evenmorefrank

This is a story about how I crushed this clown in my morning meeting and the events that lead up to the crushing. When I was a sales manager I always told my staff that if you can’t sell I won’t put my name on you to be promoted. It was that simple back then. The company that I worked for considered itself a sales organization FIRST and still does to this day. Well, I had a guy I will call Dexter that was a salesperson I was responsible for. He was the biggest pompous ass I’ve ever met in my life and on top of that he was the type of person that loved to hear himself talk. I will admit that Dexter’s knowledge about products was impressive, but never translated into much sales. Anyway, for some strange reason my boss, who I till this day have the up-most respect for took a liking to Dexter. To make matters worse Dexter didn’t want to be a salesperson anymore. He wanted to get into management. When I heard about his ambitions I thought to myself, there is no way in hell he would get promoted. One day Dexter got upset because he helped another salesperson explain how a product worked and was upset that salesperson didn’t split the sale with him. Dexter took his frustrations out on me before he fully explained the situation. That pissed me off, so I called him into the office. In the office I told him that he better not EVER talk to me the way he did earlier. He agreed, but went into another rant about how he should be a manager, how he is always being taken advantage of, and how he was thinking about quitting. Me being the type of person that likes to take up new challenges, I told Dexter that I would help him become a manager. Even though I had major reservations about his ability to lead men, I still felt that it was my duty to help him succeed. So, we came up with a game plan that had clear expectations. For example, he had to improve his volume, profit, and PSP. I expected him to be an example on the sales floor and I expected him to come to work and act as if he already had the job he wanted. It didn’t take long for Dexter to settle back into his old ways. One particular occasion, I was closing and before anyone could leave they had to clean their AORs. Anyway, Dexter half ass did his AOR because he claimed he was in a rush to get home. I told him that he must finish his AOR. As I was checking AORs for other salespeople he just left the store without completing his AOR. I didn’t show it to my men, but I was beyond pissed. I wanted his ass fired to be honest, for insubordination, but mostly because my ego kinda took a shot. I told my GM about the situation and he assured me that Dexter would never pull a stunt like that again. I guess I was satisfied with that. I didn’t want to push the issue. As for me helping him get to the next level, that shit was over. A couple of months down the road on a Sunday, and I will NEVER forget I was talking to another salesperson and I see Dexter making a B-line towards me. When he reaches me he is smiling. He asks me if I heard the news? I say “what news”? He tells me that he has been promoted to regional training manager!!!! To say the least I was SHOCKED. At that time my regional manager was in the building. I ask my regional manager why did we promote that clown. He told me that he felt dexter would be a good fit for that position. I’m PISSED, I wasn’t satisfied with his answer, but I did not push the issue. I would find out later that there was another reason behind my RM’s way of thinking which made more sense. That following Saturday I was conducting my morning meeting with my entire sales staff. Fifteen minuets into my presentation Dexter walks up and wants to chime in his opinion. BIG MISTAKE!!!!! Calmly I told Dexter that I was in the middle of my meeting and it was not a good time for him to speak. He started to press the issue. Again I told him that I was not a good time for him to speak during my meeting. After ALL this he still wanted to interrupt my meeting, so I went CRAZY, and I screamed “SHUT YOUR MOUTH, THIS IS MY MEETING, SO YOU CAN EITHER BE QUIET OR GET THE HELL OUT MY BUILDING!!!!! He left the building and I felt better.

I have come to grips with the FACT that I’m a Pre Madonna myself. I guess that’s why I’ve had so many Pre Madonnas work for me. You attract what you are. Well here is a story about one of my favorite PMs. His name is Ernie and he was a great commission salesperson. Ernie’s claim to fame was the fact that he didn’t do manual labor. Ernie did everything in his power to not do his own product rollouts. Weather it was a DVD player or a 60 inch TV, he would call warehouse because Ernie was not picking it up. One day I’ve got all my warehouse guys working on a project and I don’t want them disturb. I tell them that they will not rollout any TV below 55 inches, so that means Ernie in particular will have to do his own rollouts. Earnie rolls up to me and asks why warehouse people are not doing rollouts. I smile and I let him know about my project and I tell him that he needs to do his own rollouts. Ernie is not too thrilled about that because he just sold a huge 32″ flat panel tv. Next thing I know I see Ernie dragging a 32″ tv across the sales floor. It looked hilarious, because that one moment was 100% Ernie in a nut shell.

I reckon there is someone within the company I work for better than me in store operations. There might be someone better at teaching sales…… I doubt it, but………. just maybe there is someone out there, but I PROMISE you, when it comes to closing customers down personally when the salesperson is unable to close, there is no one, AND I MEAN NO ONE, who is better than ME!!! Forget about it (in my Italian voice. ) I’ve come across and handled hundreds of different situations when it came to closing customers, but This situation I’m about to tell you is a first for me. It all started when Cruz came to me about working a deal for a customer. Cruz told me the customer didn’t like the deal he gave him, was being unreasonable with his demands and wanted to speak to a manager. HOLD UP…did he just say he already gave a discount? He did and I wasn’t happy at all about it, so I let Cruz know it. Me being a closer, I was more concerned about closing the customer instead of CRUSHING Cruz for being weak. After asking Cruz some questions I had all the info I needed to close this customer. What I didn’t know yet was the tactic I would use to CRUSH this customer. What I did know was I’m about to deal with a customer that had the perception that Cruz’s offer (last weeks sale price) wasn’t good enough and wanted MORE. I knew that the there was another salesperson (Walter) involved. Walter was with the customer typing the sale and waiting for my decision I decided then that I wasn’t giving anything else….I decided to RISK the sale. I walk up to the customer and I introduce myself. The customer goes on and on and on about how he’s spending thousands of dollars and how he wanted me to show him a little love. I’m thinking….FUCK THAT SHIT… over my dead body. I ask him a question I already know the answer to. ” Have we discounted anything yet”? The customer said “yes”. That’s when I begin to make the customer feel uncomfortable by putting on my best ANGRY face I’ve ever done. And I told the customer that I’m the ONLY person that could authorize a discount. I quickly direct my anger towards Cruz. He doesn’t know I’m giving an academy award winning performance. I asked Cruz why did he give the customer a discount without asking me first? He had no answers. I told the customer that I can’t afford to pay my commission sales person and him, so here is what I will do. I will allow you to keep the discount, but I’m not paying my sales person. Without letting the customer speak I told him have a good day and that I appreciated his business. I looked at Cruz and said GET IN MY OFFICE!! You could hear a pin drop. I told Walter to finish up with the customer. I stormed to my office with Cruz trailing behind. I slam the door hard enough so the customer could hear it. I turned to face Cruz, he still didn’t know, but that only lasted a few seconds. I smiled…..and then he laughed when he realized everything was an act. I told him to keep the laughter down. After a couple of minutes I told him to go to the book store so my performance looked even more believable. Needless to say the customer bought and my legend grew!!

If you haven’t figured it out by now I WANT RESULTS!! No excuses, no whining, no crying, and NO kissing MY ASS!!!! Although I will not tolerate people who come at me whining, crying or with excuses, but there is a special place for the CLOWN that tries to kiss my ass!!! This one clown comes to mind when I think about this subject. His name is Billy and he made it very clear from the start that he had absolutely no problem with kissing ass, which was quite disturbing to me. Not only was he an ass kisser, but he was a complainer, whiner and a trouble maker. He made it very clear that he wanted to be promoted. On several occasions he wanted to speak to me in my office about his future. He would go on about how he has improved with his constant complaining, and whining. Every time I would tell him to stop kissing my ass and PERFORM!!!!! You want to know what this clown did after every meeting? He continued to do the same crap he was doing, and even worse would go around a tell his peers that our conversation was about how I was looking to promote him!! Wow what liar. Needless to say he quit when I told him that his vacation was not approved with 3 days notice. Readers, what are your thoughts on ass kissing?

You know what I can’t stand? I can’t stand salespeople complaining about how slow it is. Listen people, I don’t give crap about a down economy. We do not participate in down economies. I can give two shits about a recession. We don’t participate in recessions. I’m a firm believer that in times like this you should expect to write an increase. I’m not saying that if you think like that you’ll write an increase. What I’m saying is that you should put your best foot forward in everything that you do. So when salespeople come to me about how slow it is, my response is no it’s not slow your weak!!! I tell them ok since it’s so slow go ahead and quit so the rest of these jokers can eat!! It’s a fact that GOOD salespeople always find a way. In my experience it’s the weakest salespeople that complain the most. My question to people complaining is this, are you doing everything you can do on YOUR END? Are you working on you sales technique? Are you Maximizing your sales? Are you efficient when your ringing tickets? Are you staying positive? And lastly are you working point HARD? LOOK!!! This is what we DO, this is the LIFE we CHOSE!!! Commission SALES, not for the faint heart. Brass Balls my friend, it takes BRASS BALLS to do what we do well.

On a pure commission sales floor it’s just a matter of time before there is conflict between two or more salespeople. My take on commission disputes is this……” I don’t get involved in commission disputes, I just house deals”!! Yes sir my friend that’s how I ROLL. You can thank my man Stan for teaching me this philosophy. Now let me explain what a housed deal is. A housed deal is a salespersons commission that is takin away from them for various reasons. A few reasons would be, but not limited to delivery mistakes, packing PSP, taking money off products without authorization and when two salespeople are fighting over a sale and can’t agree to split the sale. Ahhh….. How I love to see salespeople arguing over a commission. I have to admit it’s a guilty pleasure of mine. It’s like watching reality TV unfold right before your eyes. Quite frankly I think the drama is hilarious, but when dealing with the situation I’m always “Cool Hand Luke”. Listen people, I’ve heard it all before, all the scenarios, all the “he said she said”, all the back and forth crying. While funny, I Typically have no remorse for the salesperson crying foul. Now listen folks, there have been cases of true SNAKE jobs, and I handled those rare occasions swiftly and decisively. But let me tell you, 99.9% of ALL commission disputes is rooted behind POOR salesmanship!!! THATS A FACT!!! When a salesperson comes to me a cries foul, I always ask questions. For example, if salesperson comes to me and says Johnny Rachetface “stole” his “B-Back”(a customer that left the building then came back to buy), I would ask the salesperson what manager did you get involved with your sale before the customer walked? That one question always decides what I do next. If the salesperson tells me they indeed did get a manager involved then I’ll split the sale once I confirm with that manager. If the salesperson didn’t get a manager involved then not only does the salesperson not get any of the sale, but they might get written up for not doing their job. Depends on how I’m feeling……..

The first time I met Alex was at a grand opening when I was a commission salesperson. My first impression of him was very average. I didn’t really think much of him. He looked like a choir boy, that was scared of his own shadow. I thought to myself this guy is not going to make it as a commission salesperson, so you can imagine my amazement when he shattered all my preconceived notions and just CRUSHED at the grand opening. I told myself I’m not going to let some ROOKIE beat me in volume when I’m on the floor!! So every time I had a good sell, I made sure Alex knew about it. It was on like DONKEY KONG when he rolled up to me to brag to me about his numbers. Overall I can’t remember exactly who won between the two of us, but more than likely I think it was me. However one things for sure I never ever underestimated him again. About six months later I get promoted to sales manager at same store Alex works at, therefore becoming his boss. During that time Alex became the number one salesperson in the region and one of the top salesperson in the company. Alex like most top salespeople was very out spoken and at times thought he was above it all. He use to say to me all the time “Frank I’m your number one guy, get these other clowns to do it”. Alex was the classic Pre Madonna. Bottom line, Alex could sell his ass off and what made him a killer was the fact that he “looked” so unassuming. He came across to customers as a soft-spoken and very humble enabling him to gain their trust very quickly. What the customers did not see was the fact that Alex was hyper aggressive and didn’t take no for an answer, but what made him really dangerous was the fact that he was very efficient. He could gain the trust of the customers, get them set on a piece, attach ,close, and ring the ticket faster than anyone I’ve ever seen. When he was on the floor engaging a customer, I had total faith in him closing the sell.

“It’s too BIG, it’s too WIDE, It’s too STRONG, it won’t FIT, it’s too MUCH, it’s too TOUGH, I talk like this, cause I can BACK it UP!!! Folks I got a HUGE EGO. It’s ridiculous and I don’t care, I’m not perfect. I have high expectations and with that I expect A LOT out of my people. Everyday I drive an hour to work. During those drives I get a lot of thinking done and sometimes I can get real PISSED when as I’m thinking about different things. One day on a Saturday morning I was driving to work and I was thinking about my salespeople. I’m thinking about how I’m running one of the BEST BOXES in the COMPANY and how I don’t have any MILLION DOLLAR writers in my building. Now listen, I know I don’t NEED a million dollar writer for a box to run smooth, but like I said I’ve got a big EGO and sometimes I find it necessary to talk SHIT at any given moment to any number of MoFos that might think my team is not the BEST. Like I said I’m not perfect. Anyway, after thinking about this for duration of my drive to work, I came to the conclusion that I don’t have any million dollar writers in my building because the MOST talented salespeople in my building are ok with having stellar metrics with low volume. Low volume meaning fifty or sixty stacks delivered in one month. Anyway, by the time I reach the store to say the least, I’m disappointed, I’m determined, but most of all I’M PISSED. What happens next is classic ME. On Saturdays I have every salesperson on deck and at the time I took a step back and let my sales manager run the morning meetings, because in my mind me giving the morning meeting quite frankly is nowhere near EPIC ENOUGH until TODAY. Today I’m pissed and my juices are flowing. I tell my sales manager that I’ll be conducting the first part of the morning meeting. The meeting was pretty much a one way conversation. I went on by telling my staff that when I was on the floor there was several salespeople tracking to do a million dollars in one year. I told them that I felt that they were not giving me their ALL. I told them that I felt they thought it was ok to be sixteen and ten with fifty or sixty stacks of volume. I told them that although those numbers paid the bills and made my store look good, I was pissed at the fact that not one person had the drive to be a million dollar writer. I told them (which you could describe as harsh) that I could literally WILL anybody to do what they are doing. I went even further and told them that I could hire and train ANY BUM OFF THE STREET to do what they are doing PERIOD and that’s a fact. My sales force was upset at my statements and I don’t care. Two weeks after that I hired a BUM to prove my point, but that tale is for another day. Happy Selling!

Have you ever met someone who has SO MUCH talent and ability to be the BEST, but doesn’t fully commit and work to be the BEST. While being one of the most talented individuals I’ve ever meet, he is also on of the most narcissistic individuals I’ve ever meet which in sales that’s not necessarily a bad thing . That’s how I feel about Quinn. How I first meet Quinn is kinda funny, because I almost didn’t hire him. One day my brother and I are chopping it up and he tells me that his girlfriend’s sister’s boyfriend needs a job. I cringe, because I don’t really like hiring people “needing a job”. A lot of times they end up being a piece of shit hire. Anyway, I told my brother to tell him to put in an application and to let me know when it is finished so we can schedule an interview. A few days later my brother let’s me know Quinn put in his application. I look at the application and Quinn meets the qualifications for employment. I tell my brother call Quinn and tell him to come see me for an interview that day. I’m at the back of the store when Quinn shows up. We didn’t have a formal interview and I don’t remember much, but I do remember asking standard questions like “how do you feel about pure commission”,and “can you sell”. The main thing I remember about our informal meeting was the fact that he said “he would have to get back to me about working for me”. I started to get offended, but I remembered before I started with the company I told my future GM the same thing. He came to his senses and started working. In the beginning I was impressed with how he paid close attention to his uniform. Once I started to train him, I quickly saw talent. He learned fast, he was HYPER aggressive, and he was SUPER hungry. I have a saying ” I’d rather put someone out on fire then wake someone up from the dead. Quinn, that joker was burning in flames. He was getting into it with different associates. I’m not going to talk about all the issues in this post, but the first flame came up during his training. Before he was on pure commission he help sale this customer a very nice package. During the middle of the sale I sent in one of my veteran salesperson to make sure the deal got closed. Anyway, after the sale was done he demands my veteran slit the deal. My veteran informs Quinn that during his training period he was hourly and not commission. Quinn didn’t give a damn, he wanted something, so he insisted he get credit. My veteran got frustrated with Quinn and let me know about the situation. I pulled Quinn to the side and explained how things work, but he didn’t seem satisfied!!?!! I kinda got PISSED!!! I asked him did he have a problem with my decision? He said no, but something inside me didn’t buy it.

When we first met, our relationship was rocky. Early on we just didn’t connect. Early on I almost gave up, but for real I gotta tell you, I’ve got it BAD y’all. I’m in LOVE people and the shit ain’t going away. But it’s not just any kind of love MoFos. It’s more like an addiction, that thing is like a habit I can’t kick. An itch I cant scratch. I feel like “Pookie” from the movie New Jack City. Listen, I NEED HELP!!! I feel like that neighborhood crackhead on a mission to get my fix. A lot of people don’t like what I’m talking about, some people are allergic to it, some clowns give lame excuses on why they don’t get it. As for me, I dream about it, I hunger for it, when I wake up I think about it, when I go to work I crush people about it. That’s right you heard me, when I go to work I crush people about it. I force them to become little Pookies. It’s like night of the living dead in my building, but instead of screaming BRAINS, my team screams CHEEEEEESE!!!! My team is addicted because I made them addicted. They are in love because I made them fall in love. We are in love with the CHEESE. In my line of work we call PSP CHEESE. Now hold on people stay with me. Let me explain exactly what CHEESE is. CHEESE is straight JUICY. CHEESE is the icing on that cake. CHEESE is that sauce on those wings. CHEESE is that miracle whip on that sandwich. CHEESE is that kiss on that first date. CHEESE Is LOVE at first sight. HOLLA!!!! CHEESE is just plain old GOOD CUSTOMER SERVICE. We sell a lot of products in my building and to be honest with you, man-made shit breaks down. Knowing this we provide the CHEESE at an additional cost. The reason that I say that cheese is good customer service is because when products breakdown after the manufactures warranty expires the customer doesn’t want to hear that there is nothing I can do for them. In my mind, I’m thinking you should have gotten the CHEESE fool. Most times the customer will blame us for the breakdown and demand an exchange. What they fail to realize is that I hold ALL the keys and they should have gotten the cheese. As a company we don’t build products MoFos. After I crush the customers entitlement disposition, they are left with a bad taste in their mouth forever having ill will towards us. All because we didn’t sell them PSP. If we had sold them PSP then the conversation would have been, Mr or Ms customer you’re product is covered and we’ll set up a service call. The customer is happy that he can get service with no extra charges thus, providing good customer service. But let me be EVEN MORE FRANK!!! My salespeople love the CHEESE because if you don’t love cheese you can’t work for me. Don’t clock in, don’t pass go, don’t collect three hundred and thirty dollars!!!! Just get the hell out my building because I feel disrespected.