Advertise on podcast: TheInquisitor Podcast with Marcus Cauchi

  Most sales leaders invest in process, technology, and training. Almost none of them invest in the one lever that silently controls all three: the language their people use — out loud and in their own heads. Andy Weins has spent 20+ years in the military as a mass resiliency trainer, built a business from scratch, and studied the neuroscience and psychology of how the words we choose wire our behaviour. In this episode, he and Marcus Cauchi go deep on the specific phrases that signal avoidance, underperformance, and self-sabotage, and the language patterns that drive ownership, execution, and results. If you lead a sales team or run a company, this is not a soft conversation about mindfulness. It is a diagnostic tool. By the end, you will recognise the exact words your team uses when they are not going to close the deal, and you will know what to replace them with. Why This Matters Every sales team has what looks like a pipeline problem, a skills problem, or a market problem. Often it is a language problem in disguise. When your salespeople say "I just wanted to follow up," they are signalling low value before they have even started. When they say "I should call that account," they are parking it indefinitely. When they say "we need more leads," they are frequently deflecting accountability for what they already have. The language your team uses in CRM notes, forecast calls, and customer conversations is data. It tells you who is owning their number and who is performing learned helplessness. This episode gives you the framework to hear that signal clearly. Key Themes and Takeaways 1. Blame, Excuse, and Denial: The Three Default Failure Modes Andy opens with a concept drawn from Brené Brown's work on shame: when there is a gap between what we want and what we have, the brain defaults to one of three responses — blame, excuse, or denial — because they require the least cognitive effort. In sales, this shows up as: Blame: "The prospect went dark." "Marketing isn't generating quality leads." "The economy is tough." Excuse: "I didn't have time to prep." "The deck wasn't ready." Denial: "I didn't really want that account anyway." The correction Andy offers is deceptively simple: ask "Where is my DNA in this?" Even if you are 1% responsible for a poor outcome, claiming that 1% shifts you from passenger to driver. For sales leaders running deal reviews, that question, where is your DNA in this?, is worth installing as a standard. 2. "Just" and "But": The Two Words That Kill Credibility Before You've Started Marcus flags two words that most people use dozens of times a day without realising their cost: "Just" — minimises what follows. "I'm just calling to check in" communicates low value, low confidence, and low intent. Andy's framing: just justifies the nonsense that's about to happen. Train your team to remove it entirely from outreach language. Not "I just wanted to reach out" — "I'm calling because..." "But" — cancels everything before it. "Great work on that proposal, but..." means the compliment is noise. Two conflicting ideas, only one of which is true: the one that comes after but. In coaching conversations with reps, this matters. In customer conversations, it is fatal. These are not stylistic preferences. They are trust and credibility signals that prospects and internal stakeholders pick up subconsciously. 3. The Difference Between a Desire and an Expectation — and Why It Determines Whether You Hit Target Andy draws a sharp distinction that has direct application to how sales leaders manage their teams and how salespeople manage their customers: An expectation is what you want from someone else. It sets you up for resentment, conflict, and passivity — because other people are not here to meet your expectations. A desire is what you want. It is owned. It creates agency, because the question that follows is what are you willing to do to get it? In sales management, the difference sounds like this: Expectation: "My reps should be hitting 80% of quota by Q2." Desire: "I want a team hitting 80% by Q2. What am I prepared to do to coach, structure, and resource them to get there?" The second version puts you back in the problem. That is where leverage lives. 4. "Need" vs "Want": Why Needs Create Victims and Wants Create Agency Drawing on Dan Sullivan's 10x Is Easier Than 2x, Andy argues that needs are a trap. When you say "I need a six-figure salary" or "we need more pipeline," you are constructing a prison: a world where survival is contingent on something outside your control, which justifies inaction when that thing doesn't arrive. Wants work differently. "I want more pipeline" immediately opens the question: what are you willing to do to generate it? The conflict becomes internal — which want is greater, your want for comfort or your want for results? — and internal conflict is where growth happens. For founders: audit the language in your strategy meetings. Count how many times need is used as a reason not to act rather than a prompt to act. It is a reliable indicator of where learned helplessness has taken root. 5. People Talk About Results to Justify Decisions They've Already Made This is one of the episode's sharpest insights, and it maps directly onto how sales forecasts and pipeline reviews get distorted. Andy's framing: the people who get funded on Dragons' Den are the ones who talk about the work — "we will take this influencer, they will post three times a week, that will reduce our customer acquisition cost by X" — not the ones who say "we'll increase sales and grow the business." Watch for this in forecast calls. Reps who say "I'm going to close this at the end of the month" are describing a result. Reps who say "I have a confirmed call with economic buyer on Thursday, legal review is booked for the following week, and we've agreed the commercial terms" are describing work. The second rep knows what they're doing. The first is hoping. Marcus extends this: the work is the reward. Not a soft point — a structural one. Fixating on the number makes you passive. Fixating on the three specific actions that produce the number makes you active. Build your pipeline reviews around activity and methodology, not outcomes, and the outcomes improve. 6. The Six Most Powerful Statements — A Framework for High-Performance Internal Dialogue Andy's framework for replacing avoidance language with accountable language is built on six sentence-starters, used in sequence. For sales leaders, this is a coaching script and a self-assessment tool. I am — Identity. Who are you as a seller, a leader, a professional? This sets the anchor. It also establishes boundaries: I am not going to take that approach is more powerful than I can't or I won't. I can — Capability. Honest inventory of what is within reach. Not everything, but something. What can you actually do? In coaching conversations, this is where excuses go to die. I feel — Emotional data. The body knows before the brain articulates. I feel uncomfortable with this account's timeline is information. Suppressing it is expensive. Andy's recommended construct: I feel [emotion] when [specific behaviour occurs]. Clean, ownable, actionable. I know — Empirical grounding. Not assumption, not interpretation. What do you actually know versus what are you telling yourself? In sales, this is the difference between a forecast based on facts and one based on optimism. I want — Stated desire. Now that you are grounded in reality, what do you actually want? This is where new thinking enters. It plants a direction. I will — Commitment. A contract with yourself. Time-bound, specific, testable. This is where language stops being self-talk and becomes execution. Run your 1:1s through this lens. What do you know about this deal? What do you want to happen? What will you do in the next 48 hours? That is a coaching conversation. 7. Should → Could → Can → Will: The Language Ladder That Turns Avoidance into Action This is Andy's most immediately deployable tool for sales managers dealing with stalled activity, sandbagged pipeline, or reps who are busy without being productive. Should — moralises and parks. "I should call that enterprise account" means it will not happen. It creates guilt without commitment. It is where people store things they have decided not to do. Could — generates options. Crucially, Andy argues that you must start here with unlimited time, money, and resource. No constraints. Let the brain go wide. This is how you break out of small thinking. In team exercises, this is the brainstorm phase. Can — grounds in reality. Take the expanded could list and ask: what can we actually do, given current constraints? You typically get more options than if you'd started with can directly — because could first opens more neural pathways. Will — is the commitment. Specific. Time-bound. Testable. And Andy's observation from hundreds of workshops: the will is almost always a small, basic action that the person had been avoiding simply because they had never written it down. For sales leaders: run this sequence on any stalled deal, underperforming territory, or strategic initiative that has been sitting in should for more than two weeks. It takes fifteen minutes and it moves things. The Four Agreements Applied to Sales Leadership Marcus frames the episode's second half around Don Miguel Ruiz's The Four Agreements and their antithesis — a framework that maps precisely onto how high-performing versus underperforming sales cultures operate: Agreement What it looks like in a strong sales culture What the antithesis looks like in a broken one Be impeccable with your word Forecasts you can trust; commitments that stick CRM noise; happy-ears forecasting; overpromising Don't take anything personally Reps who hear objections as information Reps who go quiet after one rejection Don'

In this episode of The Inquisitor Podcast, Marcus Cauchi and Ryan Burman discuss procurement in B2B sales, buyer psychology, total cost of ownership, and how sales teams can build trust with procurement instead of fighting it. The discussion reframes procurement as a risk management function rather than a price cutting function. Ryan explains that successful sales teams focus less on persuasion and more on aligning with how procurement evaluates suppliers, especially around risk, reliability, and total cost of ownership. This episode is relevant for sales leaders, account executives, and commercial teams working in complex B2B sales environments where procurement plays a key role in decision making. Key Topics Covered * Procurement in B2B sales and how it influences buying decisions * Buyer psychology and how procurement evaluates supplier risk * Total cost of ownership (TCO) vs ROI in procurement decisions * Sales and procurement alignment in enterprise and mid-market deals * How to build trust with procurement teams in B2B selling * Why co-creation improves sales outcomes compared to traditional pitching * Common sales mistakes when dealing with procurement teams * How procurement manages risk, continuity, and supplier reliability Key Takeaways Procurement is focused on risk management Procurement teams prioritise reducing operational and commercial risk, not just lowering costs. Buyer decision making is driven by risk Suppliers are evaluated on whether they reduce uncertainty or introduce it. Total cost of ownership matters more than ROI Procurement considers long-term costs including quality, supply chain stability, and maintenance. Co-creation improves sales success Building solutions with procurement leads to stronger alignment and higher win rates. Trust is the deciding factor Buyers prioritise predictability and reduced internal risk over lowest price. Key Insight for Sales Teams In B2B sales, every deal must satisfy three buyer needs: * Functional, does the solution work * Social, how it impacts internal stakeholders * Emotional, whether it reduces personal and career risk   Ryan Burman is the founder of Pitch to Procure and creator of the First to Pitch methodology. He helps sales and procurement teams improve alignment, negotiation outcomes, and supplier relationships in complex B2B sales environments. Key Quote “The first transaction is not the win. The first transaction is the test of trust. Pass that test and even if you don’t get a deal, you can get a customer for life.” Marcus Cauchi   Ryan Berman | LinkedIn Marcus Cauchi | LinkedIn

What does it actually mean to be a trusted adviser and, how would you know if you were one? Most customer-facing professionals believe they're trusted. Their customers largely disagree. That gap is the problem Rowly Hirst has spent his career trying to solve. Rowly is CEO of Relate.US and the creator of Sandy, a generative AI analyst that measures trust in real time using the Maister-Green-Galford Trust Equation: Credibility + Reliability + Intimacy ÷ Self-Orientation. In this conversation, Marcus and Rowly go deep on what trust actually looks like in practice, why the most popular sales frameworks quietly destroy it, and what it takes to become a genuine ally rather than an accomplice, or worse, an adversary. If you spend your days in complex, high-stakes conversations, this episode is for you. What We Cover Why trust is defined not by what someone says about you, but by what they do when they could stay vague, delay, or protect themselves, and choose not to The difference between an ally, an accomplice, and an adversary in a sales relationship, and the precise moment sellers cross the line Why the word "playbook" is the wrong mental model entirely, and what replaces it A masterclass in trust-building from an AT&T store in Boston: how a $50 sale became a case study in the Trust Equation in action The five operating principles that separate trusted advisers from everyone else How Challenger, BANT, MEDIC, SPIN, and Sandler all fail in the same way under pressure, and what that failure looks like in practice The 55 sub-factors Sandy measures across the four components of the Trust Equation Why gamifying your trust score actually works, and ends up benefiting the customer, not just the seller The 90/30 trust perception gap: why over 90% of sales reps believe they're trusted advisers while only 30% of their customers agree What Sandy has taught Rowly about his own blind spots, including a real example of how he lost an investor in a meeting and what he changed afterwards Why saying "I don't know" is a credibility asset, not a liability How measurement of trust has gone from a $600 human analysis taking a week to a six-cent automated result in under two minutes Gallup's estimate that improving meaningful feedback and trust-building could lift global employee engagement from 20% to 80% — an $8.5 trillion productivity uplift Key Idea from This Episode Trust isn't something you ask for or declare. It's something the other person gifts you, quietly, through their behaviour, especially when risk is on the table. It breaks down not when objections appear, but earlier: when pressure rises and we unconsciously shift from ally to accomplice. The fix isn't a better playbook. It's noticing yourself under pressure and choosing differently. About Rowly Hirst Rowly Hirst is CEO of Relate.us and has over 25 years of experience in consultative sales and account management in financial services. He began developing the thinking behind Relate.us in 2013 after a career taking CEOs and CFOs to meet investors, observing first-hand how poorly the industry measured what actually mattered in high-stakes relationships. Sandy, Relate.us's generative AI trust analyst, is built on the Maister-Green-Galford Trust Equation and measures trust objectively across 55 sub-factors, delivering results in near real-time at a fraction of the cost of traditional survey or human-review methods. Connect with Rowly 🌐 relateUS.com 🔗 LinkedIn: Rowly Hirst Connect with Marcus 🔗 LinkedIn: Marcus Cauchi 🌐 theinquisitorpodcast.com Chapters 0:00 — Introduction & Rowly's background 2:34 — Defining trust as observable behaviour under uncertainty 4:07 — Ally vs accomplice vs adversary 5:28 — Why "playbook" is the wrong model 7:05 — The AT&T store story: trust in a 25-minute sale 9:45 — The five principles of a trusted adviser 12:46 — Where sellers cross the line from ally to accomplice 15:17 — What managers should stop coaching 17:17 — How Challenger, BANT, MEDIC, SPIN & Sandler erode trust 20:09 — What Sandy is and how it works 25:00 — The gamification effect 27:21 — The feedback people push back against most 31:00 — Self-awareness vs self-perception 32:31 — The 90/30 trust perception gap 33:47 — What would tank Marcus's trust score right now 37:50 — How Sandy's coaching evolves across meetings 38:07 — Inside the 55 sub-factors 40:27 — Vulnerability, credibility, and "I don't know" 44:23 — Why proposals fail when the buyer's voice isn't in them 45:34 — The cost of measuring trust: then vs now 47:23 — The $8.5 trillion productivity opportunity 48:24 — Rowly's advice to his 23-year-old self If This Landed Don't rush to agree or disagree. Spend the next few days paying attention. Notice when your curiosity drops. Notice when you try to rescue. And if you catch a moment where trust shifted, in either direction , we would genuinely like to hear what you saw. Stay safe and happy selling.

  The Honest Conversation Nobody Else Is Having Every founder reads the analyst reports. Every sales leader nods along in the conference sessions. Partnerships are the future. Ecosystems are everything. Co-selling is the key to unlocking faster growth, bigger deals, and stickier customers. And yet, ask those same founders and sales leaders whether they're actually banking on partner-sourced revenue to hit their number this quarter, and the answer is almost always the same: no. Why? Because it's never been reliable. Because it's always been treated as a nice-to-have. Because nobody actually knows how to make it work. That's the conversation this episode is built around. Alex Buckles has spent 20 years in enterprise sales, in the SAP ecosystem, the Adobe ecosystem, running and exiting two professional services companies, and figured out early in his career that if he wanted deal flow from partners, he had to earn it. That realisation eventually became Forecastable, a company whose only measure of success is pipeline production through co-sell motions. What You'll Hear in This Episode Why the instinct to hire a partnerships professional first is wrong When a sub-150 person company decides to get serious about partnerships, the first move is almost always to bring in someone with a traditional partnerships background. Alex argues this is the wrong call, not because those people aren't valuable, but because what you actually need at that stage is proof of concept, not infrastructure. A junior AE or an SDR with the right playbook can prove repeatability faster and cheaper than six months of PRM setup and deal registration frameworks. The co-sell door opener and why discovery calls don't cut it The most powerful concept in this episode is what Alex calls the co-sell door opener: a high-value experience you invite the prospect into rather than a pitch you push at them. Think of it like a $5,000 event that the vendor covers, limited seats, relevant to a specific pain, designed to create genuine engagement rather than manufactured urgency. It doesn't feel like a sales motion because, done right, it isn't one. The three types of value anyone ever sells Fix something. Prevent something. Improve something. That's it. And when you're building co-sell plays, Alex argues the fix is almost always the most powerful place to start. If the prospect has a raging toothache, don't pitch them a one-year dental plan. Why 60% of pipeline dies in no decision — and what's really behind it Marcus and Alex dig into something most sales training doesn't touch: buyer safety. Not qualification. Not discovery. The deeper question of whether the person sitting across from you can actually afford, professionally, politically, emotionally, to make this decision. When you ignore that question, you end up with a pipeline full of deals that were never going anywhere, a constipated middle of funnel, and a close rate that would make any CFO reach for the antacids. The second room problem 80 to 90 percent of the sale happens without you in it. The internal conversations, the allocation committees, the corridor conversations between stakeholders, none of that is visible to the vendor. Which means your champion has to carry your story, unedited and unaccompanied, into rooms you'll never see. The question isn't whether your deal is qualified on paper. It's whether every stakeholder in that buying committee would go to bat for you when you're not there. What great partner enablement actually looks like It's not onboarding decks and quarterly business reviews. It's getting in front of the frontline manager with a win story, asking for 15 minutes on their weekly team call, and showing up with something their reps can use in the field that week. Ghost-written outreach. Account development research. Win wires in shared Slack channels. Perpetual mindshare, that's what you're actually after. Demos: mostly a waste of time Alex's take on this is blunt. Once you've given a demo, the buyer has locked in their view of you. You've answered a bunch of curiosities, and they may ghost you. Save the demo for last. Use it to confirm the order, not to create one. If it won't change a stakeholder's decision, don't do it. Three Takeaways You Can Use Tomorrow 1. Start with the interview, not the one-pager. Before you build any co-sell playbook, get the most trusted systems integrator in the room and ask them what makes them different. Real conversations produce better plays than merged marketing decks every time. 2. Know who owns the problem and who owns the outcome — they're almost never the same person. In most organisations, the partnership professional owns the problem but has no budget and limited authority. The sales leader owns the outcome but views partnerships as fluffy. Bridging those two people explicitly — not hoping it happens organically — is what gets deals done. 3. Ask yourself the second room question for every stakeholder. If this person were in a room with their boss right now and you weren't there, would they go to bat for you? If you can't answer yes with confidence, you've got more work to do. About Alex Buckles Alex is the CEO and co-founder of Forecastable, a professional services company that stands up partner programs and co-sell motions that produce measurable pipeline. With a background spanning enterprise sales, the SAP and Adobe ecosystems, and two exited professional services businesses — all built through co-selling — Alex brings a perspective on partnerships that is grounded entirely in what produces revenue, not what looks good on a slide. 🔗 Find Alex on LinkedIn or visit forecastable.com for published pricing and use cases. About The Inquisitor Podcast The Inquisitor is hosted by Marcus Cauchi and is built around one idea: honest, evidence-based conversations about what actually works in sales, go-to-market, and revenue leadership. No posturing. No vanity metrics. Just the real work. If this episode was useful, share it with a founder or sales leader who's talking about partnerships but hasn't yet made them produce. That's who this was made for.  

  If you run a business with a sales team, this episode will make you uncomfortable. That's the point. Marcus Cauchi and Andy Hough have a no-holds-barred conversation about why sales has become distrusted, what's causing it, and what founders and CEOs can actually do to fix it. Andy has spent decades in the field, from Lloyds and Barclays to 16 years at EMC (now Dell), and has since sat through hundreds of hours of sales meetings as a researcher. He knows where the bodies are buried. What we cover in this episode: Why sales has shifted from a relationship-driven profession to a numbers and technology treadmill, and what that's costing you in customer trust, revenue quality, and staff retention. How shareholder pressure flows down through leadership, management, and sellers, and arrives in front of your buyers as inauthenticity, shallow discovery, and unwanted pressure. Why the best sales interactions are built on understanding how your customer makes money, protects margin, and carries risk, and why most sales teams have lost this entirely. The 90-day productivity myth. Research puts it at 3.2 years for a salesperson to hit full stride. Most organisations churn people before they ever get there. Why activity metrics destroy quality, and what the alternative actually looks like in practice. The player-manager trap and why it almost always ends badly for the team, the manager, and ultimately the customer. What sales coaching actually is, and why the gap between what managers think they're doing and what salespeople are experiencing is wider than most leaders realise. Why seller psychological safety is as important as buyer trust, and how the wrong people keep getting promoted. Why your CRM is aligned to your sales process and not your buyer's journey,  and why that single misalignment is costing you deals you didn't even know you lost. The case for sustainable sales: focusing on the 6-to-36 month pipeline where there's no competition, time to build real relationships, and room to become a trusted adviser rather than another vendor chasing a quarterly number. The question this episode leaves every founder and CEO with: Are the systems you've built designed to create trust with customers, or are they quietly destroying it in order to hit this quarter's number? And critically, does anyone in your organisation feel safe enough to tell you? About Andy Hough Andy Hough is co-founder of the Institute of Sales Professionals, a tireless advocate for sales as a profession, and a doctoral researcher studying the adaptability of salespeople and its impact on performance. He lectures at Cranfield University and is part of the Global Sales Science Institute. He has carried a target, led teams, and spent his career trying to return sales to what it was in its best form. A genuinely human, outcome-focused profession. Connect with Andy on LinkedIn or visit the ISP at www.isp.uk.com About Marcus Cauchi Marcus Cauchi is the host of the Inquisitor Podcast and works with founders, CEOs, and sales leaders on decision safety, go-to-market alignment, and building sales organisations that create long-term customer value. He is currently completing a manuscript on the systemic compromises that accumulate inside sales cultures and the cost they carry. Connect with Marcus on LinkedIn If this episode resonated, share it with your CRO, your Head of Sales, or any founder who's wondering why pipeline feels harder than it used to. The answer is probably in this conversation.

In this episode of the Inquisitor Podcast, host Marcus Cauchi  talks with LinkedIn expert Graeme Riley, a platform user since 2004 and business development consultant since 2012, to cut through the noise and get practical about what actually works on LinkedIn. Graeme shares why most people are using LinkedIn wrong, how the platform's algorithm has evolved, and what separates the salespeople who consistently hit their targets from those who burn out in 18 months. Topics covered include: building a LinkedIn strategy tied to revenue goals, curating your ideal client network, optimising your profile for today's audience, the right content mix for dwell time and reshares, the difference between free, premium and Sales Navigator accounts, and why most companies are wasting their investment in the platform. Whether you're a solo entrepreneur or leading a sales team, this episode will challenge your assumptions and give you actionable steps to stop being a well-kept secret. Find Graeme Riley on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/grahamkeithriley/  

Stop leaving money on the table. In this episode, sales historian and author Todd Caponi reveals why traditional negotiation tactics are destroying trust, eroding margins, and creating unsustainable business models. Todd shares the revolutionary Four Levers framework that helped him close a $7.5M deal when the customer demanded 35% off - and they ended up with only 15% discount while paying upfront for three years. What You'll Learn: 🟣Why building trust until the close, then "starting to lie" about pricing is killing your deals 🟣Negotiation Without the Games: Todd Caponi's Four Levers Framework 🟣The 115-year-old concept of "sound basis pricing" that buyers have been demanding since 1910 🟣How the 4x pipeline rule forces reps to waste time on garbage opportunities 🟣Why BANT qualification is outdated and what to do instead 🟣The Four Levers: Volume, Timing of Cash, Length of Commitment, and Timing of Deal 🟣How to stop discounting unilaterally andEducating buyers to squeeze harder 🟣Real data: 20-30% reduction in discounting, 7-8 figure profitability improvements 🟣Why every unasked-for concession (even net 45 vs net 30) signals everything is negotiable Perfect for: Founders, sales leaders, and top performers who want to increase deal values, improve forecast accuracy, and build sustainable pricing models. About Todd Caponi Author of "The Transparency Sale", "The Transparent Sales Leader" and "Four Levers Negotiating," Todd is a longtime sales leader, self confessed transparency nerd, and the only sales history expert who collects artifacts from the 1800s-1900s. His approach has been working for 17+ years across multiple organizations. Get Todd's Book: "Four Levers Negotiating" - https://amzn.to/4jPmjG9 Connect with Todd: 🌐 www.toddcaponi.com 🎙️ The Sales History Podcast https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-sales-history-podcast/id1571354113 LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/toddcaponi/ 💡 Found this valuable? Like, comment, and share with your sales team. 📊 What's your biggest negotiation challenge? Drop it in the comments. #SalesNegotiation #B2BSales #SalesLeadership #Pricing #RevenueGrowth

Most B2B deals don’t end in “no”. They die quietly. No decision. No movement. No momentum. In this episode, Marcus Cauchi speaks with Karl Schmidt,one of the leaders of the research teams that helped 100s of companies take advantage of the insights from The Challenger Sale. Buyers now do most of their thinking before they ever speak to a salesperson. Buying committees have doubled. Information is everywhere. Confidence is not. This conversation explores why traditional sales approaches struggle in this reality, and why the best sellers are no longer pushing solutions. They’re helping buyers make sense of risk, complexity, and internal politics. You’ll hear: • Why decision confidence matters more than solution confidence • The fears that quietly kill deals • How sellers unintentionally strip buyers of agency • Why “no decision” is the real competitor • What framemaking looks like in real sales conversations If you’re a founder, CEO, sales leader, or an aspiring top performer, this episode will change how you think about discovery, deal reviews, and what it really means to help a customer buy. This is not about tactics. It’s about leadership in the buying process. Resources Mentioned: The Framemaking Sale by Karl Schmidt and Brent Adamson: https://amzn.to/4jHYYpU The Challenger Sale https://amzn.to/4qv7w63 Noise by Daniel Kahneman https://amzn.to/4pzcGwr More resources at theframemakingsale.com   Contact Karl:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/karl-schmidt-q/        

Are you settling for "good enough" while your sales organisation invests in an 85% loser rate? In this episode, Marcus Cauchi sits down with David Brock, author of "Is Good Enough Good Enough? Mindsets and Behaviors for Sales Excellence," to challenge the traditional "metrics madness" that keeps founders and sales leaders trapped in cycles of mindless activity. Dave shares his pragmatic, scientific approach to performance, revealing how top performers achieve their goals by being "intelligently lazy" and cutting out the "dead work" that consumes the average workday. They explore the "Three-Pile Strategy" for auditing tasks, the high cost of customer churn, and why personal accountability is the ultimate differentiator between top performers and those who make excuses. A major highlight of this conversation is David’s contrarian take on AI. Having used Claude AI as a "thought partner" and "debate partner" to co-author his book, David explains why AI is a "profound amplifier" that makes deep thinkers better but makes "lazy idiots" fail at scale. Learn how to use discovery-based prompting to internalise strategic ownership and why curiosity remains the foundational behaviour for the next generation of leaders. Key Topics Covered: • The Trap of Activity vs. Outcomes: Why being "busy" is often a mask for underperformance. • The Three-Pile Audit: Examine tasks and reclaiming 40% of your team's capacity. • Retention vs. Acquisition: Why the obsession with new logos is a recipe for wasted effort. • AI as a Debate Partner: Moving beyond automation to elevate your strategic thinking. • The Sacred Habit: Why scheduling 20 minutes of reflection daily is non-negotiable for excellence   Contact David Brock on linkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davebrock/ Email: [email protected] Website: http://partnersinexcellenceblog.com/ Read the book:  https://amzn.to/4brvQku   Contact Marcus https://www.linkedin.com/in/marcuscauchi/  

Why do so many sales teams stumble despite talented hires? In this episode, Peter Wheeler, serial entrepreneur and expert in scaling revenue velocity for early-stage organisations, explores the decline of apprenticeship in modern sales and the impact it has on team performance and long-term growth. We examine why the traditional player-manager model often fails, how role siloing prevents junior staff from learning the ropes, and why leadership needs to move beyond administrative tasks to actively coach and support teams in the field. Peter highlights the systemic dysfunctions caused by shareholder primacy and short-term thinking, including the hidden costs of high sales turnover, conflicting departmental metrics, and the erosion of trust and integrity in organisations. He explains why senior executives, not just salespeople, must engage with customers to understand real-world challenges and make informed strategic decisions. We also discuss practical solutions to restore apprenticeship and learning in sales, including aligning teams around customer outcomes, leveraging AI as a personal coaching tool, and fostering a culture of trust, integrity, and long-term thinking. Listeners will gain insights into how to build high-performing teams, reduce churn, and develop sustainable business growth, even in times of uncertainty or economic turmoil. Whether you’re a founder, sales leader, or executive looking to improve team performance, this episode offers actionable advice, fresh perspectives, and strategies to thrive in a sales environment that too often sacrifices learning for short-term results. Key Takeaways: The hidden costs of high sales turnover and short-termism How role siloing and player-manager models stunt growth and learning Why senior leaders must be actively engaged with customers Strategies for aligning departments and prioritising customer outcomes Leveraging AI for coaching, personal effectiveness, and customer-centric entrepreneurship Thriving through market uncertainty by focusing on what you can control   Contact Peter on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/peterledgrowth/ Contact Marcus https://www.linkedin.com/in/marcuscauchi/ or email [email protected]

For busy leaders who want growth without the burn The bottom line Modern sales is not about hunting trophies. It is about helping customers make good decisions. Sometimes that decision is not you. That is not weakness, it is credibility. If sales feels combative, high churn is the price you are paying. Why this matters Boiler room tactics and hire-fast-fire-faster cultures look productive until you check the retention numbers. Low trust, internal conflict and customers who regret buying are all symptoms of the same thing. You can hit target while quietly eroding the business. That is what going broke on the instalment plan looks like. The rules of sustainable selling 1. Always tell the truth Lies compound. You stop selling and start managing fiction. Everyone loses, including your future self. 2. Serve everybody Service is not closing at all costs. It is pointing people in the right direction, even when that direction leads elsewhere. Referring a bad fit to a competitor can be the most profitable decision you make. 3. Make things easier Remove friction. Psychological, commercial, procedural. Buyers do not need pressure, they need clarity. What leaders should pay attention to Know your Anti-ICP Not every customer is worth having. Some drain time, energy and morale, then leave unhappy anyway. The courage to say no early protects margin and culture. Risk beats reassurance Ken shares how a 30-day performance guarantee removed buyer risk so completely that a physical showroom became unnecessary for 16 years. When risk disappears, hesitation follows. Self-awareness is not optional When a deal derails, the common factor is often the seller’s own reactions, assumptions or emotional immaturity. Sales capability without self-control is a liability. Radical transparency works Glass walls, literal or metaphorical, show customers how you operate when no one is watching. Executive buyers spot theatre instantly. They trust what feels calm, open and boringly consistent. The bigger picture Your job is not to be the hero. It is to help the customer become one. When buyers feel safe, informed and respected, loyalty follows. Sustainable revenue is a by-product, not the goal. Resources mentioned Book: Selling Sustainably: The Ethics of Decision Facilitation by Ken Ward Concepts: The Trust Equation by Charlie Green, Relational Emotive Behavioural Therapy by Dr Albert Ellis Connect: www.educarlabs.com or find Ken Ward on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/kenneth-ward-1761016/        

In this episode, I chat with Tom Stearns, a consultant to CEOs and CROs, about how mentorship helped him redefine and scale his business.   Tom shares how he gained clarity, focused on the right clients, shortened sales cycles, increased deal sizes, and walked away from boring work, all while achieving a four-day workweek. Whether you’re a founder, sales leader, or consultant looking for practical strategies to grow your business and work smarter, Tom’s story offers actionable insights and inspiration.   Contact [email protected] Contact Tom https://www.linkedin.com/in/tomstearns/    

Steve’s journey was marked by sheer graft and some brutal personal blows. His first five years were, in his own words, madness. Eighteen to twenty hour days, six days a week. Then came a messy divorce, COVID and throat cancer. The Founder Dependency Trap Like many founders, Steve found himself in the classic trap. Everyone relied on him to make every decision. He sought help because his sales team was struggling and he realised he needed to learn how to step out of the way so his business could run without him. The Uncomfortable Mentorship: Facing the Tormentor Steve brought in Marcus and very quickly discovered this was not a cosy training course. He describes it as counselling for sales, full of uncomfortable moments, direct questions, and role plays that forced him to confront his own habits. The turning point came when he learned to challenge and filter prospects properly. At first he thought it was rude to push back or walk away. In reality, detaching from the outcome stopped him wasting hours on buyers who were never going to buy. The Measurable Transformation The discomfort paid off. In spades. Efficiency: He went from putting in 100 percent effort to about 25 percent, yet was selling four times as much. Asset Growth: Between 2020 and 2024, while battling both COVID and cancer, the company’s net worth grew from £750k to £2.5m. Profitability: Pre tax profit rose from nearly £200k to just under £500k. Final Win: He closed his career with a £1.7m order. As he puts it, he started selling paper yachts and ended selling a battleship. Personal Return: The negotiation skills he picked up even saved him hundreds of thousands in his divorce settlement. The Outcome: Freedom When he sold in February 2025, Steve felt absolutely floating. The win was not just financial. He had finally proved the business could run without him. If you are a founder trying to build a saleable asset and escape founder dependency, Steve’s story is well worth your time. It is honest, hard won, and full of lessons for anyone walking a similar path.   Contact Steve on Linkedin

Why Trust Breaks Down and What To Do About It In this episode, Marcus talks with Charles Green, one of the genuine heavyweights in the world of trust and commercial relationships. If you lead a mid market scaling tech firm and you suspect your sales or GTM function is underperforming for reasons no dashboard can explain, this conversation will feel uncomfortably accurate. Together they explore how fear, uncertainty, and internal pressure quietly poison performance. Forget the usual talk about activity ratios and pipeline hygiene. This is a candid look at the human drivers behind buyer reluctance, stalling, and ghosting, and why most attempts to “solve” these problems only make them worse. Charlie argues that instead of trying to measure trust, leaders should focus on spotting and removing the behaviours that actively destroy it. If you are grappling with the tension between short term targets and long term customer value, this episode will challenge how you think about leadership, incentives, and your culture. Key Takeaways for Scaling Founders, GTM Leaders and Sales People Trust is lived, not conceptual. It is emotional as much as rational. Charlie draws a clear distinction between thin, institutional trust and thick, personal trust. Trust is often built in moments. Reliability takes repetition, but intimacy is created quickly. How you pause, how you listen, and how you look at someone all matter more than your slide deck. Over promising is lying twice. One promise on the way in, one on the way out. It corrodes trust faster than anything. Fear drives most distrust. Buyers who feel uncertain catastrophise. That is what creates anticipatory buyer remorse and pipeline ghosting. The antidote is to name the fear out loud. Once spoken, it loses power. Repair beats perfection. A relationship that has been broken and then repaired well is often stronger than one that never faced a test. Repair requires vulnerability and accountability, not ego. The Trust Equation and Why Most Firms Focus on the Wrong Bits The Trust Equation helped popularise the components of trustworthiness. Most leaders obsess over credibility and reliability because they are convenient to measure. Charlie explains why they are nowhere near the strongest drivers. Intimacy. By far the biggest factor. It is about making the other person feel safe, understood, and genuinely heard. Nurses top trust rankings for a reason. Low Self Orientation. The second strongest factor. Hard to measure and impossible to bribe into existence. Fear drives self orientation. Freedom from fear frees you to focus on others. Scaling, Money, and the Uncomfortable Truth About Culture Charlie and Marcus tackle why trust based, customer centric selling so often collapses once a company grows beyond 100 or 200 people. Money permeates culture. Investors and boards often prioritise valuation over outcomes. This shifts intent and corrodes trust without anyone noticing. Ideology shapes behaviour. Modern management is built on economic beliefs that favour short term gains and things that are easy to measure. Mixed messages destroy conviction. Telling teams to “do the right thing” while driving absurd stretch targets creates confusion and cynicism. The Bill Green example. When the former Accenture CEO was challenged about incentives conflicting with doing the right thing, he told the room to do the right thing first, then fix the incentives later. That clarity changed the behaviour of forty senior leaders immediately. Practical Trust Based GTM Moves These are the actions Charles Green recommends leaders adopt straight away. Be transparent on price early. Withholding price to “build value” creates anxiety. Give a ballpark early to remove fear. Stop using discounts as currency. It destroys trust. Offer only standard, published discounts such as volume or non profit rates. Protect existing customers first. Expansion and net new wins come after that. Repeat business is far more profitable and far less stressful. Measure Time to Value, not NPS. Buyers rent an outcome. How quickly they reach it tells you more about your trustworthiness than a score. Build your trust muscle. Make many small promises and keep every one of them. It is astonishing how fast this compounds. Model the behaviour you want. Trust others first and show your workings. A simple line such as “I could be wrong, but it seems this is an issue. Is it?” creates space for honesty. Final Thoughts and What Happens Next Trust is built in tiny moments. Charlie encourages listeners to choose two or three insights, write them down, and let them settle into daily practice. Marcus points out that a 0.1 percent daily improvement compounds to roughly 30 percent over a year. The benefits start immediately. Listeners are invitated to join Sellers Anonymous, a community helping salespeople strengthen their trust muscle Subscribe to hear the next episode: Marcus and Charles will dissect how the Trust Equation applies to negotiation, objections, and winning second and third waves of business.   Links to books discussed Adam Smith Wealth of Nations The Theory of Moral Sentiments   Frederick Reichheld The Loyalty Effect   Peter Boghossian How to have impossible conversations Manual for creating atheists   Contacts Connect with Charlie on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/charleshgreen/ Connect with Marcus https://www.linkedin.com/in/marcuscauchi/ And if you'd like to be a guest contact me https://www.linkedin.com/in/suzannecauchi/

In this episode, Jordan Corn and Marcus Cauchi dissect the deeply flawed traditional approach to employee performance evaluation, the "Annual Festival of Fiction". They challenge the idea that reviews serve their intended purpose and share actionable frameworks for leaders to build continuous growth systems, rather than just checking boxes. Key Themes for Leaders and Managers 1. The Broken System: Checking Boxes vs. Driving Growth Traditional performance reviews are often theatre: they replace truth with formality and create anxiety instead of growth. When managers simply mark a three on a scale to avoid justification, they are "checking a box". The problem is systemic: reviews often exist as a paper trail for pay decisions and compliance, not for meaningful reflection or planning. Some reflection is better than none, but if the process isn’t valuable or valued, it won’t change much. 2. Relationships Come First Effective performance management starts with the manager-employee relationship. Reviews fail if the manager is a bully, a micromanager, or insecure. Psychological Safety and Vulnerability: Managers must earn the right to tell the truth by showing vulnerability, asking where staff need help and seeking their advice. Bidirectional Feedback: Feedback should flow in all directions. Employees need to feel safe critiquing management, and managers must be willing to listen without defensiveness. 3. Frequency, Focus, and Continuous Improvement Waiting a year is too long. Annual reviews without ongoing feedback are "like washing once a year". Real performance management is continuous, like adjusting a plane mid-flight. Agile Coaching: Regular micro check-ins: monthly 15–30 minutes or daily three-minute updates keep everyone aligned. Focus on Strengths: Lean into what people do well. Reviews should energise, not dwell on weaknesses. Separate Compensation: Tying pay to reviews is "absolutely inane" and undermines their value. 4. Systemic Issues: Hiring and Alignment Problems often start at recruitment. High turnover results from compromise, or searching for mythical “purple unicorns,” creating systems built to reject rather than select the right fit. Self-Awareness: Reviews can become "behavioral reviews," helping employees understand how they show up and how others respond. Preparation Over Ambush: Managers should prime employees a week in advance and encourage reflection from both sides. The goal is to synchronise reality, not sanitise it. Final Takeaway If you can’t run a review rooted in honesty, psychological safety, and growth - or if you limit them to once a year - Jordan Corn says, "throw the whole thing out". Instead, leaders should redesign the process around the human being first, then fill in whatever is required for compliance. For teams stuck in the "Festival of Fiction," Marcus shares systemic models to "model and scale human judgment" and even measure trust as a hard metric, helping embed learning, dignity, and accountability into management practices.   Connect with Jordan on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/jordan-corn/ Connect with Marcus https://www.linkedin.com/in/marcuscauchi/ And if you'd like to be a guest contact me https://www.linkedin.com/in/suzannecauchi/