Success is not about crossing some inanimate finish line or sleeping on a big pile of money. To me, success is showing up every day and doing the work that allows you to connect with and enrich the lives of other people.

A personal relationship will sometimes form out of a professional one, but it rarely goes the other way around. Stop telling yourself that lie.

A focus solely on the results (or lack thereof) is highly problematic though because despite what you're desperate to believe, you don't have nearly as much control over those results as you'd like. What you do have control over, however, is the process you undertake to generate those results.

Failure in sales rarely has anything to do with the product or the company. It's got a lot more to do with three things that are imminently within your control.

It seems to me that any salesperson worth a salt that takes real responsibility for their profession knows the fundamentals, as well as how to best deploy them. No #hashtags required.

So what does your body language say about you?

Vacation does so much more than recharge the batteries. It reminds you what is important, and it interrupts the steady stream of noise we navigate daily.

Try something new. Learn something new.

In business, trust is the most valuable currency. What I find ironic is that the misguided efforts to build and keep it are often the very reasons it's lost.

When you have it, you need to heed it. When you don't, you need to seek it. It's the thing that drives you when you don't feel like driving anymore.

What would your organization look like if there was more transparency?

What does it take to succeed? A lot more than a skill set and hard work.

You hear it all the time- selling is a relationship business. But what if you don’t have any relationships? How do you even get started?

If you’re familiar with Mike’s previous work (and if you aren’t, where have you been?), you’ll recognize his straightforward approach developed further. There are also some absolute gems in here that I’ve not seen in writing before.

I realized this week that I’ve fallen into a trap that so many salespeople often do. I hope my mea culpa can be your lesson too…

There is a lot of talk about established (but lazy) salespeople, the value of SDR's, and hunters vs. farmers. Here's something that I think all of those discussions are missing.

Adding an extra day to a business trip is not a vacation. Working remotely from a beach or a golf course is not a vacation. While they are perks of the job, let's stop pretending that they're ideal. Stop convincing yourself that the whole enterprise will fall apart if you're not constantly connected.

You don't need to be or act like anyone else in order to be an effective salesperson. In fact, the most effective seller you can be is you.

When you get the leeway to take more risks and push more envelopes, you begin to break away from the pack. Suddenly, you look around and notice you're doing things a lot differently than your peers. It's like you're on an island. Even though you're there for all the right reasons, you still feel like you're alone.

No matter how you slice it, there is no such thing as a sustainable shortcut. On a long enough timeline, those who do things the right way prevail over people who consistently cut corners.