Creating Synergy Podcast

#26 - Connor O'Rourke, Director of Sales at Nuago, on Building Sales and Customer Service Excellence

January 27, 2021 SynergyIQ
Creating Synergy Podcast
#26 - Connor O'Rourke, Director of Sales at Nuago, on Building Sales and Customer Service Excellence
Show Notes Transcript

Connor O’Rourke is the Director of Sales and a founding member of Nuago, a strategic IT partner which helps businesses transition IT by aligning strategic business objectives with technology solutions. 

Connor has more than a decade of experience in the IT industry and has considerable expertise in all elements of Sales and customer service across market segments in South Australia. He brings a strong customer-centric leadership style and an entrepreneurial mindset which means that Nuago’s customers are often respectfully challenged with new ways of thinking about technology and how it can aid their organisation. Connor has a Bachelor of Arts in Journalism and Psychology from Colorado State University. Before starting Nuago, Connor was the General Manager of Sales at Datacom Systems. He also holds numerous sales certifications across the Nuago technology stack as well as having completed several leadership and self-development courses. As Director of Sales, Connor is responsible for the overall management of relationships with our customers, trusted partners and Nuago’s outstanding customer-focused sales team.

In this episode, Daniel and Connor deep dive into the world of sales, business development and customer service. Connor breaks the salesperson stereotype and shares why do some people consider "Sales" a dirty word. Conner believes that sales is not something you do to someone; it is something you do for someone. His emphasis is on customer service, and he shares how important it is to be authentic and provide products and services that add value to the client. He also shares the characteristics and behaviours he sees in some of the most successful salespeople and what he looks for when hiring and growing a world-class sales team.

Where to find Connor O'Rourke 

LinkedIn: Connor O'Rourke
Nuago's Website

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Say hello to our host Daniel on LinkedIn

Synergy IQ:

Welcome to creating synergy where we explore what it takes to transform. We are powered by Synergy IQ. Our mission is to help leaders create world class businesses where people are safe, valued, inspired and fulfilled. We can only do this with our amazing community. So thank you for listening.

Daniel Franco:

I this is synergises and welcome back to another episode of The creating synergy podcast. My name is Daniel Franco, your host. And today we have a little bit of a theme about our podcast. Our podcast today is about sales. Essentially sales, often seen as a dirty word generally comes with the view of the used car salesman stereotype. You know, the stereotype which depicts a middle aged man trying to force sell you a car with the intention purely to receive a commission or a paycheck. This person actually doesn't really care what it is that you want, comes across dishonest, self absorbed, potentially sleazy, while withholding information just to get the sale over the line. So that's generally what people think of when they think of a salesperson. But I'm glad to say that today's podcast we'll hopefully put that stereotype to bed for you. So late last year, we were very privileged to catch up and chat with a very good friend of mine, Connor O'Rourke, who is not the used car salesman that I described above, but is an absolute genuine human being whose sole purpose is to provide a product and services that adds value to the client. During the podcast kind of states that sales isn't something that you do to someone. It's something that you do for someone. His whole emphasis is on customer service. I absolutely love it. In 2016, Connor joined forces with his brother Brendan and his father Mick, who we've had on the show previously, and Dave been in Craig to create what is now known as new Argo. newaygo is a South Australian it business that is on track to becoming the leading technology solutions company in South Australia. And since commencing in 2016, Connor and the team and you have seen you Iger recognizing both the CRN and video fastest growing companies list numerous times. Connor is currently the Director of Sales at New Argo and previously was General Manager of sales at.com systems. He's got over 10 years of experience in the IT industry and considerable expertise in all elements of sales and customer service across different market segments in South Australia. The podcast today we deep dive into the world of sales and business development. We discuss Connors approach to sales and customer service to the types of characteristics and behaviors that he sees in some of the most successful salespeople to what he looks for when he's hiring and growing a world class sales team the answer how to have a great first meeting with a potential client. During our chat, you will really notice Connors strong customer centric leadership style, as he demonstrates why empathetic listening and strategic questioning are critical to the successes of understanding the client's pain points. I recommend this podcast for all leaders who are looking to scale their businesses, or even just grow as a sales team internally, or individuals who are looking to increase their sphere of influence not only just in sales, but in all walks of life. I absolutely love this chat. And I know you will love listening to Connor too. Thanks very much guys. Take care. Excellent. So welcome back to the creating synergy podcast. My name is Daniel Franco, your host and today we have the one and only Connor O'Rourke. Welcome to the show. Thanks for having me, Dan. Very excited. So COVID, Director of Sales at New Argo, an illustrious career in business and in sales. Can you give us a little bit of a background around who you are? What makes you tick your family all the above?

Connor O' Rourke:

Right? My tires? There's so much I try to do it some justice. So no, I kind of explained myself as you know, I'm a bit of a bit of a nerd at heart. Probably a confused entrepreneur, and aspiring single digit handicap golfer. So

Daniel Franco:

I guess from a little plug for your golfing probably work on that with bloody me at the moment. It's hard to get out on the course. But we'll have to go hit some sometime. So what's a confused entrepreneur before you go in?

Connor O' Rourke:

Aren't we all I think, Wow. You know, entrepreneurial ism is such a is a confusing time in life really much like Parenthood. Yeah, you know, I think there's a lot of analogies.

Daniel Franco:

I think leadership is one as well. Yeah,

Connor O' Rourke:

absolutely. And it's you know, I think I've heard on some of your previous cast, it's about you know, that holistic living there's not you don't really change gears that often there's not this clear delineation I think, especially post pandemic, Merle working from home, it's you You know, it all really does blend together. I think a lot of the things we're working on so there's principles that we can holistically adapt to our lives are great.

Daniel Franco:

Absolutely. All right. So let's go into it. So who give us a bit of background? How did you? How did you get to where you are today?

Connor O' Rourke:

How'd I get to where I am today? So I was kind of born into the it game a little bit. My old man worked in Silicon Valley and some customers are in some companies there and some startups and turn around so

Daniel Franco:

we so Mick O'Rourke, who is your old man, we've had him on the podcast before Yeah, yeah.

Connor O' Rourke:

So you know, followed in his footsteps to an extent with some some deviations along the way. You know, sales is an interesting craft that didn't necessarily see myself in but but found myself in longer term. And I think really, sales for me has always been kind of analogous to being a business owner, you get the exposure of all the different facets of a business. And so really, when I finished university, I was doing some hand selling of wine of in the US representing a Spanish in New Zealand portfolio, there is nothing about wine. One of my roommates was doing a viticulture degree. And he said, hey, I've got some, some work on the side, if you want to make a bit of money, and being a uni student, of course, I was going to jump at that opportunity to make a bit of cash on the side. And that was just going selling wine to different bottle lows and different restaurants and those sort of things. So did you

Daniel Franco:

use the lot one for you one for me approach

Connor O' Rourke:

might have been two for me, one for them, you know, again, uni student access to unlimited wine as it you know, that was gonna go one way. But no, it certainly gave me an appreciation for the craft of selling. And yeah, that it's not something that you can just really walk into, like anything, it actually has to be treated as a profession. There is a formula to to being successful in it. So that was really the first dabble into sales. And then I came back actually for Christmas break for holidays. And dad picked me up at the airport, we were driving back to back to our house and said, Hey, you want to stop in and meet with a few of the guys. And he had, he's working at datacom and started that business at that point in time. And they're about 30 or so staff quite quite early in the pieces 2010. And I said absolutely stopping for coffee, because in this building we're in right now he was nine years old putting RAM and PCs and what not was my first real taste in it. So it had come full circle with a lot of the guys he'd worked with at Centauri. And so I wanted to see what their business was about. Because I lived in the states for five or so years, and sat down for coffee was just really interesting what they were doing. And I didn't know it was anything more than a coffee at the time, but turned into a job interview. And they offered me a job as a as an internal account manager there. So doing internal sales were kind of the frontline sales support. I was still living in the States, I'd plan to go back in three weeks and kind of went home to think about it. And the next day said, the GFC hit in America, I'd applied for a bunch of jobs, I didn't really have a The next thing to look forward to on the horizon.

Daniel Franco:

And so what were you looking for in America? And when you apply for jobs, were they in sales roles? Or are they in

Connor O' Rourke:

numerous different roles, you know, I did a couple days as a as a door to door vacuum salesman. Because there was really it was a terrible time to be finishing University with a whole bunch of people trying to get resumes in the market and didn't really have a big network on which to be able to build those things. And so it became quite clear to me when I came back here is it's it's important about your network and the equity you have in the market and those things as well. So gave me an opportunity to go well, it's probably time to be an adult as well. Yeah, stop snowboard and hockey.

Daniel Franco:

So how old were you at that point? When I moved back in? Yeah. 22 turning 23. So you moved here when your old man bought the businesses, then you move back? Yeah.

Connor O' Rourke:

So in 96 moved here. I was nine years old and moved out here. And then I did my first year university here and decided I was still living at home with mom and dad and I really wanted to go out and kind of experience and understand who I was as a man and kind of get a different perspective. I loved my hockey and my snowboarding and whatnot. there's not as much of that here in South Australia. So ice hockey, ice hockey in line hockey and field hockey actually played all those. The main one I played was more roller hockey or inline hockey. They call it one rink in Adelaide for ice hockey. But yeah, definitely played ice growing up as well. So it was a huge passion of mine, but certainly something I don't really you.

Daniel Franco:

You have mentioned before you bodies feeling the effects of all that.

Connor O' Rourke:

Yeah, it certainly is. Yeah. Yep. A couple of concussions and then certainly several trips to hospital to get the limbs repeat.

Daniel Franco:

And over feeling you'll see Well, absolutely. So you decided to come back. What what other than the drug? Was there anything that drew you back to Adelaide? Oh,

Connor O' Rourke:

yeah, absolutely. Like my, my immediate family lived here. And it I was raised here, right. So despite the dirty accent sound like a Yeah, it feels like home to me here. You know, it's funny when you know, I may have had a glass of wine or a beer and I'm running astray. And I start to turn a little more strain in my accent and whatnot but

Daniel Franco:

adaptability of a salesman. I mean,

Connor O' Rourke:

oh, I think just after you've traveled a lot, you know, it's one of my biggest passions is seeing the world. Yeah, I think communication is the definition of the response that you get from people and for whatever reason, I think we if you listen to people from different cultures, you often hear them starting to gravitate a little bit more towards each other in the way they communicate. So I don't think it's necessarily a salesy thing because I think that's one of the misnomers, with with selling as well as that people are not being authentic necessarily in the process. It's adaptability is I think key to communicating with people. So as long as it's not being disingenuous, I'm cool.

Daniel Franco:

Yeah. So you've done pretty well, right? You've you've gone from datacom. And built in, you start as an account manager and then moved into sales lead, they're the new dm. Yeah. So

Connor O' Rourke:

what did about six, six and a half years, I think I was at datacom, started as an internal account manager, and then kind of went through the ranks there. So I had four or five roles whilst I was there. And that, that ended in the final row. And there was General Manager of sales for the South Australian business, which was a great learning experience for me, and really, I guess, helped me set the foundation for for starting this company,

Daniel Franco:

then you've left left, not safe, no job safe these days, but a safer, consistent income. Discuss start up your own business, in Nuago with your brother and few of the team had it tell us your thought process of why you decided to do that.

Connor O' Rourke:

I think entrepreneurial ism has always been in the family a little bit. So I was you know, I was raised around that that kind of entrepreneurial spirit. And, you know, for me, it was it was time for a new challenge. Some of the people I had worked with had to part of the organization in terms of the leadership team and whatnot. And I had always wanted to start a company I'd done quite a lot of time there's approaching seven years in the business and timing seemed right in the markets when the most important things for what we were thinking about to be the the really the offering we wanted to bring to the market. And my brother also had come back from the military. And really, this was the the key impetus to getting started. And he he'd worked on a business plan. And we sat down at a little cafe and all day he my dad and myself back. And I think it was March of 2016. And he spoke about this business plan that he had together. And I said, Well, I want it on this, I'd love to be a part of it. And he was fortunate enough to give me a shot and say, Yeah, cool. Let's try something, you know, it's always an interesting one, being silly enough to go start a business with your family in the first instance. And so we said, Look, this isn't going to be a family business. despite there being three of our six shareholder members have the same last name, we thought that the the assets that we brought to the company were the important thing. And we all look at the world from quite a different perspective, were cut from the same cloth, but we all have different interests. And then the other three gentlemen that we've added to the board in the mix, absolutely made it a stellar team, so we wouldn't have it any other way.

Daniel Franco:

Well done. So you've taken the company from strength to strength. The common chat in the world is that sales is king. So is there a little bit of a head wobble going on?

Connor O' Rourke:

You know, I'm you look at the Clifton strengths. My two things, our strategic thinking competitiveness, yeah, right. So I think, you know, that's probably one of the key reasons I'm sales is king. sales in my sales certainly is the first activity inside of a business to getting business. Right. So perhaps that's why they've coined it that way. Yeah, I think that's a little bit. You know, sales can be associated with arrogance, and those sorts of things as well. And so I probably wouldn't say sales is king, I'd say sales leads. Sales is definitely a incredibly important activity that I think many businesses don't nurture appropriately.

Daniel Franco:

Yeah, absolutely. So what do you believe are sort of the three fundamentals of creating a successful business? of creating success? Not three, what do you think some of the most important areas, but what's the reason behind your success and quick growth?

Connor O' Rourke:

I think it's, it's, it comes back to your value sets and the type of people you surround yourself with, you know, you spend so much you spend more time with the people you work with than you do with your partners, you exclude the hours that you're selling. Yeah. So you may as well hang around people that you like that are like minded, and you can do fun, enjoyable things that stretch you to now one of the first things we talk about here is a culture of performance. People see the output of the values that you live by, and that's what forms your culture, right. And often people will see Oh, there's a ping pong table, or you guys look like you're having fun all the time. You earn that right? By having a performance culture where you have a viable company that is great to come and work out where people feel safe to fail inside of. And I think that ultimately, is the key fundamental, hire incredibly intelligent people that match the value set. And ultimately try to stay out of the way as much as you can.

Daniel Franco:

What's the Steve Jobs quote, isn't it? Yeah, hire great people and get them to tell you what the exactly, exactly do you can you explain a performance culture? What What does that mean for you? Like, how do you how do you hold people to account in a performance culture?

Connor O' Rourke:

It's a challenge. That's, that's for sure. But it's about having a center Just to steal your word that energy. We stole it from

Daniel Franco:

Stephen Cohen.

Connor O' Rourke:

It's a wonderful. He's a fantastic thinker. But you synergy is super important. Absolutely it does come at the core of my father in my wedding recently spoke about synergy is one of the key things in life and it absolutely is it's how do we have an approach that's congruent from whatever level you are in the company and we don't like we have a pretty flat structure with the way that we like to operate. See, there's no no walls in the building between the boss's office, there are no offices for any any members of staff. There are no reserved carparks for anybody in the business yet first come first serve. That's how it's always with us. Yeah. So yeah, it can be it is a constant 24 by seven activity to ensure that, you know, the standard you walk past is the standard that you accept. And we drum those things in and that's not just a statement I've heard you talked previously about the values that are plastered on a wall. The values are what you do every single day, and how you live by, by things in your in your personal life in your professional life. So I think it's about setting that example. You know, it's been an interesting year, a lot of people take hits, but how you walk through that door in the morning is probably the most important thing you need to focus on as a leader. And listen to your people listen to your customer. business isn't that complicated? I always like that quote, it's, it's simple, but it's not easy. Right? Where it's there's some fundamental things you can hear him over and over and over again, but to execute on them and to be consistent 24 seven, it's, that's the hard thing to do.

Daniel Franco:

I found running my own businesses, grit, resilience, these fundamentals in becoming successful. Not even just success, but just even just getting through I mean, you talk about a confused entrepreneur. And I mentioned later and you mentioned family, I think that is the ultimate, you know, that's there isn't a golden egg there that people can chase. It's just the constant learning continuous, you know, you guys use Kaizen as your as your value, it's the continuous improvement at figuring it out along the way. You've also mentioned, we allow people to come in here and make mistakes. That's what you should do in your life. Yeah, it's about moving forward, consistently one step at a time, small steps generally get you further in life than, you know, taking one big leap. So yeah, I really, I really understand where you're coming from, and very empathetic with, with your approach. Leadership is a lonely place. There's six of you guys at the top there, you know, leading the business into in through a pandemic, how have you guys gone through this?

Connor O' Rourke:

Look, I saw a quote the other day about, you know, this time of year, often people are asking about what they what they can get and what they want. And it's such a time to be thankful. We live in a place a country in the world that is so fortunate, you know. So for me, I feel incredibly humbled that we're able to sustain something like this, to not lose a single member of our team, in fact, to grow through that time, when so many other Thank you. But when so many other people are struggling. It's not something we're wanting to go scream from the rooftops, it's, look, it's lovely to get accolades and attaboys and pack Pat's on the back and those sort of things. But you know, it's I just, I just feel thankful, you know, there's a lot of families that need at the table here now and being able to ensure that they had sustainability was our number one focus through that time, to be relevant for our customers, and to only be there to assist not to really be looking to scale the business to art was really just about helping the people to the right and left you I think, for the last six to nine months now.

Daniel Franco:

Yeah, really great approach. Thank you. So I really want to dive into the topic of sales and pick your brain I believe, for leaders out there who not only in sort of the small to medium enterprise, but also in, in large corporate, I think this is an element. That is always it sounds a dirty word. I mean, like if you were to say, I'm an engineer, or you were to say I'm a salesman or a BDM. I think people hold the engineers and the likes in much more prestigious, in a much more prestigious light than what they would a salesman. Why is sales viewed upon as that used car salesman type? Yeah,

Connor O' Rourke:

it certainly is a is a perception. I would say in some cases, a mis conception. But I think often it's that snake oil salesmen. It's a used car. Some people may have had a poor experience in their life and they then make that blink snap judgment that all people must be like this, because I think also it can maybe have to do with the renumeration is that people know that this person may be getting paid a commission or a cut of the deal. So does that then make their motives ulterior? I don't believe that it should. Does it happen? Absolutely. Absolutely. And that's why I'm passionate about sales being a profession. Yeah, about it actually being a craft that we care about. And one of my favorite sayings about sales is sales isn't something you do to someone, it's something you do for someone. Yeah. So it's actually about customer service. I'm not ashamed that over my career, I've earned commission and large amounts of commission, or that my reps get paid, large, massive commission, if they hit their targets, they should share in the success of the organization. Businesses need to make money to survive. So to me, it's actually it's a very simple, it's a facilitation role. Yeah. And it's a very challenging role had to become a, a real high end sales professional, you're very, very rare people. And we've really had to take an approach of finding individuals with the appropriate fundamental elements, and then putting them in the crucible and putting them through our sales Academy here to really try to teach them the way that we believe that the selling should be done. Alright,

Daniel Franco:

so a few points in there. What are the characteristics that you genuinely look for? In a sales professional when I'm interviewing or Yeah,

Connor O' Rourke:

there, there certainly are a lot of sales people come in all different formats, right. So there's no real one size fits all, I think, at least when it comes to selling, and you probably see that from the mix of the folks that are on the team, right? They all come from very, very diverse backgrounds. empathic listening is incredibly important. I've heard that 60 30 10 rule gets spoken about by make on your previous podcast. And that's critical you two ears and one mouth for a reason. Listen twice as much as you speak. And that listening needs to then be reflected to the person that you're speaking with. And this isn't just a sales thing. This is about communicating effectively in our lives. Right, your wonderful communicator, my probably greatest skills you have is listening to remember getting taught listening in school?

Daniel Franco:

No, I know, it is definitely an acquired thing. Right. And it's something we can work. In fact, I was horrible at it.

Connor O' Rourke:

I think the hardest books typically, that's probably the biggest feedback I get from my wife is, you know, she's, it's, it's often. Yeah, it's it's something that we often we're preparing what we're going to say next, rather than actually receiving what's being said across the table from us. Right. Yeah. So I think seek to understand exactly, exactly, yeah, one of the seven habits. professionalism. Right, your, we asked our people here to have executive level conversations, because ultimately, we want to go to people that that have the purse strings in the company that another strategic direction, that have a genuine care factor for what goes on inside of their organization. consistency is key. Alright, so you're judged on your worst day, not on your best. So people that are up and down too much, and those sort of things, you get a lot of emotional care, because I want them right. But if you're too inconsistent, your behaviors, it's it's hard for people to put, you know, they're trusting you in that.

Daniel Franco:

Yeah, you don't have to you don't want to go on an emotional roller coaster. When you hire someone you want them to be pretty level headed ego in check.

Connor O' Rourke:

Exactly. Exactly. And, you know, one of the things I kind of put that to the test recently, one of my team members came to me and asked me a question, hey, I want to know what you do in this situation. I said, you know what I would do in this situation? I said, Okay, I just want to make sure I said, because if you don't know what I would do in this situation, I'm not being very consistent in my leadership, and I need to work on that.

Daniel Franco:

So what would you do in this situation?

Connor O' Rourke:

What wasn't even remember? And he wouldn't made the right call?

Daniel Franco:

Yeah. Great. So leading by example,

Connor O' Rourke:

allowing people to fail Yeah, levels of delegation as you as you, you kind of build through the relationship people, you need to give them more rope more opportunity. Otherwise, next skill, a very effective business.

Daniel Franco:

I'm interested in the empathetic listening. Yes. It's often one that gets thrown around a fair bit when I say thrown around and with good reason, right? It's absolutely, that it's one thing to, to say you need to listen, and you need to seek to understand. There's a follow up to that, that I think often gets missed in it's actually being able to ask good questions. Definitely. Because you could, the conversation can run out very quickly, I think the ability to being able to ask questions, and consistently and open ended questions and seek to find the little, you know, we talk about rabbit holes a lot, they go down the rabbit hole with the client understand what their pain points are, what we're, what the fee points are for the future, what they feel within their staff and what their staff needs and what their customer needs. If you can consistently ask these questions, then I think listening becomes much easier, because you want to learn that information from the questions that you're asking. Yeah, so I think the to go hand in hand,

Connor O' Rourke:

they absolutely do. And I think you know, often you get the closed question, the open question and those sort of things, empathic listening, and people always confuse sympathy and empathy. Yeah, I got told him a nice analogy for that one time is sympathy to standing above a hole Well, the person is Yeah. And empathy is getting in the hole with them.

Daniel Franco:

Yeah. And that's a Brene brown thing.

Connor O' Rourke:

Yeah, absolutely hear you're very widely read. So I often forget where these things come from. So thank you for helping me with that. No, but really, it does go hand in hand critical listening, in order to be able to ask strategic questions, you have to be a great listener. I think those things definitely go hand in hand.

Daniel Franco:

They do. We've talked about authenticity. a fair bit. Yes. Is that one of the characteristics that you believe? She talked about consistency? Is authenticity, this the perception of the snake oil salesman, the used car salesman, the Commission's allegations, how do you be authentic? When people have that preconceived idea of you?

Connor O' Rourke:

I think you work bloody hard to try to break it down is really the only way to do that. You give them positive experiences to outweigh the negative ones that they had. Being aware of it going into it, I think, is critical to winning that battle. Because you know, how can you defeat an enemy You don't understand. And I often think you need to know who you are first before you go into because sales is a is a is a hard knock sport, right? You get knocked to the canvas hard, especially with the high performance and like we have here. Yeah, we expect greatness. And that's part of being part of the team here. So you don't really get the high fives for doing what's required. You go above and beyond is what we look for the new auto concierge is something we talk about a lot. You know, so, so explain the old concierge. So you go to a nice hotel somewhere, right? You go stay with your family there is the person at the concierge seems like nothing is too hard for them to assist you with, right? They're not disingenuous, right, they're not leading you down the garden path. They're just there to go above and beyond to make sure you have that white glove five star experience with them. And you can go buy a computer from anybody, right? You can go buy from one of the other 400 shops in town that you can do similar services to what we might be able to do. Yeah, I'd like to think that our people are a lot better. But what's gonna differentiate us is the service and the way that you deliver better services by getting people that are geared towards living by your values. Yeah.

Daniel Franco:

So it's interesting, my mind's going to every time I walked into a clothing shop, or something like that, and I generally don't like when people come up to me and say, Can I help you? Right? No, I don't need help. I'm here looking. But then I also get very frustrated when they don't come out. Because I actually walk out, it's like, there's no one here. That actually gives a shit. Right? If that's the right wording, absolutely.

Connor O' Rourke:

So when using that as a customer, from customer service to is that what we are doing is saying sales we're serving. That's basically we're there to serve, ultimately, and if people don't want to be bothered with things, you need to leave them to it, we deal with all sorts of different walks of life in this game, right? And, you know, as you were saying that as well, then I was thinking about in the United States, they've got this system where you tip the waiter, which I think is ridiculous system, pay people enough money for the restaurant, the proprietor, you know, give them the appropriate clip of this. But obviously, it's back to the governmental level, whatever. But yeah, the the piece I want to draw here is that ultimately, every time that waiter comes to the table, I often hear how is my tip going, because it's almost over the top. If you and I were sitting there trying to have lunch, and the person appears five times the table go, Okay, this is over serving me, and it almost starts to become a little bit put on at that point. So my vote he looks, they're absolutely Goldilocks on some we talked about a lot, right, it's right in the middle somewhere where we need to be relevant. You know, it depends on because of the type of services that our businesses deliver. It's not highly transactional, they're a little bit more kind of strategic, I would call them conversation. So it's really important, because you don't get a lot of opportunities to get a second chance in this sort of game. People make their mind up pretty quickly, right?

Daniel Franco:

Yeah, they do. How do you? So you've got a team and a team of professionals, which I love, right? Is that is that is sales focus, service focused account manager focused, rather, how do we continually serve our client, and we continually add value? That's your approach. Brilliant. How do you get the rest of the team on board? How do you get those like, you know, Dan pink, Daniel Pink writes a book to sell as human. The simple basic meaning of that book is that everyone sells if you work for a company, and you are at the barbecue at your friend's neighbor's house next door and someone says what do you do? You are in a position of selling at that point? So how do you get your team to welcome the the ability to sell? is it part of the culture? Is it the simple fact that they're so proud to work and wear the badge of new logo on them? Or is it do you train them? Is there anything that you guys do in that space?

Connor O' Rourke:

Yeah. is probably the first to I would hope that they are. I believe that by creating a vibrant culture where people like coming to work naturally they want to tell other people about it right? If you've had a great experience or you've got a product you just love, we're think we're talking about our mobile phones before you go and you talk about it right? You think it's a fantastic thing because you want more people to come along. And that's why our team is largely grown here by the referral system. Yeah, you know, there's more people that are like minded. We my brother played this, our Managing Director Brennan, he played this video of the dancing man. I mean, this guy's he's, I think he's clearly had a couple to shanties at this Woodstock looking event. Yeah, he's dancing. They're crazy by himself. And like two minutes later, everybody has started to join this guy. And they're dancing with crazy man. And that's what we spoke about when we started long ago, we were just the one kind of crazy guy standing there going, Hey, we think we have something great to bring the market, we think we can create a wonderful organization where people come and feel like they're getting the best out of themselves, and can hopefully, you know, grow some friendships along the way. So that's kind of the way that I think it happens. We, we talk about our why we were reminded by our why our mission, our vision constantly, and it's something that through the whole interview process, through your offer letter that's in your letter of offer, or at least in your employment package, when you're first starting to come on board with us. So I think it it ends up becoming part of the fabric as well, when it's not the the values aren't just something you walk past in the morning. We genuinely have a vision and a purpose that I think everybody sees as congruent throughout the company. And I think that's imperative to people wanting to go evangelize the brand. And I think you're talking about authenticity before. Yeah, they're in his authenticity. Yeah, people then just going saying, This is my actual experience. So that's all selling is at the core to me is going out and telling stories of examples where you've been able to maybe assist a customer the similar

Daniel Franco:

Yeah. Do you? Do you have an expectation on these people, though, that if there is an opportunity that they they go and seek it? Or do is is it just left to your sales team? What do you do pay bonus schemes or something like that? Oh, absolutely. Outside of the sales team,

Connor O' Rourke:

why not? You know, why should you have to have a sales tell? If you generate income for the organization that helps everything we're trying to achieve here? Why wouldn't we, you know, sharing that for you? It's a meritocracy. Right? You know, where the work is done. Let's let's, let's assist, you know, in sharing the wealth that's created from it.

Daniel Franco:

So I'm a new sales person, you BDM been hired? You've said, I've got all those characteristics on that list. Thank you, dude. Yeah, it's turned into one. Yeah. What? What do you what is my first week look like with the business? It's a big one. You know, it's because you talked about the sales Academy? Yeah. Yeah.

Connor O' Rourke:

So it's a lot of a lot of a lot of input. Right. So the first two weeks is really is about understanding our organization at every single level, what is it that we do? And why, most importantly, why is it that we do what we do? How do we go about doing it? And then we really get into who our customers, what are the problems we might have been able to solve for them. And then we start to work through what we call the sales excellence pillars here are 12 different elements of how we approach becoming a professional salesperson. And we refer back to this content quite a lot. And we've got enablement pieces that that have been developed over over several iterations of, of different sales roles that I've been in and things that I've stolen from companies that my dad has started, and I've tried to add little bits and pieces as the market is shifted to that. So it's really going through intensive sessions around what's the great first meeting look like. And we do one on fanatical prospecting is a book by Jeb blunt. And that's really just about how do I get access to these sort of people to tell my message to them? We talked about the the 60 3010 rule, and all those elements.

Daniel Franco:

How do you get access to these people? And we talked about asking for my gold now. Yeah. Well, as a general rule of thumb, how do we get in front? How do we beat the gatekeepers and get in front

Connor O' Rourke:

Go do your homework first and foremost? You know, cold calling needs to become warm calling so how do you warm up your your your CRM right into your customer relationship management system? I think that's that's step one is is knowing your target, right vague plans get vague results. And you as a stuck, you've been a start up? Yeah. It's it's analogous to that you you talk to everybody when you first start and you become probably more focused more choosy and more, we try to offer more of a laser focus for people because I feel that you know, that really gets you an outcome that you're looking for a lot quicker than this kind of any old approach. So it's really about determining as well what is the background this person has come from where is their interest and their passion? Then aligning the customer base they go after to that. That's how we go back to authenticity again, align people to their passion.

Daniel Franco:

Yeah. The there's a lot of CEOs who won't give their time to you. Yes, right. Yes, there's a lot of there's a lot of noise on LinkedIn. Certainly every person who's got the title CEO, cio, cio, director, Executive Director, whatever, is getting 10 to 20. LinkedIn messages a day. Hey, can I help you? Right? And how do I can I tell you this? If LinkedIn is so bombarded, and the phone call is, is a tough one, because you don't have the details in your CRM, yeah. Where do you what do you do? Where do you how do you get in front of these people? What approach do you use to fill up your CRM is working with a marketing team? Is it just going out there and trying to meet as many people as possible? Is it guessing what the there might what their email might be?

Connor O' Rourke:

Look, there's, you've probably covered, I've seen all of these. And there is no silver bullet, right? things come together in various ways. As you grow, and as you build reputation, okay, you start to maybe get a little bit more referral business starting to come back. But we try to not rely on referral business, we've got a message, we want to tell the market, and we try to get out there and pound the pavement in order to get access to questions and access getting to the C suite people. It is hard yakka we go with the layer cake approach, right, our executive team is involved in our selling every single day, the folks who started this company, they're obviously very passionate about what my favorite place to be is be in front of the customer listening to them, ideally, getting to tell them a little bit about our story and, and seeing if some things align. So our access into a company may not be starting at the C suite. But it also might could be from one of the boards or associations or groups that the executive team are on. You meet people through those associations, it could be that you and I, you know, are sitting down having breakfast one day and compare notes. And it just so happens that I can make an intro for you, you can make one for me. And then we align a business development manager depending on the market focus in which they have, so that we can go out and try to say, look, number one, what are you about? And number two, do we think that we could assist and helping you execute on that strategic vision?

Daniel Franco:

Brilliant. I'm going to go back to your 60 3010 model 60% listening. You're in front of a CEO or CIO, for the first time you got half an hour, 20 minutes. How do you listen for 20 of those minutes?

Connor O' Rourke:

Those ones are tough, right? Sometimes that can also be an indicator that that's not a prime prospect for you look at half an hour. It's tough to get through. Because we can't do business, though we know each other. Right? Talk about the know, like trust continue. Yeah, you need to know me before you can like me before you're going to trust me and trust is required before we can start to build rapport. do business do all that right? Yeah. So it's a hard one to do in 20 or 30 minutes, but you set the expectation from the outset of the meeting. You need to respect that this person's time they can be very busy person and 20 to 30 minutes is an absolute luxury for them to be giving you Yeah. So that could be the point that we're gonna actually get their lunch in for the day because they had 1617 minutes you've had some of these days, I'm sure. Right. So number one going into respecting their time and saying what setting expectation the purpose of our meeting today, actually let him know. Often that's glazed over and people just start to wrap it all grows, go on the weekend and all this that

Daniel Franco:

so what is your expectation? Is your is setting the expectation? Is it going is I'm here to sell you something or is it I'm here to get to know you

Connor O' Rourke:

or it's ultimately I'm here to get to know it's actually I'm not here to sell you anything today. It's otherwise it'd be like going to the doctor without telling the doc and he doesn't ask any questions about what your problem is. Yeah. Hey, but here's some antibiotics. Yeah. And you go home, and he never asked you about what your challenges were. So I think it's really going into understand because we can't help every customer. Yeah. Businesses need to be in the right position. Sometimes because we choose the customers, both the customer choosing us, that's what partnership is about. And that's why we don't want to be treated like a subby. That's just, you know, thrown by the wayside. lowest cost wins. That's not our customer. Yeah, we're not about having all of that allayed as our customers, we want the ones that values align with us that value technology that value the security posture of their business.

Daniel Franco:

So you guys are at a point where that's available. Now. Is that where you were at the start? Oh,

Connor O' Rourke:

absolutely. No, I was I was anybody who would have a chat with me We would be exactly in the top. There's a whiteboard out the back part of the building there. And we each wrote our estimate on when we get our first order, and we're sitting there and I remember we were going crazy sitting there, and we finally got a laptop order hot five going bonkers about it. But it's a scary world starting a company, you got to be a little bit crazy. You got to be the right amount of crazy, I think to do this sort of sport. So

Daniel Franco:

yeah, it's, it's not for the faint hearted. No, not at all. So you've got your, from what everything that you've been talking about here I've been hearing avatars beside is not our customer yet right? Even use those words, but that's what I'm hearing. Typically, in a service, we're not selling widgets, you're selling a service, you're selling value add to the company. What would you typical avatar look like? Is it the C suite isn't managerial level? And when you do research? What does that research look like? What do you What are you trying to find it? And where do you find it? whatever you can. Yeah,

Connor O' Rourke:

you spoke before about. And I'm gonna jump around a little bit. This one. You spoke before about LinkedIn being pretty congested? Well, if you're only using LinkedIn, and you're just trying to Okay, I'm going to buy a LinkedIn premium profile and try to get my free credits to send a message to these people, you're probably not going to get access to them, you probably get a ton of these a day. Right? I get 1215 of these things a day, trying to add me from some business. Hi, I noticed we had similar interests, it'd be great to connect. And you see, I'm a recruitment agent or I work with an outsource company. Yeah, yeah, I help businesses with sales leads and things. Hey, everybody's got to make a crust. But I don't think that you've earned the position to pitch me at that point. You know what I mean? It's that's far too easy. That's lazy selling, in my opinion. So yeah, it's, I can't remember the Genesis necessarily of this exact question, but because it's it is such a complex sport to play. There. There are so many things that you can find on the internet. But what is relevant, because you get so many different types of people as well. It is hard to find certain people on online as

Daniel Franco:

well, if you're looking, let's say you work in like you guys do a lot of work with schools. Yes. How do you find information on people in schools, especially like it's one of those things in nonprofits there's, there's good news stories about what they're doing is a non for profit. But from a, how do I add value point of view, it's a tough gig to it's a scrappy sport,

Connor O' Rourke:

right? You got to be little scrappy, to be a good business development manager and how you find information, it can you know, what I tell, you could go have a coffee with the janitor, because he can give you information about the great business that he works for, he's gonna give you insight about it. It doesn't have to be the C suite. It can be anybody inside of that business. Because we have influencers, we have decision makers, and we typically have a chorus of people that are making any strategic business decision these days. So you've got to really be resilient. You talked a lot about resilience before you got to be gritty. But you've got to be scrappy, you got to find a way to win. You've got to Okay, who am I playing against? Yeah, you can sell your differences. Yeah. You know, people often do sell their sameness. Own. And you know, like I said, before anybody can sell your computer. What's your differentiator?

Daniel Franco:

Yeah, yeah. Love, it makes you think. So how do you get more people in your CRM, then, you know, as a new business, you start off and you've got, yes, you've got your networks, and you've got your contacts? And yes, you've been around for a while. But you might have 500,000 people in your CRM based on previous contacts and everyone's all amalgamated put together? How do you get 10,000 people in your CRM? That's a good question. We get these. You know, you read the fanatical prospecting books and you read all these sales, Bible books and everything like that, but they say 120 calls a day, I don't have enough people in my CRM to I'd run out after about a week of calls that how do you fill up your your CRM in that space?

Connor O' Rourke:

It's, that's the probably the biggest sales challenge, right? If you if you give a good quality leads list to a sales rep, they can typically pick the phone up and convert those into first meetings with a customer, which then starts the process from there. With them within a bar is the approach that we've taken. It's a combination of absolutely personal network. You know, Adelaide is an interesting parochial town. So we have to adapt our approach to the market in which we play, right. So some of the people that might be listening to certain might be in different markets, where it may not necessarily apply it in a less parochial context. But it's about really, what's your your, your market, vertical focus, I think also starts to determine where you're going to go because once you know, hey, I'm gonna go after the defense sector. Well, there's plenty of resources out there to go find, well, here's the types of businesses and then you start to just work your way through the the sausage factory ultimately, at that point, right. So it's okay, well, I know that I want to go after x, y, Zed defense prime, who are the people there and LinkedIn will start to show you who those people are, what their titles might be, depending on their positions, they may not be putting a whole lot on LinkedIn about themselves, because they definitely don't know phone number. Right. Exactly. Exactly. So then comes the challenging part of the actual cold call, which is a little bit warmer at this point. But it's really hard to get access through these people. So yeah, cold calling is an art and a science as much as it is a you know Repetition game.

Daniel Franco:

You have mentioned that you prefer the warm call versus the cold call. How do you go about getting the warm intro?

Connor O' Rourke:

The warm intro is one thing, the warm call, and I try to warm up a cold call. So it's not necessarily by an intro. Ideally, we want a reference in there. Yeah, by all means, hey, Dan, you know, x y Zed over this company, I'd love if you wouldn't mind if I can use your name or better off, if you wouldn't mind giving them a bell for me and saying, hey, look out for this, this company, they're gonna give you a call, they do good work. So warming up the call is important to at least understand, what does this business do? Because often a salesperson will go into it just going, oh, I've got the Yellow Pages flip through call a number without really understanding what is it that they do? And if you're calling this person to ask for their time, because that's ultimately interrupting their day? You better have some value to add, and how can you add value if you don't really understand anything about them whatsoever?

Daniel Franco:

So is that your conversion to warm when you then understand who they are? Exactly? Yeah.

Connor O' Rourke:

So the conversion to warm I think is really it's about going through that that qualification criteria is this is this a new auto prospect even to start with before you pick the phone? Right, because it's it's hard to get hung up on is, you know, cold calling is one of the most challenging things to do. And anybody wants to turn their nose up at sales are laughing so you're most welcome, anytime to come give it a try. When we started the company, all the founders sat there and got a taste for cold calling, even if they hadn't been in sales before. So it's, it can be a very challenging thing to do. And so you want to my my takeaway This is do anything you can to understand the individual or the business on which you are the business that you're trying to go after. Ultimately,

Daniel Franco:

it is it is hard, though, because sales, there's a lot of books and techniques and everything that you can read a lot of podcasts you can listen to, or you know, audible whatever it might be, who are all sort of saying the same thing. So people are becoming more and more educated in sales. The idea of the used car salesman is, is reducing their sales training programs. So you can do so now everyone's trying to find research about everyone, and they're all doing their research. So then still, it becomes a highly competitive market. How do you How does new I go to differentiate themselves? How do you guys stand out from the crowd? from a pure sales down? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Well, sales and marketing point of view? Well, you might even give us your sales pitch. Now, how does how do you guys lead the way in what you do?

Connor O' Rourke:

I think that the actual people we select is the most critical element moving from a transactional to a transformational selling organization. So I've been in ones before, it's about moving volume, moving the widget and those sort of things. Yeah. For us, it's more about wanting to work with less customers, but go more broad and have more depth with them. And longer term relationships where we're actually helping move them in a strategic direction. So at the risk of sounding like this is pre Qantas, it's genuinely it's about the intelligent people that we hire in the backgrounds that they've had and what they bring of our guys are chartered accountants, we've been an IT manager before, we so we've got some really interesting, diverse sort of backgrounds that folks come from, but we spend an incredible amount of time enabling our salespeople. You know, I'm in every single first meeting pretty much that we have with a customer. So once our warriors GO, GO pound the phones and get meetings, I went out there and tell the message not to, you know, suck all the air out of the room, I you know, earlier in the piece, it'll be me doing most of the pitch so that they see the way that we go about doing, doing the sales crafted in the logo. But ultimately, I start to then take a backseat in those meetings to the point where they probably don't need me, but good luck trying to get me to not go till Yeah.

Daniel Franco:

Well, you still passionate about the business, which is great. You're 10 you so you as a sales manager that we use. Let's put our sales manager hat on. Yeah, yeah. How do you set goals, KPIs? What what are your expectations of the team? Yeah, as you talk about performance culture? What does that look like for your team? And and how do you hold them accountable? To the through the CRM, all the above?

Connor O' Rourke:

Yeah, all the books. So I'm just saying you could probably tell me who said it, because you've got a great, you can only manage what you can measure? Yeah. So it's really important. And in a sport like selling, it's all numbers driven. For the most part, you know, how many calls you make equals probably how many meetings you get what you get your conversion there. So if I pick up the phone 100 times I get 10 meetings? Well, I mean, you know, you got a 10% conversion rate. The the formula that we have is around X amount of meetings per month that a rep would have to have in order to see success for themselves. meetings with quality. Anyone know so meetings with an outbound customer so and, you know, in this digital age, we live it's wonderful, and these are enabling and tools that really help us on the ancillary, but we're still absolutely about getting in front of people. Yeah, you know, we lose a lot of the ability to interact into Build authentic relationships with people, I think, if it's solely through digital means it's absolutely helped us through these times. Yeah, and will continue to be integrated into what we do in our in our lives in our work. But I think that, you know, we're big fans of the old school of get in front of people and actually have that face to face experience, you can't

Daniel Franco:

win you looking at the KPIs and looking at your numbers, do you count the meanings in front of people who aren't decision makers? So often, you have to have a few meetings with the non decision makers in admin type roles and the low level of the business, say without being rude, like the law, you know, sort of the bottom of the pyramid to work your way up, you get your referrals. Hi, have a really great meeting with them. They're working on a project, you just speak to my manager? Yep, absolutely. Let's move up the move up the chain they included in as part of your or do you purely look at

Connor O' Rourke:

you get the ones, you certainly get some of those, we would prefer to be getting access to the people that are making decision, you certainly need to find your way and yeah, whatever way you can. But it really comes back to your qualification criteria. We do use the T bap method, here is one of the ones you've probably seen a lot of the books. And it's really that assists the business development manager and have a compass on is this the person that I should be talking to? Cuz you can burn a lot of cycles? Who doesn't want a free coffee? Yeah. Someone says to me, you know, get a monkey out of demonstrating me. So it's definitely about being rigorous with that, that that qualification criteria and being real with yourself? Is there actually opportunity here for me? Can I add some value in this space, or in my my best to give some focus to something that I can actually add some value around and hopefully achieve in relationships?

Daniel Franco:

So your salesman or sales person hasn't achieved? What they need to achieve in two or three months running? What conversation? Do you have them? What does that look like?

Connor O' Rourke:

You wouldn't go two or three months with us? Right? So your forecast your they say your pipeline is your lifeline, right. So we add an executive level pay very close attention to our forecast, because that's going to dictate the cash that comes into the company and our hiring, who the people are bringing the business, those are two of the most important fundamentals in running any business. So we look at the pipe quite far out in terms of we know the amount of meetings will equal the amount of deals to be able to achieve the the metrics that we want to that we put down at the beginning of every financial year as a board. So it's really just cascades down from that for the objectives the reps need to achieve. If they're missing for two to three months, well, they're probably not making enough calls. And we're measuring that far before that happens. We do have a great CRM system, and we're able to go forward and measure each of these different elements for it. So to classify, you know, is this a true prospect? Or is this an influencer, maybe inside of the prospect, I think is definitely a good piece to look at. But sales animals, they don't want to be investigated too deeply. And you don't want to have them spending too much time on activities that aren't the things that they're passionate about, which is going out having great conversations, building relationships, and ultimately evangelizing the brand. So two to three months, you know, that you send that person? Do you really want to do the sport? You know, I think that's tough for two or three months, you start to get behind in the sales game. It's hard to recover if you're getting behind for some period of time. Yeah, yeah, definitely your confidence. Once it's low, it's really hard to get back up off the canvas and go, you know, at least my boots up today and go get hung up on a lot. Yeah.

Daniel Franco:

But there's got to be a point where, even if it's not two months, it's one like if someone's not meeting him meeting their their requirements, how quickly the swiping, they know, before I do,

Connor O' Rourke:

yeah, okay. You know, that's the type of culture you've built. Absolutely. You know, people get trust from the outset, it's not something that they earn, you lose your integrity once you can't get it back. So really, you know, we have, I have one on ones with my team, once a fortnight we have every Monday morning as our forecast meeting, I have a 90 day forecast call the each of the business development managers has to do each month. And they get access to our executive team to say, Hey, here's what I'm looking to achieve. And here's the type of resourcing that I would require in order to be able to execute on these objectives. So, yeah, yeah, it's too long between drinks for me, if we're going two or three months in this person's Mr. Number, I've probably failed them as a leader, I might have selected somebody that wasn't necessarily right. For this sort of game. Yes, you look inwardly. We that's we always have to do right. We can't control this action. So it's really what can I control in this situation, circle of influence, circle of control type thing, and really well, what I can control is what I do from here and, you know, I try to operate with that mentality. I fail at it quite a lot. But I try to operate with that mentality as best

Daniel Franco:

possible, the marketing of the team as well. Do you manage the marketing aspect to date I

Connor O' Rourke:

have, we've engaged one of the best houses in Adelaide to not take that over because sales and marketing often get lumped into the same bucket, but they're obvious distinct disciplines that absolutely need their own focuses. So I've certainly learned a lot in the marketing journey over the last four, four and a half years or so. And learning under my father has been great, because he always had a marketing background, I've been probably more on the sales side of things. But there's, there's a significant discipline to marketing. And a lot of people just think it's the brand, which is obviously one of the key outputs. Sure, you guys have looked at the three C's and four P's and all those things, right. So big advocate of that, and I'm very excited about what we're doing with the external company we're working with now and brighter here locally, which is a fantastic company really lines with us. And I think the next step, or the next kind of outputs we're gonna have are going to be quite impressive. And, you know, my recreational approach to marketing, I think, is not going to have a lot more of a professional perspective, I'm really excited for

Daniel Franco:

she's going to create more inbound leads for you guys.

Connor O' Rourke:

Oh, I mean, that's, that's a, that'd be a lovely output of that. But it's that that consistency of brand that can grow is that every time you deal with Nuago, there's a, there's a distinct feeling about it. Whether it's any of the different folks you meet from our wonderful business, whether it's the logo, the branding, the taglines, the events that we run, the quality solutions that we're synonymous with. So we want all that to always just feel like the consistent new algo experience for our clients and Alliance partners.

Daniel Franco:

So when you have a new young gun coming up in your world, you are not know me personally, I'm using this as an example. I don't feel young, trust me, the enemy thinking, you know what? sales seems like a lucrative world. It seems like you know, you often hear companies say I spy person in this company is the salesperson. So it makes you think and we know a few young guns that are floating around the market, as well. He's probably listening right now. What is the what is some of the advice that you would give to someone looking to start a career in the sales world?

Connor O' Rourke:

From a wealth generation standpoint, because you mentioned lucrative there? So are you are you pretty well?

Daniel Franco:

Okay, so the younger generation would generally look at sales as a lucrative Yes, I can. I can earn some decent coin. Yeah. Without having to study. Fair enough. Yeah, right. It's a it's almost the get quick get rich, quick scheme. Essentially, you can look like that, from the outside having having known what some of these real estate agents are earning at some, you know, you see these these people earning some quite, quite decent dollars. When someone is making that decision version in the throes of making that decision, you put your arm around them, and you say, What do you say? I'd say buckle up, buddy, cuz that's a bunch

Connor O' Rourke:

of bullshit. Yeah. It is. It is a sport. You're correct. Can it be lucrative? Yes. But there's a reason not a lot of people are successful in doing it, because it is absolutely day in day out a sport for the greedy. And that's why they do get to share in the wealth of it. Yeah, the highest paid person in this company is a salesperson. And I have no problems with that. Yeah. Because if the salesperson is generating that sort of capital, they should be sharing in it, because the company is also taking their piece. And if you might have gotten your sales plan wrong, if that's not, if that's not in lockstep, you know, it's that's ultimately knowing that the business is sustainable, and this person is going out there and going the hard yards and standing there, you know, taking it in the front line. So, you know, I don't ever have a problem with the fact that sales professionals can make a commission, because they have a long journey ahead of them before they get to that level. And you mentioned before about without study or training, you're going to be pretty bad at this sport. And you probably going to, you're probably going to fall into that camp before around disingenuous. This used car salesman, snake oil salesman, because the best sales professionals that I know are truly that they're professionals that treat this as a craft. And they come here every day to learn and be students of that craft. So my advice would be Listen, listen, first and foremost, develop strategic questioning, empathically listen, and that can be practiced everyday don't have to be selling to impact. Listen, a lot of the key fundamentals of being a sales professional, in my opinion, is simply my opinion. Are those good core fundamentals around being a good communicator in life, being a good husband being a good wife being a good daughter, son, being a good parent? All those sort of things.

Daniel Franco:

Love it. You're very, very well spoken. Connor, what's that? What do you do outside of work to you know, from a growth perspective? Do you spend a lot of time on personal development to you want What are your habits? How do you go About your everyday learning, especially as a as a leader of a business, we talked about it being lonely at the top and building that grit and resilience in a confused entrepreneur. How do you become unconfused? What do you do to develop yourself?

Connor O' Rourke:

There's, I think a lot of things in our Absolutely. Self education is so important. You know, the day that I stopped learning is the day it's time for me to call it quits. Because you start to believe your own bullshit, it's probably getting towards the end of what you should be doing. So absolutely educate yourself every single day. You know, I think there's a quote and again, you're probably gonna know the person is it Gandhi that says, live as if you'll die tomorrow, but learn as if you'll live forever? Yeah. I love that. You know, it's Kaizen. We talked about that before. It's not broken. Fix it anyway. There's always something new and interesting out there and I get I get bored quickly, I need to give my my mind something to be stimulated by. So I mean, give an example. What do I do? Well, this morning, I'll just try to think back to that. I'll probably get up at five. Read a document that got released for tender last night. Had a coffee whilst listening to to a podcast this morning. Then went and met my personal trainer with my wife and worked out, did some Wim Hof. Breathing after that and got ready came to work. But typically what I'll do is I'll read three or four or five different publications in the morning. So probably about a half an hour of reading of trying to get up to speed on what's happening in my market, what's happening in our economy, ensuring that I plan my day ahead, schedule my priority so that my schedule doesn't prioritize my time. Because you know, the inboxes start to take over and the phone calls and teams and every other platform under the sun interruptions. Surprise, we haven't had one.

Daniel Franco:

Yeah. The designer. Yeah. So the when Wim Hof breathing says For those who don't know Wim Hof is an absolute freak and probably one of the most well read. Tim Ferriss has a lot of interviews with him. I think Joe Rogan does a lot of fun. He's got books out and whatnot as well. What is the Wim Hof reading? Is that your form of meditation?

Connor O' Rourke:

Yeah, look, I also like some traditional meditation as well, I've found it to work best for me, I think everybody's got their own piece. And meditation can come in many forms from nature walk, but some people like to do even, you know, fire watching and these sort of things. But I like Wim Hof because it's, it's really, it's about centering your breathing, not necessarily quieting your mind, because I always have a real problem to make the mind scale. It's such a hard thing to do. But Wim Hof really helps you I guess with physiologically as well, the guy holds insane amount of world records and things for feats of physical endurance. And he's known as The Iceman. So he's Yeah, I do the ice, cold showers and the breathing technique, and it really helps activate parts of your nervous system that wouldn't be otherwise. And I mean, I think they even injected him with E. coli at one point. And they monitored all his vitals, I had him in a hospital with him hooked up to a whole bunch of different machines. And it didn't impact his immune system. Nice. So I think there's something to be learned in that the guy went through some really, really tough times in the 90s, with the loss of his wife due to mental illness, left with four kids. And he was searching for purpose and found through this sort of breathing. And he's his whole premise is finding comfort in discomfort. And it's really about building that that resilience, and that you start your day with a nice cold shower in the middle of winter, the rest of your day.

Daniel Franco:

Doesn't look so bad. Is that part of your process of keeping your mind fresh? I mean, you're running your business you can you come into work, and you make those sales calls, not that you probably do as much of it anymore, you probably still do it constantly getting knocked back, there's the ups and downs of business. Someone once told me that you can have a, you know, you've made it in business when you have a bad day and a good day in the same day. So how do you keep your mind fresh? How do you keep coming back for more the next day and giving it your all and giving your people leading your people into the next day?

Connor O' Rourke:

What do you do? It's important about recharging to find those things for you. And they're, they're different for everybody. But for me, it's it's it's exercise, it's time spent with my beautiful wife and my daughter, and our little silly dog. It's about going out and having new adventures keeping things fresh, but also switching off from technology. So I make sure that I scheduled time we're actually put the tech away. And I try to be there and be present with my wife and my daughter. Because it's so important, especially with all the notifications coming up on our screens. It's it's so easy to get sucked into those things. I'm sure you watch the social dilemma.

Daniel Franco:

I haven't yet no. Oh my gosh, on water, but I think I know, right? It's been recommended to me 1000 times I have all notifications switched off and yeah, just I yeah, I know the importance of it. Absolutely.

Connor O' Rourke:

It's you know, I've had a LinkedIn for quite some time, but I think I ditch the socials back in 2012 or 2013 just because I found it wasn't given me at The focus I wanted to determine for myself it was either technology platform determining my focus.

Daniel Franco:

Yeah, I agree. How you mentioned your daughter, how has fatherhood changed your life?

Connor O' Rourke:

In such positive ways, you know, you once you've gone through becoming a parent, your parent and it, really everything else seems less important. seems less challenging. But it really gives you a sense of purpose where it, it made me for the first time think about legacy and what I wanted to leave the world for her. And for my future children, hopefully, so. Yeah, I, I it's hard to explain what's the name

Daniel Franco:

ailish. English beautiful.

Connor O' Rourke:

Thank you. So she's, yeah, four years old. Little sass, Queen, but a whiz kid, you know, it's it's taught me about to slow down, I think, you know, when you see your kid playing in the dirt looking at a flower or, you know, fascinated by looking up at the clouds moving in those sort of things. I think it in our fast paced world where everything's going a million miles an hour, it seems to just stop and appreciate the small things in life is so important. My, my grandmother maymay, she's 89 I hope she listens to this. She's down in Florida having to leave the house for about six or seven months because bloody pandemic. She says some I don't buy green bananas. No, I love that saying it's you know, nobody likes the agreement. They're discussing, right? She buys bananas for today, you know, eat them because you never know you're not promised tomorrow. Yeah. And I think if anything I've learned this year is to slow down and appreciate what's happening right now. Because you never know when you're doing your time is up. And I think ultimately, that's what father has really put an exclamation point on for me is that, you know, enjoy, find those moments to enjoy every single day. You know, don't delay that gratification for yourself.

Daniel Franco:

It's hard work. Yeah, absolutely. It's a constant battle. The one thing that I learned when I became a father for the first time was that it was no longer about me absolute Brock and that's the most humbling experience and learning though ever had it literally. I am here to serve right and I've actually learned that that is a really great model a method to use in life but I'm not here for myself. I'm here to serve other people. Yes, I'm here to look after myself and look after my health and and spend time on my own development and growth and set my own goals. Yes. But ultimately it's almost a selfish thing happiness in the the enjoyment of life comes when you're surrounded by other people. That's my belief and introverts are probably screaming at me for something so I'm just conscious of time we are we are approaching that we're from the if not over the hour, Mark. Gabs has given us the nod. You are a big reader and a learner. I don't ask you a few this two questions here in regards to books. The first question I'm going to digress from some of the previous questions. What is one sales book that you were you mentioned fanatical prospecting? And that is brilliant. Anyway, everyone should get onto that. But give us another one. What is one sales book that you would

Connor O' Rourke:

recommend? I can give you one of the anything, a couple that come to mind for me. So how to become a Rainmaker. Rainmaker is a great book, I really like that. And one that I did earlier this year, his book called flip the script by Oren klaff. Yeah, man, the guy's the pitch, gentlemen was good. In hearing his stories, I like to do an audio book cuz I get a little bit more of the experience, I think through and I can do it in my commute time. That's a great one. Absolutely. A couple of the team have picked that up. But I try to flip the script. script. Yeah, yeah. Oren klaff, KL a double.

Daniel Franco:

Right. And so this first was sales. What about personal growth? Well, that one book that's changed your life or one that's you've recommended more,

Connor O' Rourke:

you know, one is often I think you recommend books to people, I think 90% of them probably stay on the shelf and not get picked up. So one that's really easy to read that I just adore. That was fantastic. It can be a confronting read, but a man's search for meaning. Viktor Frankl was one of the best, it's just it's really about, you know, he's the godfather of logotherapy. And I had a background in psych. So I really always liked kind of the tenants of psychology that he explored. And I remember there was an example where he's in his concentration camp in horrible conditions, obviously in World War Two, and was staring in this the bowl of soup or that they call it a bowl but it basically just a runny broth that they get. And that day he had a floating dead fish head in There. And that was he was able to appreciate that it was the most amazing thing. And his wife, I think it had been sent to the gas chambers, all sorts of horrific things have happened in front of him. But it's finding meaning in those challenging things in life. And I think at the moment, we're going through a really tough time in history. And so being able to appreciate what we have when we have it, and being able to apply meaning in situations that might seem meaningless at times, I

Daniel Franco:

think is a is a very challenging skill, but a very rewarding one. Well, it goes to you living in the moment that you spoke of before I love that book, I read it 1000 times is there an element that gets me is when you know, they get transferred from concentration camp to concentration, with different gas chambers, and the way they knew their gas chambers discusses big chimneys, right, exactly. And are remembering it was one part of the book where he wrote, We rocked up to we arrived at a new concentration camp and noticed that there was no chimneys and the bus erupted, which is and when you talk about living in the moment, right. Amongst all that adversity, these people found happiness. I don't know. It's a bit twisted in, in what in the story itself, but it is, yeah, for me, it was an amazing, it's right. It gives you some perspective. Absolutely. Does. I think that's where I was going. Yep. Okay. So we're gonna finish up there, I've got some quickfire questions that we throw our way to, to everyone. I love these questions, because it shows me the way your brain works. So if you could have one superpower, what would it be?

Connor O' Rourke:

Oh, look, it might be lame, but I'd want to fly, fly. You know, the freedom that that gives. I love travel. I like I'm a bit of an adventure seeker. So just being able to fly. I think that would just be such a wonderful way to sometimes just gain a new perspective. Yeah, just talking about before being able to just fly up to 50,000 feet and observe something from a different perspective, I think would be a heck of a lot of fun from a thrill perspective, but also from a, I guess, being able to zoom out from where you sit as a first person sometimes and looking at from an alternative perspective.

Daniel Franco:

brilliants. to bet you'd have to wear if you want to fly out of out of out of space, you need to come up with some ways to breathe. Yeah. Felix Baumgartner guy. If you had one time, if you had a time machine, and you could go anywhere, you had access to a time machine, you could go anywhere, where would you go? I think I'd probably go lots of places. I don't know how much so let's go one. You got what you got? You got one key, you got a key that can take you

Connor O' Rourke:

Okay, maybe I won't. I go back to maybe where my ancestors were a couple 100 years ago to see what they were about. To see kind of always like that theory to, to know where you're going if nowhere you've been away from so I think it'd be interesting to see how well they lived and pretty surprised

Daniel Franco:

with this story be pretty gruesome. I think that's brilliant. Outside of business goals, what's you know, you say you like to travel? What's one of the items on you? What's an item on your bucket list?

Connor O' Rourke:

I'm really I've got a principle I try to live within that seven new country under my belt for every year that I live. It's my favorite thing to do with my wife has been traveling to new places. So when hopefully we returned post vaccine to a world where we can do a lot of international travel again is, is do that. And I look I'm a big sports fan like yourself. So seeing iconic sports events in history. So you know, your Olympics, your Stanley Cups, Your World Cups and different events for different sports. I'd like to go to the Super Bowl One day, the grand final in Australia. They're all things I'd definitely like to do on your bucket list.

Daniel Franco:

Beautiful. And one of my favorite questions of the whole podcast is your father. So you're bound to have a dad joke floating around? Dad jokes.

Connor O' Rourke:

They're all so bad. But it's amazing how you get I started doing dad jokes for I was a dad and you actually get the privilege to say, I'm a dad. I can do that now. But oh, here's one. necessarily jokes. It's a stupid statement. two wrongs don't make a right. But three rights make a left. So thank you for you know, one of our guys. He's got almost like the daily dad joke. He actually said, Hey, Connor, in the new buildings, we're looking for a new facility at the moment with the elevator, we make sure that if it's a cow, I said, Yeah, sure, man. Why is that so that we can raise the stakes? shot to

Daniel Franco:

keep that guy pay rise? Brilliant. Thank you very much. for your time today counter. It's been enlightening. I'm sure for all the ladies out there listening in and potential people looking interested or interested in growing in their sales career. It would be a very enlightening podcast. Where can we find you? How do we get in contact with you? I should say do you want to be contacted as well? Sure. You

Connor O' Rourke:

know I firstly Dan, thanks so much. It's always a pleasure to have a chat with you and it was a privilege. I'm humbled to be here. Welcome to another program today so hopefully your users got something from it. So follow me is really probably LinkedIn is the easiest or go to our website and lago.com.au there's some some ways to access me through there. Or my images is Connor dot O'Rourke at nwaba Comdata. You and yeah, happy to have a chat about anything I can I can help you or your excellent wonderful viewership with.

Daniel Franco:

Beautiful. Thank you very much my It's been an amazing chat. We'll catch you all next time. Cheers. Bye bye.

Synergy IQ:

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