Episode 33
The Role of Accountability in Sales Success
Summary
In this episode, Lucas Price interviews Mike Muhfelder, a seasoned sales leader, about the challenges of screening and hiring top salespeople. They discuss the importance of patience and observation when evaluating candidates, as well as the need for candidates to take ownership of their situations and demonstrate accountability. Mike shares valuable insights on how to identify resilient and determined individuals who are well-prepared and have a growth mindset. He emphasizes the significance of research and effective communication skills in the hiring process.
Take Aways
Patience and observation are crucial when screening candidates for sales roles. Understanding the reasons behind a candidate's current situation and their accountability for it can provide valuable insights.
Candidates who take ownership of their circumstances and demonstrate resilience and determination are more likely to succeed in sales roles.
Preparation and research are key indicators of a candidate's commitment and suitability for a sales position. Candidates who show a deep understanding of the company and the interviewer's background stand out.
Effective communication skills, both written and verbal, are essential for sales professionals. Candidates who can articulate complex ideas in a simple and concise manner are more likely to excel in sales roles.
The ability to adapt and be resourceful is highly valued in sales. Candidates who have overcome challenges and can explain how they navigated difficult situations demonstrate their ability to handle adversity.
Learn More: https://www.yardstick.team/
Connect with Lucas Price: linkedin.com/in/lucasprice1
Connect with Dr. Jim: linkedin.com/in/drjimk
Connect with Mike Muhfelder: linkedin.com/in/michael-muhlfelder-064280
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Transcript
Now you talk to another candidate, maybe not as good, but they still might have what it takes to succeed. Does this ever keep happening to you? One of the topics we're going to be covering today is how to screen for sellers in a way that's both efficient and effective to help you deal with this issue.
I'm excited to discuss that and more with our guest, Mike Mulfelder. A Boston based sales leader with a career in B2B sales of over 30 years. He started off as an individual contributor and grew into a variety of sales leadership roles in companies from startups to some of the largest tech companies in the world.
s of success that they dream [:Mike Muhfelder: Thank you, Lucas. It's great to be here.
Lucas Price: What else should our audience know about you? What, what got you started in sales leadership?
Mike Muhfelder: I started in towards the sales leadership track as an individual contributor fairly early on. I was working for ADP payroll company and they had a program where you could become a sales training manager. So you had one or two people That reported to you more as a mentor than anything else.
And I, and as I did that for a little while, I realized I didn't know enough about selling, I didn't know enough about management to be a good mentor to those people. So I said, I'm going to, I'm going to focus my energy on learning how to sell. And how to lead people which i'm still learning both by the way that never stops and fast forward Almost another 10 years later is when I moved into my first sales leadership role because at that point I had I had been selling everything from smb to enterprise.
d been in tech at that point [:That they had only dreamed of, whether it was, buying a house or a car or being able to go on vacations or, whatever it was that they dreamed of to be able to accomplish that. So that was really what drove me into sales leadership. It was not a preordained kind of thing.
other sellers always wanted [:Mike Muhfelder: I'm glad you said that because it is a big part of it. I, what I've, one of the things I've seen over my career is. And it still doesn't happen as much, but it still happens is we're going to promote our top rep into a management job. And oftentimes the top rep has personality traits that make them a top rep, but not a great leader of people. So similarly, I was not, I have my great months, my great quarters, my great years, but I was never the guy I was never the number one. I was friends with them and I sought their advice. And their help and I tried to emulate them in certain ways, but that just wasn't who I was but it's when you see in sports people who become great coaches and managers of teams.
But when you look back, it's not like they were hall of fame players. They just paid attention to what was going on in the field. And they understand the game. I think that's a big part of us.
ckup players that become the [:Mike Muhfelder: So one is the power of observation and patience. And by the way, patience came to be much later, and I'm still working on that. So one of the things that I learned after and it took me a few times of being in leadership roles. That you almost have to apply a Hippocratic oath, the doctors have, when you start with an organization, take over a team, what have you meaning first do no harm.
The first thing is just to understand how things. Why are things being done the way they are? Why are what are the strengths of certain people? Why are they in the roles that they're in? Before you start moving things around. Because there's usually a pretty good reason for it. It's if you're building or rebuilding a house and you rip out the the support beam because you didn't know that was going to take the whole, a wall down.
nce is one. I think you need [:But the people do want, they want to be coached and they want to be helped. And that's, I think what a big part of my job is to help people, as I said before and because they're humans, they're going to do things that are going to, if you've raised kids, like many times you'll just shake your head and can't believe that people do think some of the things that they do, but they do it.
I think you also need to develop a thick skin. Because people may not do the things that you want or want them to do or need them to do. And you can't get mad about that. You can't, you can, but it doesn't really serve a purpose and it doesn't get you anywhere.
And again, there's usually a reason why they're not doing. And you're also, the higher up you go in the organization, the more shots you're going to take from other people who may not like what you're doing.
eas in your head at the same [:
And not just assume that, that it's wrong or something like that. At the same time, I think you can go into an organization. And it's like the analogy one of my friends gave me was when, if you move into a new house and you're like, the kitchen smells really bad in here, you want to take note of that because after a couple of weeks, you're not going to be able to tell that the kitchen smells bad anymore.
of, what you accept without [:Mike Muhfelder: I'm a furious note taker and I'm still old school, . I use, I still use paper notebooks and I, and it's not that I don't do a lot of work online and a lot of writing online, but the notebook still serves a purpose. First off, it makes, it does make me think. And it also gives me an archive I can go back to immediately.
So I do exactly what you're saying. And I can go back and say, okay I had this meeting with Lucas on January 18th. I can go back to my notebook and say, okay, here's what we talked about in that meeting.
Lucas Price: Tell me a little bit about how you think of of hiring and the important parts of it. What are the challenges hiring the right salespeople and identifying the right salespeople?
Mike Muhfelder: This is huge, and people talk about this and write about it quite a bit, that a big part of success or failure in an organization, especially sales, because you have higher turnover, is how well you hire people. And in the past, I admit, I have had people say, Oh, Mike's not real good at hiring people.
weigh in on it. The problem [:Like I hired a guy this is years ago He sailed through the interviews. Everybody loved him. He had written a book. He was he thought he said, oh you guys use medic I love medic. I'm all about medic. I'm and I said we follow a process. It's fairly rigid Everything is in salesforce. It's not salesforce didn't happen.
This is how we qualify blah blah. I like I laid it all out I brought him on board, could not get him to do anything along the lines of the process. He fought it and fought it. Meanwhile, by the way, he's closing deals. He's top of the heap, but the amount of broken glass behind him was excruciating.
hat this is how it was going [:That can that can mitigate it, that can give you a better feel for a person right away. And this happened came to me after that person, by the way. You don't learn anything easy, right? No, there's no easy lesson. Which by the way, that's the other thing with patients, is there's no overnight sensation.
None. People want to believe it, but no, even if Taylor Swift is so hot right now, but when you look at her backstory, it's not like she just signed a record deal and became You know, a billionaire.
Lucas Price: it didn't happen last year. Yeah
Mike Muhfelder: I'm no Taylor Swift for sure. But what, so one of the things that I learned and I, we use this also in qualifying deals is the first question I ask a candidate is what's going on in your current situation?
u're, that you've taken this [:But what I'm looking for is, are they running from something or running to something, and are they accountable and responsible for the situation that they're in?
So if the answer to that question is is to blame is to make excuses very rarely are we going past the first interview. Because I already know that, I can fast forward and as soon as things start to get tough.
They're going to do the same thing.
Lucas Price: One of the questions that I like to ask sales leaders and I keep an internal tab, an estimate of the answer to this, but it's when a salesperson fails, what are the most significant reasons? And I find about 70 percent of the time. The answer is related to people and talent and, and the assumption is that people have an internal locus of control that they can control their own circumstances.
time, the answer that I get [:In the conversation that we have at yardstick around hiring and the people in the 70 percent are interested in the conversation we have around hiring around yardstick. But, and so I think that's part of what you're getting at is that you believe your answer is that it's a person issue, a talent issue, a internal locus of control issue, as opposed to like the tools are wrong or whatever.
And so you're looking for. Does this candidate believe they're in control or are they going to point and blame this to some other issue?
Mike Muhfelder: that's exactly it. I've had my own personal journey as have we all. And I've had to deal with some, difficult questions of my own, and I've had to slay my own, some of my own dragons. I'm no different than anybody else and along the way, I have come to learn a few things that are, I think, laws, if you will.
One is that [:But we want to blame everybody else and all these other factors. Sometimes it's just stuff happens. You're in the wrong place at the wrong time or you're in the right place at the right time. But you also have to know when that's true for you. Oh, I'm in the right. I'm like, I'm in a really great situation right now. I am going to make the most of it or I'm in a really bad situation and I need to get out.
Lucas Price: Sometimes people are victims, right? How do you think someone should handle that in an interview situation?
Mike Muhfelder: They should be able to to address the fact that, yeah, you know what? Something bad happened to me and it happened either because I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Didn't, and didn't recognize it until it was too late. Or I put myself in the wrong place at the wrong time and I didn't recognize it.
at happen to people that are [:They changed my comp plan. It's okay, that stuff happens. So did you had your comp plan changed and your reaction to that was to quit your job? That's a victim that isn't addressing the fact that, Hey I'm going to, I got put into a lousy situation. I know I could, and I couldn't find the silver lining on that.
Maybe there is no silver lining and that's fine to say to a, to say to a hiring manager, they changed my comp plan. There's no way I can make my OTE, even if I crush my number and I can crush my number. I need to make this much money. I'm not going to make that here. That's just business. So I have to go somewhere where I can make, where I have an opportunity to make that money and more, and I'm not going to change the comp plan.
out it. But I'm not going to [:Lucas Price: So that's a very pointed question that you use to screen out candidates early on. Right out of the gate. So I love that question. I like to ease people into that screening interview a little bit. So I have a question that I'm going to share with our audience as well.
And I'd love you to respond to it to get your thoughts. It's can you explain something complicated that you understand? Can you explain 30 seconds? And part of what I'm looking for there is, Their communication ability, but also underlying is like, is this somebody who has a passion about something who's a passion about something that's complicated, that they have been passionate enough about it, that they really understand the complexity and know how to simplify it.
's a good way to ease people [:
Mike Muhfelder: It's a great question. I will ask that, or a slight variation on it. That question that I ask is walk me through something that you have gone through, preferably not in your personal life. cause I've learned that the hard way that was really difficult that you, but you got through it successfully, but you don't want to have to do it again. And from that, usually I get to okay, can I explain it to me simply? So one way or the other, I'm going to, I'm going to get to the same thing.
What I'll do in the screening interview is I'll ask what do you know about the company? Whatever company it is that I'm so because I do fractional work so it could be different companies What do you know about the company and I want to understand did they just go to the website like?
earch? Have you applied some [:But when you're talking about deals that are, In the tens to hundreds of thousands of, to millions of dollars, strategic executive selling very different type of persona that's required for those jobs. And I think that's also where we're headed now from a sales standpoint.
Lucas Price: I love those questions because one of the things we know from the research is that the best sellers prepare, and there are a lot of sellers in today's day and age who think they can wing everything and don't need to prepare. But preparing for the interview is one of the best predictors of success in the role, because it shows a habit of preparing.
And like you said, for the types of deals we're talking about sellers need to be well prepared for every meeting and can't just show up and wing it.
say that there are very few [:Lucas Price: I think the question is very pointed in terms of what happened to you in your last role or why are you here taking this interview? And I think that, I'm sure that leads to really interesting discussions and, get a viewpoint about how the candidate deals with challenges.
So all those, I think are great takeaways for the discussion here,. Other things post screening, what are the most important parts of hiring and what gives you the most insight into who to hire?
Mike Muhfelder: Follow up. Again, thinking I'm really channeling salespeople. If you don't follow up with every single person that you interview with in writing, . So I I came from the world where like you hit, send a handwritten note, dropped it in the mail and then you waited. Now we have email and it's instantaneously boom.
the way, not just thank you [:Hopefully they also closed on next steps. If you're a salesperson and you didn't close on next steps at the end of the interview, probably not getting the follow on interview, at least not with me.
That's your job is to be closing to the next step. So those are the things that I think, you have to come to these to, to an interview or any meeting with a point of view, a researched point of view that you've applied some thinking to it.
just tells me you're not like[:Lucas Price: One of the things we talk about is identifying the competencies that are key to success in the role. Some other people, sometimes people call them mindset, but there are things like adaptability, resourcefulness, emotional intelligence. What are the key ones that you think are most important?
Mike Muhfelder: This is great. So I working with one of my friends, mentors, peers a guy named Randy Zador who's also a fractional leader. We built a a sales assessment and it's a three. You can get it off my website, by the way, it's completely free. No obligation. I'm not going to call you and try to sell you stuff.
You get to something in the world. It's actually free. There's three tabs to it. One is a manager tab. Where a manager can assess a salesperson and their attributes. One is for the salesperson to be able to assess their attributes. And one is an interview assessment that where you can check to see how someone does.
So the things that I want to [:And I had two kids to feed and my wife got there but I made my number and here's how I did it. That's the, those are great stories or I didn't make my number, but here are all the things that I did.
Lucas Price: So determination and resilience.
Mike Muhfelder: Yeah, and I can't teach those things, by the way, can't coach them that you either have that or you don't,
Back to the thing about research, . Can the person I'm talking to go out and learn about the person in the company that they're talking to? Or are they just showing up?
nd you haven't thought about [:at what's going on in the market right now. There are a thousand people putting in applications for sales jobs and sales leadership jobs. If you're fortunate enough to get an interview, you need to shine because the next person coming in is probably going to do that, or there's a good chance.
Lucas Price: Yeah,
Mike Muhfelder: And again, you can then say, oh, they didn't gimme a fair shot, or, oh, they, they, they didn't like me 'cause I was in a button down shirt. No that's not it. And you and again, you have to be, I look for people to be able to be self-reflective that they're paying attention.
Are they talking over me? Things like that.
Lucas Price: So we've had a discussion here around the traits that you needed to move into sales leadership. And then a discussion around what to do during the hiring process to identify. I think I love the way you shared both sides of it. This is, what you need to do as a candidate.
two key takeaways that you'd [:Mike Muhfelder: You and I met by happenstance. And here we are having what I think is a really valuable conversation for both of us in for however many people watch it. So being open to the possibility, I think, is a valuable thing.
And the other is just is like you own your stuff. Find a way to make yourself accountable for your situation. Do not blame other people. Do not blame the situation in the world. There's nothing that's happening in the world right now that has not happened before and will not happen again. So you can blame anything you want.
You can blame the economy. You can blame politicians. You can blame your boss. You can blame your significant other. But there's nothing that's new. It's it, whatever's going to happen to and for you is, has to be done by you. as soon as you, as soon as you're able to get that and really internalize it, I think your world changes.
e patience to understand, to [:Mike Muhfelder: So there's a couple of ways you can find me. First of all I am the only Michael Mulfelder in the world. There is, I think there's one guy in Germany who still has the umlaut over the you, but I'm the, I'm a legitimately the only one. So that makes me easy to find. You can find, you can email me at Mike.
At CalmOceanSales, C A L M O C A L E S one word dot com. You can go to my website, CalmOceanSales. com. You can learn more about me and what I do and how I do it and contact me through that.
Lucas Price: Great. Thanks. And if you enjoyed today's show, please leave us a review online. You can find out more about yardstick at yardstick. team, or you can find me on LinkedIn, Lucas Price. Thank you very much.
