Welcome to the Fast Slow Motion podcast, where we teach you how to build a business you love while enjoying your life. I’m your host, Sam Donaghey. Picture this – a consultant wraps up a successful project with a client, and during a routine conversation, they hear about another challenge that the client is facing, and they realize their firm has the perfect solution.

But instead of pitching it, they hesitate. If you own or lead with any kind of service based business, this scenario probably sounds familiar. And today we’re tackling why it’s so important to train delivery teams to turn these moments into seamless internal sales opportunities and how to do it without feeling pushy or awkward or salesy. And there’s no one better to guide us through this than today’s guest.

Barry Thomason. Barry is an exceptional sales advisor who works with Founders and early stage growth companies, and he’s made a significant impact in the fields of sales and marketing throughout his career. And he currently holds the position of Entrepreneur in Residence at the New Venture Accelerator in the Harbert College of Business at Auburn University. And Barry is no stranger to us here at Fast Slow Motion, either, because he also played a pivotal role here in helping to build the company for eight and a half years before retiring in December 2022.

Barry, it’s awesome to have you here again on the show today. Thank you Sam. Always great to be back with the Fast Slow Motion team. Well, 100%. Barry, before we dive into the how, let’s bring this to life to share an example of a delivery team member that you’ve seen successfully drive internal sales. What did they do right?

Yeah, I’ll tell you I’ll give you a composite more than an individual having been, as you said, finished my career at Fast Slow Motion. You know, there’s so many individuals just on that team that are that are great examples. But you know, it’s number one is just awareness. You know, every now and then look up from the work that’s on your plate and pay attention to what’s going on around you is part of it.

And two just, you know, always having that service provider mindset. You’re engaged with a client because they need your help and they may they may need your help in ways they haven’t thought of you at or unaware of. Or you may see something that, based on your experience, needs to be pointed out. And so it’s it’s like a combination of curiosity and being willing to suggest solutions, put some ideas in play, that kind of thing. A lot of it could just be kind of conversational, just as the work ebbs and flows and goes by and you see things you know, see something, say something.

kind of mindset. So, Barry, why should service firms focus on training their delivery teams for internal sales? What makes this such an important strategy, would you say? Well, you know, apart from the training aspect, it’s good business. If you want to try to scale a professional services firm on 100% new clients, you’re probably not going to make it, a healthy professional services firm,

A firm like Fast Slow Motion is probably going to get 70, maybe even 80% of their business from recurring work and existing clients. So it’s, you know, it’s it’s great for the bottom line. And it’s also great for the, for the client too, because you know, you’re you’re in there, you have a relationship. You’re very aware of what goes on, what they’re good at, what they’re not good at.

There’s there’s a lot of positives in that. And that keeps, helps keep the risk low. If I’m really versed in your environment, then I don’t. You know, I’m not having to. I’m not having to guess at things when I write a statement of work. And people don’t realize a lot of times, you know, risk costs money and services firms that are smart, they have to price for risk.

And so we can, you know, we’re working with somebody on a job number two say, you know, we’re already at an advantage from a risk perspective. And so we price more efficiently. So, you mentioned before that internal sales is more of a craft than an art. Can you elaborate on that? You know what what do you mean by that.

Yeah, it’s a funny thing just in the in kind of it’s just in general. Right. People seem to think that sales is somewhere between a genetic trait and witchcraft. And, you know, maybe I’ve heard it many times. You probably have to somebody say, well, such and such person. They were born to sell, they’re a natural seller or that kind of thing.

And, you know, there are personality traits that come into play. But but sales is a craft. There’s nothing magic about it. It’s it’s just a set of practices and processes. And if you work at it, you can get get at least okay at it. Some people surprise themselves and get very good at it. A lot of times I use the analogy of, you know, if you set me on a hillside with a, an easel and a canvas and some paint paintbrush, you just, you know, till we paint the landscape, you know, that requires an artist.

And there is a, there is an innate kind of kind of genetic component to that. And I don’t have oh have it, I don’t have the sense of light and space and scale and shadow and color and all that stuff. So you’re not going to get a very good result. But if you give me a bucket of paint, tell me to paint a house, I can probably do it.

And the more I do it, the better I’ll get at it. Because it’s a craft. It just takes you, just gets you figure out kind of how to do it, figure out some basic steps and just repeat those steps and you’ll get better at it. So that’s that’s kind of how I contrast it to. And it’s a benefit to everybody,

right. Because would you agree with this statement that you’re always selling everything is a negotiation. Definitely. Whether there’s an exchange of money or not. You’re certainly often trying to influence and persuade, which is a it’s a component of sales. So yeah, like it or not. So, there’s a there’s a the common misconception is that sales is dirty or dishonest.

So why do you think people view sales as dishonest. And how can we go about changing that perception in a service based business. Yeah, some some of that. I think it just gets down to folklore. It’s just kind of always been that way. Maybe goes back, you know, hundreds of years when people went to, you know, the early sales people went around selling these tonics and elixirs and things.

It really wasn’t anything but but moonshine in a bottle, you know, and maybe, maybe some of it, some of it comes from that and some of it is, some of it is earned by some companies who who, you know, engage in some shady practices and do some do some different things. But it doesn’t have to be that way.

Sales done right. It’s just another kind of service. You know, at Fast Slow Motion and the some other companies I’ve worked with in the past where we’ve, we’ve taught the professional staff how to sell. That’s where we start the discussion. But if you think about if you call up the sales line, the 1-800 number at some company, somebody answers the phone on the other end, you know, what are they going to say?

How can I help you? That’s service. Right? So you just kind of have to break through the old mindset. And and a lot of it is just by your execution, right? Be honest, be direct. Don’t say yes to everything and be helpful. And you’ll demonstrate to the other folks okay. This this is different. This is different. Yeah I’ve heard that as well.

Cold calling for instance, when you’re calling up somebody else out of the blue, they’re not expecting that right. It’s not it’s not a warm lead. It’s not a hot lead. It’s a cold call. And you almost feel as the caller that you’re stepping on their toes right. You’ve interrupted that day. But if you see yourself as adding true value on that call and you’re providing a service, then you know it’s not going to be the same sort of feeling on the call.

What kind of advice do you have for people who might be in an industry where they might not be adding value as a salesperson? Right. And they are maybe selling something that doesn’t offer true value? Is it time to get out of that situation and find something new, or is there a way around that to try and, you know, become successful?

You know, I think you should always try to bring it back to, you know, how are we both going to win in this transaction? And, you know, if you can’t do that, then maybe maybe you want to think about a different environment for yourself if you don’t want to do that, well maybe that’s just a different problem altogether, right?

You may just be one of those kind of folks like, look, I’m going to go see what I’m going to do, whatever I can to get these deals, close this business and let the chips fall where they may. That’s a, that’s a that’s a different problem that, you know, so my head you have to self-correct that problem or get thrown in jail you know.

Yeah. Yeah. The other I guess. So Barry, many delivery team members hesitate, right? When it comes to sales, they’re often worried about coming off as pushy or the stepping outside their role. How do you help them overcome that mindset? Yeah, the first thing is a lot of the pushy part of sales is in the the area of trying to initiate that first contact and get established with a new prospective client, where you have to persist and you have to work to get in front of somebody.

Well then, if you’re on a delivery team in a professional services environment that doesn’t exist, you’re already inside, right? So that’s the first thing. And then the next thing is, as I said, you want to you want to teach your folks from the outset that, you know, when you’re in sales mode, if you will, you’re still a service provider.

It’s just a different kind of service. You know, you just have to kind of intentionally help the team understand as part of your training process that, you know, this is part of what we do, and this is why we do it this way, and this is why it’s okay. Is it? You know, we’re going to we’re going to point out some things to our clients that we think are opportunities.

We’re going to, you know, ask them, you know, to let us pursue that a little bit with them in some cases. And in other cases, they may ask us to look at something and we may say, you know what? That’s not a good idea. And we might call ourselves a little money in the near term. But again, it’s always we’re approaching it from, look, we’re here to leave this client better off than we found them.

Sometimes that means showing them something they weren’t aware of. Other times it means don’t let it. Don’t let them go over a cliff. Then we’re doing that. And as long as we’re doing that, we’re going to be fine. So that’s always worked for me, like a Fast Slow Motion when we were teaching the team and in other companies, I’ve done the same thing.

Barry, you’ve also said that delivery teams have a unique inside view into a client’s situation. What advantages does the give? Well, number one, they’re just in there, right? So, you know, the first thing is, you know, when you when you’re in a professional services sale, you know, it’s a it’s a risky transaction to start with because at the at the at the point you sign the agreement to do the work, there’s no value conveyed. If you buy a product, if you sign the contract, you get the product, right.

So, you know, if you sign the contract and at some point in time, I’m going to give you a Salesforce or HubSpot implementation, or I’m going to provide you with some kind of consulting or due process. It’s all perspective, right? When you’re on the inside, you’ve got a lot of a better view of what’s going on internally. You know where the client has strengths and weaknesses.

A lot of times that will be in. You may you may be aware of some things like in their technical environment that are dicey that might cause you problems. So they may think they have some process issues that may cause some problems. More often than not, there’s probably what I call peopleware issues that might cause you problems or, you know, like who can, who on the inside can deliver what they say, who comes to meetings and who does their homework and all that kind of stuff.

So, you know, those are those are some things that really help. And then all of that, again, drives towards more efficient pricing because I understand the environment so much more. I don’t have to price in a lot of risk. Just you’re working from it a lot more informed position. And then when it comes to timing, you know, how can delivery teams identify the right moment to introduce new services solutions once they’re inside?

And and how can they do it in a way that feels seamless for the client? Yeah, a lot of it has to do with, you know, you just it’s part of the rhythm of the engagement. So a lot of these things might come up where, where you’re in some kind of a status review meeting or something like that, or you’re review in some work product or some delivery or that kind of thing, and it just kind of naturally kind of falls out of the conversation.

Other times, you know, you might be engaged at work and, and the client just brings you something is kind of outside the project because you’ve been a reliable delivery person. They bring it to you like, hey, you know what you think about this particular thing, you know, like to learn a little bit more about it. So, so a lot of times it presents itself like that when it does it.

And when you’ve just got an idea that you want to bring up, I think the biggest thing is, is don’t bring it up right after you just made a mistake and the client is mad at you and that happens, right? Or if some kind of crisis has erupted inside the client’s organization, that will not have anything to do with you or your work.

Something’s going on. Something bad’s happened. Don’t either. Don’t do it then, right. Just be smart. Use your common sense. You’ll know when it’s time. That’s really good advice. And Barry, you’ve also shared that existing clients are the best environment to try new methods and technologies. You’ve kind of just alluded to that, right? The timing has to be right when you do this.

But why is that? And how can it lower risk for both the firm and the client? Yeah. When you you know, if you think about that, when you’re a service provider and you’re, you’re delivering on an engagement, really all you’re doing is, you know, every day you’ve got a set of promises you’ve made, you’ve got to list of tasks

you’re going to be working on, you know, and every day you deliver some work. So you’re you’re approaching this from the, the perspective of the client’s thinking of you as hey, this person makes promises and this person seems to make promises come true on a regular basis. So if I can trust you and little things and I can trust you in other things or bigger things, right?

So it’s there’s a, there’s a real kind of a behavioral element to it. And so, you know, what happens is like let’s, let’s say you have a client that you’re working on, just a regular Salesforce implementation work, and they come to you and say, hey, we want to we really need to explore this. Some kind of AI agent work with you.

Everybody’s looking at these days. And you may say to yourself, I’ve never really done that before, but to the extent you feel like you can do it, but you got the ability to learn the things you need to learn, and you can deliver for the client. And, you know, you say, go. You go ahead, say, yeah, let’s take a look at that together.

You maybe do a little bit of uncompensated work to kind of get the ball rolling or something like that. But again, as long as you’ve delivered in the past, they would just as soon just have you solve the next problem and not have to do a bunch of thinking and worrying about about it. Contrast that with your brand new relationship with a brand new client.

If they approach you in that setting, they’re going to want to know where else have you done this work? Because I’ve never seen you deliver any work. Right. So the point is there’s there’s so much power you accumulate so much currency if you will, by saying what you’re going to do and then doing what you said you were going to do.

I guess just to close that out on just the risk side, if you’re smart about that, you know, it. It de-risk it for the client because, you know, if you’ve got a good client relationship, you’re you’re going to bend over backwards to keep it. And so, you know, let’s say you’re moving into a new technical area and you haven’t quite figured everything out yet.

You’re going to get it figured out. You’re not going to cause any damage to that client relationship. You’re not going to charge extra for your mistakes or missteps, that kind of thing. You’re going to handle it. And that’s just good relationship management. And Barry, you know, in your experience, what would you say the top challenges are when you’re training delivery teams for internal sales?

Well, the first thing it’s not really that hard to train because you can kind of you can kind of get it down to some to some pretty simple fundamentals, like we said, at the top or at just get your eyes and ears open, ask point things out, you know, be observant. Those got those kind of things. I think where it’s harder is if you’re going to be good at this, it’s a it’s more of a cultural thing.

And so it’s it’s okay. This is and you know, it’s Fast Slow Motion, right. And you get you get trained in sales when you’re a delivery person. And the company I work for before Fast Slow Motion, which was a software engineering firm, we trained every consultant that we hired. And, you know, we had a little, little sales clinic we did for them.

And it all starts with sales as a service. It’s part of our service offering. And it’s it’s expected of you. And then, you know, a lot of technical people kind of have an oh crap moment like nobody told us about that. And then we get we go into, okay, but this is why it’s okay. It’s not what whatever you think sales might have been, this is what it really is, right?

It’s it’s. And then obviously part of your culture is what you will and will tolerate. And then you train it. Okay. We’re not in there to advance our agenda over theirs, we’re in there to help them. We’re in one of the ways we help them. You know, there’s there’s really kind of three levels of service from lowest to highest.

The first level is, your client has a problem. The client kind of has an idea how to solve it. They just need you to do the work. The next the next level is, the client has a problem. They don’t know how to solve it. So they need you to figure out how to solve it. And then the highest level is the client doesn’t know they have a problem or doesn’t know there’s an opportunity at hand.

And if you don’t point it out, they’re not going to know you’re, you know, shedding light on a blind spot. Keeping them from getting run over from behind by a train, right. And if you if you can teach your delivery teams those concepts that this is what we’re talking about it again it’s just a service you’re providing. It’s just a different it’s a little bit different kind.

And we’re not trying to get away with anything. Then you know it becomes okay. And you know, and I found even with very technical people sometimes that can be, very introverted, sometimes shy can get quite good at it once they understand what it’s all about, kind of get, you know, the misconception. I can imagine technical folks being good at, like, thinking through the solutions aspect of it and talking with clients about what the product or the service can do for them. I’d imagine

maybe it gets a little bit more difficult for those folks when it comes to process and closing things like that. Is that fair? Is there anything in that? I have encountered a lot of times where they think that that’s a difficulty and then it becomes a difficulty because they’re afraid of it, but generally, again, if you’re doing a good job, you have so much credibility.

There’s no there’s no magic to closing it. You just tell them how much it’s going to cost. Tell them what you’re going to start, you know, tell them how long it’s going to take. And they go, okay, that’s good, or they’ll come back. Oh, well, we can’t start then or we don’t quite have that budget. Can you rethink it?

Those kinds of things. But you know what? We what we always did at Fast Slow Motion and what I’ve done at some other places is in those situations like, sometimes particularly with newer people coming up through the ranks of Fast Slow, they might get so far as initial scope and fee, and then they may bring me back the delivery team that we bring that back.

So, hey, will you write this up and make it look like something presentable and in some cases, even. Would you review it with the client, with me? You want to have a, you know, a process where you can you can get them some help if they have a rough spot there. But again, I think they’ll find if they tried a little bit, they’ll find out it’s this, this notion of closing is it’s a nonevent.

If you’re doing a good job on the front end, figuring out the solution and making a good offer, it’s easy to close. So, Barry for service firms that are looking to implement this strategy. The one that you’ve spoken about today, what are some of the key steps that they can take to start integrating internal sales into their delivery teams?

Yeah. Again, the first thing is that it starts with that cultural idea. It’s got to be part of what the business does and believes in. The next thing is, is your service delivery better be buttoned up. And if you’re not excellent at service delivery, you need to get excellent at it because that’s really the key, right? If if you can’t deliver on your promises, you’re not going to get the next job.

Those are those are the first two things. And those are you know, for a company like Fast Slow Motion, that’s not a problem, right. That stuff’s all been taken care of improving long ago. So then from there it just becomes, you know, figuring out what your process is going to be and teaching the team and again, teaching the team about the what we mean by sales and get them over those over those misconceptions.

And, you know, again, at Fast Slow Motion and some other places I’ve been, you know, not lengthy trainings, but informal trainings where, you know, you got to get an hour, you know, sales for the for the accidental sell or we sometimes call that or for the non sales person, you just, you know, you give them a couple of simple techniques because a lot of this is very much common sense.

And sometimes as much as anything it’s more about just awareness. Be looking and be listening because the opportunities will come to you. Clients will bring stuff to you if you’re delivering for them. Because I want to. I love your approach. It’s you know, you’re simplifying this stuff, right? You’re not overcomplicating it or overthinking it. You’re trying to simplify it, which actually makes it less scary.

Yeah. I mean, it’s, you know, I mean, I was a regular old sales guy for almost 40 years and, you know, not to sell the profession short, but it’s not rocket science, you know, is there some basic stuff you need to do and that’s it. And you just do it over and over and over again, right. And so yeah, it’s it’s really it particularly selling to an existing client is not hard.

Again, as long as you’re delivering this it’s not a difficult thing to do. Another reason why you want to do it is a professional services firm, right. So it’s a lot cheaper than a big Salesforce out there. It’s a lot less risk. You know, you have less work interruption for your teams, all those kinds of things. So it’s very good business.

So before we wrap up, we always like to ask our guests if there’s a piece of advice or a quote that’s really inspired you along your journey that you’d like to share. Yeah. You know, I was listening to a podcast, a month or so ago, and the guest was Seth Godin, and he really summed up a big part of what we were talking about today.

The misconception of sales and what he said was sales is not hustle. Sales is not pushing something of somebody. A good sales person creates the conditions for somebody to get what they want. They allow them to feel comfortable going ahead. And that’s that’s pretty much it. Barry, it’s been awesome to see you. Thank you so much again for for being on the podcast today.

Thank you, Sam. Always great to be back with you all. Well, that wraps up today’s episode of the Fast Slow Motion podcast. A big thank you to Barry for walking us through how service firms can leverage that delivery teams for internal sales and unlock untapped revenue potential. Remember to subscribe to the podcast on your favorite podcast platform and check out past episodes at fastslowmotion.com/podcast.

And as always, if you have any topics that you’d like to hear more about or questions about what we what we’ve covered in an episode, you can send us your requests and questions to us at fastslowmotion.com/podcastfeedback.