Noob School - Episode 1: Michael Pace

Episode Date: June 11, 2021

Meet Michael Pace, who was coaching baseball before he met John Sterling and started his sales career. He found himself moving to Mexico within the first year of his career to grow the Latin America territory and built an incredibly successful inside sales team. Learn more about how he turned his passion for coaching people into a key part of his career and other important lessons he picked up on his journey toward running global sales for a billion dollar company. Follow John on social media: Instagram: instagram.com/johnsterling_ Facebook: facebook.com/johnsterlingsales Twitter: twitter.com/johnsterling_ TikTok: tiktok.com/@johnsterling_

Hey there, I'm John Sterling. Welcome to Noob School. This is where you learn a lot about how to get started. Put your best foot forward in sales, and I'm bringing in folks that have already done it. Today, I've got Michael Pace. Michael is one of the all-time greats I've worked with. Michael started with me just out of Wofford College. He was a star baseball player. You were. You were a star baseball player. That's what the resume is. In my mother's eyes. That's right.

That's right. And I never forget, Michael was a, he was an assistant baseball coach at Wofford when I interviewed him. So he'd already graduated and he was working as a coach working his way up the ranks, I guess. And I offered him a job working for our company in sales. And he accepted the job and he's like, he goes, you sure I got this job? I'm like, yeah. And he goes, you have just quintupled my salary. So I'm glad you joined this, Michael.

Thank you, John. I'm very glad I did as well. So it was the start of a lot of fun and a great career so far. Absolutely. Absolutely. So tell us about the beginning, like how we first met your interview and what it was like starting in sales with Data Stream back then. Well, as you mentioned, John, I was coaching baseball and I was making $350 a month before taxes. and I realized, although I grew up with a coach and a teacher, respect him tremendously, I just said I need to get out. The ends weren't meeting like I thought I wanted him to. And so we interviewed. I was at a bachelor party.

I met Dustin Caldell. He said he was working with you. And so, well, I know the Sterlings. Don't know John, but I'm going to go try to get an interview. So I got the interview. One of the questions you asked me, which I'll never forget, and was, well, how much do you want to make in your first year? And I'd interviewed with banks, and I said, well, I'd like to make somewhere between $21,000 and $23,000 a year.

And you look at me dead in the eyes and he goes, if that's all you make, I'll fire you. I was like, this is the place for me. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, you know, that's a good, you know, we talk about this in the book a little bit, but it's a good point. Michael was a great baseball player and had a good education. But at that moment, he met me did not have, he'd not talk to a lot of potential job hiring folks. So he talked to some banks, but he didn't know what was out there. So our opportunity, he matched up perfectly with us, and we were happy to give them the big raise.

Now, that was a while back. That was a few years ago. Tell us about what you're doing now, what you've evolved into. Because I know, well, back up a little bit, I know when you're with us, you went through inside sales, inside sales management. And then we had an opportunity to open up an office in Mexico. and we had nobody down there. We just thought we ought to be in Mexico and have a presence. And I said, Michael, we'd like you to go.

Oh, now. How old were you then? I was 24 when we started talking about it, was 25 when we moved. Yeah. So he's like, why me? Why me, John? And I'm like, because you can speak Spanish. I saw it on your resume.

I'll never forget. It said minor Spanish. No, it was a major. Double major. C-Con in Spanish, and I was not fluent as far as from it. Well, that's what you said. You said, it doesn't, just because you majored in Spanish doesn't mean you can speak it. That's right.

And I said, well, you're close. You're closest. Yeah, it was an opportunity of lifetime, no idea what in the world to do. So I turned to an uncle, because you said bring together a business plan. So I turned to my uncle who had done some international business, said, will you send me whatever your company has? and about relocation packages and everything. So I pulled it all together, gave it to you. You met with Larry and said, all right, y'all go do it.

So I had to go home and tell my wife she was quitting her job. Oh, my God. And on my first wedding anniversary, I was on the way to Mexico, and Devin was back home, packing up our house, selling our two cars and moving. I'm glad it worked out. Because, I mean, that could have been a disaster. That could have been a disaster.

Being away for your first year of marriage really makes you work things out. You can't turn to others. So there were a lot of. A lot of good lessons. Yeah. Run your sister's house. Yeah. Well, that's good, man.

That's good. And then since then, you know, he had a great career in growing Latin America for our company for data stream, including an acquisition down in Buenos Aires in Argentina, the wonderful Carlos Bellotti. That was great. We love Carlos. He's, after he sold his company and worked for us for a while, he went on to, like, work in the IT part of the government, didn't he? He was one of the IT directors appointed by the president of Argentina for a period of time. That's pretty cool.

Yeah. So Michael did all that for us, international inside sales, outside sales management. And then since then, I know you stayed with the company for a while. At one time, Michael had 40 salespeople working for him with no managers, which I'm not sure if that's recommended. But we were trying to save money. We're propping it up to sell. is what was happening. I forgot about that.

But tell us about where you are now and kind of how you got there and what that organization looks like. Right. When Info required data stream, I'd been in the data stream at the time about 14 years, which is unusual in the software world. And then so I remained for the next six.

And what they realized was that data stream had a great inside sales model. And they had thousands and thousands of customers that they could sell a lot of software to over the phone. And so we started building out a larger inside sales organization, supporting all the solutions that they had globally. And when I had left there six years later, the team was about 200 employees total worldwide.

And then I followed one of the senior vice presidents to Pitney Bowes as part and to build out their inside sales team, demand generation team. and then I've done the same thing. One of the CEO that was a VIN for is now the CEO at Avanti, where I am. And so I'm responsible for all demand gen sales development teams globally. Yeah. So, I mean, for the listeners out there, this is what I'm talking about.

I mean, any of you would look at Michael Pace right now and say, gosh, I want to be like him, right? I would like to just jump right to that spot. Well, it's possible to get there, but you don't. get there immediately, but you have to make some good decisions, including getting in the right job, taking the opportunity when it presents itself like moving to Mexico, when you can't speak the language. I mean, you know, there's some things that you have to do along the way, but the book will tell you if he had gone to work for, let's just say the wrong company, let's say if Michael would have gone to work for a bank, he'd probably be a good banker right now, but he

wouldn't be running global sales for some billion dollar company like he's been doing consistently over the past probably 10 years he's had that job. So that's part of the reason we're doing this podcast. So Michael, this is perfect. It leads me to a very important question. The Colby is one of the things we talk about, the Colby scores. I think all the salespeople that drove from crazy, I was so nuts about these Colby scores. But in the book, Colby.com, just a simple test you can take online that will show you from our

perspective where you line up best in the sales world. Michael's numbers line him up best, believe it or not, to be a sales manager. The weird thing about that is, of course, he's become a great sales manager, far better than I ever was. He's perfectly suited to be a manager. He struggled in straight sales. And I don't mean like he was terrible, but he was not the very best salesperson. Would you agree with me on that? Well, for the first six months, But then after my first full 12 months, I was number one on the board, John. Well, it does not fit my narrative. No, no.

I love sales, but I like coaching people. And what I learned was that I can be a coach just doing it in a different fashion than on the field, so to speak. Yeah, okay. But Colby is important. Just back to your point, is what I've learned is, hire people better than you, right? And hiring is one of the most important things that you can do in terms of getting the right people on board. And by using the Colby, you're really able to narrow that down.

I mean, this was happening before I got there, obviously. But we refined it over a period of time with more and more people coming into the organization. So I think that and or other type of tool to limit your mistakes is huge. Yeah. And I would agree with you. I'm sure you've used multiple tools, just the consistency of using something that helps you figure out my best people kind of look like this and the people who don't work out kind of look like this. Let's get them in a right spot. That's right. Yeah. So let's talk about some of the things that you did when you started. This is for the sake of the noobs for our readers and some of our listeners. What would you tell them not to do that slows you down?

don't rely just on yourself. Don't work 9 to 5. When you get really good, you know, work 1 to 6. But come in early and stay late. But don't rely on yourself. What I mean by that is that there's a lot of people that are good at selling. And there's people within your organization. There's people outside of your organization.

There's books. There's podcasts. You know, whatever it may be. Go take advantage of those. learn from the mistakes they made so that you don't make them. It'll help you move along faster because I was slow my first five months, trying to do it alone. So reach out more, multiple sources.

It's already been done. That's right. That's good. That's a good one. And then what are some of the things that you did do that helped amplify your success that you'd want to pass on to others? I joked about not working 9 to 5, but I knew I knew nothing. thing about sales. So I had to come in early and stay late, but my peers were doing the same thing.

So it didn't seem out of the ordinary. And I learned to get folks in the boat with you, whether it's a sales engineer to help you position the solution or whether it was your manager to help negotiate the deal. The more people you get in the boat with you, the better your outcomes are going to be. And if it doesn't work out, everybody knows that you put your best foot forward and it just wasn't wasn't the right opportunity for you to win anyway. Right. So I think get people in the boat with you. Bring in help.

Yeah. That's a good one. That's a good one. And then, you know, one of my favorite things to talk about is head trash, you know, things that we think are true for whatever reasons that turn out not to be true. For example, you know, they used to always hear when I was a kid. It's not polite to talk about money. And so, you know, it kind of makes you walk on eggshells around.

money with business people. Obviously, we want to get to the point with them about, to talk about money, make sure it makes sense. So do you have any of those in your world that you've recognized that we could pass on? Well, I think it's just the intimidation, especially at a young age for a newb, is I'm 24. I'm going to go in to talk to the owner of this business that's been doing it 30 years and he's 55. What can I tell him that he doesn't know, right? It's that you have to go and do your,

that's the head trash is the lack of confidence or disbelief that you can go and do it. And so I always have said if you prepare, so you study, you do your homework, you learn about their business, you learn about how your solution compares up to what they may be doing, and you match those two, and you tell a good story about where you've been successful

or doing it before, they'll typically listen at least. You get in the door, and then that's when you bring in the horses with you, and then you open up and, and close the deal eventually. So just the head trash there is, I'm too young to have a conversation with a serious buyer, older.

Absolutely. It just creates, it erodes confidence is what happens because you just start spinning in a spiral. And that's how you can overcome it though. Okay. So big finish here. What's the best piece of advice you'd more? to pass on.

To a noob would be to is to find a solid mentor who you can turn to and then they give you guidance or mentors. It doesn't have to be one. In the world of business, number one, in the world of sales specifically within business. And if you can do those two things and learn both sides, and they can help you avoid some mistakes,

you'll be more successful long-term and more quickly, I think. Get a mentor. That's good. That's good. And lastly, what's your favorite word in the English language? Compete. I would say compete. So if you go in thinking competition and wanting to win within ethical measures,

you'll do what you can to be successful. and if you do what you can to be successful or you give it your best, your outcomes will be better, most likely. Good, compete. I love it. I love it. Well, thanks for being on the show. It's been exciting.

I thank you for making me a part of this. It's exciting. I look forward to seeing some of the other ones that will be coming down the road, especially Mimi. Yeah, she'll be here soon. Watch out for her. So thanks to all the listeners, for tuning in episode one, Noob School.

Hope you enjoyed it, and we'll see you soon.