Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Think bigger. Always assume, I think, in your words, in your favor. Be a dreamer, because why not? What's stopping you as an individual to accomplish whatever it is you want to accomplish? Certainly in sales.
[00:00:16] Speaker B: I'm Dennis Sorensen and this is the Think Big, Win Bigger podcast. This is the podcast for sales leaders and salespeople who know they're capable of more and are looking for a system that is predictable, repeatable, scalable and forecastable for growth. It's not theories, it's not motivational speeches. It's an ambitious way to operate your business.
I am very excited to bring you the second part of our two part series with my special guest, my good friend and business partner, John Giese. In part one, we covered how leaders see opportunity that others miss, why most organizations struggle without structure and accountability, and how slowing down and asking better questions actually leads to bigger outcomes. In this part two, we'll go deeper into what drives that gap, why opportunity gets missed in the first place, how intent and preparation shape performance, and why having the right mindset and systems is what ultimately turns ambition into real impact. Let's get into it. Why do you think that companies really struggle to see the opportunity that you just described? Right. Like you see a much bigger opportunity even though, you know, there might be this initial, this initial shorter term opportunity. But why do you think so many companies sort of miss seeing that? Right. Or sellers. Right. I think we think about like, you know, the audience you and I are talking to today is really like we're talking to individual sellers, we're talking to sales leaders, we're talking to CEOs of companies. Like, why do you think so much that opportunity just gets missed?
[00:01:53] Speaker A: Yeah, I don't think there's one single or two single points from my perspective, anyway. I think it's largely mindset. You know, winning's hard. It never sleeps. It doesn't care if you're sick, it doesn't care what you have going on. And all we see in society is that brief moment when people are holding the trophy. You know, I think Tim Grover talks about it in a couple of his books that all we see is the outcome. We don't see the effort that's required to be ambitious. And I think it even potentially goes back further into our childhoods, how we're raised. You know, I didn't decide to be a bull in a china shop. I just came into this world hot and it's a good thing and it's a bad thing. And my parents did a great job of not putting the fire out they'd let me get burned.
They'd let me make the mistakes and then figure out how the hell to get out of them. So I think when you are growing up, when we were kids, we all dreamed about being astronauts and fighter pilots and doctors and saving the world, whatever your dream was at the time. Well, how much dreaming do we do now? I dream all the time, because why not? I think people are afraid to tap in to the frequency. Like, it makes the hair stand up on my neck. Because anybody that spelt the frequency, like, when everything's going your way, I'll give an example. And I think, you know this story. One of our clients last year said, john, we need to. We need to get into this company at the executive level. And I said, well, I don't know anybody there, but let me work on it. A couple weeks go by, literally, I'm fine. Out of my hometown. Had to connect in Denver to get to Houston. Well, our departure was delayed. And doing the run through the airport in Denver, suit, tie, I'm a sweaty mess. Get on the airplane. And I noticed that there's somebody in my seat. So I go up and I said, hey, ma', am, I think you're in the wrong seat. She said, I'm sorry, sir, would you mind switching? I'm disabled and I've got a service dog. Of course, I feel mortified at that point. I was, no problem. So now I'm even madder because I got to go sit in the bulkhead. Nowhere for my stuff.
Last person on the plane. You know, one of those days, I sit down, there's a guy in the window. He's on the phone, you know, dressed nice, executive guy, flight attendant comes and, you know, asks to take our jacket, whatever. And a man looks right in my eye and says, hey, man, how are you doing today? And the authenticity in that interaction was just that, authentic. And I said, honestly, I thought I was having a bad day until I talked to the lady that's actually in my seat because she's disabled and I'm not. So I'm having a great day.
HE LAUGHS. And so we start talking.
Long story short, this person that I'm sitting next to was the number two executive in the company that our client wanted me to get to. I'm sitting next to him on the airplane. That's ambition.
If you believe it and you live it and you're aware of the frequencies around you, that's what happens. And Dennis, you know, I have multiple stories like that, so I think my message to this audience is We've all had bad days. We're human. But use that emotion and compartmentalize it, because had I continued where my day was going, I would have put my AirPods in and never talked to that man sitting next to me. But I was on a mission that day for a client, and I had to get back into the right mindset. So I think, you know, as you go back through, get back to your younger self, don't be afraid to tap into the metaphysical tools that are around us.
Pay attention, feel it, live it, the good, the bad, the ugly, because it always works, Period.
[00:06:20] Speaker B: Well. And I think one of the things that you know as you're. As you're. As you're telling the story and retelling the story, in my case, you know, I think the thing that stood out again, just like right now for me, is like you're saying, like, you were on a mission, you knew the mission. You didn't expect that mission was going to unfold in that moment, that day, but you had a plan, you were prepared, and you knew what to do in this situation, and you found yourself in that situation. Right. So many times we find ourselves in situations. In one, we either miss it because we did put our AirPods in, or we're not prepared for that moment when that moment arrives. Right. Like, one of the things I talk about with a lot of the sellers that I work with is, and this is something that Mike teaches around, bridge statements. Right. If you really don't know what your story is, what your sales message is, what it is you're trying to say in that moment, and that moment comes and you have that opportunity, you're at a sales rep, you're at your client's site, and you walk into an elevator and you meet the CFO for the first time, and the CFO says, what does your company do? And you don't have that answer, that story. Ready to meet the moment. Because if we lead with, let's just say we're in technology, we're one of our technology clients, and we say, well, we sell databases. Yeah, yeah, you know, the CFO goes, hey, that's great, nice to meet you, and moves up.
[00:08:01] Speaker A: That's right.
[00:08:02] Speaker B: Right. But if we're ready for that moment and we've answered, you know, like that we, we prepared ourselves from an ambition mindset, and we believe in our ability to play bigger, and we tell that bigger picture story about the impact that we can have on that CFO's business, well, then we might just get an invitation to go sit down with that CFO and tell them more, tell that person more.
And what you had was that moment when preparation met opportunity. And like you said, it was sort of the frequency and the metaphysical aspects of it, too. Right. The fact that you sort of found yourself on that plane, in that seat at that moment with that individual, and your preparation then met the opportunity. And that is truly, in my mind, when people talk about people being lucky, well, luck is just simply that it's when preparation meets opportunity. And when we think about, like, when we first came up with the name of Horizons west, like, one of the things that made me fall in love with the name Horizon is that it's where the landscape meets the sky. And that's one of the things I love about it, is like, in and of itself, the horizon is ambitious because you're looking to the sky. You're looking to the horizon. And so that, to me, is one of the key aspects that jumps out at me from your story that you just told.
[00:09:27] Speaker A: Yeah. And there's many, many times over my career, as you're talking through it, that the opportunity was there, but the preparation was not.
And whether I stuttered or completely just missed the opportunity, I can count just as many, if not more of those as I can where preparation really did meet opportunities. I will say that now, again, since this rebirth and really connecting with you, it hasn't happened. I'm a big believer that if you put the work in and you ask for it, you shall receive. You just have to be prepared. That simple.
[00:10:10] Speaker B: Well, think about us. How many times do you and I actually practice the shot together?
[00:10:17] Speaker A: Every day.
[00:10:18] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:10:19] Speaker A: Yeah. And it's even meeting you.
After I met Weinberg, I read his books, and I had a friend of a friend that knows Mike pretty well, introduced me to him. And when I heard your podcast, the one of Mike's first ones, I said, I need to meet that guy. And it happened.
I think it's intent. Back to one of your earlier questions on maybe what individuals and companies miss is what's your intent?
We're here for a short amount of time when you really break it down, and if we don't have intent every day to. And including who you hang out with, who you give your energy to and your love to, like, who's your tribe? You don't have intent. You might still be successful, but you're leaving a lot on the table. So I think intent is another reason why people miss the opportunity. You know, I'm not special. I'm not the smartest guy. I'm not the hardest worker. Yeah, I just. I have a gift, and I use that now in a way that is far less destructive than it was earlier in my life. Because having these types of abilities can get somebody in trouble.
And so it's just channeling these energies with your intent to make ambition.
[00:11:51] Speaker B: One of the best ways to really be able to kind of, in my mind, flow, formalize that intent is everything that we're talking about in ambition thinking. Right. Because we talk about understanding the total potential that we have in front of us and then setting our eyes on achieving a big portion of that total potential so that we don't have to play a perfect game. We can play an imperfect game, have modest success. And that modest success is still a tremendous outcome. A tremendous outcome.
Because like we said earlier in the episode, right, like, once you see the total potential of something, you can't unsee it. It works like, the beauty of it. In my mind. I was teaching one of the ambition workshops that we teach, and I had one of the sellers come up to me afterwards, and she. She said, because this. This seller, she basically had, you know, come in with an understanding that she thought she had of the total potential of her opportunity being, you know, in. In maybe five to ten million dollars. And then by the time we finished, she had identified $335 million worth of opportunity that she had to go be able to pursue. And she came up to me after that class and she said, dennis, it's all I can think about is that $335 million. And I said to her, you know, that's the point. Right. The point is, is that once you see it, you can unsee it. And now her mind is working on it. Right. She's letting her mind come to help her. Right. In terms of breaking it down into the. Answering the most important question, which is, well, what would have to be true. Right. For this outcome to happen? Right. Because once we start asking that question, well, what would have to be true in order for my ambition to be achieved?
That in my mind, begins to shape intent.
[00:13:44] Speaker A: Yeah. You know, and this is for a guy that doesn't like math. I love sales math because it's a very powerful tool. And when you take that and put it together with ambition and you see these numbers, then you get to do the simple math, the sales math of how you get there. Yeah. Because Even if you're 50% wrong, you're still three to four, five times bigger than what you originally thought was your best. It's great math.
[00:14:15] Speaker B: It is great math.
[00:14:16] Speaker A: I love it.
[00:14:17] Speaker B: It's really good math.
[00:14:17] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:14:18] Speaker B: Hey. Hey. One other thing I wanted to hit on here with you today was, you know, one of the things I think that has shaped you, and you've shared some stories with me of how it shaped you was really kind of your. Your background with martial arts. And I'd love to. I'd love to just explore that a little bit with you here. Right. And.
And just even. Just take five minutes just to kind of talk about what did you learn through that experience that has sort of shaped what you do and even how you interact with your. Not just your clients, but with me as your friend.
[00:14:52] Speaker A: That's a lot. Yeah. I started martial arts late in my life with a gentleman, Masaharu Saki Mukai.
He was the founder of Chintokan Karate do, the first dojos, obviously, in Japan, and then expanded around the globe. But he happened to have one in Jacksonville, Florida.
And, I mean, this is 20, 25 years ago.
I had found him through a friend, and Mr. Saki Mugai was a true master in the art of budo karate, jodo yaido, the Japanese tea ceremony. A true artist, but somebody that, if he had to, could really hurt people. I've always been interested in the Eastern philosophy and specifically their style of martial arts.
So I went to meet this man, pulled up in my car, had suit and tie on, and I had called ahead of time in my first lesson with him. I was in my early 30s, I think, and I walked in to the meeting with my sunglasses on my head, you know, just being casual, even though I was dressed up. And I. He offered me a seat and he says, oh, were you a businessman?
I said, yes, sir.
He said, oh, do you wear your sunglasses on your head when you go to business meetings? And my answer was obvious, no. Then why do you wear here? And at that moment, I knew, number one, he was interviewing me. But number two, this is exactly what I needed.
And Mr. Saki Mukai passed away at a very young age.
And it was obviously devastating for me, but I was able, under his tutelage, to get all the way up to my third degree black belt. At the time, I was spending 15 to 20 hours a week training with this man, one on one. We weren't just training a martial arts, as I learned later. I got a lot of lessons that are applicable in life, you know, not the least of which is etiquette. I had invited my family to a function at our dojo, and my family got there before I did. I wasn't late. They just arrived before I did. And you never invite guests to your home or to a function and they get there before you do. It's extremely disrespectful, for sure, in the Japanese culture, but even here in the us, I would never invite somebody to our home for something like a dinner. And then I come in later and instead of doing the demonstration that I was supposed to do, I got punished essentially for about 45 minutes.
My mom, my dad, my aunt and uncle, so on and so forth. Watched this as a grown man. And it just, those lessons were countless and countless where he was building integrity and etiquette and courage and ambition into me, even though I was in my 30s, almost into my 40s.
The man was just amazing. Because these dojos, excuse me, typically if they're a traditional old school dojo, they're not handing out black belts and brown belts, meaning they're not there to make money. They're there to make an impact on the individual that's there. And watching this man fulfill his dream of having his own standalone dojo that was built from the ground to finished product was nothing but amazing because he had an ambition and he never wavered from it. He saw it and he couldn't unsee it. And that is how he lived his life every day. And I, you know, his son, Yoshi Saki Mukai, now runs the schools around the world.
And I've learned a lot from Yoshi as well. But I'm very thankful that I had had such an impact on my life.
[00:19:32] Speaker B: Well, and I think one of the things that jumps out and the reason I ask you to share it is because of what you just said, the impact that you have or that he had on people, right? Like, he wasn't in it to make money. He was in it to have an impact, make an impact on people and on the world, right? And if you think about like everything that we do, the reason that this to me is my passion, what we do, what I teach, where I spend my time, I wake up every day doing the thing I love. I wake up every day because what I want to be able to do is I want to be able to make an impact. And what I'd say to you, my friend, is that you, you make that impact on people.
You make that impact every day. You've made that impact on me, right? In the relationship and the friendship we have. And I thank you and I really greatly appreciate all of that and I appreciate you being here. But before we go, I just want to ask you to do one more thing. For me. Right. So if you're speaking directly right now to a seller, what would you tell that seller to do?
What would you encourage them to do differently starting tomorrow?
[00:20:46] Speaker A: Think bigger. Always assume, I think in your words, in your favor. I think I said it earlier in the podcast, be a dreamer. Because why not? What's stopping you as an individual to accomplish whatever it is you want to accomplish? Certainly in sales. But as the story I just gave, Mr. Saki Mukai didn't have any money, but somehow he figured out how to buy some land, build a dojo, and continue to make an impact on people.
And so I think if you just think bigger, change the way you think, change the way you live, It's a lifestyle.
[00:21:28] Speaker B: You said about the reason he accomplished everything that he accomplished is because his intent was to have an impact on people. And if we think about what we do in sales, when we put our customer first, when we put them first and foremost, and we think about the impact that we can have on them and on their business, on the outcome, right. When, like when we, when we think about when in technology, right. When we think about when we shift our thinking from being technology led to being business outcome led. Right. And the impact when sellers can shift their thinking to the impact they can have on their customer, on their client, on the business of their client, and helping their client to accomplish their mission, their most important business initiatives like that, if they can put that impact first, I think that that makes a big difference.
[00:22:23] Speaker A: Well, yeah, you're, you're honestly no longer selling. It's part of the reason why sales people in general get a bad rap, because they're just looking at it as a transaction. But if you really get into the psychological side of why you should be doing anything that you do every day, it's to make it have an impact, a positive one. And if you could impact people's quality of life at work, it's going to benefit their quality of life at home.
Now your phone will never stop ringing if they know that you have their best interest, that you're making them better.
I mean, people write books about that.
[00:23:03] Speaker B: They do, they do. So, so, so, so we our message to sellers. Now your message to sales leaders and to CEOs about the same thing.
[00:23:13] Speaker A: For some reason, answering these, this question seems harder than, than to, to the sellers. But, you know, I think to the leaders, you know, set your ego aside and really ask, can you afford not to do this if you're there to scale and grow the business? And I don't mean 5 to 6% annually.
That doesn't get me excited. If it gets you excited, we're probably not going to have a long conversation. If you're going to have meaningful growth in your enterprise, do yourself a favor and really put the work in to formalizing your revenue function. Because you have formal processes and formal procedures for your operations.
They plan, they prepare, they practice, and then they go play. They have big objectives. Whether it's doing something new the company has never done before, that's ambitious. Well, why wouldn't you put a structure around the revenue function? It is an operation in your business if done correctly. I would also add that, you know, whether it's Horizons west or any other advisory firm, if they're advising you to do something, implement it. Because, you know, Dennis or myself, we can come in and coach and do all the things that we do and train, but if you, Mr. And Mrs. CEO or Mr. Mrs. Croft, don't implement it and hold people accountable, you just wasted your money. You got to implement it. And you have to trust the process because if you do, the results speak for themselves. I hope that answers the question.
[00:25:01] Speaker B: I think it does. I think it truly captures in my mind what it is that we do at Horizons West. Our whole mission is that we help companies to see their total potential and then to build the systems to realize it. That's what we do. Thank you, John, it's been great. Dennis, thank you very much.
[00:25:22] Speaker A: Love you, brother. Everybody, thank you so much.
[00:25:25] Speaker B: Thank you all. Look forward to having you back. And until then, just win.
[00:25:36] Speaker A: Sam.
