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Welcome to the Sales Lead Dog podcast hosted by CRM technology and sales process expert Christopher Smith.
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Talking with sales leaders that have separated themselves from the rest of the pack.
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Listen to find out how the best of the best achieved success with their team and CRM technology.
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And remember, unless you were the lead dog, the view never changes.
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Welcome to Sales Lead Dog.
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Joining me for today’s episode, I have Lee Weach, Vice President of Sales for Executech.
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Lee, welcome to Sales Lead Dog.
0:36
Appreciate you having me this morning.
0:38
It’s great to have you here.
0:39
It’s a Friday here, beautiful Denver, Co.
0:41
So it’s a great day to to talk with you, Lee.
0:46
Lee, tell me a little bit about Executech.
0:49
Yeah, I’d love to.
0:50
Executech.
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We’re a 25 year old MANA service provider.
0:54
We were founded here in Salt Lake City, UT.
0:56
We have since grown acquired by a private equity firm, Evergreen.
1:01
We have 8 locations and six states providing managed services, IT infrastructure, managed security, cybersecurity type audits, things like that.
1:12
And then we have a whole separate cloud division as well.
1:15
Nothing but cloud servers, integrations, architecture, anything cloud related.
1:22
Yeah, there’s, I think two big areas that I see.
1:26
You know, my side of the world, it’s cloud and it’s cybersecurity.
1:30
Is that the same way for you guys?
1:33
Absolutely.
1:33
I mean, everyone’s going to need the infrastructure piece.
1:36
You know, business can’t run without the computers and the servers and the switches and the firewall, stuff like that.
1:42
But where we’re seeing a lot of growth is is in the cloud and the security pace.
1:47
It’s interesting.
1:47
Security, you know, I think it’s still on the tipping point.
1:51
A lot of people are discussing, they’re talking about security.
1:55
It’s top of mind with the news reports and the different things that are happening, you know, with with security and businesses.
2:02
But it’s interesting, they haven’t really jumped into the pond, so to speak, from a cost perspective.
2:08
Whereas in the cloud, I think there’s a natural migration to the cloud when servers are getting kind of long on the teeth, getting a little bit old, and they’re making that decision on whether to, you know, replace on premise or to replace in the cloud.
2:22
A lot of them are making that transition.
2:24
It’s a natural timeline to push into the cloud.
2:27
Yeah, I think the security thing, you just, I mean, the worst case scenario is you’re in that scenario where crap, we’ve been hacked, you know, we’re being held ransom, whatever, that stuff happens and it’s horrible to go through that experience.
2:42
You don’t want to be that person.
2:43
But I think if you end up where you have a friend or someone who’s going through that, that’s when it’s like, crap, I need to take this serious, you know?
2:51
Yeah, we, we’ve had a long time phrase it, it started probably 20 years ago or so.
2:57
Where backups are the Holy Grail of IT and we we really take the backup serious and and whether that’s having an on Prem device like a Nas as your initial storage and then having a cloud option on the back end of that or just having the cloud, whatever’s important to the client and the speed of their operation.
3:17
But when you have your backups and they’re working and you know they’re working, you’ve tested them, you know, you can kind of disregard some of those ransomware attacks.
3:27
But the software that’s that’s available now to prevent the cybersecurity and the hacking and all that other stuff, you know, it’s, it’s worth its weight in gold.
3:39
I call it the sleep well at night service and software.
3:43
Yeah.
3:43
Yeah.
3:44
And what AI is bringing to that space, too, is amazing.
3:46
Oh, well, going back to your security, you know, AI is kind of interesting.
3:51
It it really makes people’s lives easier.
3:54
You know, your work’s easier.
3:55
Hey, transcribe this paragraph for me, whatever the case may be.
3:59
But a lot of people don’t realize that ChatGPT, as great as it is and how easy it is to use.
4:07
If you say any corporate private information or the way your company does business, whatever you say pertaining to your business now is out there.
4:16
It’s on the World Wide Web essentially.
4:19
And now your competitors or anybody can go in and search for your company name and pull up information about your, you know, I’m on the sales side, right?
4:27
So I don’t want to give them any trade secrets of how we price anything out or, you know, build me a quote or anything like that, because ultimately all our competitors can go in there and find it.
4:38
So, you know, we’re, we’re a big fan of AI, but we like to make sure it’s kind of quarantined.
4:43
It’s the doors are shut.
4:45
You know, it’s in, you know, the Microsoft space with Copilot, those kind of type situations.
4:51
So you really need to do a kind of a data governance, you know, audit almost and make sure that that stuff’s taken care of.
4:58
Yeah, you bet.
4:59
Lee, when you look back over your career and you’ve had a pretty significant journey to where you are today, what are the three things that have really driven you to the level of success that you’ve achieved?
5:12
You know, the MSP space is, is different.
5:14
You know, from a sales side, it’s not a widget, it’s not a software.
5:18
You know, there’s, there’s a very human touch to what we do in sales when it comes to a managed services.
5:24
I, I use the analogy that people are trusting you to watch their baby.
5:28
You know, it’s, it’s literally their baby of the organization and they have to trust the salesperson, They have to trust the technicians, they have to trust the business.
5:37
So in in my life, just as a human is kind of who I am, you know, some of the three core things that I really kind of hold my truths are honesty.
5:47
You know, sometimes, you know, the, the saying brutally honest, sometimes you can be soft with your honesty, but you need to be honest with people.
5:55
And if you can do something, you can do it.
5:58
If you can’t do it, you don’t do it.
5:59
And there’s been plenty of times in my career here at Executech where I tell them, yeah, you don’t need this.
6:05
And they look at you kind of crazy, like I can’t believe you actually said that.
6:09
But it’s like, no, that’s a little, you know, that’s a Rolls Royce and you only need a Lexus, you know, type scenario, you know, so, so honesty is 1 showing up is a big one.
6:21
You know, not only in MSP world, but previous lives world, you know, multiple stories of driving through the snow here in Utah to be at a meeting at 9:00 in the morning.
6:31
And, you know, they look at you again like you’re crazy for being there, Like you actually showed up, you know, just being present.
6:38
You know, recent story, you know, there I was down in southern Utah, had a 3 1/2 hour drive home.
6:46
And there was an association meeting, you know, later on that afternoon.
6:50
And it was an hour past my house.
6:52
I didn’t really want to go yet, honestly, But I went, Nope, you got to show up.
6:57
And I ended up sitting next to a gentleman that needed IT help.
7:00
And now they’re a significant client of ours.
7:03
You know, so just showing up is a big deal.
7:06
And then the third one kind of relates to #1 but transparency, you know, really let people know, You know, the founder of Executech, Eric Montague, I was on a call with him with a big client, big time client of our became a client, I should say.
7:23
And they asked him a question, you know, and, and the question from the owner of that business was what’s not working for Executech?
7:31
What do you need to fix?
7:33
And he didn’t even hesitate.
7:34
He immediately answered the question and gave him like 2 examples of what wasn’t working at Executech.
7:42
And this is what we’re doing to fix it and this is what we’re working on.
7:46
So that was a real eye opening for me.
7:49
Even though that was part of my core values, just to see it live in action from someone that’s been highly successful was real eye opening for me.
7:57
That’s incredible.
7:57
That’s a great story.
8:00
You know, I’m, I’m a big believer in that two people can smell when you’re full of BS, right?
8:06
They can smell it, they know.
8:08
And so all you’re doing is you’re just digging a hole for yourself.
8:13
It, you know, might work in the short term, but over the long term, that’s really hard to keep that up.
8:18
And so, yeah, I’d love that.
8:20
Yeah.
8:21
And, and you can’t, you know, if you’re White Lion or you telling partial truths now, you can’t remember who you told the partial truth to, who you told the.
8:29
So just just stop, Right.
8:31
Just just stop re evaluate things and especially from the sales side and and you said it, you know very eloquently is they can smell it.
8:40
You know, they they know.
8:42
I mean, all these business owners, the men and women that are making financial decisions for organizations, this isn’t their first rodeo.
8:51
You know, they go through these things all the time.
8:53
They’re looking for that human connection.
8:55
And as I mentioned, do they trust you that, you know, that’s the biggest thing.
8:59
Do they do they trust you?
9:00
So if if you’re kind of Hemming and Han and you’re kind of telling partial truths, you’re just digging.
9:06
You’re literally digging.
9:08
Yeah.
9:09
What was the best thing about your first sales job?
9:13
For sales job, it’s actually a negative, but helps me in a positive light.
9:17
There you go, I’ll take it.
9:19
Yeah.
9:20
So right out of college, I had a a moonlighting job at a car dealership.
9:24
So I kind of watched car car sales and their processes, follow-ups, stuff like that.
9:31
But my first, what I consider my first true sales job, I was working in the transportation industry for a freight forwarder that served the Hawaiian Islands.
9:39
And one of the things that I wish, I think I would, I would have been a lot better at it now with better tooling.
9:48
We didn’t have ACRM, we didn’t have a way to track what businesses, how much they were, you know, shipping with us on a weekly basis reports, you know, those kind of type things.
10:00
So I felt like I was really floundering in there and we would get the what are called bill of ladings and I would flip through the bill of ladings, try to find the names that seemed familiar, you know, really kind of old school, if you will.
10:12
So doing all that.
10:13
So that really taught me moving forward, how to stay a little more organized when it comes to things.
10:19
And if you have a tool, great, use it.
10:21
If you don’t have a tool, how can you still be organized without the greatest, you know, options given to you by a by a business?
10:29
Yeah, that’s a great that I like that one a lot that because it is all about those lessons learned, those ones that you carry for the rest of your career.
10:38
Yeah.
10:38
And then the other one, I, I will say the other story that popped into my head from a sales side.
10:43
I, I dabbled in the car sales world not very long, maybe six months, you know, right out of college.
10:49
Let’s see how this goes kind of thing.
10:51
And I remember there was a, a gentleman looking at a used car and he was negotiating and he wanted a better price, of course.
11:00
And I remember our general sales manager Mark said to me, go out there and tell him the price is blank, take it or leave it type scenario.
11:10
And that’s the first time in my life that I’ve, I’ve really been put in that situation.
11:14
And I was looking at him like, you got to be kidding me.
11:17
You’re like, I’m going to lose this thing over $500.
11:20
You know, like your mind’s just racing, racing, racing.
11:23
And he’s, and he looked me dead in the face and he said, go hit him right between the eyes with the number.
11:29
Just say it strongly, politely, but authoritatively.
11:35
Hit him between the eyes with the number.
11:37
Okey dokey, you know, all right, and you know, you ended up selling it because the guy wanted the car, truck, whatever it was, but it but but the the story and the lesson learned of sometimes going back to the true thing, right?
11:51
Sometimes you just have to hit them with it.
11:54
They’re not going to like it or they might love it.
11:56
You don’t know.
11:58
But here it comes and we can deal with it exactly.
12:01
You know what, again, it, it’s a different type of transparency and honesty, but it’s got to be a win for both sides, right?
12:08
If you’re constantly putting yourself in a weak position, eventually you’re going to go out of business.
12:13
You know, like you have to be able at some point stick to your numbers.
12:17
Well, especially in today’s day and age, people have an idea what things cost.
12:21
They know how much a couch cost, they know how much a car cost.
12:24
You know, whatever they’re buying that’s a higher ticket item, refrigerator, whatever it is.
12:29
So you can research what the profitability is on some of these things, what the going rates are.
12:34
So, you know, if the sales guy tells me on a, you know, say a $2000 refrigerator that you can’t find a better deal below $3000, you know, they’re lying to you, you know, and then, all right, we’re done.
12:46
You’re leaving.
12:47
You know, it’s like there’s there’s, there’s I, I just can’t deal with that, you know, Is this scenarios?
12:52
Yeah, no, I totally agree with that.
12:55
So what were some of the key lessons or additional key lessons you took away from those early sales jobs before you got into leadership?
13:05
Jeez, again, I might, I don’t know why my mind goes negative, but I think of the failures, you know, that really kind of shape who you are not only as a human, but as a sales professional or professional in general.
13:18
You know, I’ll readily admit that I kind of skated through some things I didn’t give not even 80% effort on some of the jobs that I had and it and it cost me a couple jobs.
13:32
I was removed from from one or two positions because of the a lack of urgency, a lack of follow through, a lack of attention to detail.
13:43
You know, all of those things that I really wish I had learned earlier in my life.
13:48
You know, even as a high school senior, have a part time job where you have the accountability to show up or you know, a lot of those things, you just it, it, it’s, it’s hand to mouth you.
13:59
You can’t really tell people.
14:00
You can tell them, but you know, there’s there’s action of where that really is.
14:05
So a lot of those lessons really shaped kind of who I am and you know, you kind of have an epiphany or I, I had an epiphany.
14:12
You know, when these things are happening, I have to change me.
14:16
I have to change fundamentally who I am.
14:18
I think I am who I am as a core, but I’m not really projecting that, you know, I’m not really carrying that in my business life, personal life, absolutely professional life.
14:31
I’m not really showing all the stars.
14:33
And I really had, you know, this is 2013, 2014, 2015.
14:39
I really had to take a hard look at myself.
14:41
You know, not going to lie to you.
14:42
You know, it was a let’s go drive up into the mountains, have a heart to heart, come to Jesus type moments, you know, of what are you doing?
14:50
You know, if you continue down this path, your kids are only going to be able to, you know, only going to I’ll say this again, you’re only going to be able to afford blank for your kids.
15:00
If you continue down this path.
15:02
You have to you have to change.
15:04
And, and that really is what set me forward.
15:07
Probably 2016 was where I really started on this path that got me to where I am today.
15:14
I love how real you’re being There it it is.
15:18
We learned way more from falling on her face and those hard lessons.
15:25
Those are the things that are truly transformative.
15:27
You know, those are the things that are going to either you’re going to suck it up and really start pushing forward in the direction you need to be going in, or you’re going to stay on the ground and just kind of be miserable.
15:38
And now I that’s why to me, that’s the stuff that is most important are the failures, in my opinion.
15:45
Absolutely.
15:46
You know, anybody can, you know, be born into family money and you’re just given family money and a lot of people take that and run and, you know, they make even better.
15:57
They go further, you know, but there’s a lot of people in this world, entrepreneurs, people who are running businesses, CE OS, CE OS, you know, CF OS.
16:07
They, they, they weren’t handed a golden spoon, you know, and they had those tough lessons, whether it was childhood, watching mom and dad struggle, or whether is, you know, they had a high paying job and they were relieved of that job and had to fall on their face and like, oh man, how am I actually going to feed myself?
16:24
And I only have $20.00 for gas to last three days, but how do I continue my job?
16:29
Those struggles really define a people, you know, in my opinion, they really define who you are.
16:35
And you can see it later on in life, the people that are, are really that go after it.
16:40
Oh, yeah, totally.
16:41
It’s, it’s in my world.
16:43
You know, I’m, I’m very connected to the entrepreneur network here in Colorado.
16:48
And you meet all kinds of people.
16:51
And there’s some people that achieve incredible success.
16:56
But you look at him like this, this person’s not very smart, you know, like how some people are just really lucky.
17:03
They get into that sweet spot at the right time and just stuff falls in place for them and they’re super successful.
17:11
I’ve met other people that are super, super smart.
17:13
You think like, God, this person’s going to achieve incredible success and they have nothing but failure after failure.
17:18
It’s incredibly, I think it’s almost impossible to predict those outcomes.
17:23
But there are some common threads through all this stuff, you know, and that and the ones that I see, the ones that the kind of more the middle, I think what I described are kind of the extremes.
17:33
But the people in the middle that are, that are achieving that 20 percent, 10 to 20% growth every year.
17:38
They’re working their tails off.
17:40
You know, they’ve got a vision, they’ve got core values and they’re setting those milestones out in front of the Subs and they’re working their tail off to get there, you know.
17:49
Yeah.
17:49
And I, I really like being around.
17:51
Yeah, I’ll add a little bit to it.
17:53
You, you use the phrase working your tail off.
17:55
That doesn’t mean 60-70 hour week.
17:58
It doesn’t mean that.
17:59
It means you’re very strategic and you align yourself with people and you’re, and you’re doing the right things.
18:06
Whether it’s focus groups, whether you’re in a 20 group, whether you’re, you know your, your life is scripted out from a calendar perspective, you’re working your tail off to put yourself in the right situations at the right time or with the right information to make the right decision at the right time to be able to pivot.
18:29
As I use the analogy, anybody can drive a car fast straight, anybody can go fast straight.
18:36
But when the curves start happening, what do you do?
18:39
Do you know when to brake?
18:40
Do you know when to hit the throttle?
18:41
Do you know when to take the apex?
18:43
That’s where in the business world you’ll really start to see who’s going to shine is watching those decisions.
18:50
Oh, big time, big time.
18:52
It it’s so true.
18:53
And and it’s having that ability, that willingness to pivot to say, hey, this isn’t working.
19:01
Let’s what do we need to adjust?
19:02
Where do we need to, you know, where do we turn?
19:05
Where do, which direction are we going now?
19:07
Because what we’re doing isn’t going to work or it’s not working.
19:10
We’re not getting where we need to be.
19:13
Yeah, I’m a big inside of Zeki tech.
19:16
I’m kind of known as the idea guy, you know, And I like to brainstorm.
19:20
I like to throw things at the wall, write them down on dry erase board, all of those things.
19:25
I don’t have the answer of how to do it, you know?
19:27
I don’t.
19:27
I’m not.
19:28
I haven’t I planned this thing out steps one through 10, but I’ll brainstorm with you and I’ll come up with ideas based on my experience of of being in the managed service provider sales space for almost 8 years now and 125 clients that have come over to executech under my watch.
19:46
You know, you have those knowledge things you know and brainstorm, but you got to put yourself in the room with brighter minds and people that you trust to help brainstorm to make these decisions.
19:59
So I, I have a, a sales leadership council, if you will.
20:04
There’s two other sales guys with me and then we have our director of marketing joins us on it as well.
20:10
Because I value their opinions, you know, and if, if I say something stupid or I say something crazy or off the wall, I need to trust these people to say, you know, you’re missing the mark a little bit.
20:23
I understand where you’re going.
20:25
I understand what you want to accomplish, but.
20:29
You’re not thinking of the following two things.
20:31
You know you have to.
20:33
If not, you know, I honestly, I think people are doomed to failure if they try to keep it all to themselves.
20:38
I agree.
20:39
What’s the hardest part about being a sales leader for you?
20:43
For me, it’s I want everybody to succeed.
20:48
I want the receptionist to be the best.
20:50
I want finance to be the best operations.
20:53
Everybody just to be happy, living life, paying their mortgages, vacations with their family.
20:59
I’m one of those type of individuals, you know, I want everyone to succeed.
21:03
So from a sales leadership perspective, having so many people kind of reporting to me or a better way of saying that is, is using me when things get tough or they have questions, it’s how much time do I have to be on meetings with, you know, people outside of what I’m currently doing?
21:24
How do I space myself out?
21:26
How do I pivot from being at an association meeting that ends at 1:00, and I know that my salesperson needs me at 1:30 to be on a team’s call with a $5000 prospective client?
21:42
How do you balance that?
21:43
Do you cut out early to the association?
21:46
Do you stay to network?
21:47
So you know, a lot of those things really take a lot of balance.
21:51
I’m really trying to understand the importance of everything that you’re trying to be at and prioritizing which ones are best.
21:59
Yeah.
22:01
What’s the best part about your job watching people succeed?
22:04
As I mentioned a little while ago, I mean, we had a tremendous second quarter and net new revenue growth, 100 and 3030% of the quota, you know, for the entire group of salespeople here at Executech and just watching, you know, the deals being closed and the different names attached to them and you know, all different regions are adding revenue to their business.
22:27
It’s just, it’s exciting to me, you know, and, and again, I said it, but it’s, I know that’s life changing for people.
22:36
Stability comes from the sales world of selling deals and the commissions on the back end of selling a deal is vital for what these people do.
22:45
And you know, again, I’m a people person.
22:47
So getting to know them and their kids and, you know, having to fly up to Seattle to bring their father-in-law home or their kid is in the hospital.
22:56
And, you know, sometimes it’s just picking up the phone and and before we start business, how is your daughter doing?
23:03
How is your father-in-law?
23:05
How did that work out?
23:06
You know, that that’s rewarding to me.
23:08
That’s awesome.
23:09
Lee, you strike me as a person who leads from the front, which I think is really important.
23:14
I think it’s a critical element to be a successful leader, but that can also be very, it just can wipe you out sometimes.
23:22
How do you keep up your energy?
23:23
How do you stay motivated?
23:25
That’s that’s a very good question.
23:28
And, and it’s something that we’ve been thinking about or I personally been thinking about kind of brainstorming with some of my confidants.
23:35
You know, that, as I mentioned, is how do you do that when you, when you lead by the front?
23:40
You know, I still talk to perspective clients.
23:42
I have my own book of business that I’m chasing, you know, for new deals.
23:46
So finding that balance of what to do, but sometimes you don’t.
23:52
Sometimes it does just wipe you out.
23:54
You know, I think maybe maybe that’s a critical piece to understand is sometimes it’s going to be difficult physically, you know, driving everywhere, popping from one place to the other.
24:06
But sometimes you just have to be on for seven hours and it’s taxing.
24:11
I took my daughter Kara up to the Utah Bankers Association annual meeting.
24:16
So she, you know, she was in the booth with me for, you know, part of Sunday, part of Monday, walking around and, and something that she and I talked about was the always on part.
24:26
You can’t just sit down on a chair and look grumpy.
24:29
You can’t, you know, you always have to be on.
24:32
So, so when you’re a sales leader and you’re leading from the front, when you have people, you know, there are times that I’m going to disagree with something.
24:40
You know, we might be on a call with all, you know, 12 of us on a call and I disagree with what somebody’s saying.
24:46
It’s not fundamentally wrong.
24:49
You know, it’s not going to burn the house down wrong.
24:52
But how do you tactfully, you know, help that person realize the, the other side?
25:00
But I, I agree with you, it’s, it’s taxing.
25:04
You know, sometimes I come home, you know, being real with you and transparent, I’ll come home and I sit on the couch and all of a sudden it’s 9:00 and I don’t even know where three hours went.
25:15
And mentally you’re just resetting at that point.
25:18
But then I guess one of the other things I, I, I, I do and I, they didn’t really put it into this context until you formed like the OR gave me the question was, and it’s cliche, but take time for you, whatever you is.
25:32
If you like to do woodworking, go do woodworking.
25:35
If you like to go sit in your car up in the mountains, go do that right?
25:38
And carve out time.
25:40
And sometimes this is going to be a little interesting, but sometimes you have to say no.
25:46
Saying no is difficult when you lead from the front.
25:50
And sometimes it’s I, I can’t do it at 3, but I can do it at 4 or at 9:00 tomorrow.
25:57
So I always try to give them options when I say no.
26:00
But sometimes you just have to.
26:02
Yeah.
26:02
The hardest thing for me on my journey in leadership is delegation.
26:07
You know, that I always thought, like, you know, I’m up front.
26:10
I need to do as much as I can.
26:12
But that’s a hard lesson to learn too, that, you know, we all have our limits, but I’m also not helping my team behind me if I’m the one doing everything or doing the hardest stuff.
26:24
I’m not giving them opportunities to grow.
26:26
Have you ever encountered scenarios like that?
26:28
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
26:30
I had a couple popping to mind.
26:31
And I’ll, I’ll leave some of the privacy details out of it.
26:35
But, you know, there’s been times where some of our salespeople have questioned some of the decisions, not questioning a real negative, you know, I’m leaving the company question, but more.
26:46
That’s interesting.
26:47
I don’t understand blank, you know, and they’re talking to me about it and I like, well, I can give you my opinion or kind of work from the seat I’m at.
26:55
I can give you a little two cents, but you need to go ask.
27:00
You need to go ask.
27:01
I can ask for you, but you need to go ask, you know, and and like you said, it gives people who haven’t had that opportunity to grow and, and how to learn how to handle difficult situations or potential touchy situations.
27:16
But if we’re all on the same team, we’re all trying to accomplish the same goal, you know, sometimes you just have to tell people.
27:24
I don’t agree with that.
27:26
Here are the three reasons why.
27:28
And these are my suggestions of a corrective action.
27:32
Yeah.
27:33
And I think it’s also that it’s important that your team knows like, hey, I need to you go do this.
27:39
Give it a shot.
27:40
I’ve got your back.
27:41
I’ll be here if you need me, but you need to go do that, you know, and and I think that’s the other important part is, is making sure the team knows I’ve got your back.
27:52
Yeah.
27:52
And sometimes you have, you have to be willing to take the arrows.
27:55
That’s right.
27:55
You know, you, you as a leader, you’re gathering the information from your your people, whoever they might be.
28:03
You’re gathering the information.
28:05
Put it in clear, concise sentences.
28:08
You know, say it in if you can say it in three sentences, Don’t say it in 12.
28:12
Just be concise with what you’re saying, but be prepared.
28:17
Here comes some arrows.
28:19
They’re not going to just take this laying down because they’ve, they’re vested in it, they’re emotional in it.
28:24
It’s their decision, whatever those scenarios are.
28:27
So you you need to be able to be constructive, but firm and transparent of the reasons why you feel something’s not going to be successful.
28:37
Right.
28:37
I think building a culture of honesty and transparency like you’ve done at Executech begins in the hiring process.
28:46
How do you hire to your core values?
28:50
Yeah, So there’s, there’s two things that’s interesting when it comes to hiring.
28:54
So typically I’m not the initial wave of interviews.
28:58
I get them when it’s kind of dwindled down to, you know, 234 options, maybe a little unique, maybe it’s a little bit different, but it’s who I am as a person.
29:09
I don’t, I have about 3 questions written down of that I want to ask them.
29:13
Not your traditional interview, just, you know, whatever comes to mind, kind time questions and I want to have a conversation with them, especially the managed service provider space because that’s what you’re going to be doing when we sell.
29:26
There’s no order of questions.
29:28
You know, I tell people all the time, you know, I can get the information to build a quote in under 3 minutes.
29:33
That’s just rattling me off information.
29:36
The the next 45 minutes is where you’re really actually going to earn your money and you know, to show how good you are.
29:43
So from a hiring, I want to see the people who want to work for our organization, how can they have off the cuff conversations, spitballing questions?
29:54
How do they handle those kind of type situations is what I really, really want to know.
29:59
Because if you’re trying to sell me, you’re trying to sell them and they’re going to sniff it out as we talked at the very beginning of this.
30:07
So that’s one thing that I do on it.
30:11
You know, the, the other thing from a, a hiring, once they’re hired, once we’ve depicted or we came to a conclusion, actually, sometimes it does come up in the interview, depending if they ask, but typically it’s when they’re actually on board.
30:25
I’ll be very, very transparent with them from an earnings perspective.
30:31
You know, right now you’re looking at X year 2, you’re looking at X year three, you’re looking at Y, you know, kind of type situation and be very transparent with them.
30:42
Can you sell $400,000 on net new revenue business and start making great money at Executech?
30:50
Absolutely.
30:51
It’s possible.
30:52
Likely no, but it’s possible, right?
30:55
So that type of transparency and honesty from a hiring perspective, I, I just want to make sure people are on the right footing.
31:03
You know, this, this is a long term hire for us.
31:06
This isn’t a short term, you know, smash and grab income leaving two years type situation.
31:12
Yep.
31:12
CRM.
31:14
Do you love it or do you hate it?
31:16
I love it for certain things and I hate it for other things.
31:19
You know, I think that’s the standard answer I get.
31:23
It is, I mean, I’m a sales guy, right?
31:25
Like I don’t want to be talking and I want to be having conversations.
31:28
I don’t want to be bogged down on having to input data and kind of know where it is.
31:34
So from a leadership perspective, whatever the organization does for their, you know, purpose in life is understand who’s using the CRMS to understand what they may or may not like to do.
31:47
Try to streamline it as much as possible.
31:49
That’s what we’ve done here at Executech.
31:51
We use ACRM, HubSpot and we’ve streamlined it so you know, when they’re working through a deal, when they’re kind of going through the stages, some of it’s automatic.
32:01
It will automatically kick it to the next stage.
32:03
When you send a quote, it automatically kicks it, but you have to go in there and mark it.
32:08
One is actually auto flagged as no, actually I take that back.
32:12
One is not auto flagged, but you have to go in there and do certain things, you know, and updates and make sure the revenue number is right.
32:20
So I love it from a leadership perspective.
32:24
It gives me an idea what people are working on, gives me an idea of the potential revenue that’s out there.
32:30
That gives me visibility on the size of the deals that they’re working on.
32:34
So from a leadership perspective, would it help if I made a phone call?
32:38
Would it help if I made sent an e-mail on behalf, you know, those type situations.
32:43
But it’s a necessary evil for sure.
32:46
But it’s something that the better you get at it, the more you use it, the more you do it in your daily life, it it can really help you out.
32:56
Yeah.
32:56
The magic wand where you could wave it and fix one thing or add one thing to your CRM.
33:01
What would it be?
33:03
I see your own capacity.
33:08
I wish there was a little more automation in it.
33:11
We can do the automation.
33:13
Where my mind went was doing drip campaigns for maybe lost deals, you know, maybe at 12 months we do it there.
33:23
We just have to build it.
33:25
Not terribly difficult, but you know, there, there’s some time that you have to take touching the CRM to make sure it’s done right.
33:34
And I wish it was just a little more, call it Fisher Price of the World, where it’s just three steps versus 10 steps.
33:41
Yeah, yeah, yeah, that’s always a big one.
33:44
I come across that a lot that, you know, from my perspective, CRM is at a, a, a, a point where the way people have been using CRM last 20 years, over the next three years, it’s going to be fundamentally different with, with the advent of AI and how AI is coming into play.
34:13
I know some of the stuff that Microsoft is working on, I know Salesforce is investing a lot as well, but Microsoft is really the leader when it comes to AI and leveraging it within tools like CRM.
34:23
Some of the stuff that they’re doing, it’s absolutely mind boggling.
34:27
And I think to see a real transformation around, you know, not just automation, but to where it’s actually making your data actual.
34:39
You know, one of the things that I’ve seen in my world is this, you know, for years, it’s always been about customer 360.
34:44
We have to have 360° view of the data.
34:46
Well, but that data is just sitting there.
34:48
So yeah, I can see 360° views of my customer, which is a myth.
34:53
Nobody can.
34:56
They might get close, but it’s me as a salesperson.
35:00
OK, I’ve got this data you’re leaving up to the salesperson to figure out what to do.
35:04
You know what where’s what’s my next step?
35:06
What’s my next action?
35:07
What’s where’s these hidden opportunities where I can go revenue for my business?
35:12
What’s coming is, you know, haven’t see where I’m actually serving that stuff up to your sales team.
35:17
We’re actually driving action.
35:20
And do you find that as a sales leader, is that be a dream of yours, you know, where it’s really driving things for your team instead of your team having to figure it out on their own?
35:32
Yeah, absolutely.
35:33
Yeah.
35:33
Like I said, the automation part, you know, with AI, you know, can they take, I’m going to emails?
35:40
Can they take e-mail language that a specific person use and then draft emails on behalf of you, Tee em up.
35:51
Maybe they put them in a queue doesn’t send it automatically or, or if you’re OK with it, you do send it automatically, but queue them up in your language, your wording, your closing, your opening, all of that for these type things.
36:04
You know, one of the things that I, I was thinking about too, is we talked about this with my director of marketing and how nice it would it be to know when people that work at your current client take a job at another client and there’s software out there that you can buy that’s going to scrub the linked ends of the world and give you that data.
36:24
Yeah, I, I know what’s out there, right.
36:26
But how cool and easy would it be if that was integrated in as, as an, as a native feature inside of ACRM And maybe it’s out there and we haven’t come across it, right.
36:37
So I’ll put that little caveat.
36:38
Maybe I’m just not aware of it right now, you know, but to, to give you flags.
36:43
Hey, by the way, Betty Smith is not at company A, she’s at company M now.
36:49
You might want to reach out.
36:51
That’s kind of cool, you know?
36:53
Yeah, big time.
36:54
Lee, thank you for coming on.
36:56
We’re at our time here in sales.
36:57
Lee.
36:57
Doc, thanks for coming on the show and chatting with me.
36:59
I really appreciate it.
37:00
People want to reach out, connect with you.
37:02
Lee, if they want to find out more about Executech, what’s the best way for them to do that?
37:07
Yeah, I appreciate you having me.
37:08
Great conversation.
37:09
You make it really easy.
37:10
So I appreciate your time and effort you put into this to reach me at Executech.
37:15
It’s really easy.
37:16
Obviously, I’m on LinkedIn where you can find me on the LinkedIn and then my e-mail address is very easy.
37:22
It’s just [email protected].
37:24
Feel free to reach out if I can help you or brainstorm with you or just discuss a a issue situation you’re having and you want some insight, Be more than happy to help whoever needs some.
37:35
That’s awesome, Lee, thank you.
37:37
We will have all that information in our show notes.
37:39
So if you didn’t catch that, no worries.
37:41
Just go to impellercrm.com/sales Lead Dog will you’ll get the show notes for this episode.
37:46
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37:52
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37:53
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37:55
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37:57
Lee, thanks again for coming on Sales Lead Dog and welcome to the sales League Dog Pack.
38:02
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38:10
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38:14
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38:18
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38:28
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