111: Supporting Women In Sales with Natalie Severino

Thank you to our partners, SalesLoft, LeadIQ, and Costello for helping us put this one on. Find all our upcoming events at jbarrows.com slash events. Good afternoon, everybody. This is John Barrows. Make it happen Mondays. Hopefully you had a fantastic weekend. I am very interested in having a discussion I'm about to have because this one is near and dear to my heart. It's been near and dear to my heart, but it's with my daughter being born and everything else and where I see things going. I think this conversation needs to be amplified and I'm excited to have it. So I'd like to introduce everybody to Natalie over at Chorus. Natalie, would you tell everybody what's your background, where you're coming from, what you're doing these days?

Yeah, great to be here. Thanks for having me. I'm Chorus's VP of Marketing, but I like to refer to myself as a marketer with a bias for sales. I started my career out in the field with sales as a marketer calling on customers. And one of the things that it really taught me early on was about caring about what works, what gets the deal over the line, what brings the money in. So typically, my sales leaders love working with me because they know I'm on the right team. And so I feel like I found the right company for me focused on salespeople, which I love. I love it. Yeah, it's funny. You know, my background's marketing. That was my degree. And I think that's why I have a healthy respect for marketing.

But I obviously now come from the sales side of the house. And, you know, when they do work together, sales and marketing can do some incredible things together. It's unfortunate that we're still in a position where there's that divide in a lot of companies where kind of marketing is over here and sales is over here. And they don't really talk to each other. But it sounds like you're doing some fantastic work over Chorus to try to bridge that gap. I always laugh when people bring up the misalignment between sales and marketing. Joe Caprio is my VP of sales. We sit right next to each other. We cut it up all the time. And we're very much part of the same team. And so I just I can't imagine it any other way.

If I don't succeed, he doesn't succeed. If he doesn't succeed, I don't succeed. One team, one dream. Let's get after it. Love it. Love it. Well, let's let's dive into the conversation today because this one, I think this is a little bit more important than sales and marketing alignment and a little bit more and a little bit more important than, you know, any tactics or anything like that that I typically talk about. Right. And it's the whole, you know, women in sales and the culture around sales and diversity and everything like that. And so could you, you know, walk me through your career a little bit, because I know you now head up women in sales, the group. Right. But could you give me just some background of you getting from college into the workforce and that type of stuff?

And now that you've had some experience, like what's been your experience growing up in business as a woman, educated, all that stuff, all the same tools that most of the men have. Right. And now what kind of got you to the point where you started to say, all right, wait, we got to, we got to start having this conversation about this. Could you kind of give me some background? Well, I, I'm really fortunate in that. So I started my career at a little company you might've heard called Intuit. It, it, uh, it actually, uh, was pre IPO when I started, I guess I'm dating myself a bit. It was, uh, the OG startup back in the day. Um, I spent 15 years there and part of the reason why my tenure was so long is, as I mentioned, I was a marketer that was part of, uh, the sales department.

And it's actually interesting coming to today because the, the VP of sales that I worked for was a woman, which was not necessarily so common back then, but she's a badass, um, super smart, really strategic, really knows how to think through how to, uh, move relationships with customers from transactional to strategic building that win-win. And I was really fortunate because she really sponsored me throughout my tenure there. She saw something in me and wanted to find a way to grow it. And I think it's actually one of the topics that, that we've talked about in some of the meetups that there's a big difference between mentorship and sponsorship. Mentorship is, you know, I might give you some time.

We'd go have coffee. We talk about what's going on. A sponsor is somebody that's going to put their political capital on the line for you. She guided my early career in such a profound way. Like she was actually thinking about what kind of experience did I have and what kind of experience was I lacking in order to be on the path to leadership and specifically went out of her way to develop rotational opportunities for me within the company to round out my skills and help me grow. Um, so not only did I get to learn from a really strong woman, I learned how to be a good leader, how to make people feel invested in and really take that forward in, in my career. Um, and so the interesting thing is, you know, getting to the topic of, of today around women in sales, um, we had on our team, the two of our top reps are actually women.

And one of them came to me and had this idea of, you know, like there's no meetups that exist that I can find in San Francisco that are for women in sales. And that feels like it's an unmet need and something that we should try and address. Do you think we could, do you think we could try it? And at first, like it didn't even occur to me that it was something to be concerned with because I had grown up under the strong female leader. Um, but looking at things turned out, she was right. And something that we were, yeah, willing to give a try. Like we want to be a strong member of the sales community and helping to contribute to people's growth and development and help them be successful in their careers.

Like part of what we do is all about that. It's about coaching and development. Um, and so we decided to give it a shot and we're just really stunned by the response that we've had so far, but it, it was interesting how we came to conclusion that it was wanted to. So, so with that, cause I, I mean, we were talking right before we jumped on here, you know, I, I've always considered myself a somewhat empathetic man. You know, I, I've always tried to, you know, look at both sides and I don't mean just women in general, right. Race and all that other stuff too. Um, but the, but then I had my daughter and I, and I, and I started looking at the world in a completely different light just on how men and women were treated and marketed to.

And so kind of woke me up a little bit to that. So I was like, all right, now I feel like I'm more empathetic. Good for me. Um, but then all of a sudden what happens and quick story, you know, was in a lot of people who've listened to this podcast, they've probably seen this, but you know, when drift had their hyper growth conference before that, I was, I was seeing a lot of the bro stuff start to resurface a little bit more than I typically had. And, and I think a lot of it had to do with just social in general, right. With social and people now posting on LinkedIn and stuff like that. Usually the loudest voice gets the most attention, whether it's good or bad. And so, and inevitably it was some dude, Hey, what's up?

Hit the gong. I'm hitting the gym at five o'clock in the morning, you know, that type of stuff. And so, all right, whatever. But I just started seeing it creep more and more. And then I went to the drift conference and, uh, hyper growth and Grant Cardone got up there and I love Grant Cardone in general, just in the sales community itself. I think he's everything that's wrong about selling in my opinion. Um, but because I respect drift so much and Armin and the, and DC over there, I kind of decided to give him a chance and, you know, I'm like, you know what, I've only seen some small stuff of his, so I've never actually gone to one of his shows or anything like that. So whatever. So because of my respect for drift, I decided to give him a chance.

And I remember sitting there and he did his, he did exactly what he was, you know, said he was what I thought I hit the list and he did this whole stuff. And I was like, whatever, but I was standing there in the back. And I remember Trish Bertuzzi came up right next to me, like middle way through his conversation. And she's like, how's he doing? I'm like, he's exactly what I thought he was, but whatever. And then he started talking about his wife and, and now mind you, we're at a tech conference in Boston, pretty liberal. And it was on election day, as a matter of fact. So it was actually last year on election day. So, you know, and he's dropping Trump's name, but whatever, you know, fine. And then all, but then all of a sudden he says, like, literally he says to his wife, Hey, honey, stand up.

And he starts saying, Hey, look at that. That's mine. Right. You know, and talking to him about her as it, that, mine and all those types of things. And then saying some of the things he was going to do to her on his private jet on the way out. And I, I'm rarely speechless. Okay. Rarely. Um, I, and I remember Trish just like smacks me across the chest and she's like, are you listening to this right now? I'm like, I don't know. I can't imagine this is actually happening. Right. And that, that was kind of the feel of the crowd too. There was a very awkward feel of the crowd. And I was expecting people to leave in droves being like disgusted with what he was saying, but there was, there was obviously a crowd mentality there because the setup was weird.

It was stadium seating. So if you left, like you had to get up and kind of cut out everybody. So it was going to be obvious that you were leaving because you were disgusted. Right. So I think that's what held a lot of people back from kind of standing out, if you will. And so from there, I ended up, you know, just getting on LinkedIn and lighten off about it. I was like, all right, guys, cut the shit. Like we have to stop this. And we're alienating like a massive population that is, does nothing but bring value to what we do as an order as, as a culture and as, you know, as a sales community here. And it was by far and away the most popular post I've ever done on LinkedIn. I got like hundreds of thousands of views.

I got like three, 4,000 comments on it. And what kind of, we had talked about is it really uncovered what was, what was underneath what I think a lot of us quote unquote empathetic men thought wasn't that bad anymore. You know what I mean? And, and so we drive, it ended up being me, Trish Bertuzzi, Lori Richardson and Casey Jones. And we did this, it was called, we need to talk webinar. And we put out a survey to everybody and said, Hey, could you fill out? And this is anonymous survey. Give us a question you want to ask that you're afraid to ask in your current work environment. Give us a scenario that you faced that you had a hard time dealing with and give us a potential solution that you've seen apply.

That's made a difference. And when I say, when we got this feedback, I almost cried because it was so many examples of so many different things that, that again, not the necessarily overt sexist, like, I mean, when that happens, I don't think there's a tolerance for it anymore. And if there is, then you should leave that company. Right. But it's all the little systemic things that come up. And so I guess my question to you, as it relates to this topic in general is, I think there are a lot of well-meaning men out there that, that don't want to alienate women, but that do, right. I look back at me as, as a vice president of sales when I had six, I only had six or seven reps reporting to me and I, and I had a few women on my team and I always thought, Hey, you know, totally everybody, whatever, but I almost guarantee there was some things that I did as a manager that alienated.

And because I was a nice guy, the woman on the team didn't really want to say anything because in, in general, I'm pretty good, but you know, that, so whatever, but I know that I did some stuff that, that probably alienated some people. So I guess my question for you is this, is how, how do we, how do we uncover that without being accusatory, without being different? You know what I mean? As a, from a woman's standpoint, like, how do you speak up without being labeled? Um, and also without, uh, like coming out of somebody like me, who again, has the perception that I'm, I'm empathetic and I don't mean that whatever, but in reality, there's some stuff that, that, that happens that I need to learn about.

So what are your thoughts around that? I think that these are, these are real things that women, especially in sales are dealing with all the time, but some of them even in other types of roles, but as we've, as we've done some of these meetups, like some of the things that have come up as an example is feeling like they're always called on to be the team mom that I'm sure that nobody is doing anything purposefully, right? Like picking on, uh, picking on you because you're a woman to take the notes or to arrange the meeting or to arrange the catering. But it feels like that's probably coming from a place of unconscious bias. Like, why aren't you asking one of the men on the team or are you round robining that?

And how does the woman actually bring that up and not come across as being shrill about it or not being a team player? I think that that's a real concern that people have talked about in, in the meetups when we've done it. And it's everything from that to, geez, I'm one of the top performers and yet I keep getting passed over for the promotion. How do I get my due? How do I, how do I, uh, how do I roll my shoulders back and ask for what I deserve and not just be labeled as an aggressive bitch because I feel like I'm asking for the things that I've earned. These are the conversations that women want to have and work through as part of a community. And I think, you know, every situation is going to be different.

Um, I think that you've got to, you've got to be kind of honest about the way that you're feeling about it, but in a way where you can bring people over to your side and, and not come across as a shrew, which is a, it's, it's a tightrope, right? Oh, it's a total tightrope because I mean, I look at it for me, you know, I, and, and that's, this is why, by the way, I was, I was very uncomfortable being kind of one leading this, this panel discussion. Cause I'm like, who am I? I'm a, I'm a middle-aged white guy who's never been discriminated against in my life. And I've actually been encouraged by most of that aggressive behavior. Right. So like, for me, like me speaking my mind and being very direct and in your face and hard charging and all that other stuff, I've been praised for that my entire life.

Whereas if a woman were to do that, to your point, she's called a bitch. She's called, you know, all these different things. And it's like, so, you know, I guess, how would you, let me ask you this to be like, I guess, tactical in the, in nature. Say you do have a male leader. Okay. Who for the majority, for the most part is, is pretty, a pretty good guy, if you will. And, but, but has done something that has made you, so say, and let's, let's play this role out here, right? Say I, say I'm your boss, if you will, you're on my team and I've done something, whether it's like, you know, I've said something in a meeting or I've done something that has made you feel uncomfortable and like I'm, like I'm, you know, putting you in a box or whatever it might be.

Okay. How would you approach me? Well, of course, uh, I always feel like it's better to have a one-to-one conversation versus doing something publicly. I think that that's really important when you're trying to build a productive and trusting relationship with someone, whether it's your boss or it's a peer in a situation like that. I think that it's, you have to relate it back to, you have to not, not assume bad intent and relate it back to your feelings. And so like, let's say we're talking about the, the team mom situation where a woman feels like she's always being asked to be the note taker. What I would probably do is take that person aside and say, Hey, I'm sure you don't mean anything by this, but I feel like you always ask me to take the notes and I can't help but wonder if it's because I'm the woman on the team.

And I wonder if we could share that responsibility across with other folks. I'm like, I think that if I approach someone like you with that kind of, um, transparency, transparency, but in a non-aggressive, non-accusatory way, you'd be like, Oh shit, I didn't mean to do that. Is that the way I made you feel like definitely we should do better. And I've actually done that before in the past and, and had it go okay. Well, and I think you, you hit on something that's important is the, as, and I know this shouldn't be the burden of, of the woman versus the man, but unfortunately it has to be is, is assume, don't assume bad intent. Right. And, and it presented that way. Now, if it gets taken like the wrong way, now, you know what you're dealing with, but give, I think that's where that, that's where I look to is like, Hey, to your point, like, holy shit, I didn't even think of that.

My, my bad. You know what I mean? I'm sorry. It's a learning lesson for me. Um, but I think that's where, you know, if you approach somebody the right way, you take them aside and say, Hey, let me paint this scenario for you and get your feedback on it and tell you how I feel about it. And then see if we can do something about it again. It really shouldn't be on, on, on, uh, the woman to have to do that. But I think that's kind of where we are right now with the, with the, with the non overtly sexist man, you know what I mean? Like with the person that, that could, that could, and should be an advocate for women and potentially could be a sponsor for, for women to help them go through their careers, you know, depending on where they are.

Um, but, uh, but I think that the, the, don't assume bad intent to start and then, but base your next steps on their reaction to that. Right. Right. So I, uh, I try and always approach things of trust until proven otherwise. And, and then, you know, and you like, it's so dangerous to, to make assumptions about where somebody is coming from, whether it's something, I mean, the more egregious things I think we know, but, um, something like that, I think is probably less, uh, less intentional. But again, if it's coming from a place of unconscious bias, they may not even know that they're doing it and making you feel that way. And they're not going to, unless you have the courage to say and talk about what you need.

What can guys, what can guys do on the team? Uh, so say there's some, some men listening to this who are on a team. They have, you know, out of the 10 reps on the team, two of them are women. Um, and, and is there things that, that we can look for that, that kind of show like that we might not know about, you know what I mean? Is there something that we can look for to say, shit, I need to, I need to now be an advocate for somebody who might not be speaking up for themselves. And, and, and by the way, is that, is that even appropriate? Right. Like, so, so say I, I'm on a team and I can tell that I have a couple of women who are getting talked over during meetings. They're, you know, they're maybe not getting the opportunities and you can tell they're, they're, they're pulling themselves back from team events because it's maybe at the sports bar or something like that.

A, what can I look for? And B, what should I do? Um, I think that, um, I, I think that there are a lot of men that are allies. We've actually had men come to these meetups, um, both to support and to learn, which has been awesome to see. Um, I think that there's a variety of things. Like if there's a woman on the team that is having a hard time getting a word in edgewise, ask her for her opinion. If you witness one of your colleagues mansplaining, joke about, joke about the mansplaining, like, Oh, I'm sure she really needed you to explain that, John. Maybe why don't you ask her what her opinion is about that? I mean, it can be non-threatening and it can be funny. And I think that, um, when women are in that situation, it actually just lightens everything and it makes them feel valued to know that somebody actually cares when they observe something like that happening.

What do you see as the benefit? So, I mean, there's plenty of studies and you probably know, I mean, I've heard about them. I don't know the statistics, but diversity in the workforce, right? And not just men and women, but people of color and all different experiences. Um, I mean, there's plenty of stats that talk about how those teams that, that promote inclusion, if you will, of multiple different opinions coming from multiple different facets are far more successful in, um, uh, in sales and business and everything else. So what are some of the things that you, you're, you've done or you've seen done to help foster the inclusion environment, if you will. Uh, so, you know, so we can excel as, as organizations and as sales teams.

You know, it was really interesting, uh, you know, hearkening back to my Intuit days. I actually went to a diversity training and this was more than 10 years ago that, uh, it was actually talking about diversity is not race, gender, sexual orientation. One of the most important ones is diversity of thought and experiences. Um, because if you actually want to create a culture about seeking the best, seeking the best ideas, seeking the best solutions to problems, um, really being successful. If you surround yourself with people that think exactly the same way that you do, nobody's ever going to challenge you. Nobody's ever going to push you to think differently or to, you know, challenge your assumptions.

And I've, I've seen it go both ways. Like we, after kind of going through that, we specifically went down a path to look for people with diverse experiences, um, in addition to, you know, whether it was cultural or educational or work experience, but to try and get that diversity onto the team. Um, and then on the flip side, I had an experience where I worked for somebody that only wanted to hire people that went to his alma mater. And it's like, how is that ever going to help us? Like, I get that there's respect because you went there and it's good program and smart people go there and, you know, there may be benefits, but if everybody thinks exactly the same way, where are we going to get at the end of the day?

And, um, and so, you know, I think the reality is at least in the data that we've looked at through like some of our customer data is that, um, women, there's far fewer of them, but they tend to have higher win rates and higher ACVs. So they're doing something right. And so what a part of my message would be, if you're not paying attention to how are they handling that objection or how are they approaching that discovery conversation or what are they doing in the, in the negotiation that maybe is different from the way that you approach it, you're probably missing out on something that could help you do better. Um, cause I do think that there's a bit of a survival of the fittest with women in sales in some way.

And so the ones that are killing it are killing it for a reason. And you should try and learn from everyone around you that's successful. Yeah. I mean, I think the one thing that is definitely clear to me, and I think why, why, why I see a lot of women be more, you know, ultimately more successful, uh, and at the top of that leaderboard is, is what I think you need most in sales, which is empathy, right? And, and a genuine care and understanding for the person who's sitting across the table from you. And I think too many of us as, as men, like we lack that empathy because again, it's a competition and it's a, Hey, you know, let's, let's win this type of thing where in sales, it's not about winning, right?

It's a, well, yes, it's about, it's about winning, but winning the right way and winning so that, so that both people come out of it feeling like this is, Hey, this is going to be a good relationship moving forward here. Um, and I think a lot of the, the, the historic sales culture has been, hasn't been about that. You know, it's been about when it's been about close the deal, hit your number, hit the gong, all that stuff, which doesn't really facilitate a collaborative environment or empathy in any way, shape or form. Um, one of the things that's, uh, that's also been interesting for me as I've been, uh, doing some work with, uh, Dr. Howard Dover from UTD. Do you know him? You know him he's, uh, so university of Texas at Dallas actually has a professional sales program as part of their degree program.

And so he's running classes, like how to do good prospecting, how to, uh, like his students actually carry a quota. Nice. So it's not just, it's not just book learning. They're carrying a quota. They're using real technology. They're using Salesforce. They're using zoom. They're using chorus. They're using different things. And, um, one of the things that he's teaching them at this point in their career before they learn bad behaviors is how do you earn the right to ask for the business? Are you being a good, you know, are you actually helping people solve a real business problem? Because in B2B sales, it's not about the transaction. Like you could close that deal, but if you didn't actually sell them something that is going to help them, that's going to turn.

How's that going to look on you whenever the term is up? And, and so the one that like the people that form great relationships with their customers is because of what you said, they're investing the time to understand the real problems that they're trying to achieve and aligning products and services that they have to solve those problems and being okay with walking away. If they're not the best solution, you'll have another chance to sell them down the line, whether it's another product that you come out with or you have another company. But if you sell them something that's a bad fit, they're probably going to remember you for that. Well, yeah. And now with all the reviews and, you know, such a, a small world that we're living in, you know, you do that one too many times and you're going to have a hard time building a business or a, or a career in general.

You know, I was just talking to a few friends where it was like, you know, transparency right now is it's, it's not necessarily, uh, even something. It's not even an option at this point, right? Because if you are that, that pushy or that company that's selling something that really doesn't work and it's, you know, whatever those reviews are going to come, people are going to talk about it and there's, and, and you'll fail period. Uh, the, the age of kind of opening up the covers here and being vulnerable about what the situation is and, and what you're good at, I mean, really highlighting what you're good at and being open about what you're not good at. I mean, I tell reps all the time, like you, I actually disqualify people far more than I qualify at this point.

Like I'm trying to find all the reasons why you shouldn't do business with me. Right. Because you're going to find those out eventually. I might as well get those out of the way up front. And, and, but search for that company that is really that right fit for what you do. Because when that happens, first of all, the sales a lot easier. And second of all, those become the best customers. Um, you know, anybody. Well, and you're, sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt. I was just going to say, you're ultimately going to be more successful too, because the faster you DQ somebody out, the more time you're going to have to focus on the good fits. A hundred percent. Right. So it's, it's just as important to DQ out as it is to DQ somebody in.

Yeah. And, and, and, and I think a lot of, uh, challenges that people face when starting a company or, you know, trying to grow a company is they'll, they'll almost take revenue from anybody, right? It's like almost anybody who will give you money. Yay. Cause I need the money, right? We need the money to pay the bills and that type of stuff. But you take bad money, you take bad customers. And that tends to take away from the real good customers and the customer success and the resources and everything else. So it's this kind of self-fulfilling, like, yeah, you're taking money and you're, you're, you're barely treading water here and you're probably going to be treading water for quite a long time versus deferring some of that bad money and not so good customers and really hyper-focusing on the ones that matter.

Um, because then once you have that foundation, you can build off of that. And, and I think it takes a, I'm, I'm encouraged to see that, uh, more universities are teaching sales as an actual profession and something that, uh, that I'm personally excited about. Uh, you know, a lot of people have been asking me like, John, when are you going to write a book? Right. And, uh, you know, what am I going to write? So, um, that hasn't already been written before, but I decided to write a book, uh, but it's not the book everybody else is thinking, right. It's, uh, it's a, it's a children's book and it's called, I actually have a copy of it right here. It's, uh, I want to be in sales when I grow up. I love it.

And it's, nobody says that, you know what I mean? Nobody says, and so the idea here is if you get into sales early and treat it as a real profession, as opposed to the default profession and educate yourselves and go to psychology classes, like learn how to understand people and then apply some business sense to it, right. You could actually be extraordinarily successful coming out of high school, right. And also a lot more flexible as far as your career is concerned, because you can kind of go sell anything. Uh, and then the other major point of it is, is also to get more women into sales. So this is my daughter, uh, and it kind of follows her path of learning how to sell Girl Scout cookies.

And, um, um, because I just think, um, so you've seen those blog posts like that basically led to this. And the idea there is, cause I, I fundamentally, you know, every woman I've ever had on my team has been extraordinarily successful. And I, and I, and I do believe that the, the, the, the diversity of a team is, is what makes it great. And so I want to see if hopefully, uh, we can kind of break some of the stereotypes about sales and the hard hitting and the, you know, all the sports analogies that everybody uses and turn it into an actual profession, you know what I mean? Uh, that, that, that you can look at and see yourself in, um, at an earlier age than, Hey, I just spent $300,000 on an education.

Now I got a $40,000 a year job that I don't like. And so may, might as well get into sales. You know what I mean? Like that's exactly, that's like 80% of how salespeople end up being salespeople is I can't afford to pay my bills and, uh, I don't like what I went to school for. So low barrier of entry. Let me get into sales and see what I can do. Right. Yeah. When I, uh, I went down to Dallas and I was with, and five of the students, uh, most of which were girls, the ones that I talked to, they were kind of top. And one of the consistent things that they said to me was, we believe that sales is a noble profession. We're helping our customers solve problems. We're not slick used car salesmen. And that's what people think.

And we want to change the perception of what sales is. And we want to do it the right way. And we're happy that we're learning it in school. And I'm like, damn, I can't wait to hire you. Right. Oh my God. I can't, I mean, I can't imagine if, especially for the, universities that actually make it a quota carrying thing where they actually have to sell. And it's not just this theory sitting in a classroom talking about, oh, sales and whatever. Um, man, I would hire that kid in a heartbeat, you know, coming out of sales or coming out of university, because usually you have to, you know, get that kid who doesn't have the degree and teach them. Um, and, you know, and I think the stats are still pretty crazy that 50 to 60% of the people that actually get into sales, get out because, because they either either don't get the right training.

It's, they don't feel it's for them. They don't get supported by their organization. And I think a massive portion of that 50 to 60% could be successful if given the right guidance and tools and, and, and, you know, and structure around it. But it's just, you know, it's funny to me that it's the number one profession on the planet, but yet none of us are actually formally taught how to do it. You know, it drives every single thing that every business does, every decision they make, every hiring decision, every investment decision, every strategy, but yet we're the least educated in what we do. Yeah, totally. So. I'm so happy to see that somebody is trying to change that. And, and actually, um, there was a conference in June that were for educators in the sales space and more is happening there.

And I think, I think that we're going to start to see that become more of a thing, which is just awesome. Teach them how, show them how, um, cause you're right. People fall into sales because it's the only job they can get and they have no idea if it aligns to what they're good at or what they're passionate about and how to actually be successful. And that's what, what they all ultimately want coming out. Can, so how would you, let's talk about this. So let's talk about the college thing. Cause I think a lot, I think I've heard some sort of stat or whatever somebody threw out there that, that women don't even consider a job in sales because of the perception of it, right? Like, even if they're thinking, uh, I don't like what I'm doing right now, maybe, you know, I could do something else.

They literally discard sales from the gate because they're like, yeah, no, you know, I, I, the perception is negative for me. So being, being a woman coming out of college and sitting in that position of, you know, I don't think I want to do what I'm doing right now. And, and maybe how would you guide somebody to, to, to, to, I guess, look at sales as a career and, and figure out whether it's for them or not. You know what I mean? From, from, from a woman's standpoint. I think, you know, quite honestly, I wasn't sure what I wanted to do at first. And, and I had a couple of different roles in the early days. And then I got into this, uh, thing about, um, rotational assignments. So I could kind of figure that out and round out my skills.

And some of that came from just having both the opportunity to try some things and the opportunity to talk to somebody that was successful in their career that I, I looked up to and find out what their journey was like and what brought them to it and, and why they felt like it was a, um, why they felt like it was a fit for them. And so I think, I think look for these groups, like, you know, the work that Lauren Bailey is doing around, um, girls club and rise up is great. Um, trying to help, uh, women in sales become leaders and teaching them how to be leaders. Um, I think, you know, you look for, you look for somebody and you just have some honest conversations. Like, how did you get here and why are you still doing it?

And why does that feel like a good fit? And what is, what is your day, week, month, year look like? What are the pressures? Cause we all know, sales is hard work. Yeah. It is like, there's so many stereotypes about, oh, we're off at the golf course and we're doing, you know, we're drinking in the bar and, you know, all of this stuff. But the reality is, is it's, it's hard work. And the ones that, you know, are the most successful are putting in the time and the effort to prospect, to learn about their customers, understand their business. They're reading their financial statements. They're learning about their org structure. They're figuring out how they can be a contributor to that company's business and their success.

And, you know, if people understand that going recently, I taught some folks on our, on our business development team about what a 10 Q was and why you would read one when you're trying to prospect into an account and all the things that it can teach you and tell you. And it was like, oh, I never even heard of that. What is it? And yeah. How would I use it? Um, there's just, I think for so long, the sales, a little bit of smoke mirrors and magic. Yeah. And, and I get it. And the reality is, is that there's some process and there's some like science that goes with the magic and the art. And the more that we can expose that and help people understand it, the more that they'll be able to evaluate whether it's a good fit for them.

Yeah. It's funny. I talk about that all the time. I say that, you know, science art, um, uh, obviously sales is both. It's a science and an art, but I actually believe it should be way more science than art, right? Because the structure, the process that we put in place and it allows the art form to be more effective. You know, I almost kind of go by, uh, you know, I always say for me, I went to school, my first major was art. Um, I realized very quickly I wasn't, I wasn't going to be good at it or make any money at it. So I got, uh, so I got into business, but you know, Picasso is my favorite artist. Um, and look, I'll never be Picasso, right? I've never be Picasso, but you give me a paint by numbers and you tell me to put yellow there, red there, and then let me mix it to make my own flavor of it.

I'll come pretty damn close. You know what I mean? And so it's kind of like, I don't know if you ever, have you ever done those like paint night things like date night, paint night, right? Where there's an artist. It's funny because my wife, right? She's a scientist. She's a environmental scientist. So, and her, she's about as far away from an artist as you can get, right? I mean, she has a hard time drawing stick figures. And so, you know, we go to these things and, you know, there's a Monet up there and she's looking at it like, are you on your mind? Like, there's no way I'm going to be able to paint that. I'm even looking at that Monet going, shit. I don't know if I can get there, right? But what does the instructor do?

The instructor sits there and says, all right, everybody grab your paintbrush number three, dip it in yellow, paint the top corner yellow, right? Now take paintbrush number two and paint the bottom blue and then take it and swirl this and do that and do this. And at the end, everybody's painting kind of looks like the Monet, right? And everybody's got their own flavor and some are better than others. But I think that that process that you talk about, that structure gives people a little bit more comfortable, like confidence that it's not about just having it. You know, I actually think that there's less than 5% of our population in sales that just have it in the sense that, you know, they know the questions they ask.

They know how to manage their time, where to focus, how to relate to people. Like my uncle's one of them. He lives out in California. You know, he literally, if he walks into a room, there's almost like an aura around him, right? And people gravitate towards him and he relates to them almost effortlessly. And whatever he's selling, you're buying it. Because it's just, and he's not doing it cheesy, genuine everything about him is, right? Like, I literally think that's about less than 5% of our population. Like, I don't have that ability. You know, I have to really work my ass off in sales and do all the little grunt work stuff to put myself in a position to have those conversations. And I think if you, to your point, if you demystify the art, if you will, of trying to be a Picasso and break it down into a process, you know, you find that a lot of people could be very successful in this career if they're given the right guidance.

And I think that's women and women, right? Yeah. I think that that's an excellent analogy. And when you think of it, it's a little off topic for where we started, but we look at kind of the rise in the sales enablement happening and the investments that companies are making into coaching and making sure that they're doing things like film review and, you know, bringing like real customer recordings into one-on-ones and things like that. It's so that they're getting the coaching that you got about putting the yellow in the corner. It's like, hey, you did this, but if you did X, Y, and Z, you would actually be more successful in this call. So you're learning from the masters, but in a way that you can actually apply it and come out with something in the end that looks like art.

There you go. Right. Awesome. Natalie, well, I think this is, I appreciate you coming on board and having this conversation. I think the conversation, I think that, I will say, I think the best thing that we all can do to help address the issues, the underlying issues, the things that might not be overly is to literally have these types of conversations and keep the conversation going. So it's not, and again, it's not like an accusatory thing. It's not, and I'll kind of end. End on where, you know, like the Me Too movement, right? When the Me Too movement came out, I think they, and I'll say it, I think they missed the mark a little bit because it was a, it was a very anti-male movement. And I remember going to some of those, the meetups and that type of stuff.

And I, and I was almost being attacked, even though I was there to support. And it was, I always felt like it was like, oh, all men suck type of scenario. And granted, you know, I don't, I don't say that everybody was doing that. I just, I just, the general ethos was I felt very attacked as a, as a male and which is, which is actually the exact opposite of what needs to happen, right? We need to be included in these conversations. So to your point of the women in sales, I really encourage men to go, right? Listen to these conversations. Ask the woman in the office, how they feel about stuff, take them out to lunch and say, hey, you know, I might be blind to this. What am I blind to, right? What, what am I blind to?

What is your day? You know, throughout the day, talk to me about what happens that puts you in a position to feel awkward about some type of scenario, just so I can keep out, you know, keep an eye out for it, if nothing else. And so I think just the more we have these conversations, hopefully the better it'll get. I love it. We're going to be out, we're going to be back in Boston in September. Lori Richardson's going to be joining us and I'll be sending you a personal invitation. I hope you, I hope you'll come out. Well, is that October? So is that the October 23rd? Because Lori has won women in sales on October 23rd or 4th or something like that. Is that a different one? It's different and it'll be in September in Boston.

I'll, I'll let you, I'll send you an invite. Yes, please do. Please do. Because I know Lori actually, she, when she saw the book, because I gave her a sneak preview, she, she lost it. And she was like, she wanted, she's going to sponsor like a hundred books for the, for her thing that she's doing on the 23rd. And it, and she had invited myself, my wife and my daughter to come up on stage and talk about, you know, the experience and my daughter talk a little bit about, you know, sales and all that stuff. So I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm really excited about that one. That's amazing. Well, uh, we'll, we'll, we'll see if we can put something similar together in September. How about that? I mean, I'm happy to, always happy to join and, and at least, you know, add whatever value I can add in my voice from my perspective, if it helps.

So, uh, if there's, let me know. And, and, and for those people out there looking to learn a little bit more about you, about your organization, where, where should they go? Um, so of course you can come and check out chorus.ai. We have an events page that talks about upcoming events. Um, we will be having a dedicated website coming soon. Um, and please feel free to reach out to me on LinkedIn. Just be sure and add a little note and let me know why, and I'll be happy to connect. Yeah. And again, it's, uh, that last is S E V E R I N O. Right. Natalie. Correct. Okay, cool. So just for those people looking out for Natalie on, on LinkedIn, but, uh, awesome. Well, thank you again so much. Uh, tell everybody over a course, I said, hi.

And, um, and again, thanks for coming on. I really appreciate what you do. Thanks, thanks, John. I appreciate you too. All right. So, all right, everybody with, um, with that, hopefully you enjoyed the conversation as much as I did. And, uh, as I always say, you know, uh, go out there and make somebody smile today, right? If you did nothing else today, but make somebody smile, you know, you had a good day. So, uh, have a great week and, uh, let's make it happen. Thank you all very much. Cheers. Cheers. Cheers. Cheers. Cheers. Cheers.