Mastering Business Growth with Strategy, Leadership, and Delegation – Featuring Henry Swarey

Jul 15, 2024 | Assembling The Band, Learning from the Best, PodCast, Practice Makes Progress, Season 3

The Back-Story

In this episode of the Work At Home Rockstar Podcast, host Tim Melanson interviews Henry Swarey, a seasoned business strategist and leadership coach. Henry shares his extensive entrepreneurial journey spanning over 20 years, shedding light on how he managed to balance work and personal life effectively. He delves into the importance of delegation, the art of building a strong team, and maintaining a positive company culture. Henry also discusses a significant challenge he faced when key employees believed the business was failing and decided to quit, offering insights on overcoming such obstacles. He emphasizes the need for continuous learning, having a long-term vision, and leveraging one’s strengths. Henry’s expertise in sales and his approach to hiring the right people provide invaluable lessons for listeners looking to grow and scale their businesses.

Who is Henry Swarey?

Henry Swarey is a business strategist and leadership coach with a proven track record in transforming sales teams and driving business growth. He is the founder of Lighthouse Leadership, where he helps top-achieving sales teams enhance their performance and grow their revenue. Henry’s unique strategies have propelled his own team from $0 to $30 million in a new market within just two years. His mission is to help one million sales team members each generate $1 million by 2033.

Show Notes

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In this Episode:

00:00 Introduction and Guest Welcome
00:24 Success Story: From Struggles to Family Time
01:36 Balancing Business and Travel
04:11 Challenges and Lessons Learned
08:42 Importance of Company Culture
13:00 Staying Motivated and Focused
19:52 Delegation and Scaling Your Business
22:54 Guest Solo: Exciting Business Ventures
27:39 Conclusion and Contact Information

Transcript

Read Transcript (generated: may contain errors)

Tim Melanson: [00:00:00] Hello and welcome to today’s episode of the work at home rockstar podcast. Excited for today’s interview. We are talking with the owner of Henry Swarey and what he does is he helps to improve people’s businesses with strategy and leadership and finances. So excited to be rocking out here with Henry.

Hey, you ready to rock?

Henry Swarey: I’m ready to rock Tim. Hey, how’s it going today? Glad to meet you.

Tim Melanson: It is going awesome. We always start off here in a good note. So tell me a story of success.

Henry Swarey: Sure. Well story of success, you know, maybe is followed by something that didn’t go so well. I mean, I started as an entrepreneur. It’s been over 20 years now since I started. And uh, I, I did, I went from not having enough time to be with my family to now having time to Go on family vacations. I went from not having a schedule to, you know, things are a little bit together now, and now I have a schedule and everything is on my calendar.

So I feel like that’s a success. Like I can take extended family, uh, vacations and so on.[00:01:00]

Tim Melanson: That’s something that probably a lot of people are looking to do is, uh, those extended vacations and not have their business fall apart. Right.

Henry Swarey: Yeah, that’s for me. I mean, I, I love to travel. My wife and I love to travel. And I think that’s something that’s important that if, if, uh, you have a spouse that you’re on the same note, even on the business, you know, it’s so much easier if you have someone or business partner that, pulls for you instead of pulls away or doesn’t even care, you know.

So for me, travel is the way of really getting rejuvenized, you know, getting, getting my mind back, you know, after a hectic day or hectic weekend. We like to go to the lake and so on.

Tim Melanson: Now, do you take your business with you at all when you go travel?

Henry Swarey: So of course, I couldn’t, say no to that. Of course. I mean, with our technology that we have a business seems to follow us around. So I, I, I limit myself. So that’s what I do is when I’m at the lake, I’m at the lake. But I do look at my phone. I do look at my tablet. Um, I tend to go without my computer though.

So I don’t have extensive [00:02:00] use of my business software and so on. So I can see what’s going on. I keep a tab on it.

Tim Melanson: Yeah. So you can see what’s going on. You can kind of, you know, react to some things here and there, but you’re not going to be tempted to, you know, sit on your laptop for a few hours. Right.

Henry Swarey: No, no, I mean, family is important. Like I found that I really have to prioritize. My, my, my life, you know, what’s the most important? I think a lot of entrepreneurs, they go through life and, and their life starts getting jammed and they’re like, man, I don’t have time for my marriage or I don’t have time for my best friend or, you know, like family vacation.

Like, I don’t have time, but I don’t have time. I would love to, but I don’t have time.

Tim Melanson: Yeah. And so, like, was this something that you worked towards or were you kind of like building it all, all along with that time in mind?

Henry Swarey: So I’ve always been working toward that. Um, Delegation, I guess process. I think one of my strength is delegation. I delegate everything out. And then, uh, but then I gotta make sure that I follow [00:03:00] up with accountability. Um, as far as answering your question for pressing for that time. Um, think for me, it’s what’s important in my life.

Like, You know, when I was younger, maybe it was more of the money, but it’s kind of shifted, like it’s like we need money, but the purpose is different. It’s, you know, it’s important to have relationships. With those around you. And as you build your company, you got to have a relationship with your employees and you know how that goes, managers.

And if you want to grow your company, you got to grow your team. You got to grow yourself and all that.

Tim Melanson: Yeah, I agree. And I think for me, it’s sort of, I’m at a point where I’m shifting right now because I’d say up until now, I didn’t mind taking the business with me and not even going on vacations. I mean, really, it’s work vacations, right? And now I’m sort of starting, I feel like I’m on like this, this, uh, this, I don’t know, tipping point where now I’m like, okay, I think I’d be cool to be able to go and not bring my work, right.

Henry Swarey: [00:04:00] exactly.

Tim Melanson: And that’s probably pretty, pretty normal. Yeah. When you’re younger, you’re, you know, you’re all business. And then once,

Henry Swarey: Yeah. Yeah, for sure.

Tim Melanson: stage. Yeah, cool. So now you mentioned, uh, like, has the good note, the bad note sometimes, you know, really go together. So is there something that didn’t go super well in your business that we can learn from?

Henry Swarey: Well, yeah, so, you know, there’s, there’s a lot of things and I guess I could talk about the most recent one. I guess people would like to hear the struggles of successful people. That’s for me too. You know, I like to hear like, like they’re like me, like they also have trouble, you know, in their life because it seems like some people are making a lot of money or some people have things so successful and don’t see what’s going on the backside.

So, um, you know, if I, uh, if I may just go back quickly and I started, uh, on my own when I was like 20. Uh, 21 or something like that. I was a farmer, but then I went on my own within five years, I had grown my company from zero to, [00:05:00] Oh, I didn’t even get to a million yet. And I mean, this was 20 years ago and I sold it.

I thought, Oh man, I don’t, I don’t like business, but I found out that my roots were in business that came back stronger than ever, and, um, it wasn’t more than like a couple of years ago. Well, back in 2017, I sold that second company. I moved to a new location. Now we’re out here, uh, 500 miles away from where I knew everybody started back up and went from zero to, um, 3 million in four years.

So I think it’s easy to re repeat ourself while we’ve done now. Um, to answer your question directly, there is. Did I have a bad time? Exactly. So, I was on a, I was on a business trip out in, uh, Colorado and, um, I was in a meeting and the phone starts ringing. One of the guys is calling here in the office and I just texted back, um, I can’t talk right now.

You know how you press that button. And then, um, he replied back. It’s very important. I says, okay, let me step outside. We were dismiss, [00:06:00] dismissing for a class. And, um, so I stepped outside. Okay. And he says, Hey, uh, Henry, Hey, so everybody’s here in my company. Now I have three sales guys. I have a single guy that’s out there doing, uh, one man, uh, stuff, just, just our small projects.

And then we know we have like three office people. Uh, maybe we’re down to two at that time, uh, helping with the office work. And then we subcontract everything out. You know, we’re at most in 3 million in sales now. And, uh, they said, um, so we think we’re going bankrupt. And I’m with that, I’m quitting. And I just learned that, you know, you think you have good people in your company when hard times come, like we were kind of going through a slim time, like a little bit tougher time.

And, uh, some of the jobs weren’t getting done and the project manager was blaming it on. On, um, something else and not himself. And he just starts talking to other people. And one of the sales guys actually took his side. He goes, yeah, I wonder why [00:07:00] my job ain’t getting done. I think, you know, and then he started talking and, and when I was gone, they started going through my books and I had told that one person I was onboarding.

Don’t worry. My books aren’t up to date right now because. Um, I didn’t need to reconcile my account and I’m behind so, you know, don’t worry about that. It’s not going to show up properly. That really scared me. I had people, I had two people quit that day. And, um, so then I was on my own in the office. It was hard.

Tim Melanson: Wow. Wow. That’s, uh, yeah, that must’ve been tough. So how did you recover from that?

Henry Swarey: So I recovered by recruiting again. And so I’m always been able to, uh, stick with it. And, um, I, I recruited. And it was, um, a year later, I fired everybody in my office. I had gen, I fired a Gen I, I hired a general manager. I’d hired a bookkeeper and project manager had set everything up again. And, uh, the second time around it was. people. I just, it [00:08:00] was, you know, I thought they were for me, but then when I started talking budget and stuff like that, and then, uh, and then the general manager, it was just, it was not the right fit. And so it came to a point, I, um, I had to fire him, fire the bookkeeper.

And then the third one said, well, I’m walking out. But then I rehired and I says, you know, I need to look at my My, um, culture, who do I want? Who is really like me? And when I started rehiring again, I looked at the resume and I started asking those questions. So now when I hire people, they say they’re good at something.

You have done this. They need to show me. They need to show me I’m going to hold them right to it. And if they can’t, if they can’t bring satisfaction to me, I’m not hiring them.

Tim Melanson: well, yeah. Yeah. I’ve heard that a few times where people will hire more for the culture than they hire for necessarily the, you know, I don’t know, resume that they show up with because you never know, like you say, they can falsify that resume and also, uh, even if they’re really good at their job, they still might not get along with everybody [00:09:00] in the office, right?

Henry Swarey: Yeah. And I think culture is key. I think that’s one of the things that I look for now on the first phone call, I need to know that they have actually done some research on my company. I just don’t want somebody that wants a job. And to the first interview, they had better have something about my company.

It must be a fit on my culture and I do ask them, why do you think they look fit into my company? Before I interview them, I give them a copy of my culture, uh, printout of our culture, uh, script that we have, that we stand for. And they, they need to tell me why they look fit in. So,

Tim Melanson: that’s clever.

Henry Swarey: that’s huge, I’m telling you.

So, culture first. And then you go for skill or not. I mean, we hire will over skill, but skill is still key. You know, if somebody has good skill, I want to see it. But if they got things on their resume, they got, you know, they got 70 things they have done, they’re going to be talking to me for quite a while, how they do it.

Tim Melanson: Well, and there’s certain jobs that, um, you can train too as well, right? I mean, some jobs, you know, the skill needs [00:10:00] to be pretty high, but there’s a lot of stuff that, you know, especially in your company might be done a certain way. So you don’t have to train them anyway. Sometimes it’s better to have a little bit less experience because you can at least teach them how to do it the right way rather than all these bad habits.

Right.

Henry Swarey: exactly, exactly right. And it’s so hard to have, sometimes I think it’s the hardest to have somebody that’s more senior, let’s just say upper, in their upper 50s in their age, or in the 50s. Um, I don’t want to put age on anybody, but, uh, it just seems like the older that we get, the more we become set in our way, and the less we are open to a new direction.

Tim Melanson: yeah, yeah, exactly. And, and that can really, that can really create some friction, right? Because you get everybody doing it a different way, right?

Henry Swarey: Exactly, but I think that’s the young culture’s problem today, and it was mine when I was young. Right. I didn’t want to share my way of doing things, therefore, I was not even open to receive, like, new direction. I was just, like, arrogant, I guess, a little bit, you know, I just didn’t know what I didn’t know.[00:11:00]

Tim Melanson: So how do you, like, how do you mitigate that? Like, how do you, do you have like some sort of process that you put them through to make sure that they are going to align with you?

Henry Swarey: You mean, for onboarding new people,

Tim Melanson: Yeah,

Henry Swarey: Yeah, yeah, so then we start with the, uh, the culture, and then, uh, and then the third interview, um, we talk about, um, Like I give, I asked him for a, a, let’s say a lesson, let’s say if I’m, I’m hiring for accounting, I asked him if they know how to reconcile accounts, you know, what’s important to me, do they know Excel, do you know how to create reports?

And one of the last, one of the last people that I hired, I said, okay, create me, create a report for me, show me how I will do the profit and loss for salespeople for all the calls. I want you to create it yourself. And he did, and I was impressed, you know? So it’s just like, show me what you can do.

Tim Melanson: that’s awesome. That’s awesome. And people like to do that too, right? What they could do.

Henry Swarey: Well, yeah, but see, here’s the thing. Some people go to Google, and they copy and paste, and I ask them, did you go on Google and copy it? He goes, no, I created everything from scratch. [00:12:00] And so, if you would have said, no, I copied it, and I just added to it, I’d be like, mmm, I want to see what you can do.

Tim Melanson: Yeah, right on.

Henry Swarey: Because I can copy, like, I can copy and paste myself.

Tim Melanson: Yeah. Well, and you know, I suppose, depending on the position though, sometimes being able to research and find stuff, you know, uh, and then add to it as a good thing too, but I do remember, you know, even in some of my early interviews for, for tech stuff, I used to be a programmer and, uh, They would get us to do these interview questions on paper, so you couldn’t, like, look it up.

You had to actually write out the, you know, the code, and it was hard because, you know, for us, very little of it is just written out. Like, we copy and paste from somewhere and put it in there and then just build upon that. Uh, but really, like, having, like, no internet around you and having to write something out from scratch is, it could be challenging for sure, eh?

Henry Swarey: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. For sure. Yeah, that’s hard.[00:13:00]

Tim Melanson: So now, uh, what about getting good at what you do? Is that, so is there anything that you do to sort of keep you motivated and keep you sharp on, on the skills that you need to run your business?

Henry Swarey: Yeah, so I think I’m well rounded in a lot of areas, but then again, I don’t believe in this thing of being a jack of all trades, a master of none. I think that’s why people don’t move forward, uh, because they just turn into a jack and they stay there. Now, um, years ago, I decided I’m going to stay into the roofing industry and stay there.

And there, my friends said, well, hey, I’ve got some cement blocks I want you to lay up or some concrete I want you to pour. You said you’re a contractor. I says, nah, I’ve decided I’m going to stay in the roofing. He goes, roofing? You got enough work in roofing to stay in the roofing. Oh yeah, yeah. I think so.

I, I think I can make more money getting good at one thing and then just do it faster and better than other people. And it’s, it’s proven this point does work.

Tim Melanson: It does work. Yeah. Uh, and I mean, when you get into like the marketing side of it too, like, you know, every time you go [00:14:00] see him take a marketing class, it’s talking about niching and figuring out exactly what you do. Right. So you can’t do that if you do everything right. You got to really narrow in on being, be a specialist in something.

Right.

Henry Swarey: Yeah, yeah. And then like, uh, to answer your question, you say, what do I do to inspire myself or what do I do to keep myself going in one direction? And there’s, you know, a couple of answers to that. First, when I started going to seminars back in 2007 and reading books, I got a book subscription, I got a new book every month.

I was just so hungry for leadership and I was like, man, I got to grow myself. I realized that if I don’t grow, nobody around me can grow. If I can’t transform myself, I can’t transform others. That’s

Tim Melanson: Yeah. and that it takes a while to get to that point. Doesn’t it?

Henry Swarey: It does. And I think it goes to, it comes through pain because we, we all hit our lid. Like we can’t grow further than so far, or we face some pain and we want to go around it in our life. So many times I’ve sidestepped it and not going through the something I need to [00:15:00] do. You know how it is when you have children, I don’t know if you have, uh, young ones.

Okay. And then there’s sometimes they do things, you know, you should confront them about, and instead, uh, at least as is what I’ve done, um, You take them to the window again. Oh, look at that bird. Hey, look at the horses out there. And you distract them from what they were doing, hoping they would just forget it.

But you know, need to confront them someday. Right?

Tim Melanson: Yeah, some of it, eh?

Henry Swarey: And so that’s how you with with us as leaders that we know there’s things we need to go through, but we choose not to. And I think as long as we stay Keep sidestepping it we won’t grow and if we grow it’s in the middle of pain every pain Every opportunity is wrapped with pain and a problem. Every problem is has an opportunity

Tim Melanson: Yeah, and when you, when you look back to it, isn’t it interesting that you see that, uh, you know, some of the problems that used to be like so tough are like now normal problems that happen every day that you just [00:16:00] solve, right? And now your problems just keep getting bigger, but you keep getting bigger as well, right?

Henry Swarey: Yeah, and I think you must have the right attitude and you must be able to Have a good emotional emotional bank account because if you get all emotional about all the pain of the problem that’s going on you get Wrapped up in it You can’t take it. I tell people around me, I says, you will never grow further beyond the point and the level of pain and stress you’re able to tolerate.

And you can’t let it get to your, you can’t let it get to your head. Like, I think that’s why people, some people don’t grow because they’re just get so stressed out. They don’t know how to, how to deal with it. Like, they’re just like, I can’t do more. I can’t take it. I can’t take this payroll problem. I can’t take the stress of all these vendors coming after me.

I One of my friends said, I can’t take it that people call me all the time and they want, you know, um, you want time to pay their bill. I don’t want to call them. I don’t want to chase them for the money, you know, so. Hey, I guess it’s not for him then.

Tim Melanson: No, no, it’s not for him. Well, [00:17:00] it is something that, uh, probably, I mean, I, I think a lot of it kind of like leads into other parts of your life as well, too, like, you know, maybe some, some of the personal stresses kind of like affect your business. Right.

Henry Swarey: Exactly. Sure. It will. It’s like your personal life. Um, It’s gonna feed into your business life because that’s who we are So if we don’t fix the personal side of things the business side won’t change either

Tim Melanson: Yeah. And, and vice versa. Right. I mean, so I mean, a lot of times your business stresses come into your personal life and then you start messing things with your personal life too. Right.

Henry Swarey: Yeah, and it can be hard to keep that separate like how you know, people have a problem with that You know, especially the one man show they’re trying to do all of it themselves They say they can keep all the money or whatever it is Uh, but then they’re never home. Like, they’re always home, like you said in the beginning.

Hey, do you keep your work at home? Like, when you go to the beach, you take your job with you. Well, really, I don’t, but I, you know, have it available, but I have people in place now that do this, and I just check [00:18:00] on them.

Tim Melanson: Yeah, well, that’s awesome. So now let’s talk a little bit more about the, uh, about learning. So now do you hire coaches and mentors and all that stuff? Like, how do you, how do you keep learning and growing?

Henry Swarey: Yeah, so, I throw myself out there. I, I buy some courses, and I have a coach right now that’s helped me write a 10 year plan in my company that is amazing. And it’s someone that’s also helping other companies grow. And so they take a deep dive into my company’s financials the last three years, and then we reverse engineered the plan for 10 years, starting last year.

And it’s just amazing. Like the things I need to do, like I know I need to do it, but sometimes I just let it go. Well, to get there you really gotta, there’s certain things that we need to do in order to move to the next level. So that’s what I do.

Tim Melanson: Wow. 10 years too. Hey, that’s a big deal.

Henry Swarey: It is a big deal and it’s something that I don’t know how to write myself, you know, [00:19:00] exactly. I mean, they showed me how it’s done and all that and it’s just something that I don’t enjoy. Like, that’s not my strength. And so I have to hire that out. So I believe one of the things to help us to be, you know, stay successful or become successful is stay in your giftedness.

Like we all have a gifting. We’re good at one thing or two at least.

Tim Melanson: Yeah, I agree with that completely. Like it’s, it’s because if you start doing things that you’re not gifted at or you don’t like, then you bring that negative energy into that work as well. Right. Which it just drains you even more.

Henry Swarey: Exactly. So if you ever, if you ever do something at work and then it stresses you out or makes you completely empty, then you know that’s not your strength. But if it completely energizes you, you know, you should stay there. But sometimes, As a business owner and entrepreneur, you know, we need to hire more people, delegate more things.

Uh, before we do that, we’re like working on all areas, but the sooner we can delegate those out, the better we can grow ourself and grow the company by [00:20:00] leading into the areas that

Tim Melanson: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And what do you, what would you say would be the biggest kind of, uh, you know, barrier to, to delegating? Like what, what do you think would hold people back?

Henry Swarey: I think it’s hard to just put my finger on that one. That’s a heavy weighted question because I look at the personalities. I also have studied that for years and I also train that now. And if you look at the different types of personalities, you have the delegators, you have the doers, you have the talkers, you got the team players, and you got the analytical people.

And some people analyze things way too much. And so, um, it’s harder for some, but you have to delegate. You have to find something that you’re not good at and delegate it to someone else in order to grow.

Tim Melanson: Yeah. Yeah. I, I hear what you’re saying too. Cause I, you know, there are people that, I like, I’ve never heard this before, I’ve seen people in my life that just delegate immediately when they have no problem with it at all. They’re just like, yeah, yeah. You do this, you do this, you do this. And [00:21:00] it’s like, wow.

Like they’re not taking anything. Like I always kind of like was annoyed by that. Like, man, they’re not doing anything on their own, but that is a massive skill. Once you get into business for yourself, you realize that you can’t do everything on your own. Delegating is. Hard. So for those people that are able to do it, just, just easily, right.

It’s a, it’s definitely a skill.

Henry Swarey: Yeah. And I think we can all learn to delegate and then some people just don’t delegate well at all. They’re just. Not co delegators, but I think the more we learn that we can learn all skills and that may not be our strength, but we need to, if you’re a business owner, you need to learn to delegate or you will never scale and grow your company.

It’s hard to do it by yourself. How can you like, how can I get to 10 million just myself? It’s almost impossible.

Tim Melanson: Yeah. Yeah. I think for all entrepreneurs, probably I would say delegating and sales would be something that all entrepreneurs need to know how to do. Is there anything else that you can think of that all entrepreneurs should know, at least, you know, be [00:22:00] good at?

Henry Swarey: Yeah, yeah, so I think entrepreneurs are good in sales and I think that’s why, I think that’s why they’re able to sell their business or sell their company, their idea, because they’re good sales people for the most part, but they’re not great closers. But they’re usually, so I look at four parts of my company.

I start with marketing, and then I go sales, and then I go service. Then financials, and so one of these four you’re good at, but you can’t be good at all four, but I look at companies, other people’s companies, and I help them grow also, and I look at which area they are weak at, and which areas they are strong at, and so for each entrepreneur, like, you need to know your company in the four parts, and your strength in each part of them, and you need to get somebody in there where you’re not good at.

Tim Melanson: Well, I love that. So then this is a perfect segue. So tell me what’s exciting your business right now for your guests.

Henry Swarey: What’s that again?

Tim Melanson: So it’s time for your guest solo. So tell me what’s exciting your business. Tell me about your business.[00:23:00]

Henry Swarey: Yeah. So my business, what we do is we have a roofing company. I’ve been doing roofing for almost 20 years and, and a great thing going on in my company as is the growth that I’m able to see by transforming my salespeople into great salespeople. I love seeing other people grow. learn, but to duplicate myself has not always been easy, but now with the people in place that I have, we’re able to scale and grow the company to new heights that I’ve not seen ever in my life, and it all comes down to being able to transform yourself first, I believe, and build those relationships, got to have the right attitude.

You know, make sure that you don’t have that fear holding you back.

Tim Melanson: Right on. So how do we find out more about you then?

Henry Swarey: So you can find me on all social media. It’s either Henry Swarey, Coach Henry Swarey on Facebook. So just type it in, Henry Swarey, I should come up. Um, yeah, I’m on Facebook, I’m on Instagram, [00:24:00] LinkedIn. You can find me all over, really, TikTok.

Tim Melanson: Awesome. What would, be your target market for the people that you’d be looking forward to coach

Henry Swarey: Yeah. So I’m looking to coach, uh, business owners that want to grow and scale their company. I’m looking for people that have a business, whether you’re home and you have one or two employees, whether you have And a couple salespeople or a bunch of salespeople, I can help you grow and scale your company from where you are to where you want to go.

And it all comes in duplicating yourself and duplicating the top people in your company. Gotta have great skills, skills. I think one of the biggest things in a company, um, for success is sales and be able to close, close your sales.

Tim Melanson: and you can help with that?

Henry Swarey: I can absolutely help with that. I’ve been in sales for over 20 years and I had to relearn a few times.

Just like playing golf. If you don’t, if you don’t change your swing, you’re not going to keep going in the right direction. So as times change, people change a little bit, you know, from 10 years ago to now for sure.

Tim Melanson: [00:25:00] Yeah. And, and I, I do think that that is something that a lot of entrepreneurs, especially beginners have, uh, have a struggle with, right. Is either the sales itself or the probably the clothing.

Henry Swarey: You know, I, what I’ve seen for myself, I didn’t realize. There was a sales process. I didn’t know what I did. So for the first, it was about 10 years before I went into sales school so I could learn how to sell so I could have my own sales person that could train them. I didn’t realize there was like a beginning conversation and a middle and then the close and people, I believe, get that.

Get that mixed up. They tried to close and they ambushed the sale. And then you’re like, dude, nobody wants to talk with me.

Tim Melanson: Yeah, you’re right. You’re right. It’s, it’s, it’s odd too, right? Cause the closing part is, uh, it’s either people like jump right to it or they don’t do it at all.

Henry Swarey: Yeah. And I, and I see it with my salespeople. Uh, sometimes like, I’ll just be honest. Like it’s not easy for some [00:26:00] people to, to, uh, stay in the clothes because it’s that awkward pressure, that moment of silence. You ask for the sale. I need to shut up, zip this mouth. And if they’re not taught that, you know, they’ll be gone.

Well, you know, but then you start losing the sale because they start making a fuss that they shouldn’t even talk.

Tim Melanson: Yeah. Yeah. That one, when really, I mean, I, I definitely, I probably took similar sales courses to you that when you think about it from their perspective, like last time that someone asked you for a sale and Like what goes through your mind you start thinking you start thinking okay You’re kind of evaluating it.

If you’re interrupting them while they’re thinking about that Then you know, you’re not gonna make that sale, but it doesn’t mean that they’re they need more convincing It just just means that they’re running through it in their head, right?

Henry Swarey: Yeah, you know, there’s like these four personalities I was talking about before. We got people that make a decision in a very short time. We got the talkers, the team players, and the analytical people. So, you need to know how to close each person. You need to be able to, uh, really quick, you [00:27:00] know, see their personality style, and kind of, kind of know how they think.

Because if you don’t, then the analytical person, he will not say yes until he gets enough information. But then you give the wrong guy too much information. He’s like, dude, I gotta go. I have a doctor’s appointment. See ya. Knees out the door.

Tim Melanson: Oh, wow, that’s awesome right on so so uh, so we can reach you on social media Then uh, have you got a website too?

Henry Swarey: Yes, henryswarey. com. Just my first and last name dot com. You can email me henryswarey at gmail. com pretty easy. So I answer to both. You can DM me through any social media. I’ll see you there. Just any place really.

Tim Melanson: Love it. This has been awesome, Henry. Thanks so much for rocking out with me today.

Henry Swarey: Welcome and thanks for having me on. It’s been a pleasure.

Tim Melanson: Great. And to the listeners, make sure you subscribe, rate and comment. We’ll see you next time with the work at home rockstar podcast.

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