169: Hosting Your Clients with Lifelong Learner Suchi Mandal

0:00 Scott Ingram: This episode is brought to you thanks to the generous support of The Sales Collective. They've got a little something for everybody. If you're leading an organization, The Sales Collective can help you introduce real sales process or improve your own process so that you can consistently generate revenue and help your sales team deliver more. If you're an individual contributor, they have a ton of resources, including their Sales DNA test that will help you identify your own areas of improvement along with 250 videos to help fill those gaps. Check them out at thesalescollective.com or top1.fm/tsc. You're listening to the Sales Success Stories podcast, where we deconstruct world-class sales performers to provide insights and strategies to help you improve. To learn more, visit us at top1.fm. Here's your host, Scott Ingram. Today on the Sales Success Stories podcast, my guest is Suchi Mandal. Suchi is the top seller at Ansrsource. Welcome to the show, Suchi.

1:09 Suchi Mandal: Hi, thank you, Scott.

1:11 Scott Ingram: So I am really excited about digging into this conversation. Quick little shout out to both Dustin Brown and Alex Smith who helped you and I get connected. You've got some interesting stories and some interesting things that you're doing that I'm really eager to dig into, but we always start the show with some immediate value, and I would love to talk about the top 3 things that you believe have made you as successful as you have been in sales? What are those?

1:36 Suchi Mandal: Oh wow, thanks Scott. The top things that I think have really helped me be good at sales are my communication skills, the ability to express in that whenever there is a need to sort of share what we bring to the table as a company, the company I sell for, Ansrsource, and to understand the problems of the client. My communication skills help me a lot. And then being emotionally intelligent, and in that, being more empathy-driven in my conversations with clients has helped me bring value to my clients. And the final one would be problem solving. Over time, I've really gotten good at problem solving, whether it's on my business side or for the clients. Yeah, those are the top 3 things I believe that helped me get top sales and top value to the clients.

2:28 Scott Ingram: Perfect. I think we'll be able to connect some dots on maybe why some of those things are such strong points for you, just given your background. But why don't we contextualize just a little bit first and just talk about what is your role?

2:38 Suchi Mandal: My role at Ansrsource is I work for Ansrsource, which is essentially an e-learning provider. We define ourselves as we accelerate better ways to learn, whatever that entails… learning transformation, digital transformation. That's what I do and what I represent as far as sales is concerned. I also help a great deal in delivering the services to my clients as the vice president of the company.

3:05 Scott Ingram: Excellent. And then can you put some of your results in perspective for us? What have you been able to do for them?

3:10 Suchi Mandal: As far as quantification of results is concerned, it's been 3 years since I took up this role, and over time I have been able to threefold the sales that we were delivering. So 300%… originally my target was very 6-figure numbers, and then it has gotten much bigger now. That is only because I've been able to deliver results and show that there's a huge market in corporate learning that is untapped.

3:38 Scott Ingram: Yeah, that's fantastic. And I know you've had a little bit of an interesting adventure kind of getting into sales, maybe not what you had originally expected. What is that origin story? How did you end up making the transition?

3:49 Suchi Mandal: I wanted to stay away from sales as much as possible because I didn't think I had it in me. About 3 years ago, when I was doing program management for the company, one of our sales executives left and we needed to either quickly hire or have someone internally that could play the role for some time. And I took that on thinking, yeah, this will be a good ground for me to try and this is what the company needs right now. So I decided to take on sales after project management about 3 years ago, but I'm loving it more and more every day.

4:23 Scott Ingram: Tell me about why. I mean, and that mental switch, right? If this was something that you really probably tried to avoid initially, now that you're in How do you feel about it? What do you think sales really is at this point?

4:33 Suchi Mandal: Oh, wow. That's a good question. Sales is, in essence, helping people. That, to me, I've learned in the last couple of years as I had my mindset switch. I learned that all I'm doing every single day, every activity that I do, is ultimately helping either my clients solve a problem that they currently have, Or it's helping a learner get a better learning product because that's what we are into. So every conversation I get into is about helping somebody directly or indirectly, and I really enjoy that. It's one of my values.

5:14 Scott Ingram: I love that. It's so well said. I think that's a perfect encapsulation. Was that obvious immediately as you kind of stepped into this? Did you take that on right away, or was there a period of transition where it took you a little while to kind of find your footing?

5:27 Suchi Mandal: It took me a while, mostly because I had these notions about sales. And I come from India. I was born and brought up… like, I moved to the US about 5 years ago. Even in India and in the US, I sort of had a notion from society that sales is more about money and just like sell somehow, even if the credit card sales stereotype was there, right? Like, even if there is no need, just that's what salespeople do. They just sell it because that's what they are very focused on, the numbers. That was my notion. And so one of my hesitation when taking that role to my CEO was like, I don't think I can do that. I'm a numbers person in that I understand numbers and I can very analytical, but I don't think I can be that. And then he was like, don't worry about those things, you will be fine. And he knows me for like 10+ years, so he's seen me grow. He just knew that I'll be good at it, so he gave me the confidence to go in and, and think. Within 6 months, I knew that what sales is all about, what real sales is all about. Yeah.

6:34 Scott Ingram: If you could start that adventure over again knowing what you know now, is there anything that you would have done differently, or is there an approach that you would have taken differently?

6:43 Suchi Mandal: Yeah, I wish I had the mindset of helping people from day one. I would be better. I would be better at what I know now.

6:52 Scott Ingram: Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's so simple. I think part of the problem is those stereotypes that we do think, hey, this is a selfish thing and I'm supposed to push people and manipulate people and just do all these awful things, when the reality is if you just help people get what they want, it all works out.

7:08 Suchi Mandal: Yeah, it really does. Funnily enough, people can see through that. Your buyers can see through that, like, oh, you're not here for your selfish reason, you're here for helping me. Eventually they see it. Of course, trust builds over time. It's not going to happen in one presentation, but over time it then multifolds. Business multifolds without you doing much, just being a good human.

7:34 Scott Ingram: Yeah, I think that trust piece is so, so key, and I have a feeling this might be a good transition and get us to one of the things that I've been really excited about talking with you So, usually what I ask is, heck, the show is called Sales Success Stories. I would love to hear a story of maybe your favorite sale and just the process, the approach, and kind of what you learned from it.

7:58 Suchi Mandal: Yeah, sure. Favorite sales story. So, about… this is before I got into sales. I had seen, as a part of the operations and the delivery team, I had seen that as a company, we had gotten one of our clients, like biggest online university, over to India because we have a good size of team in India and a reasonable size in the US. So we are quite global that way. And when clients work with us, they work with both the countries. They work with US, then they work with India. About 7 years ago, we had taken this university, some executives, the people that will be working most with the team in India, we had taken them to India. And I saw the effect that it had on me as a team member, and I saw on others, my colleagues. So when I took on the sales role, that was one of the first things that I wanted to do with my clients. I was really eager to take them to India because I wanted them to see the talent for themselves, see what I see and why I have so much confidence in my team. Recently, it's been 2 years, I've been taking one of my biggest clients. I've been traveling with them. To India, every single time it's some different people from the team and they get to be more exposed to our team. And that has helped to grow the relationship so much by like multifold as far as how much trust there is between teams, how we deal with difficult situations together on the client side and on our side, and just how we show up for each other, like true partnership.

9:32 Scott Ingram: I love this so much. I mean, our first conversation when you and I talked, I don't know how we got here. I don't know how I found out that you were doing this. You know what happened?

9:41 Suchi Mandal: So I was inquiring to you about the conference tickets, and I was just about to drop the call. And I said, you gave me the information, everything. And then I said to you that I don't know if I'll be able to make it because my main priority is this trip that I'm taking with my client. We're going to India together. And so you got like really curious in the last 2 minutes. And I think that lingered in your mind. I think.

10:06 Scott Ingram: Yeah, that is what it was because it was just a timing conflict. You're right. I was so curious about, wait, what are you doing with your client? How is it that you're traveling with them to India? And you started to share this. I think it's so powerful to bring the humans together. And I want to hear a lot more just about your process, your approach. I imagine giving your kind of program management background, you've got a little bit of a system in the way that you're sort of managing this and really being thoughtful about the overall experience. Experience and how it's working, but it also reminded me of a conversation I had years ago with Irfan Jafar, who was the top seller at VMware, and he was leveraging their EBC. So large companies, they often have executive briefing centers, and they'll bring their big clients together, and they're able to connect their executives, and it's such a powerful tool. But what was so interesting to me about what you're doing is it's not like you have this big briefing center and you're this massive organization. It was really just, look, and they're half a world away. You're going to connect people from different cultures and just allow them to be together. So just talk more about how are you setting this up? How are you selling your clients on, hey, you need to go to India?

11:25 Suchi Mandal: Yeah, well, I'm going to reflect here on that because it just happened so naturally that I haven't had a moment to reflect. I think the key there has been for me, I've seen that they're interested in the team that they work with. Like there's genuine interest. For example, they would be like, oh, I worked with X and Y in your team and they are really good. Whenever I visit my clients, I would hear them taking names of my team members. And I was like, wow, with emails and just phone calls, there's so much camaraderie. I need to ask if they might be interested in being in person with these team members after working with them for a year or so. Kudos to my clients as well. They're always open the moment I spring that idea and saying, hey, this other client did this, this worked in these ways in terms of building trust within the team. And the way we set it up is we have a training. The clients will go and do training about what's coming in the next year. That's my program management background, because a trip is good, but how can we make the most of the trip together? What is in value for them? What is the value for us as companies? It has to be a win-win. It's more driven by the need for training because organizations are dynamic, right? They have a lot of new… in my industry, it's more like new learning coming up, new ways of digital learning, transforming learning. Let's get together and talk about what it means for your organization. And how we can partner with you. Train us on that. What we bring to the table as value is that, okay, you are doing this, but these other industries are approaching it this way. You are a talent development organization or you're a healthcare training organization. You are approaching it this way. But we also have knowledge from the industry attending so many conferences like we are nerds about digital learning. We can share more with how you can move the needle as an organization there. So like curated knowledge knowledge share happens and the results are phenomenal. And then they, from a quality of service perspective, from a delivery to the client perspective, from upping the game for the client perspective, it all works out. There are improvements somewhere. There are a lot of improvement. In some cases there are smaller improvements and we keep moving the needle there. And as long as there's marginal improvements, both parties see value in repeating that activity.

14:01 Scott Ingram: And you mentioned both parties. I mean, talk about some of the impacts for your team, not just your client, but what happens on your side?

14:07 Suchi Mandal: Oh, that's a good one. What happens on our side is that the client is not Big Bear anymore, for lack of a better term. Like, oh my God, they're the clients, they tell us what to do and we do that. That mindset changes to they are people, we can help them and they can help us. Like, we can tell them more about XYZ. Like, we can trust them because they are good to us and we are good, bad, like they're just people comes out of that. And better consulting from my team members, better camaraderie, better trust, all of that comes through.

14:43 Scott Ingram: Can you also talk about… because you shared some great stories with me about just how this bridges some cultural gaps.

14:50 Suchi Mandal: Hmm. Yeah, cultural gaps, the ones that we are always like, oh, we can read a book and learn. But then when we go to the country, and that has happened to me too when I came to America, started living here. I learned culture is so much in the movies, in the music, in the food that you gotta experience to really understand the other side. The way Indians talk versus the way Americans talk, or the way Asian countries… I… this is my length and breadth of experience, India and US. I've dealt with a lot of European clients, but I'm not knowledgeable enough to be able to speak confidently about it. But just between India and US, I feel like A lot of understanding I've seen increases, understanding of each other's culture increases. Does that make sense?

15:39 Scott Ingram: Yeah, it does. You know, I think you also just talked about Indians by nature are maybe a little bit more, but maybe just not as, well, aggressive is an easy word that you can apply to kind of the American side, and just allowing them to feel a little bit more empowered that I can share what I think with the client. I don't have to be afraid kind of things, right?

15:58 Suchi Mandal: Absolutely. There is so much talent in India, and I'll give the right words to what you were trying to say, Scott. Indians… and not stereotyping… but a lot of India still tends to take order-taking mentality from the West. Like, you tell me what to do and I'll do it. But India has so much talent. And again, there are pockets, there are exceptions where that's not happening, where there is no fear of sort of like I need to do as is told kind of year are the people that have had more global exposure. Like I had that before moving here. When I moved here and I got like, it's been 5 years now, I'm just being able to see beyond the you will tell what I need to do and I'll do it with the client. So I can personally, I have had a journey where I can say that I now bring the best version of myself, a confident version of myself in conversations with clients and problem solving because I know that they are treating me as equals. Does that make sense?

17:03 Scott Ingram: Yeah, it does. And I mean, it's not always just one culture versus another.

17:07 Suchi Mandal: Correct. Yeah.

17:08 Scott Ingram: What came out of what you just shared, I mean, I see sometimes within my own team and the consultants that I work with is people appreciate, like, if you have perspective, if you see a better way based on your experience, don't just do what they're asking. Say, hey, before we go down that path, maybe we should explore this other way, or I've seen it done this way. Might that make more sense? And Yeah, it's just helping people realize they want that. They don't just want you to jump. When I say jump, it's more like, well, hang on, let me ask a question. Let me understand, because maybe there's a better approach. And so I think the way that you're bringing everybody together and helping them understand and just feel comfortable in asking those questions or making that suggestion serves everybody.

17:53 Suchi Mandal: Absolutely. And that's what my team gets to see, that side of our clients where they are like, You tell me, show me. And this doesn't happen over one meeting. It happens over… the meeting happened and then we all go for dinner and we're not talking work anymore. We are talking lives, like kids and singing songs and exchanging ideas and talking about non-work topics, but still important topics in the world, like global warming and philosophical questions like, is there free will? All that stuff. And then The cultures merge very beautifully in that group, in those moments.

18:30 Scott Ingram: That's so good. It's so good. So, how do you kind of structure these? Like, how much time do your clients typically spend in India? How do you kind of set up that agenda, set up those opportunities for them to your point, experience the country? Like, how do we go out together and enjoy a meal and have a good time?

18:48 Suchi Mandal: Well, we start with an Excel sheet where we sort of plan out like 50% training time, or maybe 60, 70 sometimes, depending on how much there is to talk about in the partnership, and 30% just time allowed to learn about each other sort of a thing. And we plan each day as a team together, clients and us. And also we ask them, what would you like to see? We curate an experience, India experience, for There's so many things you can do here, and what's your preference? So we want to make them… because it's usually a quick trip, like 1 week to like 7, 8, 9 days maybe sometimes, but that needs to allow for jet lag. Is there so much logistic and thinking and thought needs to go into that to make it a good experience and valuable experience for both?

19:42 Scott Ingram: Yeah, I think that probably is, from what I've heard, is secretly a portion of your superpower. I'm just sort of struck by this idea of… because you're obviously being super thoughtful about it, but you're just asking them, well, what do you want? I'm sure you have some clients who are like, well, I'd like to go to a museum, or maybe they're into food, or they're interested in nightlife stuff. Everybody likes different things, so you're just asking them, what kind of experience do you want to have?

20:04 Suchi Mandal: Yeah, India has so much to offer. It's a geographically small country but a huge country, right, from a diversity standpoint. You go to South of India, you'll feel like you're in a different It's like Europe in some ways, like you're in a different geographical, like different country. And then you go to North India, it's absolutely gorgeous, but in different ways, just like US too.

20:27 Scott Ingram: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. So good. So Suchi, what are you most proud of? I mean, you've had a pretty great run the last 3 years. What are you most proud of?

20:35 Suchi Mandal: I'm most proud of the relationships I've built in my role over the last 3 years. I think developed some really good friendships out of this, which wasn't Again, that wasn't the goal, but that's why it's so authentic, because it wasn't the goal. Like, I can call my clients on a tough day and just vent, and they give me the same energy back. And I feel proud to say that it started the other way around, where my clients are vulnerable with me. And in that, it just feels like we have a really good relationship, and I feel really fulfilled, and I'm really proud of that. On both sides, we feel fulfilled. Yeah.

21:15 Scott Ingram: Yeah. So good. I mean, we'll actually be sharing a presentation at some point in the future that Baumann just did at the summit and talking about it was really client champion focused. But what he has found is that he's developed lifelong friendships with the relationships that he's built with his clients. I think a lot of that comes through the trust. It's the shared experience, but it's also just that look, I trust this person. And vulnerable is such a great word. If you can have just real conversations with each other and there's not like we're playing a game. I think that's the other stereotypical position that we often get into if we're not trying to help. It becomes, oh, you're the buyer, I'm the seller, you're supposed to act this way, I'm supposed to act this way, and it's this game and nobody is served in playing that game.

22:02 Suchi Mandal: Yeah, exactly. I'll tell you a quick anecdote. One of my clients actually calls in And every once in a while, this is repeated, she would ask me, this vendor is saying this, what do you think? Am I right here? Or this vendor is right? And that vendor is my competition. But the truth is that, and she knows this, that's why I get the call again. Because if the vendor is right, I will say the vendor is right. And she knows that she would call me again when the next time it happens, because she wants to hear the truth.

22:36 Scott Ingram: The truth. That's what it is. Even if I'm guessing there are situations in that example where you're like, okay, well, the truth may not actually serve me. It might not put me in the best light.

22:47 Suchi Mandal: But it's not about me. It's about helping her in that situation.

22:50 Scott Ingram: Oh, so good.

22:51 Suchi Mandal: I love it. When I reflect upon it, I'm like, that was cool, Suchi. High five.

22:56 Scott Ingram: Yeah, that's awesome. What about the flip side though? What do you find to be the biggest challenge? What do you struggle with the most?

23:05 Suchi Mandal: I think I struggle in sales.

23:07 Scott Ingram: I'll leave it open. Okay, take it how you want.

23:11 Suchi Mandal: In general, I struggle with what comes with being nice as just a person. Like, I'm a nice person, and that sometimes has not worked to my advantage. Like, in personal life, that translates to professional as well. It just takes me longer to get somewhere because I'm nice. Sometimes, but I still get there.

23:30 Scott Ingram: Why do you think that?

23:31 Suchi Mandal: Why do I think being nice has been a challenge?

23:33 Scott Ingram: Yeah.

23:33 Suchi Mandal: Because I feel like sometimes people take you for granted or your niceness for sort of like, oh, she's nice, she won't mind if I say that, like crossing boundaries.

23:44 Scott Ingram: Ah, yeah, that's funny because that was literally the word that was in my head, right, is… was just kind of boundaries, or, or maybe just a little bit more assertiveness and kind of asking for what you want or what you need, or again, kind of pushing back on, I want to be able to help you, but but that's not gonna happen.

23:59 Suchi Mandal: Exactly, exactly. Your niceness is taken for, yeah, she will be okay with everything, right?

24:05 Scott Ingram: Right. Interesting. Is there anything you're doing to kind of overcome that?

24:10 Suchi Mandal: Yeah, I'm starting to become more upfront about my boundaries, not in a threatening way, but also I establish them early on in either a professional relationship or a personal relationship, since you kept it open, the definition But yeah, I think being upfront has helped me set expectations on both ends.

24:32 Scott Ingram: Yeah, that's excellent. That's excellent. Well, I would love to know, I like to get super granular in the way that just people kind of operate and function and structure their days and their lives. And the way that I like to ask this question is, walk me through kind of a typical day in your world. Your alarm clock goes off, tell me what time that happened. And I want a kind of pretty detailed rundown until your head hits the pillow again?

24:57 Suchi Mandal: I'm typically an early riser. That early sometimes means 5 AM, most times means 5 AM these days, and sometimes it's 6 depending on how lazy I'm feeling. It can be 8 too, but on a workday it's 5 AM. And then I get up. My morning routine typically has some meditation and yoga in it. I meditate till I feel like meditating. I allow enough time between my workday to start from when I start my morning to just allow myself to be.

25:33 Scott Ingram: Okay, wait, wait, go back to that. You said you meditate until you feel like meditating?

25:39 Suchi Mandal: Yeah.

25:39 Scott Ingram: Say more about that.

25:41 Suchi Mandal: That's meditation for me. When I sit down silently, I get to a zone where I feel like what's important comes to me sort of a thing, like what's important during the day that I need to think about. It's like a mental gym, going to the gym, but mentally. So yeah, I do that.

26:01 Scott Ingram: Fascinating.

26:02 Suchi Mandal: Does that answer your question?

26:03 Scott Ingram: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I was just… the way you said it was so interesting to me. How long do you typically spend meditating?

26:09 Suchi Mandal: If I'm in a hurry, then it's 10 minutes. Some days I am in a hurry, but the days that I get up at 5:00 AM and I have my time, I sometimes meditate for an hour and Awesome. Awesome. After meditation and spending time, I typically start my day at 7:30 a.m. workday. Usually there is always music right before the day because you asked me to be detailed. I'm going to be detailed. At 7:35 to start my day at 7 a.m., 7:30, I'm just listening to some playlist that I'm enjoying that or I'm feeling that day. Then I start working. Most of my work entails either meeting my team to tell them how to deliver to the clients well, or they are with clients just checking in or talking about a new project or how are things going in the projects that they are working. So those are the nature of meetings I have, and of course new presentation, new clients, and all that. Mostly meetings. And then a part of my role also has responsibilities for numbers and budgets and all that, so I do that in the evening. I just, with my partner Chris, I watch some shows and sleep at around 8. Is that detailed enough?

27:19 Scott Ingram: Pretty simple. Any particular ways as you're working through the workday and just kind of your meetings, any just overarching strategy that you apply there to… are there certain times of day that you're taking certain meetings or what's your approach there?

27:32 Suchi Mandal: I try to keep my most important meetings for the morning because my brain is fresh and I can dedicate more mental bandwidth and more focus to those conversations. And then lighter conversations can happen later in the day where I don't have to use a lot of mental power.

27:51 Scott Ingram: Got it. What about your information diet? What are you listening to? What are you reading? What are you watching? And when does that happen?

27:57 Suchi Mandal: Oh, I'm reading Thinking, Fast and Slow currently. I listen to a lot of audiobooks, actually. I'm reading about the 6 types of working genius. That's And then The Art of Gathering. I almost finished it. At any point in time, I'm reading 3, 4 books depending on what I'm feeling during that time is what I pick up and never split the difference.

28:19 Scott Ingram: Great stuff. We always include links to the books in the show notes. So top1.fm/this episode number will get you there. I've not heard of… I'm sorry, it was something about gathering.

28:30 Suchi Mandal: The Art of Gathering.

28:31 Scott Ingram: The Art of Gathering. What is that?

28:33 Suchi Mandal: Actually, that's a book I started reading because I was doing these India trips that we were talking about. This book is by this author called Priya Parker. She has a lot of experience in community building, and this book is more about… she says if you just put people together, they're gonna have fun. That's not the hard job. How to make the most of a gathering, because more and more it's becoming rare to gather together. So this book talks about the tactics and the why of doing that. Intentional gatherings can be so much better than just putting people together and having some fun.

29:13 Scott Ingram: Super interesting. This is a personal obsession of mine. What's been the biggest epiphany? What's the thing that you're taking from that that you're applying?

29:20 Suchi Mandal: Hmm. I think the biggest… and this is the theme of the book, but she keeps bringing it back… being intentional about a gathering, even if it's a wedding or it's taking your clients to India. She doesn't talk about that, but that's what I translated to. Or a big gathering or a small gathering, or you're gathering with your client just to negotiate, even like 5 of you guys and 5 of them are coming to the table. It's a gathering. You're spending a whole day being intentional about how you're going to spend time. What are the important things? The presentation is a part of it, but there's so much more that happens. There's going to be dinner. There's going to be some times that you just spend in leisure with each other, being intentional about and organizing that gathering. Before getting into it can produce so much more results than just being like, yeah, sure, we'll just make a presentation and show up.

30:15 Scott Ingram: This is so interesting. And this is… maybe it was obvious to me. I don't know how obvious it is to folks who are listening. This is kind of the point and kind of why I wanted to have this conversation is it's the intentionality of bringing humans together. This could be as simple as, hey, I'm going on site. To visit a client and we're going to do a presentation, right? And it's kind of a traditional type of a setup. But to your point, if you're more intentional about that, like, we're bringing humans together.

30:46 Suchi Mandal: Yeah.

30:46 Scott Ingram: And some things are going to happen kind of naturally, but you can maybe make it even better. And so the idea of, are we going to include a meal? Is there some other thing that we can do together experientially that's going to allow us to just make deeper connections and have more open conversations about what's going on without kind of, again, being in the traditional roles.

31:11 Suchi Mandal: Yeah, with the guards down.

31:12 Scott Ingram: Yeah, like we're here to present, you sit there, you listen, here's our presentation deck. Like, oh my God.

31:19 Suchi Mandal: And you get to critique it, or you get to tell us the next steps, which may or may not lead to a sale. Like, let's not do that to each other.

31:27 Scott Ingram: Yeah, again, my whole interest in this conversation, and it's delivering, is do we be more thoughtful? Yeah, about even just like, I mean, a gathering could be you and I have coffee to talk about how we can help each other with our accounts, or it could be so granular. Yeah.

31:46 Suchi Mandal: And the part a host plays in that, right, Scott? I think where we may end up missing the mark is that nobody takes the role of a host. If you think of the business setups, Who is the host of that gathering? That 5 people are coming to talk about a merger deal, a big deal. You have to talk for the whole day. You're stuck with each other. It's not even one meeting, right? Who then becomes the host there? And then ideally, you want to co-host from the other party so you can together be like, what's meaningful to you? What's meaningful to us? Let's make the most of this. Let's take time out to have fun also. There's this concert going on. Are you interested? Would your people be interested? And let's do it together. And quite candidly, like my clients that I take, they split half the cost of doing this together. That's the level of partnership we have about this.

32:40 Scott Ingram: Oh, that's interesting. So they also have skin in the game.

32:43 Suchi Mandal: Yeah, they do.

32:45 Scott Ingram: So I love this idea of, and again, it's like being a leader or being a host. It's not something that somebody has to bestow upon you. It's something you can just do. Yeah.

32:55 Suchi Mandal: You need one in the group to say, I'll plan this. That's all you need. Yeah, nobody will oppose to it. I don't think so. Maybe they will, I don't know. Maybe I'm spoiled.

33:07 Scott Ingram: This is so good. I'm loving this. I'm loving this. I want to ask, we talked about your information diet and some of the books that you're listening to. What about the tools and apps that you use just to run your life?

33:18 Suchi Mandal: I heavily rely on Excel, Smartsheets. I'm old school that way. I'll write things down. That I want to do. And just Teams, Outlook, Zoom, just the regular stuff. I don't do anything special digitally, tools-wise, not yet.

33:34 Scott Ingram: So, it sounds like there's a lot of keeping it relatively simple and sounds like you're also drawing on a lot of your program management skills with just, just your comfort in Excel and Smartsheets and those types of tools.

33:48 Suchi Mandal: Yeah.

33:49 Scott Ingram: Love it. Suchi, do you subscribe to a particular sales philosophy?

33:54 Suchi Mandal: Yeah, I've subscribed to, and I attended this sales training, my first sales training recently, formal training, uh, with April Shprintz. Am I saying her second name right? She put words to this. I always felt it. Generosity culture. That's what I subscribe to. I subscribe to the generosity culture philosophy of sales where you're generous. To your client.

34:21 Scott Ingram: I love it. I love it. And I'll make sure that we get a link to her LinkedIn profile included in the notes. Yeah, if anybody wants to connect there, because I've not heard of her or that idea, but I love it.

34:31 Suchi Mandal: She's amazing.

34:32 Scott Ingram: How would you describe your style within sort of that generous approach?

34:37 Suchi Mandal: It essentially comes down to… and it's not just sales, it's just a way of living… like being generous to whoever you come across. That doesn't necessarily translate to giving money out all the time. That's not what I'm talking about. But mostly how can I be of service to you? Like a service way of living in Eastern philosophy. And I'm not religious, I'm spiritual. It's a way of living, like being of service to others. For me, it's the generosity culture, essentially. Be generous around and give more than you receive, and it will come back.

35:13 Scott Ingram: Brilliant. Love it, love it. So what drives all of this? What motivates you? How do you think about motivation? What is that for you?

35:20 Suchi Mandal: Motivation for me, I struggled with the purpose of life questions recently, like a couple of years ago more. Like, I have to define it for myself somehow or the other so I can keep going, you know, because money is not it for me personally. Money is not the purpose of life. Then what is it for me personally? It's, for now, it is to serve my society. And I use my society very intentionally. I want to serve my society in such that that everybody's life is a little better, even if it is so much marginally better, because I was able to help them in some way. And so my society, it is not like everybody, but everybody that I come in contact with, I want to be able to serve in some way or the other. And if I have been able to help improve their lives, even just by one day got better because of me, I consider that as success.

36:20 Scott Ingram: It is crazy to me that you used the word society because I intentionally sort of pivoted what traditionally has been the Sales Success Community to this idea of the Sales Success Society. We're moving to an invitation-only type of model, but what you described is exactly why it works is because everybody's showing up and it's not just, well, what do I get out of this? It's also, what do I contribute? So fascinating to me that that just came full circle. We'll talk more about that in a minute once I turn off the recording. But so interesting that it came there. I'm curious about… we've talked a little bit about some of the sales stereotypes and things like that. I wonder if there's something that you believe that the average or typical sales professional would think is crazy?

37:16 Suchi Mandal: I think the generosity culture thing might throw some people off. I don't know. I don't have enough experience yet to say. And listening to your podcast and people like Alyce who have like a lot of experience in sales, even I feel like there is probably more acceptance of generosity culture, but I don't know. I haven't met many salespeople yet. So I feel like that could be something that, you know, oh, what does she mean give more? Give more and it will come back to you just doesn't sound logically right to some people I've seen or heard. Sure, sure.

37:55 Scott Ingram: What about the flip side? Is there something that the typical sales professional believes that you think is crazy?

38:02 Suchi Mandal: I think there's just… if you increase the number of follow-ups, it will sell. Sometimes I find it a little crazy, like not in the sense that I feel like the mindless follow-ups, like, hey, I'm following up on this, I am following up on this, that's not going to turn into a sale. I feel like what would turn into a sale instead is just a modification of that. Try to understand where your client is at and why they are not replying to your message and find other alternate ways of doing follow-up in those cases if you really want to, if you really know that there's a need.

38:37 Scott Ingram: Yeah, so what does that look like for you? What's a good follow-up from your perspective?

38:41 Suchi Mandal: From my perspective, I pick up the call sometimes if my client is close to me and I ask like, hey, should I just take this off my pipeline? I want to be able to give realistic numbers to my management. I'm direct about it depending on the relationship that I share. If it's an RFP, I won't do that, but if I have a relationship, I am just more candid, and then I get candid answers Easy as that.

39:05 Scott Ingram: Easy as that.

39:05 Suchi Mandal: Yeah.

39:06 Scott Ingram: Suchi, what have been the most important decisions you've made or lessons you've learned that helped you get where you are today?

39:13 Suchi Mandal: I've learned a lot of lessons. One of my values is continuous learning. So I've learned from so many people around myself. So one of the things my CEO always says, he helped me see alternate ways of selling early on in my career because he sells through relationships. Like, people just want to work with him. So one of the lessons I've learned is become that person. Person that people want to work with, and you'll find success. So that stands out as you ask that question.

39:41 Scott Ingram: Oh, that's fantastic. Do you work with your CEO in your sales cycles? How do you guys work together?

39:46 Suchi Mandal: We are going to start working more and more together in the coming next year is the way we are structuring ourselves now. But in my day-to-day, it's more like I call him when I need advice. I'm going to do this, what is your advice? Here's what I'm hearing from the client, what is your And he would tell me what he thinks based on his experience. He's done this for much longer and has seen all the things that I am going to see. He coaches me through that, and then I make my version of it and execute it.

40:18 Scott Ingram: Awesome, awesome. Well, speaking of advice, what advice do you have for somebody that's just getting started in sales today? What would you tell them?

40:25 Suchi Mandal: Oh, I would tell them that remember, it's all about people. People, people, people. Just remember that who you are dealing with are just people like yourself. And if you can look beyond just the words that are being said and really get an understanding of what helps your client be successful, you are going to be successful.

40:50 Scott Ingram: Brilliant. What about for somebody that is a little further in? So they've been in sales for a while and either they're struggling a bit, or maybe they're doing well, but they haven't found that next gear to greatness. What do you tell them?

41:04 Suchi Mandal: Maybe my lack of experience will get the best out of me here, but I feel like it would depend on who I'm talking to and why they are stuck. To give a real answer to this one with my knowledge, Scott, I feel like it's very person-dependent. And if you have experience, sometimes people are stuck because they feel like, oh, I'm not able to problem solve efficiently, then I would tell them I'll dig deeper. That's how I problem solve. I dig deeper and understand why are you not able to problem solve? Is it because you need to get out of your own mind that your product is not good or you're not bringing value? Because if you know you're bringing value, then you shouldn't feel stuck. There are only 2 ways. If you know you're bringing value to the client, then either the client is finding more value somewhere else or they are are anyway easily swayed by the new things. But if you are aware of a client that you bring value to, then confidence should… in your pitch, your deals should come through.

42:09 Scott Ingram: I wonder if we can take that idea and maybe simplify it, and maybe it's as simple as focus on your value.

42:15 Suchi Mandal: Focus on your value. Thank you for putting those words. Yeah, Scott, that's good.

42:19 Scott Ingram: I like that because you get kind of two sides of that. One is that working on serving your customers and figuring out, well, what is the value of the solution that we're bringing? But also So, coming back to that, the humanity element of what is my value?

42:33 Suchi Mandal: Yeah, that's a very good way of putting that, Scott.

42:37 Scott Ingram: Well, you helped a lot.

42:39 Suchi Mandal: I was rambling through it, but thank you.

42:42 Scott Ingram: Suchi, you're a lifelong learner, and we are all about learning from each other. What would you want to know about top sellers in other organizations?

42:53 Suchi Mandal: I would like to know know, all the questions that you ask, Scott, to these people… like, I just started following your podcast and I was like, why didn't I follow this before? I would have gotten a free sales training. Your episodes are really good. I just listened to one and a half of it before our preparation. It was quick heads up for me. But yeah, the questions you ask are the things I would want to know. Nothing else comes to my mind right now.

43:20 Scott Ingram: Well, the good news is there's a lot more of these episodes, so there's…

43:24 Suchi Mandal: yeah, dig into…

43:24 Scott Ingram: I'm binging. Well, Suchi, the way I always like to wrap this up is with something actionable. What would you suggest that our listener do over the course of the next week, maybe the next 2 weeks, to improve themselves and improve their results?

43:41 Suchi Mandal: I would encourage you to make a list of all your clients and see the relationship. Like, give yourself marks, rate yourself. You don't need to show it to anybody. Ask yourself how strong the relationship is to what it can be. Be, just for business reasons even. And wherever it's lacking, try to understand why. Constructive feedback to yourself helps, I've seen. And it's not also judgmental, like you want yourself to grow. So I would say that making that list might help.

44:12 Scott Ingram: That is a fascinating challenge. I love it. Suchi, this has been amazing. Thank you so much.

44:16 Suchi Mandal: Thank you, Scott.

44:19 Scott Ingram: Thanks for listening to the Sales Stories podcast. To be sure you never miss an episode and for an invitation to our Sales Success Community powered by Influitive, subscribe to our newsletter at top1.fm.