Dale Dupree: Rebellion, Reflection, and the AI Debate

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And this was a fun conversation with a repeat offender here, Dale Dupree. And what made it extra special is that Dale actually joined me for the sales play event that I put together. And this was an incredibly memorable and special event. Probably one of the best ones I think I've ever put on or attended myself. And I always believe that bringing good people together, magic happens. And that's exactly what happens on Friday. So this was a debrief of that. We talked about, first of all, Dale connected really well with my mentor, Jeff Hoffman, especially after the fact and when we were talking about sales and everything. And I think everybody understands now why I call Jeff Hoffman the greatest sales professional I've ever met in my entire life by far.

And some of the things that he was talking about, so we unpacked that. We talked about the play, the Glen Gary Glen Ross play that was the anchor for this event last week where we all went to see it and then came back to the suite afterwards and debriefed on it and talked about some of the symbolism in there and about sales and also the roles because there was no women and the only black person in there was actually the manager who had no power. So these were nuances that if the group wasn't as diverse as it was, I don't think we would be even paid attention to. So it led to some extremely rich conversation, which we unpacked here with Dale. And then also just got into like the benefit of the doubt.

And because, you know, a lot of the, there was a lot, there was a lot of stuff in that play that was really inappropriate in today's world, but it gave perspective on, to a certain degree, some of the progress, I guess we've kind of made, maybe not, but it got to the point where we talked about how we've lost the benefit of the doubt. We have to get that back and that everybody's dealing with their own issues these days. So we have to have some empathy for that. And then last but not least, we had to unpack the fact that during the round table, Dale said that AI is a Trent. We got everybody else in the room to be like, wait a minute, what the fuck did you just say? So I had to have him clarify for that.

We got into that as well. So I hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I did. Let's make it happen. Dale Dupree, the rebel. What's going on, brother? Good to see you. It's been about a minute, but it's only been really a couple. Yeah, right. That is kind of funny, right? People within this might not realize that we were just together having one of the greatest days ever in New York City. And now we're here like virtually hanging out again. Like we just hang out, we probably got just a hot minute to go, right? But yeah, man, it's good. Things are good, man. Appreciate you having me on the show today. Yeah, of course. And it's funny. I think we booked this before I even started putting the plan together.

Sure did. Like literally, like you and I could have not planned this. No way. Why literally come to our friends? Not even close. So for everybody listening here, hopefully you've been paying attention. I did this free trading Friday where I called it the sales play, brought 18 just practitioners, good people, everything together and had, I think one of the more memorable days, you know, because we went LinkedIn, we did, you know, shared tips and all that other stuff. And then we did a roundtable event, had an awesome conversation. Then we did a happy hour that everybody had a really cool conversation there. And then we went and saw Glenn, Gary Glenn Ross and brought it back to the hotel afterwards and had just an insane conversation.

By the way, short term thoughts on Hoffman, dude, what an incredible human to be around in person, right? Because seeing Hoffman on the internet or fearing him or hearing stories is pretty incredible. But in person, just, just an absolutely amazing person. You are one lucky dude to have had a guy like that in your life. Not sure he hit me so much. Dude, I, I absolutely. And I tell people he's the greatest sales professional I've ever, I, I, I know. And there's not even a close second. Um, and people like, well, why? I'm like, I, I don't know how to explain it. I'm like, you just have to talk to him about sales. And within the first five minutes of you talking to him about sales, you'll understand why.

And it was like, that for me was like, I, I vividly remember it. I think I gave an intro to him this way. Like I vividly remember, I thought my shit didn't stink when I was selling. Right. Cause I, we were the fastest growing company in Massachusetts. I was kicking everybody's ass in the area. And I was like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. I'll take some, but I'm always looking for training. Right. So I took training and I remember sitting in a class with Hoffman and having him up there presenting and I, and I was immediately humbled. I was like, Oh my God. I'm like, that's what a fucking real sales professional is. And I'm like, I am nowhere near that. I have a lot of work to do. I mean, I'm still nowhere close to him, but man, he's, he's like a wizard.

Yeah. It's like the, it's this idea of the standard of sales and how condoled and lost it's become over time and how a guy like Hoffman is like quite literally, he doesn't care what the trends are. He doesn't care. What's new. He doesn't care. What's popular. He cares what's right. And ultimately he cares about what the, like the salespeople before him that taught him sales cared about too. Cause even, even I loved him telling me a little bit more about selling cars. Right. So we sat at the bar at the happy hour, his first job, he's like what, 14 or 15 or some crazy ship, right? Selling cars. And I think what was great about that story though, was that it, yeah, there was a couple of things that resonated with me deeply is one.

I think he told me the story ultimately because I told him about my dad and I told him a story and my dad, he was like, you're going to like, think about that for just a second that man I like these, my dad and, and, and him would have never met if my dad was even still alive. They probably would have never met quite frankly. I've been like completely different lives, completely different areas. Yet they are like the two of the standards of sales, right? Walking their own path in different areas and, and really never allowing anything against like influence them out of their standard. And the first was, I love, I love the idea that you could have an idea that you're, that you can be wrong about, but that, but that even though you're wrong, that you like it.

And so you, so even though it's, it might not be necessarily be right. It's like, well, that's okay. I don't have to be right about this thing. And I, I find that to be, I don't know, just ultra motivating, if you will. I think the, the, I think one of the more interesting conversations of the night was, was when he was talking about, you know, Al Pacino's character effectively in the movie of Glenn Gary, Glenn Ross, and, and he was portrayed, uh, portrayed by McCulkin in the play and how he was like, you know, today's, today's sales world doesn't have room for that. Cause you know, he's vilified in a lot of ways. Cause he's, you know, he's, he's taking, and I was, and that was my response to him.

I was like, yeah, but Jeff, he's doing, he's like, he's a douchebag. Like he's, he's convincing people and, and that's not what sales is. And he actually corrected my mindset a little bit on that. Where do you remember what he like extracted from that conversation? Like what, what, what, what he told us? The thing like, okay. So the thing that I thought was so incredible about that rant was how it first off that he didn't need to necessarily explain himself to anybody. He didn't, it wasn't like that. He was trying to justify why he liked that character. What he was really trying to help everybody see is that, well, so back when I first saw it as a, as a kid in sales, or even as a young adult in sales, you know, he was telling us that it, it was kind of the standard of like a good salesperson.

And I think it's a really important thing for people to hear and understand is that there could potentially be a little bit of a misconception here on like the hardcore salesperson of the past. Right. Cause we would look at it as hardcore, but what he explained to us was this identity of a good salesperson is not there because you like buying. They're there because you need them to sell you something. And that was such a beautiful, beautiful thought, dude. Just, again, I think, I think the beauty of Jeff is that for, especially for the new generations or for our generation, even, I feel like the beauty of him is that he's, he's not going to sugarcoat anything and he's not going to let the, the good standards of sales leave him at any point in time.

He's going to continue to preach those things. And I, man, I think it's, I do think it's crazy that we don't talk enough about a, the right experience, the best experience, a good experience, an unforgettable, undeniable experience. And that's literally what he was giving us there in his, in his tirade. And you got it all on film, which is even better. So at some point I'm, I'm 1000% just going to put it on a loop when I get the raw footage downloaded and just watch it over and over again. Yeah. Hey, I hope you're enjoying the conversation so far. I want to take a quick minute to share with you what I'm working on these days with my new JB sales membership. It includes live monthly training delivered by me on my two signature courses, which are filling the funnel and driving a close that cover all aspects of the sales process.

It also includes monthly workshops that I'll be running on specific sales skills and different tech skills like ChatGVT and how to leverage AI throughout the entire sales process. Finally, the membership gives you access to my entire online catalog with every course and every tip I've ever done. And as an exclusive offer to my podcast listeners, if you go to JBarrows.com, click on the individual membership link and use coupon code podcast at checkout, you'll get 25% off. Now let's get back to the conversation. And, and, and again, it's a, it's a, it's an interesting perspective. I'd love your thoughts on that where, cause what he was saying was he doesn't sell, which, you know, I've talked to him about this a couple of times, but it, it, it always, I always forget it.

You know, we, we were taught to sell the dream and you know what the potential. And he's like, fuck that. He's like, I ain't selling the dream. I'm selling you where you are right now. If you're in pain, I'm going to sell you pain. If you're in pleasure, I'm going to sell you pleasure, but I'm going to sell it to you right now because I'm not going to promise you the future. I'm going to meet you where you're at. And unless you stop me, I'm going to keep this train moving in the direction that you are not stopping me from going. Right. So that's where I, I struggle a little bit because it's kind of the ends justifies the means, right? It's like, Hey, and this is where I've always argued with like shitty sales reps because they convinced themselves that they're, they're stuffing it down somebody's throat because ultimately it's going to be in their best benefit.

Right. So fuck it. If I have to manipulate you a little bit to get to the end goal, I can justify it in my head. But I still struggle with a little bit because I'm like, Jeff, like there's some people that aren't, they're just so soft that you can drive them towards whatever the fuck you want to drive them towards. And that's not right. And he's like, I don't fucking care if it's right or wrong. They're letting me do it. So I'm going to fucking do it. And I, and I struggle with that, but I see his point. Yeah, I do. I just see his point too. And so I, I, I always look at, I love it when somebody has an opinion that's different than ours. I know you feel the same way, right? Because it's so powerful in regarding, in regards to letting us learn more.

Anthony Bourdain has a great quote where he says, he's like, you know, go out and eat the oysters. Right. It's how it's like, it's like, do the shit that you wouldn't typically do. Listen, sit and hang out with someone that you think you'd never get along with. Right. And listen to them and enjoy them. I love that quote. It's such a good, there's so much to unpack in that quote, right? But I, I like that type of lifestyle because it helps, it helps me to see outside of my little bubble. And ultimately I'm not in an echo chamber because of it. And I think Jeff's points, everything is important because for a guy like me, that's kind of experienced a lot of stuff. And like you, and ultimately beyond sales, I hear it like this.

When Jeff says those things, I hear it like this, that there is a version of what he says that could be highly manipulative. There is a version of what Jeff says that is so true. It's so pure. And ultimately it's coveted by people because to meet someone where they are as a principal is extraordinarily tough. So if you're a person that, and we talked about this a little bit, remember, cause I said, dude, that, see, this is the art of sales in motion. And you were like, exactly. I'm the science guy. I can't get, I don't under, even understand some of the stuff that Jeff talks about. I can, I can visualize it. And I can ultimately, I can, I can very much tangibly create the moment that Jeff is spelling out for myself on the way that I would do it.

And when he says things like that, because I see this idea that, well, what if I walk into the room and even though I've got like my pain funnel or my systematic approach or whatever my thing is like, what if I just let go of that? And instead just figured out like, where does this person need me to be today? And, and additionally do it without sacrificing who I am and my authentic, you know, approach to the, to the sales cycle, because then I don't think it's as manipulative. And honestly, like, even though Jeff says, I hope he listens to this, even though Jeff says like, you know, he's so brash and he's like, I don't care about all that. Like, and it, and it makes it sound like he's probably manipulating people.

I don't think he fucking is, man. You know what I mean? Like, I don't, I think what he does so naturally makes people comfortable. It makes them feel good that they, that they might even say something hard to him or difficult to tell him like, well, Hey, are you just trying to get me to do this thing? And he'll be honest and go, well, yeah, dude, I've, I've heard stories, of course, right. I've heard stories from him that were, he's literally, you know, talking to the sea, what the fuck ever. Right. And, you know, Abelmate and all this other stuff and whatever. And like the sea level will look at him and say, well, you know, if we do this, Jeff, with you, we're going to have to lay off like five or six of our enablement team.

And Jeff will look at him and go, yep, it's exactly what you're going to have to do. And it's like, Oh, like, Holy shit. Like, I don't know if I would, I don't know if I would have the cojones to do that. You know what I mean? I mean, maybe if it was absolutely the right thing. And I knew those five people were absolute dead weight and I knew this was going to fundamentally shift. Right. But Jeff's like, I'm like, fuck off. Yes. You're going to have to do that. Like, I'm not going to sugarcoat this around you. If you want to do this the right way, you're going to have to let go of those people and do this. And like, it's just, it, to your point, it's like, it's beautiful in his bluntness, but in a way that is like, I get it.

Yeah, exactly. It's all you can say really, because until you're in the room and have the experience or you're the buyer, you really can't, there's no way to measure it or explain it for that. I had a, I had a mentor outside of my dad, Rich Johnson. I talk about him a lot. He's the guy that really ultimately took me to the next level and helped me make a million bucks in my career. And I mean, he's the guy. And I remember sitting in a room on time with a group of, of other men where he told me to do this before we got in there. He said, when they tried to negotiate the price and say, no, because there's nothing we can do. There's nothing we can do. We have, this is our value is this. And even if we wanted to negotiate the price, it's not going to be good for anybody because we're going to have to ultimately cut corners on the backend.

And we need to be remembering that so that we don't just get the deal. We get the deal. We said the tip with CFO, COO, vice president of operations on top of it. And so we're sitting with this group of men that are basically very much numbers people and process people. And they asked us twice, you know, to make changes around this particular thing. And the first time I told the guy, no. And the second time my mentor steps in, right? Six foot five. I mean, this guy's, he's kind of scary, right? And he goes, with all due respect. And he reiterates what I said. It tells him that there's nothing we can do with that. And the guy said, if there's nothing you can do with that, then we're done. And my boss said, then we're done.

He slams his hands on the table. You know, gets out. He runs out of the office space. But it's like, fuck you guys, right? Like, I'll never forget that. We won that deal two weeks later at the price that we were offering, right? And again, I think it goes back to that perspective again of like, if you've experienced, after that experience, I knew that I could be honest with people. I could feel better about it on the way out. I could, and like, even if it was a hard thing to say or do that ultimately, you know, it was worth it at the end of the day. So, you know, I think you put it beautifully that, again, like, it's really hard to articulate the way that like a guy like Jeff sells. It's, man, I would encourage people to just literally pay him a thousand bucks to sit in a five minute meeting and watch him work so that they can just go, oh, holy smokes.

Like, I have never really thought about it this way because that's literally what would happen to most people all day. Like, that's why, like, that kid Amir from LinkedIn, like, I was looking and him and Jeff had like an hour, like, Jeff sat with him for like a half an hour talking to him directly about his career. I'm like, kid, do you have any fucking idea what you're getting right now? Like, you should pay thousands of dollars for that half an hour of advice that you're getting right now, one-on-one, because it was gold that he was putting out there. Yeah, it was, it was, I think it was, and I think everybody, quite frankly, like the, the conversation, I'm really interested in revisiting the post-play conversation when we had it at the W, like when everybody was there, because, man, there was some nuanced shit there about race and about, you know, women and how, like, we talked about privilege, right?

Like, I don't know about you, did the fact that it was an all-male cast even dawn on you? Yeah, it's like, it does and it doesn't, right? And, like, I'll explain that, like, it, it does because I have, I have sisters and I, and, and I have a wife and I have a lot of nieces. A lot of my cousins are female. I think about that a lot because of my upbringing, right? It's like, put the toilet down as a kid. It was that simple to, like, help, my parents helped me to understand, like, you have to accommodate your sisters, right? And then my whole life was, dad's going to spank me. If I don't accommodate my sisters, I have to beat this guy up because he just disrespected my sister, right? There's, so it's there, but at the same time, it's almost as if there's a piece of us that becomes super comfortable with who we are and what we do.

And so there's a piece of us that says it may be in our own mind even that it doesn't matter. Maybe that's not the exact things it's saying, but it's, like, whispering that to an extent and, and just kind of, like, asking you to just move on from that, which I think is a valid thing to bring up, ultimately. Because, you know, the women in the room definitely know this, and they definitely have thought about it, and they think about it, and it affects them. But for us men, you know, sometimes it's just like, oh, it's just a storage. It's the way it is. And we just think past it. Yeah, and that's where, what I would love to do, and I would actually love it to do with the women who are there, is I would love to either remake it, remake Glengarry Glen Ross in two ways.

One is an all-female cast to see how that plays, right? And the other is to replace the Al Pacino character with a badass woman. You know what I mean? Like, she's the alpha, and she comes in and tells everybody else to fuck off and all this other stuff. And I wonder how that would feel to watch. You know what I mean? Because I guarantee you she would be a bitch. She would be too pushy. She would be, you know, blah, blah, blah, where all of us are like, oh, Pacino's the man, and he's like, I got to respect him for, you know, for doing what he does. And I think it would just be such an interesting dynamic to introduce that into the whole equation. It would be weird, but I think it would be pretty cool.

Yeah. If somebody did it the right way, it would be phenomenal to witness. I think one thing, though, that's super important about the story itself is, and I think it was pointed out less by Roderick, ultimately, that we started to have these conversations. I know Morgan felt the same way as Paul, too, and he was really in tune with this portion of it. But I thought that it was good that they kept a lot of the stuff that makes us go, oh, my gosh. You know, kind of to the extent, right? Like the Indian Patel stuff, right? Right. The racism that essentially existed in places like the 70s, the 80s, and the workforce with salespeople. This unspoken privilege of white males in sales thinking they deserve the Cadillac, right?

They deserve the best leads instead of, like, the notion of hard work. And see, the thing is, is that guys like me and you were taught by people that did the opposite. They were hard workers, and they told us, dude, nothing is given to you, period. You go earn it, and if you ever think that you have a privilege inside of the workforce, then get your head straight, right? And so it's different for guys like me and you, but, dude, that's why it's so important to tell the story. Because if the stories aren't told, then people will forget that they ever existed, that they were a thing, and then it's, like, repeating the problems of the past. So I liked that they actually, they got a little edgier, they made the office manager, basically, right, who they labeled it, not the black guy, who was basically berated and called the worst shit.

Like, stuff that guys like me and you were called, and, like, we don't even flinch, bro. We just, like, knuckle up and, like, sorry, I didn't mean to bunch you, but you shouldn't have said that, right? And I think it was important to see those things, and it is important for the next generation to see those things and go, and not go, wow, what a racist play. But to go, dude, this is history, this is a real account, this isn't just, like, an idea, this is really what used to happen. I don't want to go back to that personally, so maybe I'll try to make it different. I am dying to get Bill Burr or whoever, whoever I can, and I'm going to put a campaign to try to get this going so I can interview one of them.

I want to know that decision, to put a black man as the manager, because it was obviously a conscious decision, right? Because he wasn't black in the movie, Kevin Spacey's not black. And they chose to put a black man in a position of authority without any authority. And as Roderick brought up, he was the only one cleaning up the office when it got broken into. He was, like, he had zero power, zero authority, and Roderick identified immediately with him. And he's, like, I can't tell you how many roles I've had in an organization that I've had a role, a title that shows power, but ultimately had none because I was just a token figure, you know, head or whatever it was. And so my struggle with it, the answer was interesting, because my struggle was, I thought it was fantastic because of the conversation we were having afterwards.

Like, holy shit, this is a layer that is really thoughtful and really insightful. And with the group that we had, it was open, honest dialogue that I thought was fascinating. But 99% of people aren't walking out of that play going, oh, man, I can't believe, oh, it's interesting that they put a black man in a role. 99% of people that didn't have power but had power, and that's a really, 99% just saw a black man in a role that didn't have any power. So I struggle with the artist's rendition and how it's not their responsibility for us to get it and the 1% that does and it facilitates that versus the 99% of people that just kind of reinforces what they see every fucking day. So what are your thoughts on that one, man?

Yeah, I think teaching in general is difficult from the perspective of the deliverer versus the adapter. So it's because you and I can probably tell stories galore of being in a room with a bunch of people who did the same thing too, and not like maybe one or two of them walked out and did the thing you said. The others will say they did the things that we told them to, but they did. But then when you review it, you're like, well, um, no, but, you know, actually, no, you didn't. So I, I do, I agree with you, but it is, it's tough, right? It's tough. But I think it's, it's part of that conversation of that. It, it has to be hard because here's what, here's what does happen when you start proclaiming, this is why we did these things is that you get, there's a certain group of people that just shut down feeling and go, oh, we're doing some kind of, you know, we're exonerating, you know, a person that doesn't need to be, you know, they got all kinds of different issues that they, they suddenly will buy and then they'll never go see this, this show.

So my, my dad, if one of my favorite stories of, of his testimony ultimately in that, you know, he didn't know, he didn't want to know God. He had no, he had zero reason to be religious. He loved alcohol. He loved partying. He, he loved being, you know, a center of attention. He loved his business and the things that he was doing. And, and ultimately he was, he was driven by things outside of like a spiritual realm. If he will, it just didn't want anything to do with all that. He thought he also grew up in like a very traditional, like Presbyterian church, but it was like, you know, instruments and. It was like, you know, just people singing out of a hymnal and it was like, what is happening in here when you're out in the world, you know, amongst other people that don't have those types of upbringings or background.

So, so my, my dad's story though, the consistent trip, there's this little tiny trip of not the stuff that he experienced that was bad necessarily, but the stuff that he experienced that put a little bit of the message ultimately of where he would end up into his head. There was an evening where things got a little tense for him ultimately. And, and he was at a point where it was change or die, quite frankly. And, and, and my dad, we could, we could, we could represent that with like my mother leaving him when he had two kids at the time and she was pregnant with a third. You could, you could say where like my dad would have maybe died of cirrhosis even, or like a car accident, or, you know, there's, there's more than just like the physical death though.

Ultimately it's like friends using you, leaving you, it's reputation being destroyed or dismantled. And so my dad didn't look at it as just like, Oh, I have to get better because if I go, then it's not good. He looked at it as, man, my life is about to be completely changed. If I don't really think about these things. Now, the only reason that he thought about these things is because for, again, for years, for decades, people had put a little bit of that message in his head to say, maybe there is something better for you. Maybe you could do things differently. And eventually one day he woke up 35 years old. He woke up and he said, maybe I'll give this a shot. Quit alcohol. And to his like first church service that he actually like wanted to go to kind of thing.

And everything changed. So I, man, I agree with you. And then at the same time, I'm like, you know, I, my experiences are that we have to do it this way. If we don't do it this way, most people just like never at the first place or the, like the right audiences that we, we need in those places don't show up because they have this perceived notion that they shouldn't be there in the first place. Yeah. It's like, I, I, I wonder how many people got immediately turned off to the entire message when they started, when Bill Burr started in on the Patels and the, and the, um, uh, the, the Polacks and that type of stuff. Right. Cause he was just ripping on these leads from Polacks and fucking Patels and they never buy shit.

And he went, you know, and it was the movie. Like if you watch the movie that he, he nailed that entire thing. And so I, I, I, I fear that there's a group of people that were in that theater that I don't want to say shut off at that moment, but immediately took like a, a turn and their lens was then was, was then discolored, if you will, with the rest of the message that they were trying to get across because they just heard the fact that he was ripping on Indian people and those types of things. So I, I'd, I'd be interested in this. It would have been a cool to see like a poll of all the people walking out or, you know, how like you do it on elections where like you positive and negative sentiment, you know what I mean?

Like it was like, Oh, they did the debate, that type of thing. Like, it'd be cool to have somebody, everybody have a little clicker and then watch the fucking sentiment go through the floor as soon as that happened. And then how many people brought it back up. Truth. It is fun to get people's reactions real time, for sure. From the perspective of the learning, without a doubt. I also think that sometimes it's like a couple of days later, if you can hit them on the survey and be like, Hey, what'd you think of this and this? Like where people have skewed out a little bit and then you get like, you don't just get the emotional response. You get like the truth. Yeah, it would have been hilarious to really watch like who, who, who is like offended in the room.

Like, and, and then ultimately too, I loved how Anish was saying he was like looking around when they were dropping all the racist remarks about Patels. He was like, well, I'm literally the only Indian guy in here. I'm the only brown dude in the building. Like, I don't know how to feel right now, but you know, and what's crazy is like the word Olog, right? Like my grandfather, my, on my wife's side, right? Her, her grandpa, I called him grandpa too. He, I heard him say that. That's the only words I ever heard, like say that term in the first place. But see, again, this goes back to that idea that it's so important to tell these stories because there's a whole generation of people who'd be like, what's a Polack?

And not even realize that there was a racist term used against this type of, that you wouldn't have even thought. I agree with you. I think that that gives context to where we are today in a lot of ways, right? So it's, it's like, and look, we can argue of how much progress we have or have not made. And as two white guys have in this conversation, it's, it's pretty insensitive for us to even attempt. Right. But, but when you do put it into context of like, Hey, look, it used to be really fucking blatant and out in the, out in the open in the business world. And that was just accepted and, and don't be offended by it because appreciate it in the sense that we've come a long way, at least in that regard.

In some, in, in some cases, not all, but I think it's the perspective is important because if you just start to chastise people for what they say today, I think without context of where they're coming from or what they've been exposed to in their lives, it's like the racist grandma. You know what I mean? Like she grew up in a time where racism was just fucking thing. So for her to drop a few racist things, it's kind of like, all right, I'm not going to change who she is. Like, this is literally who she grew up as, you know, she just, it doesn't, you know, she expresses it a little different. So I know it sucks, but you can't change everybody and you have to take their history into consideration when you're coming to give people feedback, which is why do you feel like we've lost?

This is the one thing that hurt that I wish we haven't lost as much as I think we have, which is the benefit of the doubt. Like if you say something because you're wherever you're coming from, right. And you just might not have, you know, been exposed to or whatever it is, but it comes out of your mouth the wrong way. It's no longer, Hey Dale, can I, can I share with you why I feel like it's a little offensive for dah, dah, dah, dah, like where I'm coming from. It's an immediate reaction to fuck you. You're a piece of shit, whatever. Do you feel like we've lost that? Oh my God, dude. We like, this is a constant conversation. I have actually over the course of the last probably like four or five years now, like right after COVID where we, they would think they're so divisive in 2020.

And right where, and to just think about like literally five years ago, like a whole group of people were in a whole other group of people's throats and not in a very polite way at all. And there was still going to put them in doubt. And so if you, if you believe one thing or you were bitten by another thing, and it wasn't that person's opinion or for the professed truth of that person, if you will, then you were everything wrong in that person's eyes. And that's on both narratives and perspectives. I think that's the hardest part is that it's, it's a human nature thing more than anything to just kind of be stuck in our ways. But I like, I mean, bro, when people say, how are you so calm and like this, we're in New York Saturday or Sunday morning, getting ready to fly back.

And my son Atlas is running around the road and my baby falls, he's too great. And he falls and like almost hits this guy, just coffee and just kind of lays there for a second. And, you know, the guy could have very easily just like helped him up and, and been kind. But instead he's like, um, whoever's this is should probably watch it. And now look, my wife, God forbid, see her wrath. Right. So I had to kind of calm her down for a hot second and like help move it on. But, you know, I think everybody standing there was looking at me like, do something. And I'm looking at everybody else going, forgive him. This, you know what? Cause you know, what's more powerful than me do something ignoring this and letting him live with the way that he acted first place.

And, and the statement that was made was, uh, like when everybody went outside and I was buying, I bought some Saratoga sparkling waters, bro. That's all they had. And I was like, Oh my God, am I about to buy this shit right now? Like never bought this in my life until this moment. It's crazy. Anyway. And the, and the guy happened to just be standing there and I was like, Hey, by the way, this is a human being. He's my son. One of the looks of my life. Have a great day. And like the simple as that, right. Is it, it, how can you be so tolerant now? How can you be so cool, calm and collected? How can you have the benefit of the doubt for people? Listen, ladies and gentlemen, you have been to the end when you have stared death in the face.

When you have felt true and proverbial, even pulled the trigger and said, I don't want to be here anymore. I don't want to be alive. I'm done with this. Yet you survive that innocence. Life changes. You look at things from a lens of not so much of what is difficult, but you look at things from a lens of what is it that I want to do while I'm still alive. And the number one thing for me at this stage and my walk and ultimately over the last five years, I've done a good job practicing it. And also, um, not just practicing it, but being mindful of it, more mindful than I ever have is to remember that other people are just human beings. They got their own shit. They got their own problems. They got their own things that they're going through.

And so if they think different, if they act different, if they want to, you know, do things like take a bunch of colada pins and then go out and pretend that they're like a character from the Wolf Wall Street, good for them. And, and I'm not saying it's right, but I am saying that meeting those people with pitchforks and flaming torches and anger and hatred is the wrong thing to do. The benefit of the doubt is such a powerful phrase because it is, it literally, when you look at the definition, it is the ultimate identity of unconditional love. That's what it is. And we just, we just use the phrase as a way to kind of dumb down that statement. But for me, I go right to, when you said it, even I like right away, unconditional love.

That's right. I think about it. If you can unconditionally love people for who they are, flaws and all life is better. Cause you were just saying, everybody might have that grandma that she says things and you go, grandma, you can't say, you just can't say that period. Doesn't matter the generation even, you just can't say that that's not accepted, but do you love her less? And ultimately, like if you didn't and you weren't present with her and you didn't experience the good, then you would have been missing out on a lot of things. Cause even the, the bad side of people has a, has a light, has a counter perspective, right? So, yeah. And I think that's the, the, the, the shame of it all. Right.

With where we're at right now, because I think if you get people down to a one-on-one, take the, take the walls down and allow for conversations, kind of like what we did after the going Gary, going Ross, like there was, there was no inhibition. Everybody felt comfortable with each other. You know, people had different views, whatever. But when you can get down to that human level, right. Of having that conversation, you can do some, you can, you can have some really interesting, thoughtful, insightful conversations, regardless of your stances. It's when we get grouped into buckets. And this is why anytime I have a conversation with anybody who's really pissed off about whatever it is, and the word all comes out of their mouth.

I'm like, could you shut the fuck up about all? Like, I don't put everybody into a bucket. Let's talk about, let's talk about me and you here. Okay. What do you believe? What do I believe? Let's come in. And when you do that, you tend to come down from these massive edges of all down to like some super nuanced shit, like of like how you and I slightly disagree on shades of gray here. And then you realize that's why, quite frankly, I do want to get everybody stoned. Like I think, I think getting stoned, one of the, one of my favorite videos I've seen on the internet is they had somebody far right and far left and then a libertarian in the middle. Right. And they were all, they started off yelling at each other.

Like you fucking idiot. You're a moron. And then they passed the bong and the first hit, you know, everybody's still, you're a fucking moron. And after like the second or third hit, like the, you know, far right and far, wait, what, what? Why do I hate you again? Like I got, you seem like a pretty cool dude. Like, and, and literally by the end they were friends and it's like, can we just hot box the world here for like a weekend and just shift this fucking mentality right now? Yeah. I, I will say that in my lifetime, that anytime I was ever around the people that were stoned to any, whether it was like a mushroom trip or they were smoking some weed or that they were, there was nothing you could do.

So get them out of the zone of just almost like, like I said earlier, like forgiveness, like this just space of like, nothing matters. I forget whatever arm is, is around me. And I'm just going to literally live for a hot minute here, but, but yeah, you know, again, I think it, it ultimately does come down to though this, this idea that you'll imagine that it's less about getting stoned and more about getting away. So my kids, right. My, my, I got a seven-year-old and a two-year-old in there where we're walking around on a two-year-old. So he doesn't know shit right at this point. And he, he's a total wrecking ball at this point in his, which is the opposite of his brother, which I think is just so great too.

But, but my seven-year-old, we're walking around New York, we're finding some comic book stores, some fun shit for him to like enjoy and just like be a kid about. And he's, and something happens right in front of him with, with a, a, a homeless person. I hate calling them vagrants and homeless people. I just fucking hate it. But like it is, it's a homeless, it's a homeless person. He, something happened right in front of him and I, I had to handle it. I did it respectfully. And, and afterwards, my son was like, why is that person like that? And man, I was like, damn it, dude, this is why I live in the woods in Tennessee. Because if I can keep my son thinking and believing and knowing that people are good and then get him old enough where I break the news to him, but he's, he's, he doesn't think that people are bad until that point.

Right. But instead like gets to a place where I can, I can show him. It's not that people are bad. It's that decisions they make affect them. And I can really explain that better because right now you can't, you have to say it as dumb as possible. They're just bad. They're just not, they're not nice. And, and that makes them think things, right? That even if you were to say like, I'm sure he's a nice guy just having a bad day, right? Like the kid is going to hear that as like, this isn't anything I want to be around and I like this. And I, I hate that, bro. And I like the more, and like, really, if we can get back to the understanding, but there's so much that happens to us over the course of like the first 20 years of our life that really affects the narrative, you know, how we live.

And then everybody's got an uncle or a cousin or even like a friend right now who's 21 that spends too much time watching news, no matter where they get it from, watching the news, too much time being a part of things they can't control, having a big opinion about it. It doesn't matter because they can't, literally can't change anything at this stage and what's happening, at least in the world. And to me, I mean, that's just, it's kind of like digging, digging a hole at this point, just perpetual over and over again, every day. Awesome. Well, all right, let's, we're going to finish up with this one because we have to have some clarity here. You during, you during the fucking round table. So we had the, your crumpled shit was awesome, right?

I think a lot of people, a lot of value out. And then all of a sudden we started talking about, you know, AI and the round table and, and you, you drop the AI. It was a fucking fad or a trend. One of those two. And I think every single person went, wait, what? Like a trend. So please explain what you mean by AI is a trend here. So that the people, the other 17 people who were there and, and had wanted to explode and have the conversation for the next two hours can, can get some clarity here. Of what you, what you meant. Oh, I mean, honestly, you know, it's, it's so funny, right? We said earlier, we were like, we couldn't have ever planned this conversation. I didn't, I had no idea that we were even going to talk about this until we first, when we first got started, like, I want to go back to this thing.

So two things, I think what people really need to understand about Dale that don't know me is that I love to stir the pot and not because I just liked stirring the pot. I love to say things like we just talked about that I feel in a very black and white way, no gray area. I don't like to say, well, I disagree with some things, but I agree with this. I like to just be very black and white with everything. And so I see, like, I see when I look at a trend or a fad, I see two different things first off. And I just trend. That was the one. He's by the way, there was a ton of my friends and rebels that were on the live stream. And I started getting so many texts. I said, just, they were like, bro, the whole place is talking about, you know, like no one will.

And it was, it was like nothing disrespectful by any means because your audience is dope as fuck anyway. And so are the people that, that, that surround themselves with, but they were like, bro, you've got, people are fired up. People are going, he's right. People are going, he's wrong. It was, I mean, to me, like, that's what I think the beauty of a community is though, too. It's like the person that's able, I saw a great conversation, but I also was listening to people that were, were, were saying something that they believe differently. They know differently and they use differently. Case in point would be Morgan Ingram. Morgan Ingram is probably one of the most proficient AI practitioners there are in the world sitting right next to me.

But fear is not something that will hold my opinion back. So I didn't matter to me how Morgan felt about the, the statement as much as it mattered to me that there are people listening that don't understand what we're saying. No one uses AI like Morgan. Well, maybe some, okay. Like I'll get the benefit of the doubt here, right? There are some people that use AI like Morgan, but bro, you and I agree that it's a small amount of people, man, that can actually do what he does and use that tool to his advantage. There is a small amount of people that can use the crumpled letter just like me. Right. And that's kind of the point is that if we aren't real clear about the fact that AI will be a trend, it will 1000% be a trend.

I can't wait for 10, 15 years from now when I can be like, ah, what's up guys. Remember when I said that one thing, but this is why, here's why this is the, this is what I mean. Okay. The difference between a trend and a fad. Okay. A trend is something that at least like lasts, right? It creates a shift in behavior, a shift in preference. A fad is short lived, right? So I'm not saying that it's a fad, right? A trend. It's a trend. A fad is something that's short lived, right? To me, AI is a trend because just like a pager was a trend in my mind, right? But we still get a hold of each other using things like a pager, similar to an email is very much like a pager. There are ways that it has changed, but it, but right now in the way that sales works there, it is 1000% trending.

And because it's trending, people are using it so incorrectly, bro. So people think that AI is a tool for salespeople to sell more. AI is the thing that will literally replace every worker out here and every factory and every apartment complex and every UPS store. This has nothing to do with sales at the end of the day. What it is doing is it's completely reshaping the way that society operates. Just like a machine a long time ago that was made of metal took the jobs of hundreds of thousands of people working in factories. AI is doing the same thing. And when it comes to sales, it is just trending. At some point, it will definitely evolve. It'd be something completely different that all of us know it.

And leaders like Morgan will be people that continue to use it in the way that it was supposed to be used and continue to win. Everybody else will be a sheep among the herd. So effectively, what you're saying is it's not going to go away. It's just right now it's hot and it'll become ubiquitous in the future where we won't even recognize that we're using AI in a lot of ways. So when that happens, it won't be a trend. It'll just be part of our society. Is that kind of effectively what you're trying to do? I didn't want to say it at the start of those two things I was thinking about when I was talking. First off, don't confuse the statement. I think it's a trend. So to walk on eggshells in that moment was in court was very dangerous, right?

So that's why I just started with it. Okay. But secondly, and I'm cool with the repercussions of those things. I know why. That's people's judgment and that's their problem. But secondly, I was also aware that we had women in the room. We had minorities in the room. And there are things that I wanted to say about trends in the past, especially civilizations. Rome being one of them. Like Rome is a trend, right? It's a trend. It's something that it's this idea of like a republic, of a government system, of a society, right? And then it was literally destroyed at some point. But is it? Like in my opinion, it still exists today in a lot of different facets. And I honestly, a lot of historians agree with that.

It's just changed, right? So to your point, like it is a thing that will be hot and we will think it's the next thing for sure. But at some point, everyone will stab Caesar and things will change and they will change drastically. And I think that's what people need to, like, you know, if we had another hour to unpack that conversation with people, it's like realizing that, you know, if you, let's use the Twitter world, right? Like, oh, it's trending. Okay, well, that doesn't mean it goes away after it's not trending, right? That just means for right now, it's hot and people are looking at it with probably in the wrong way in a lot of ways, right? And it eventually will become just something that we all just are a part of.

But right now, it's hashtag AI fucking it's riding high on pretty much everybody's board. Yeah. So a great way to put somebody, somebody trying to dig into me. I can't remember who I was trying to dig into in the conversation. And they said, he's wearing a shirt from the 80s. And I, and I, and I literally, again, like don't know eggshells, right? Like now, and then ultimately like black and white, right? What went through my head was I wanted to say, yeah, it died. And I'm the smart guy that kept it dulled and brought it back in my own way. And, and, and I make, and this jacket, I sell it for $150 and make it for 19. And, and then, and it's very beneficial for me, but no one did it the way I'm doing it now.

Right. But that's what went through my head ultimately. Right. Again, because it's, it is the narrative again. Like, I think what goes, it goes back to is like what I was, the point that I was trying to make was the sheep versus the leaders. That's it. Is that the, the, here we are in a, in a room full of people, man. And like, there were so many, I don't, I, I want to be careful about like, let's see, like give in certain people props as if like other people don't deserve. Oh yeah. There were so many things like the, the AI, um, the, the, the action. That was shared with us where it was like, it was like not on a artificial intelligence. And I, bro, there was so many things in that conversation where I was like, he's see the people in here, the leaders, they know, they, they get it.

They see this thing. They understand its power. They know how to use it. In fact, the people listening, the people out there went, what I was before I was a sales leader, right? The guy looking for the knowledge, looking for the experience, looking for the next big thing. I was a sheep and there's a lot of sheep listening right now going sick. Let's go jump on chat GPT and like use it and all my outreach, you know, and that's just going to kill the whole entire profession, man. But yeah, that's it. Yeah, man. Augment. I keep preaching augmentations versus automation, right? The more you try to automate with this shit, the more you're basically automating yourself out of a, out of a need, uh, for, for you in general.

So awesome, man. Well, look, I, I, I'm glad I, I'm psyched. This is like, I didn't, by the way, I didn't even remember that we had this. So like when I woke up this morning, I looked at my calendar, I'm like, fucking A, I get to talk to Dale. This is going to be cool as shit. We can debrief from last week. So I was right after that. I saw this other thing. Cause I knew I, cause I, usually I prepare, I go back and look at your last posts and all these different things. I'm like, nah, fuck it. I'm just wanting to get his feedback on this because it was such a cool experience. No doubt. I feel that bro. For sure. Awesome brother. Well, what, so what, uh, tell the team or what do you, what are you working on right now?

Anything cool that, uh, that you want to point people towards or anything that you got going on? Yeah. You know, I actually, um, shout out to you, shout out to a lot of people. Um, but, but you in particular, like, uh, everybody listening to this, uh, but John Barrett's people will have opinions about John Barrett's in your stories. People will say things like, Hey, you know, I like him. I don't like him. You know, people will say stuff, but as somebody who's been in sales for 19 years now, it was had mentors, like, like John had mentors, like the, some of the best in the world, right? Pete, people like me. And like, you don't have to agree with me either. Just hear this sentiment that John, like John is one of the greatest humans in history on planet earth, sitting right here in front of me on this virtual call recording a podcast for all of you.

And I, and I want y'all to think about this very diligently, right? Like don't look at it as brownie points. Don't look at it as me too. Look at this as truth as ultimately the idea of being successful inside of sales, especially is to surround yourself with people that will make you smarter at the end of the day. And John Barrett's, not only does he make you smarter, but he will literally never take the credit. He'll act like he did. Ah, you got that somewhere else. And the humility in that ultimately is the most powerful piece of the puzzle. So John, uh, probably like, I don't know, five, six months ago at this point was back in October, November. I mean, it was a quick exchange and he, and I literally, I was going through some changes.

I was doing something that's different. I was, I was just coming off at totality, our first in-person event thinking about stuff. Right. And I went back to this OG conversation and like, it's almost like his advice is timeless on top of it being, you know, like something that's very important. And so I changed the whole business model in January. We, we are no longer doing the same stuff that we've been doing. Instead, we are like completely changed ass trajectory. So we're the big stuff happening is that first we have a new service called grass, R-A-A-S rebel as a service. And, and the idea of that is that, look, you're going to put 50 reps through a training program with me and 10 of them are going to do the shit I'd tell you to do.

Why do that? And so we're not doing that anymore. You can no longer get a training program for me for your 50 reps. Instead, you hire me as a rep. I come into your organization with a team of three to four people. We go and you give us a territory. We send our own stuff. We set our own meetings. We pass it off to your people. We close the deals and you get to see what it looks like to use experiences over pitches from there. Then you can decide like, Hey, maybe I want to roll this out to everybody else. Even then we still, I ain't going to train them. We're just going to help you with that process of doing it. So we're, we're changing to more of like a boutique agency for sales. Right. It's the thought process.

And additionally, like instead of training, we're just opening up the community. So totality was amazing. We had a hundred plus people in the room with Kevin Dorsey on the mic, Juan Brown, Leslie Benetz, you know, some of the best at Rick at right house, Stu Brennan. With this year, we've got, I think 18 total people that'll be doing a workshop slash speaking on a panel, you know, shouting James Buckley. We're running the high level conversations with ultimately extraordinarily experiential, heavily dialed into this idea of what it is to be a rebel. And then, you know, the things that make us who we are, instead of trying to be like everybody else, like I always preach, I've said, cool, we're going to do the anti-conference.

I don't, and we're not going to talk about it. We're going to do it. It's so epically amazing that people leave and go, what the fuck did I just go through? So we've, we're opening a group. You're the first person I've told this to, it's called the rebel covenant. And that community will tie to the totality community. And it'll very simply just be that something where you can come, you can lament, you can get ideas, you can learn a little, you can hear stories, you can listen to things very particular to your industry. You can gain knowledge, but not through just listening to us, but taking action items, going and experiencing yourself and then applying that as we're still great. So those are the things that are happening with us.

And ultimately I got, man, I got nothing but love and gratitude for people like you in my life that have ultimately pushed me in this direction and continue to encourage the crazy shit that I do. Love it, man. And likewise, my friend, I think, uh, you know, it was one of those things where, like I said, you know, I first put this thing together, it was going to be for my elite members, but then very quickly I thought to myself, I'm like, do I, I don't know any of these people. And so I don't know if I want to spend a whole day with a group of 18 people that I don't know the vibe, I don't know kind of how they'll interact. And so I then just immediately flipped to, okay, who do I know that a shares my values and my why of elevating the people in profession, um, has obviously good content and stuff they could share.

But more importantly, and the most is, was like just a good person to be, to enjoy being around. It was like the audience for me was such a, and I hate to say this, admit it, but the audience was such a secondary for me. I didn't even think about promoting it or anything. Cause I figured if I just got 15 to 18 people who I knew were cool as shit together, that magic would happen. And I, I was proved right a thousand times over. Cause that was fucking one of the cooler experiences I think I've had. And it was just, it was such a, such a blessing to have somebody like you and everybody else there, uh, along for that ride. So thanks for coming, man. It was fun. Absolutely. And everybody, uh, go check out where, where can they find out more about the sales rebel comp, uh, covenant and what you're like, all the stuff that you're putting on together.

I don't, it'll, it'll, it'll be all of on the website. Once it's up, it'll be, I'm assuming this ain't coming out for a few weeks, right? So yeah, a couple of weeks. Yeah. Yeah. So, but it's something else. I can just go to salesrebellion.com or head over to LinkedIn and find my, my personal page for all the prob on there as well too. Perfect. I'm sure you got a newsletter and all that stuff that people can sign up for. They get the updates. Yeah. Yeah. Sign up for that newsletter. The sale. It's the sales rebellion.com. That's it. There it is. All right, brother. Thanks again for coming on. I appreciate it. And everybody, uh, hope you enjoy the conversation as much as I did. And like I say, at the end of all these podcasts, and like I said, at the end of the whole events the other day, when we were wrapping this up, go out there and make somebody smile today.

Cause no matter how bad your day's going or how bad you think it went, you go out there and make somebody smile and you know you had a good day and the world needs a lot more of that right now. So thank you all very much. And I will see you on the other side. Hey everyone. I hope you enjoyed that conversation as much as I did. With your support and our incredible guests, we're one of the top sales podcasts out there right now. And I can't thank you enough. Now to keep the momentum going, it would mean the world to me. If you could go and leave a five-star review on your favorite podcast platform and share some of your favorite episodes with your network. Also, I am super excited to be launching my new newsletter where I'll be sharing everything I know and everything I'm learning along the way while I'm out there selling every day, just like you go to jaybarrows.com slash newsletter to sign up today.

Let's all level up and make this happen together. Let's all level up and make this happen. Let's all level up and make this happen. Let's all level up and make this happen. Let's all level up and make this happen. Let's all level up and make this happen. Let's all level up and make this happen.