and that's what they'll enjoy, then I'd be a 100% behind it. I don't wanna push them. It's it's a little bit now, the 3 in one. Like, I've I've got a while yet, but, like, I don't try and push them into things.
Stuart:Like, Sophia's had swimming lessons, dancing lessons, horse riding. Like, I've tried to give her the opportunity to do various different things to see what she enjoys, and I think it'll be the same in their career. I'll give them advice and pros and cons of both. You know? And and that would be if she wanted to be a doctor, a rocket scientist, or an SDR.
Stuart:I think I'd try and give her an objective view of what that career is gonna entail so she can make our own informed decision. But I would never try and push her one way or the other. I'd help her and support her. That'd be the best SDR she could be. I I feel like that is what I wanna do, whether or not it actually comes in.
Stuart:It comes out when they are that age. But that's certainly what I would hope that I would do in that situation at that time.
Mark:I love that. I feel like you've answered a lot of my sort of ending questions around what advice would you give to people not filling their potential. I feel like I know the answer. If you were to start your career again, would you work in sales? I feel like it's a resounding yes.
Mark:So let's let's bring this to an end, Stew. I think this has been an amazing, interview. Really, really appreciate how open you've been, how vulnerable you've been, just how honest and general. I really enjoyed the chat. I'm gonna sign it off with, if there's one person you'd like to see on this podcast, the basically crap at sales podcast and hear their story, who would that be?
Stuart:Yeah. I knew this question was coming, and I'm still struggling for it for some reason. Who would I like to see on this podcast?
Mark:Darren from Recite Me? That'd be interesting. Yeah. So obviously, no one listens to this, while very few will be able to point to go whilst it'd be interesting. Why have you picked Darren?
Stuart:Because I remember you went to work with Darren, and Darren was was CRO or VP of sales when we were back at the test factory. And the company he's working for was smashing it doing really well. I remember you used to see Darren there and see, obviously, how successful they were, and it was kinda like Darren was was doing really well and where a lot of people wanted to be. Obviously, you worked with him. I've been fortunate enough to work with Darren as well.
Stuart:I I ended up selling, refractors it was then, the Darren and things. I just I'd be interested to see I don't even know. He might say he wasn't shit at sales. I don't know. I'm just making that up, but it'd be interesting to see see his tick on things.
Mark:K. So I I do you know what it is? I'd love the idea of this. And he's based in an office, so I could get him in the orange chair. I want you to look into that camera there and tell Darren because I'm gonna send this to him, this clip.
Mark:Yeah. Yeah. Right? Tell Darren why he
Stuart:should come on this podcast. Darren, I'd like to see you on the podcast because I'd love to hear your story. I'm a big believer that everybody start had a starting point. You've had a really successful career, and I'd like to get a bit more insight into it and see you in this orange chair, Mark.
Mark:Stu, thanks very much for coming on the I u c crapper sales podcast. Thank you. Pleasure.
Stuart:Thanks for having us. Cheers, mate.