The Sales Stoic

April 22nd - Work on your self-awareness

4 min

Actionable tips:

  • After each client interaction, jot down what you thought worked well and one thing you could try differently next time. This builds both awareness and adaptability.
  • Set a weekly time to review your goals and see how your actions aligned with them. Adjust your strategy as needed to stay on track and ensure you’re growing in the right direction.

“These are the traits of a rational mind: self-awareness, self-reflection, and self-direction.” - Marcus Aurelius

Marcus Aurelius believed a rational mind thrives on self-awareness, self-reflection, and self-direction.

In sales this means understanding your habits, controlling your reactions, and continuously improving.

Ask yourself daily:

  • What did I learn?
  • What can I improve?

Small insights compound into big growth, so the more you reflect, the sharper you become.

Remember you will die.

Subscribe to The Sales Stoic for daily insights: https://www.dealfront.com/resources/newsletters/the-sales-stoic/

Follow Jack & Zac: Jack: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jack-frimston-5010177b/ Zac: https://www.linkedin.com/in/zac-thompson-33a9a39b/

Connect with We Have a Meeting: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/we-have-a-meeting/ Website: https://www.wehaveameeting.com/

Disclaimer:

The Sales Stoic draws inspiration from the profound wisdom of Stoicism as presented in Ryan Holiday's "The Daily Stoic." As avid readers & fans, we deeply respect the work of Ryan Holiday, and acknowledge the significant impact of Stoic philosophy on our own approach to sales and life.

While The Sales Stoic applies the core principles of Stoicism to the unique challenges and opportunities faced by salespeople, it is an original work with its own distinct voice and focus. We aim to build upon the timeless wisdom of Stoicism to empower sales professionals with practical guidance and actionable insights for success in their careers and personal lives.

  • Jack Frimston

    Jack Frimston

    Co-Founder at We Have a Meeting

  • Zac Thompson

    Zac Thompson

    Co-Founder at We Have a Meeting

Master me. Master mind? No. Mastering self reflection. Mirror, mirror on the wall. Why is this guy here? We don't know at all. Right. And you used to write songs, did you? Yeah, this is a banger. I can see why you don't anymore. Moxurelius, Meditations 11.122. There are the characteristics of the rational soul. No, that's not what he said.

He said these are the characteristics of the rational soul. Self awareness, self examination and self determination. It reaps its own harvest. It succeeds in its own purpose. Good. Do you understand that? Yeah. Okay. Right. So I'd say I'm going to talk about something today that I don't know why more people don't have it. Yeah. Tell me a little note taker in your calls. Yeah. You're on discovery. I know some people have them on cold calls. Well, I think it's a great idea.

Cause what we don't realize is little things sneak in. Suddenly the email objection that you were really good at handling, you've let it slip a few times, disappeared. God, I've let it slip a few times. The deals that you close, it went really well. You're scratching your head thinking, why did they close? those calls were so smooth and they had very clear next steps, but now I can't seem to find my way. Well, having note taker, firefly, otter, whoever it may be in the calls allows you to be able to not only reflect, but be held accountable.

And it was going to point out to you, here's how the call went without all the color that you've just put in it, without all the, I think they really liked me. No, no, AI doesn't care who likes you. It's here to enslave us. What about you, Jack? What are your thoughts on this one? Cause I think you've got quite a lot of big thoughts on this one. I think it's so important. think bringing somebody in the conversation to maybe be an impartial being and give you advice or coach you, but I think self-reflection is so, so important when it comes to coaching. Like call coaching is one of the, if you're a salesperson, you're making cold calls. If you're not doing call coaching, I don't know why. Like you should be doing that with a leader. You should be doing that in a group environment because you actually, you learn, you hear it in the moment. You can say, I can see where I go went wrong there. And that's when you're starting to learn. Okay. Remember it takes lots and lots of reinforcement to learn a new thing, but hearing it.

and then teaching it and then doing it again. That's brilliant. So all of this software, what this software shouldn't be a replacement for though. And I'll give some strong advice because like you said, I've got big thoughts. You shouldn't, that doesn't mean that you should stop taking notes. So I saw somebody on LinkedIn say, well, actually, because I've got these note takers, I don't take notes anymore. The notes that you might need are going to be there later on down the line. Like you can go through, you can get the transcript, you can download that.

pop it into AI, ask it questions. Brilliant. It's amazing. But what you can do is you can start to like really understand it. But what I was saying about note taking, sorry, is you should be taking notes all the way through because actually your written notes, they're the ones you're to come back to in the conversation. You don't want to rely on AI. You don't also want to be typing. You want to be free hand. You just said, what if you just said, think maybe you just said think tank. What's the think tank? Those kinds of things that you're going to delve into a little bit more.

I was in a face to face meeting once, right? And a woman at the end of it said to me, are you sure you're going to be all right with this? taken any notes. It made me, it was the first time, was really early on, but it made me think like, even if, even if you're not going to use them, it's almost like you should be. Yeah, it's disrespectful. It's disrespectful, isn't it? Not to, not to be taking notes. It just shows that you're engaged and interested, but I'm a massive believer in it. Someone actually come one of those ginger lads that you've got no boundaries of and coming onto your house this week.

said to me, you've got, you're such an old mom with a notepad. I know that they're people who like to talk a lot and maybe not listen a lot. So if you watch in grow up, I've been Jack Frimston. I've been Zach Thompson. Remember you would die. No, she's in the house.

More from this series
See more

More series

Exclusive series on demand

Watch anywhere, anytime.