The thing is – it can get cluttered very fast.

The other thing is – sales and project management are two different functions.  

We have thousands of contacts in a sales process and dozens on active projects.  Even when we become fully mature, we’ll only have a few hundred contacts – that would be millions in revenue.

It seems that one system may be trying to be too much of a kludge to do both.  

If anything could it’s Insight.ly.  It’s a Simplifilm client that does both fairly well, but mingling both stacks (and yes, I know there are work arounds) create an environment that may be sub-optimal for both sales and project management.

The problems as I see them:

I’ve used a ton of CRM/project management software.  Simplifilm may have to roll its own. Of the current things on the market:

-37 Signals: Highrise: Weak. You don’t have any task templating functionality, you have to reinvent the wheel or make a kludge.  Also, the emails it sends out are stupid on an iPhone.
heap :Too complicated, weak UI. (They are good in many areas, and if you’re a born tinkerer…go for it).-batchbook old: Feature complete, and bone slow. Not useful because its speed is a heinous insult to all.
-new batchbook - Lacks a ‘task template’ thing.  Needs granular controls.
insight.ly – good, feature complete.  A little ‘messy’ and easy to get buried in tasks.  

Both Insight.ly and (new) Batchbook have some imperfection around user permissions.  They have an ‘all or nothing’ proposition for email access. Meaning: I have to give subordinates either the power to read my emails, or no power to do routine things like set up a todo template.  Batchbook has 3 levels: basic, advanced & owner, but they have no protections for keeping correspondence private amongst founders.

So, if there’s a personnel issue that comes up, and someone doesn’t toggle the ambient ‘forward to CRM,’ it gets lumped in there for all people to see.  Not good.

There may be some type of working out our internal workflow to meet them, and having a formalized ‘sales funnel’ that puts everyone on the same arch, but a problem is that will make things chatty by nature.

Still, it seems that I may be splitting off the sales and p.m. functions.

/navelgazing.

For a long time, I was chasing “money” as in “comfort,” as in, I wanted to ‘get around the corner,’ and have enough.  I have enough now.  I am not yet wealthy, but I could take a summer off and nobody would starve.

Thing is: I thought if I got another $10,000, or $20,000 or $50,000 my life would be forever easier.  It didn’t matter how I got that money, I just had to have it, it was a barrier between me and the kind of success that I was going to have to have someday.  That was important to me.  That’s what I deserved and needed.

But, but, but.  It never worked out that way.  I was so close, a month a way for 8 years.  Then I could quit my job.  Then I could take my place at the 30 under 30 or 40 under 40 dinners.

It never worked.  Because I was the problem.  Had I gotten that money (and I did a couple times) I would have flushed it.  It was already wasted, I wasn’t ready.  And I thought: just a little extra work and I’m there.  Just one more thing falls into place and I’m ready to be rich.

I hadn’t transcended the grind yet. The money wasn’t the problem.  It was a symptom of not knowing what I was doing. Being one or two skills away from transcending and making a real impact.

But if I had gotten a loan or money? Totally wasted.

Now that I don’t need anything?  I don’t need it.

Funny, that.

So, you’d say “I want earn $100,000 in commissions in 12 weeks.”  Then, you back out of it.  ”To do that, I have to sell $750,000 in new sales. That’s $62,500 a week.  To close that much, I must get 12 proposals out each week.  To do that, I must get 25 leads contacted a day.  To do that, I must make 100 cold calls.  To do that I must get to the office by 7am.”

This is a better plan than most, but can you smell the familiar funk of failure?  I can.  This is what I did for years and years.

Here’s what will happen:

-You’ll start strong, go through a day.  You will go through the motions and get your calls made (or sit ups done, or calories, or whatever).  You’ll record this.

-Then, you’ll be exhausted.  And because it doesn’t prioritize, you’ll still feel the paralyzing guilt when you don’t hit your targets.  But maybe the best thing you could be doing was talking to the one guy that could give you 8 sales…

-Then you fail.

-Then you don’t hit any goals because you missed the one that requires you straddle the hamster wheel of destiny.

—

It’s happened before, it’s probably gonna happen again.  And you’ll never, ever, ever catch up once you bury yourself and measure by output.

The right way?  Simple.

Start with one goal.  One thing.  One item a day, maybe at a time.  Forget the rest.  Forget the volume.  Do it.  Do it again.  That’s how you win.  

One thing.

 One easy thing, just to get going.  You’ll not catch up.  You’ll crush your goals. You won’t have the guilt.

And when it’s time to pursue another direction? When that big thing that’s off book is available? You’ll do it.

That’s how winning is done.

Me: “Yes.”

Him: “We’re usually net sixty.”

Me (confused) “OK…”

Him (slower, louder) “So, we’re usually net sixty….” (Pausing.)

Me: “We don’t offer our stuff at those terms.”

Him:  ”We don’t really do this….”

Me (cheerful) “Fair enough, let me let you go- I appreciate the opportunity.”

Him: “What?”

Me: “Well, you only want to do net sixty, we have a no exceptions policy, and it seems you do too.”

Him: “I didn’t say that but you have to throw me a bone.”

Me: “Most of our customers are prepaid – this deposit gets your place in line – listen, I wish you well, but I have to go, either hire us or don’t.”

Him: “We’re obviously going to hire you, but we’ll need you to take net sixty.”

Me: “You’re not going to hire us at net sixty.”  I put the it’s time to go in my voice.

Him: “I don’t understand?  You’re a new vendor, and you’re asking for a lot of money.”

me: “And you’re asking me to lend you mine.  I can’t afford to finance your company.”

Him: “What if we don’t like what you make?”

Me: “Then you don’t like it.”

Him: “That’s not good.”

Me: “Hey, hire us or don’t we do a nice job, we stick to our terms.”

Him: “I have to hire you, but we require net sixty.

Me: “Well, good luck with that.”

Him: “You’re really serious, aren’t you.”

Me: “Yes.  I’m going to assume you won’t hire me, I gave you the best and final offer, and I appreciate your team and [redacted].  I’d love to work with you, but we are only able to work on our terms.”

Him: “Can you give us a discount.”

me: “Yes, I can.  But I won’t.”

Him: “Why not?”

Me: “Because this conversation was a pain in the neck, and if this is the ethos of your company, I’m taking on a lot of risk.”

Him: “So you really won’t do net sixty.”

Me: “I really won’t.”

Him: “OK, we’ll send a check for the deposit.”

Me: “You’ll sign the contract, right?”

Him: “Well, legal may have some questions before we sign the contract, but your deposit is on its way.”

True story.

—

It took me a year or more to get a good handle on that idea. That I owe time to the future, and growth itself is constrained by that . I have always, always been able to sell more work than our team can do. But, when we sell without regards to timing it creates bottlenecks at bad times and increases our risk because we're not delivering in tune.

Each month, I estimate how much we need to do next month and I observe it: did we add or clear time debt? When must the time come due? Keeping this in mind lets us know what we say yes to.

People in your life.

So many projects.

But-  what’s necessary?  What’s moving the ball forward?  What’s noise? Hard telling, always.

Work out to exhaustion.  Plan something.  Rest.  Read something hard.

Stretch.  Inspire someone.  Run.  

All things to do in a good day.  

I wonder what’s necessary as part of a good day?

Here is the very best work I can do in the time I have been given for this project.

I have committed to improving my skills for years to come. I hope that the work that I can do will serve today’s needs. I know my thinking has changed over time and I expect that process to continue.

I release my work to you with pride and gratitude for this opportunity to be of service.  

I will consider your ideas for improving my work or my skills.  I invite you to share your best work with me so we can inspire one another.

…

Since perfectionism has kept me from moving forward – since I used to be fine with “quick and dirty” ( and I’m not fine with that these days)… I must have some sort of answer to my brain in advance.  I have to tell my brain: this is what I can do today, but just wait till later.

I’ll do everything here, and give 10 or so short lessons on sales.

I’m **all in** on podcasting, this is just a place that isn’t designed for traffic or traction.  I have become rusty at presenting, at my schtick and so this will be something like a rehab assignment in the minor leagues.  Once I feel comfortable, my Phase II plans will begin in earnest.

So, that said, I’ll be doing this by the end of business tomorrow with 10 quick lessons  on sales and networking.

I’ll play with levels, pre-production stuff etc.

I’ll put it in iTunes and mess with syndication and yes, it’s only practice.

The Secret types believe that if you “ask and believe” you’ll somehow get stuff.  We know the world works differently.  It’s not enough.  (I.E. having a positive attitude is necessary…though almost never sufficient for success).

You have to really understand what’s actually going on.  The terrain.  You have to get the big picture in a bigger way than everyone else.

Once you do, you can equip yourself to overcome whatever comes up, to make the “normal” stuff trivial.  It’s not negative thinking to predict and plan for obstacles, it’s basic competence. Then you can use “willpower” or energy or whatever against the stuff that comes up by surprise.  Yes, virginia, will encounter obstacles.  It’s an absolute certainty especially when you’re doing something hard.  What we have to do is conserve our efforts towards stuff that’s a real surprise.

What’s the point of failure in a new routine (going to the gym)?  Might be something as simple as “having gym clothes,” or “having a charged iPod.”  So figuring out the way to overcome that (Pack 10 gym bags) is a core part of winning.

We can’t win if we just “want it bad enough,” or “out work everyone else.”  What we have to do is address reality where it lies.