Episode 43: Bringing It Back To Trust with Sara Gupta

It's a practical part of being in a sales role of meeting your numbers and meeting and exceeding expectations is the job.

[00:00:13] But how do we play more of a long game? Collectively the companies need to meet goals, but as individuals, can we find space for honest conversations around where a human is at in their potential and in their will, and in their life. And how do we build a place where which people can fail and learn and grow. And the next thing you know, you have so much trust and so much loyalty. And then that is showing up with your customers and that's showing up with your other teams.

[00:00:50] What's up. You're listening to the Revenue Real Hotline. I'm your host, Amy Hrehovcik. This is a podcast about uncomfortable conversations. 

That was Sara Gupta. And Sara is a long time go to market professional, working across sales, customer success, business development, all of them. Sara is also the founder of start wise. A, business consulting in executive coaching business, where she focuses on the change management aspect of building great organizations. And she certainly has the resume for it. 

In this episode, Sara and I get into the human aspect of work. We tackle questions like what brings out the best in your people. And how can we create environments where people want to work and to stay. How do we make space for honest conversations around where a human being is at in their potential and in their life. And finally we get into how to do a better job supporting parents in the workplace. 

But before we get to Sara, I wanted to remind you to subscribe to this podcast wherever you listen. And if you subscribe, I'd certainly appreciate it. If you could tell me how I'm doing in the form of a review. 

Thank you friends. I appreciate you. All right, let's get to it. 

Conversation

[00:02:08] Sara Gupta. Welcome, welcome. Welcome to the Revenue Real Hotline. I am so thankful to Ashley Welch connected us, author of Naked Sales, friends and listeners. 

[00:02:20] But anyway, Sarah welcome.

[00:02:22] Thank you. Thank you for having me, Amy and excited to be here. Super thankful for Ashley to connect us. I share all the sentiments that you just shared. She's an amazing individual. And it's a great practical, thoughtful approach that she and her partner takes. So, 

It's like stop what you're doing. Do not pass. Go do not collect $200 and buy this book and read it immediately. Uh, naked sales. All right. So Sarah, before we dive right in, why don't you tell our listeners a little bit about. You are and what you do every day.

[00:02:54] Yeah, for sure. So what I do every day is rapidly changing and evolving, but who I have been, um, I am a long time go to market participant. I will say I've spanned a lot of different roles. I started. My career and early stage CPG startup is one of the first six people of a cosmetics company called tart still around. 

[00:03:18] Okay. 

[00:03:18] I'm proud to say, and then shift into technology again at a really early stage startup. The first 20 people at a company Trial Pay was eventually bought by Visa. So a great success story and a wonderful journey. And since then I have held a number of roles and sales, customer success, business development across companies like bizarre voice and Salsify and others.

[00:03:43] And I've become increasingly passionate about the human side of this work. so I talk a lot about that. I think a lot about that. I became a certified executive coach because of that, largely at first to bring that skillset and that way of thinking into my life. Role, and it's like on the ground, hands-on with my own teams. And then I've come become increasingly interested in growing the scope of influence of that work.

I'm also first generation college students. I'm a first generation professional. No one in my family has ever worked in a corporate environment besides me. which I think has made me even more in tuned to the human aspect of this, because I've been largely finding my way on my own. Certainly making a number of mistakes and open, heavily reliant on a number of mentors and angels, as I would put it who have supported me and helped me along my journey in ways that I can't even begin to articulate.

So, that's a little bit about me. 

[00:04:45] Ah, man, I love it on so many levels. So I'm going through like a, I'm learning how to be a podcast host. Right. And I'm learning how to prepare. I do a lot of researching people, right. Or just looking at someone's social presence.

[00:05:02] And it's not very often where, like I don't want to say I caught my breath, but if it's like, Ooh, like look at the, and so Sarah, your, your trajectory was quite impressive, actually. So kudos to you on that one on the off chance. You haven't heard that yet today. Like thank you for being a shining star example for us, um, on principle, but thank you for real.

[00:05:25] Okay. But we were going to talk about. Ah, man, this is the, this red pill blue pill. Okay. So Sarah and I listeners, we're just bantering ahead before we press play. Right. And again, back to the I'm learning how to prepare. I'm learning where that line is. I'm learning what kind of host I want to be and how I want to show up.

Human Aspects of Work

[00:05:48] Anyway, You said you were listening to the Jordanna episode. And I believe that episode is about psychological safety. Would you just elaborate on what you were saying for the listeners about why it resonated and we'll just go from there.

[00:06:03] Yeah, for sure. So I'll step back a little bit into kind of my personal, why that statement stood out to me. There's a lot of different words that we throw around and, uh, the human side of work, we talk about culture. We talk about psychological safety. I often talk about trust. but at the end of the day, we're talking about what are the human aspects of work that bring out the best in people that drive results that bring fulfillment and that ultimately, uh, bring longevity to an organization and growth to an organization. So when I was listening to the judge on a conversation, you had talked about this blue pill, red pill concept, and you would reference this to me before and I, out of context.

[00:06:51] And I was like, what is this talking about? 

[00:06:53] Well, you read listeners, listeners. So in this episode, we were talking about how, when you work in a, a company with great culture, with a great team, it's, it's like taking the red pill. Right. You know what that feels like? And there's no going Back. And so the question I posted your data was like, how do you give, like, how do you talk about this and create these amazing work cultures and give people this experience knowing that whenever they're in the majority, like in most workplaces that are not like this it's, it's harder.

[00:07:24] It's more painful. Okay. So it's are please continue. Now that the listeners have the context.

[00:07:29] yes. I was saying, oh my gosh, I instantly related to this because I feel like I've been very fortunate to have participated in some really healthy, um, still troublesome, every it's human. Right. It's gonna, these are human and PR work. Construct. So be, 

[00:07:46] There's you know, um, have inherent flaws. Right. But I don't have to, I think keep our expectations measured when it comes to good culture and what is possible.

[00:07:58] It doesn't mean you're going to be nothing, no missteps, but I have largely participant able to participate in a couple of really good cultures where. If you look at my trajectory there, as well as the trajectory of others, people stayed a really long time. way longer than what would be traditional in sales roles and whatnot.

[00:08:18] I'll just reference one of the companies thing was our voice. There are people who have been in that company, salespeople and sales leaders, 10 plus years, this is like, 

[00:08:27] That's the average tenure listeners is I think it's 18 months, something like that for a sales boss or a sales leader to remain in the current place. So 10 years is just off the charts outlier.

[00:08:38] Yeah. that's right. And it's, it was a culture that was largely one. From day one, the founder original founder, Brett Hurtman incredible, uh, founder and incredible investor. just a wonderful human lives and breathes the concept of, of culture. 

Definition of Culture

[00:08:56] The ultimate definition of culture is how we do things around here.

[00:08:59] So I think it's really tricky to we throw around the word culture. But I think what we have to talk about is like, he was very prescriptive around what he wanted the company to look like and how he wanted things. People did do things around here and it was rooted in trust. It was rooted in autonomy.

[00:09:17] It was rooted in treating people with respect, rooted in, uh, you know, allowing failures. 

[00:09:24] And the skills you trust the skills of your peers around you, right. Leaving it. Wasn't it was a mistake friendly zone. Um, weren't afraid of the punishment for stepping outside. Okay. I'm sorry. Please continue. I'm getting excited with you.

[00:09:38] You're saying exactly where I'm going with this. And I've since been part of other cultures and either myself specifically, or, you know, through my network of people, you hear and learn a lot about other cultures, especially in the tech and SaaS space and they're largely fear-based. largely lack room for mistakes and failures.

[00:10:04] You know, I had to laugh. And one of the conversations you were having about how it's like I don't care that a deal is slipped. You better go find them. Today. And we all know this. It's a part it's a practical part of being in a sales role of meeting your numbers and meeting and exceeding expectations is the job.

[00:10:21] But how do we play more of a long game around that? Collectively the companies need to meet goals, but as individuals, can we find space for honest conversations around where a human is at in their potential and in their will, and in their life. And say, okay, how do we work with this individual to grow them and develop them in an honest way that, of course we're not going to just throw the organizational goals out the door. Like that's not the kind of culture work anyway. Companies trying to build it. Sustainable or healthy. But how do we build a place where which people can fail and learn and grow. And the next thing you know, you have so much trust and so much loyalty, and then that is showing up. With your customers and that's showing up with your other teams. 

[00:11:17] Salespeople largely have a reputation often internally about being tough to work with or feeling entitled, which I think I've seen so many organizations fail, frankly, because they weren't playing nice with each other because they had built hierarchial organizations or lack of trust among sales and kind of everyone else. 

[00:11:44] marketing. Yeah. Everyone else. That's something in many instances that starts at the top. Although, when I was first moved into like air quotes, a support function, um, sales ops, sales enablement, one of the first places that I worked, like I didn't ask, I didn't know that I had to ask the question about the egos on the sales floor And what, to an extent where this was okay. I just, I didn't know. And so to watch it play out for the first time, so I feel it, I like it. That's the thing, uh, I myself have been guilty of that. I'm sure on multiple occasions 

[00:12:23] Yeah. And then, 

[00:12:24] done.

[00:12:25] yeah, we have to allow some space for the realities of how organizations function. Right. And how, Hey, at the end of the line, and then the day, if we're not selling, we don't have a business 

[00:12:37] you know, what's interesting though. I think in 10 years, we're going to see it. It's going to be more uncommon to not have like a, a psychologist, uh, embedded into the sales team, like a S like a sports psychologist. Like how hard do you think bill Bellacheck had to be convinced to bring in like the, or, you know what I'm saying?

[00:12:54] Just like a professional. And so I think that that will also help with the. Uh, internal relations too, right? Because I can, I remember feeling frantic and some of those situations because the buyer was online and I, but anyway, I just, I never put those two things together. Like if once the sports went, the psychologists come in, then we'll be able to fix that internal reputation stuff too.

[00:13:18] Okay. So.

Bringing It Back To Trust

[00:13:19] We're largely opening the doors to circle back to the conversation of trust. Right? There's lotta, too, for a broader set of behaviors. When there is a foundation of trust that stretches across the entire organization, because then what you get is instead of a reactive culture, you get a culture that is, you know, pausing and thinking about intent. So if somebody is acting, you know, or whatever use whatever adjective you want in that moment. Cause they're trying to get an eel done. You have the opportunity to do one of two things. In a culture of where there's a lack of trust, it's like, oh, here's that guy or gal would that, all that ego stomping all over me. 

[00:14:07] Don't they know I have priorities too or whatnot. There's an emotional reaction that is usually largely pauses and shuts down. Progress or in a place of trust, the person can say, Hm, I know so-and-so I trust their intent. They must really need. My help here. I'm going to lean in to help them because I trust them. And therefore I will be a participant in the forward progress and that is needed to get this job done, save this customer, close this deal, whatever it may be. And it all has to start with trust because if you don't start off a foundation of trust, then you can't have healthy conflict. You can't have a sense of understanding of people's intentions and their actions.

[00:15:01] And. you have a question as to whether their intentions are legitimate , if you have a trust based culture, you can ask, you can simply say, Hey, like, I'm trying to understand what's happening here. Can we take a pause and kind of have this moment with you? But if there's a lack of trust, people either are fearful and they disengage or they're combative. And they come at each other because both were based out of a fear-based reaction. 

[00:15:29] Fear. Well, all actions are based out of love or fear, one of the other. I'm chuckling though, because it's, I wrote something down when you first it's like a, don't expect Plato's Republic, right? Okay. So all that sounds wonderful. It's just like, you know, we're not looking for the perfect culture, but the reality of the situation is most of us are operating in a place that there is no trust.

[00:15:53] And so I know that you advise on this stuff. And I know, uh, I'm sure obviously Start Wise, which is your, your coaching practice and advisory services and then some right that's scaling, which we'll talk about. So I'm sure you have ideas and, and direction that you provide to clients on the leadership level for this front, but like, I read a book. I think this is the answer. It was actually called Assholes: A Theory. It was written by an economist and it's like, what are you doing? Somebody bought it for me. And first tried to give it to me. I'm like, I like, I, I interact with the assholes on a regular basis. Like I don't need to read about them too. Thank you very much. Yeah, it was insisted. The book was so good. Okay.

[00:16:33] Like literally reads like an how to like, and there's a whole chapter on asshole capitalism, which until like, I think that's short-term versus long-term thinking, um, which there's a lot of myths in there, but anyway, don't expect Plato's Republic when it comes to the trust. Like that all sounds well and good.

Be The Change 

[00:16:50] But what do you do as an IC? What do you do as the individual that's currently sitting in a place where there's not trust internally, but however, you are able to cultivate that when you're choosing how to show up for your clients right, in how you sell, which is great. And I think we're making progress there, but again, what would you say to the end person that's in that situation right now?

[00:17:14] Yeah. So such a good question. And as I think about this question, I quickly realized like, anything I'm going to say is going to sound like a bit pedantic, like it's going to, or cliche. Right. But there's the saying the words and it is about the mindful practice of putting it into motion. Right. So I'm going to say. Model the right behavior. Be the change you want to see in the world. Right. Um, so that's one. 

[00:17:45] Lead by example, also known as.

[00:17:48] there's a number of ways like cliched ways. I can say this, like the truth of the matter is like you need, we all, we all, if we all individually take the responsibility to do, we will see change, right? So there's the, you know, be the change you wanna see in the world. There is really focusing on listening and getting curious. 

[00:18:08] I talk a lot about this concept of intent, right? Really trying to say, Hey, what do I think the intent is here? We often describe this sometimes as empathy, right? As another way to think about intent, which is put myself in their shoes. Why do I think they're reacting this way? Are they under a tremendous amount of pressure or, you know, et cetera, et cetera. What are the factors at play that are potentially causing some of the behaviors I don't like in the organization?

[00:18:37] And then ask yourself the honest question. Like, are they fixable? Are we in a period of change within the organization that will take some time and I, I can see a place where we can get to somewhere better. but we're all in the grind right now. 

[00:18:53] This is tough work, like building businesses, selling enterprise solutions, whatever your role happens to be in the organization. It's tough work. There will be hard moments. it's really important to say, make sure am I taking this snapshot of time? And saying, this is going to be my, my situation forever? we do this. 

[00:19:13] I think about when I first had my first son. And all of the things about newborns are new and you're like, oh my God, like they're in a crying phase or not sleeping. Well, like something's going on. You're like, you're convinced, like, that's your new reality forever, you know? And you're like, oh my God, I'm never gonna sleep again. I'm never gonna ha you know, whatever it may be. And passes, so I think we have to take some pause to say, Hey, like, is this a tough moment in time or is there a place for change . 

Make Space for Listening and Being Curious

[00:19:42] And then let me add one more thing. The listening and the being curious. Listening and being curious internally with your stakeholders and with your boss and what not. And then focusing on the customer and listening and being curious with them. and then bringing that back in and creating the virtuous cycle yourself, that then it says the models, the behavior that says, oh, if I show up this, if someone shows up this way, they build trust with their customer. They become curious if they listen. They're getting they're showing results. They're showing progress. Maybe we should look at this more broadly. 

[00:20:22] There were so many, like you were talking I realized there's like five episodes here we could do on this whole series. Um, I like, uh, it's, I'm having a hard time picking which direction I want to bring the conversation. And so the big, when you were talking, like the last thing I heard was patience, right.

[00:20:37] Which it can be extra hard for, by having patients like, to the point of is this the right place or is this fixable? And I'm talking to myself, friends when I say this to you, because you know, this is, um, they say it's a virtue for a reason, but it's a learned, you gotta learn that one, especially if you've been in sales for a hot second where we're speed and perfection is a thing, right. But patience, patience, patience 

[00:21:05] I'll add one thing about that, because I think that this may seem, feel like a shameless plug for what I do now, but the, um, 

[00:21:13] you plug, but do the way, by the way, you can do whatever the hell you want on this shelf. So you'd shameless plug all you want girlfriend?

[00:21:21] Either leverage or get yourself a coach, like. Don't try to process all of this on your own. I think that's where we are largely falling short. 

[00:21:30] Well, because we don't have the skills. So I'm sorry to interrupt. Cause this was the other thing too. When you were saying to come internal, I then focused on the customers. I was about to say like cheer, because I thought you were talking about come like look inside yourself. if you're having a hard time with the let's call it tumultuousness of the. Uh, the awareness of your red pill around you. Right? One thing that it helped me tremendously was to check myself before I formed an opinion. Right. You want to know the best curiosity hack that I've come across all year. Like it's what it's to ask this question.

hat would it be like if I didn't have an opinion about this right now? 

Yeah. Yeah. 

[00:22:08] And that one goes a long way friends because our job is to remain objective, right? This is the goal is to keep our, is to control those smiles and those cries it's to stay objective. And these are muscles, right? These are skills. We are not born with the ability to do this.

[00:22:25] This is where to Sarah's point, having a coach to help you to develop these muscles and the tools that work for you. It makes The interpretation of the events that happen around us a lot easier. Right. And so an event is just an event, how we choose to interpret it and assign the meaning to it makes all the difference.

[00:22:46] You're nodding your head. Yeah. Sarah, it looks like

[00:22:48] Oh, yeah. I mean, you're speaking my language right now, which is in two ways, which is the looking inwards is, honestly, in so many ways, the first place to start. Um, but you also said, but Hey, we don't know how. And that's okay. like we, you know, there's a lot to learn in life and a lot to learn in this type of work.

[00:23:10] Right. You gotta be, you know, an expert of your sales process. You gotta be an expert in an industry. You've got to manage complicated technology and now you've got 

[00:23:18] people of both sides, 

[00:23:21] like, 

[00:23:21] the pressure, if you don't perform, you will lose your job. Not only that we've done a, uh, a fucking terrible job of onboarding our new sales bosses. Right. So the majority it's to the point where it's embarrassing. And so the majority of us, um, have, you know, like, so there's a lot and we burned through people.

[00:23:42] Um, okay. But anyway,

[00:23:44] We're talking about roles. I mean, when you're, cause this is a podcast for seasoned sellers, right? We're talking about roles that are, you have earning potential of a half, a million to a million dollars And you're not investing in yourself. You're not saying I don't, I don't have a few thousand dollars a month to make sure I have my head on straight.

[00:24:03] Like that would 

[00:24:04] her or you're waiting for your company, which is invested in the old system to change like the now.

Trust Yourself

[00:24:11] Yeah. Like you can largely get past so much more than we think we can by tapping into our network, tapping into self investment and, you know, to your point, staying focused and getting your head in the game. And like you said, just what if I didn't have an opinion about this? What if I just decided to do my job? because I have trust in myself 

[00:24:34] There, you just hit it. I was, it was full circle back to the trust, which is the piece that we don't talk about is that is trusting yourself. and it's, this is not like a magic thing that happens. It's like, oh, some kind of destination, where does the journey? Right. And we're all on it. Right. I certainly don't have everything all figured out.

[00:24:53] Sarah, do you have everything all figured out? No. Okay, good. So we're all on a journey. However, learning to trust yourself is an action verb . Right? You learn to trust yourself because you become, trustworthy yourself. We learned by doing so go do things that are worth being trustworthy and, okay.

What is StartWise?

[00:25:12] So Sarah, tell us a little bit about StartWise.

[00:25:16] So StartWise.

[00:25:18] was I created start wise a few years back, um, as, uh, what started as a sort of fulfillment based side hustle. I was trained, you know, trained and certified executive coach for the ICF. I have a certification in organizational leadership and coaching, and I just fell in love with it.

[00:25:42] And I still wanted to do my op my role as an operator in but I wanted. Spend more time working with people who are professionals who are largely navigating really complex things, all the people we've been discussing. And it has been the most fulfilling and wonderful and eyeopening experience that I've had.

[00:26:03] I do everything from work with people on like first 90 day onboarding plans which is to your point. Something, we often look overlook and it's so critical. I've gone from working with people who were literally like in tears on work three week, three being like, what have I done? What is happening here? Like this company is a mess. I'm a mess. I don't know what I'm doing to like 90 days later, super competent. They've explored like what is going on with them emotionally. They built the self-trust to navigate the org. The work, it didn't change. They changed. Through that last couple of years of work in, in, in sort of parallel to my operating role, and frankly the events of COVID and just seeing, you know, what's going on in the workforce today, people are, traumatized, we've gone through a collective like near death experience 

[00:26:57] Yeah. And that awareness of the trauma is also where we've seen we've, we're interpreting the experiences that we had before. COVID differently too. And in many instances, there can be some trauma in there as well. 

[00:27:10] So the goal of StartWise is too large and work with individuals or organizations to develop coaching plans that help them develop self-trust develop organizational trust. And then, uh, where applicable, which I think is largely most organizations develop. Actual hands-on change management governance plans allow them to stream 

[00:27:35] stay the 

[00:27:36] through the organization in a way that's measurable and tactical.

[00:27:41] because I think that that's largely where things go wrong. You do some coaching or you bring in a trainer and you're all Robert, but he's excited for a day or a week, but you don't do the work to stream it through, um, the organization in a way that drives actual. 

[00:27:57] Hmm. When you were talking about the difference between short-term versus long-term gains and like let's train somebody up to be a great seller revenue, human versus let's train them up to be great human, who also generates revenue and they're not zero sum. Um, but when you focus on the former there, you know what I am loving about some of the modern. like updates, I guess let's sit in neuroscience and I am by no stretch of the imagination to scientist. Right. So let's get that piece out. And there's always a chance that I've pulled it directly from my ass however I have read a couple of, well, anyway, the point is. The brain is capable of great change and it can generally, it happens very quickly.

[00:28:44] And this was one of the things that one of the bigger myths that we're working on taking down right now, right? Because it's like that old dog doesn't learn new tricks or, oh, it's easier to learn a language as a child. The brain is capable of. Great change in age has nothing to do with it.

[00:29:00] Um, to an 

[00:29:01] All neuro-plasticity. 

[00:29:02] area, go look at 

[00:29:04] The actual, uh, scientific term. but to your point, it's an amazing time because the advancements that have been made in adult learning using the concepts of neuro-plasticity and cognitive behavioral theory, and some of these other methods allow us to create Approaches that actually create meaningful long-term change for adults and workplaces.

[00:29:29] That is also very much my approach, which is not a set it and forget it, but a approach by which you create new patterns. 

How To Best Support Parents

[00:29:38] this is why you're my people. I want to ask how we can support parents better in the workplace.

[00:29:46] I think the answer is honestly the same. Coaching, resources, give people a place to process what is going on in their environment. Whether they're first gen, whether they're a mom, whether they're a different DEI group, like they're the same we're humans and our core. And what we're ultimately trying to do is process the world around us and understand where, how we can better belong within our environment. and that holds for the workplace. So the answer, I think is the same. 

[00:30:19] The methods by which what a mom might want to talk through, or work through maybe different than early stage first gen Professional. But they might not be. So I think my answer is the same, which is, invest in yourself and invest in a community of people to support you.

[00:30:36] And if you have the means in, you know, in a, you know, actual booklet, 

[00:30:42] Hmm, I hit and get heard. What you were proposing is not only it's it's the, to adding a benefit to what is it? The doula, the night doulas or the, that would be great. Just slump people asleep. So the process on a full asleep brain, my sister just had a baby I'm I'm. I asked him anyways, cause I'm I want to learn more and better.

[00:31:05] Right? Cause this is just a different choice for me. And, but at the same time, I have a lot to learn too, like all of us. Okay. So 

[00:31:14] Other thing is flexibility. 

[00:31:17] Okay.

[00:31:18] Because it's proven over and over again that moms, uh, uh, working parents, I should say. Cause it will take pulled into my next statement, which is working parents. They can be as productive or exponentially, more productive, but it kind of comes in a less linear fashion. I can work a pocket here and then I need to take some time with my family and then I can work a pocket here, but you're ultimately going to get tons of output. It's just going to be like, I need to take my kids to school and then I need to pick them up and make dinner, but then I might get back online, like whatever works for their family.

[00:31:51] And then the third thing I'll add is making sure that the benefits for men match the benefits for women so that men can be more active, participates in raising in their family and therefore leveling out the burden, so to speak for families so that it is not like some of the most successful cultures in the world that have, uh, uh, gender equality in the workplace. Equal benefits for men. Like you look at Sweden as a great example of this, right? Like men are required to take as much leave as women. And how they slice it up for their family is at their discretion. But you know, that's another huge component of this is ensuring that we're setting up an environment by which , men can actively participate in parenting as much as women. 

[00:32:40] Okay. That was awesome. That was awesome. Okay. Um, so two final questions. What was the most uncomfortable conversation that you've ever had to have and like a revenue context? And I'm like, if you remember on the sheet you gave me the answer of, and it could be a different, completely different story if you've slept about a bed or if you've thought about it.

[00:32:57] But I do, I am thinking and they're too good to not talk about.

[00:33:02] Well, I think the one I gave you as potentially a procurement conversation. 

[00:33:07] Yeah, it was all, you almost had to fire a prospect a buyer based on their treatment of one of your sellers during the sales motion.

[00:33:15] That's right. Like they were abusive a hung up on them. Um, and I think, again, it's like, it goes back to the Testament of culture, right. Because I knew that at the time I was working at a place where like, you know, 

[00:33:28] is not 

[00:33:28] They were like 

[00:33:29] We respect one another. 

[00:33:31] this customer, like, and it was a big, important customer, but the values of that company took precedent over any individual deal.

[00:33:40] but man, it was an infuriating situation. 

[00:33:46] I wanted you to share that because I want for our listeners to hear that there are sales leaders out there that will protect you like that at the way that they should.

[00:33:59] And even if you are not experiencing that right now, in any variation of what that looks like. Just know that you're, you're really hear me clearly. You're right. And feeling the way that you feel. Um, and there are leaders out there like Sarah and some, sorry, if this is your first experience to the red pill, but, um, yeah, I think like trust yourself to make those decisions based on it, but like, know what your feeling is, is, is right. It's accurate. 

[00:34:31] And I had moral of the story by the way that deal worked out. 

[00:34:35] Yeah, you did say, yeah.

[00:34:38] Having the trust to navigate those conversations appropriately, but also understanding where you stood. Right. I knew where I stood in the company that my employee knew where they stood, everyone felt protected. And so they could navigate that conversation with confidence. and then that allowed us to actually have productive conversations with the leadership of that customer and find a path forward. But if I had probably largely felt unprotected or my employee had. It would have fallen apart for sure. 

[00:35:08] It's like, I'm looking at the clock, but I have to end this cause I could go on, I could do this for the full hour, but we're not going to do that. All right. So Sara, how can people find you if they want to get, if they want to reach you or just get more of your brilliance in their life?

[00:35:20] Awesome. I love it. So you can write me at Sarah S a R a at start wise dot L Y. So start wisely, start wives' dot L Y or go to my website start wisely, or obviously on LinkedIn. Of course. I love to do. 

[00:35:36] Amazing. Amazing. Okay. So last question and then we'll be done, what is your one piece of advice for sellers about uncomfortable conversations?

[00:35:47] Gosh, it goes back to the message of the conversation, right? Trust yourself. Trust that you can navigate it. Trust that, chances are the person on the other side is as human as you are. Even if they come off as. Mean and evil for really emotional use pick two really emotional words like that might just be their guard itself. And if you show up authentic and you trust that you can navigate the conversation with grace, they likely will meet you in the same way. 

[00:36:18] Well said. Sara, thank you. Thank you. Thank you for making time for us today. 

Thank you. 

Outro

[00:36:23] And that wraps another installment of the Revenue Real Hotline. I'd like to thank my guest for sharing their insights today. And I'd like to thank you, listener for hanging out through the remainder of the conversation. I appreciate you. If you like what we're doing, tell a friend, subscribe to the podcast, wherever you listen, ready to review something that can easily be done over at revenue. real.com. 

[00:36:51] All these actions really do go so far. And I thank you. Until next time friends I'm Amy Hrehovcik. This is the Revenue Real Hotline and happy selling.