Tech Sales is for Hustlers Podcast

Campus Series: Terry Loe – Inspiration, Motivation, and Willingness to Work Hard

Guest-At-A-Glance

Name: Dr. Terry Loe

What he does: Terry is the Director of Development and External Relationships at the Center of Professional Selling at the Kennesaw State University. He is also the Executive Director and Founder of the NCSC, which stands for the National Collegiate Sales Competition.

Company/Institution: Kennesaw State University

Noteworthy: Terry has rich experience in different fields, including the car industry, investment, insurance, sports, sales, and education.

Where to find Terry: LinkedIn

Key Insights

⚡ It is important to have a vision and a goal in both sales and life. Terry claims that knowing what you want to become and where you see yourself in the future defines your success, not only in sales but also in life. “I had a vision about what I wanted to do. I had a goal in sales, but having goals is especially important in life. I knew I wanted to be a college professor. Once you’re on the pathway to get there, it laid itself out.”

⚡ Experience and hard work pay off. According to Terry, experience and hard work are the two things that won’t let you down even when you’re struggling at work or college. “If I’m not the best, which I never was, I’m going to work hard enough in order to succeed at whatever I do. At every level, in every career, you’re faced with obstacles. And all the experiences I had have contributed to whatever small successes I’ve had.”

⚡ Young people should have a positive attitude and willingness to work hard. Skills are not everything that matters. There is something in a positive attitude and willingness to work hard, as well. “If they have that kind of positive attitude, they always succeed, or they always are better off. I’ve seen so many people with skills that fail because they weren’t willing to work hard enough and they just didn’t have that vision about where they wanted to be.”

Episode Highlights

Terry Loe’s Beginnings in a Nutshell

“The most important things in my life are my faith, my family, my wife. When I got to college, I played Division 1. Baseball, I had a chance to go to the World Series a couple of times. I played in a lot of professional scouting camps and summer leagues.

That led me to some of the things that I do now, and some of these I’ve helped create or develop. I got into interesting things because I look at goals as a big part of any salesperson’s life, but it was a big reason why I am where I am today.

I always thought I wanted to teach college, but I was going to get out and make my million first. I figured by the time I was 35, I’d be able to semi-retire and just teach college and have a good life. I ended up doing that, except for making a million bucks. And this path was very interesting.”

Sports and Sales – Two Sides of the Same Coin

“Growing up in sports, I worked hard, and I had a lot of success. And when you get to college, you realize there are a lot of good athletes there. Even in college, I rode the bench for four years. But because I worked hard every year, I was seeing progress. And I started my last year, and I was a team captain.

I always felt like I had some control, at least over the input of my success. You rarely have control over the output. So the number of sales I make, I don’t have as much control over that as I do over the activity that I’m engaged in. I think that’s related to my athletic background and having to get through adversity to see success at some point.”

If You are Doing Things Just for the Money, It is Not as Rewarding or Fulfilling

“All my activity was goal-driven. I wanted to be successful, and success in sales often means making a lot of money. But if you’re just doing it for the money, it’s just not as rewarding. It’s not as fulfilling. And at some point in my life, I realized that money was not the driving force in what I was doing because my family and I were perfectly happy with the amount that we were making when I was in college, and she had quit her job.”

Not Everything is About the Money. There is Something in Happiness, Too

“Making a lot of money is great. In sales, you’re going to have a chance to make a lot of money if you work hard. It doesn’t fall on your lap. But beyond that, you are going to come to a point in your life where you realize the money is not what’s gonna make you happy.”

It Is Challenging to Engage Students in Virtual Environment

“Student engagement has always been the challenging part in a virtual environment. And I know on our campuses, it’s been more challenging because when you’re sitting at home and looking at a computer, it’s just hard to get the juices up and the motivation up to get engaged. This environment was huge, but the silver lining is that everybody had learned this technology.”

You Have to Make the Best Decision with the Information You Have

“You have to make a decision on your own, but it’s always better to have more information than less. It’s always better to have more knowledge than less, which means you need to put yourself out there and think deeply about where you want to be and what you want to become. I need to think about who I am as a person and what I want to be as a person. And that’s going to translate into where I am in business, where I am in a mass social life, et cetera.

Think about what you want to be, and then start looking at different opportunities and say, ‘How do I fit?’ And you’re never going to have all the information you need. So you have to make the best decision you can with the information you have at hand. And then don’t look back.”

You Have to Be Motivated Every Day Because Bad Things Happen

“You have to have both motivation and inspiration. You have to continue to motivate yourself each day because bad things happen every day. Everybody’s got something going on in their life or will have. Sales, especially, can beat you up. The more I thought about positive things, the more I envisioned being successful and positive. Therefore, when something bad happens, I say, ‘You know what? That happens. What do I need to do now in order to get everything back on track?'”

Transcript:

[00:00:00] Libby Galatis: [00:00:00] Welcome back hustlers to the Tech Sales is for Hustlers Campus Mini Series podcast with memoryBlue. My name is Libby Galatis, and I’m here with Kristen Wisdorf. And today we’re actually hosting Terry Loe. He is the executive director and founder of the NCSC, the National Collegiate Sales Competition, as well as the director of development and external relationships

[00:00:22] at the center of professional selling at the Kennesaw State University. Terry, welcome to our show. We’re so happy to be meeting with you today.

[00:00:29] Terry Loe: [00:00:29] Thanks a lot, appreciate you guys having me.

[00:00:32] Libby Galatis: [00:00:32] Of course. We’ll start things off today. We like to ask our our guests, the first question that we typically ask our students when we interview them which is, what is your 62nd highlight reel, Terry? Walk us through a bit about yourself and how you became the professional that you are today.

[00:00:49] Terry Loe: [00:00:49] So I listened to some of your previous podcasts just to see what, how I might answer this question, and I don’t think I could do it in 60 seconds, but, as boring as I am. About me, [00:01:00] most important things in my life are my faith, my family, my wife. Oh, I was a jock. I started played all sports growing up.

[00:01:10] When I got to college, I played division one baseball, had a chance to go to the world series a couple of times. Played in a lot of professionals scouting camps, and summer leagues, so that led me to some of the things that I do now. And some of these I’ve helped create or develop. I got into interesting thing because I look at goals are a big part of any sales person’s life, but it was a big reason that I am where I am today.

[00:01:35] So I always thought I wanted to teach college, but I was going to get out and make my million first. So I figured by the time I was 35, I’d be able to semi-retire and just teach college and have the good life. Ended up doing that, except for the making the million bucks. And it was, and the path was very interesting.

[00:01:52] So I played an extra year in college and got my master’s degree because I broke my hand. But by doing that [00:02:00] it allowed me to begin to work towards one of the goals, which was to become a college professor 

Okay. And in 1981, when I did that, it was a very interesting path because I didn’t think I really wasn’t sure where I was going to go,

[00:02:14] Terry Loe: [00:02:14] I just knew where I wanted to be. So I got my first job in management. Worked in that a couple of years. That company went out of business. And one of these always thought, as “If I get out and I’m successful, make the million bucks, it’s going to be hard for me to quit because of, all the money I was making.” God saw fit to put me in circumstances that got me over that.

[00:02:34] So in the 11 years, after I graduated from college I had five companies that went out of business, I worked for. Oh, I got into sales after my second job, mainly because I thought I work, I have to work hard because I’m not that smart. And I always tell him if I work hard enough, I’m going to be fine.

[00:02:53] So I always work 60 hour weeks regardless, but I was on salary. The opportunity came up for me to get into [00:03:00] sales. And I thought I’ve really want to do this because if I work hard I might as well make money doing it. So I got into my first sales job in about 1983 and it was in investment business.

[00:03:10] I got my series seven, my series six, sold bonds, but basically what I got back then was a phone book and a phone. Of course, most people don’t realize what phone books are. We didn’t have computers, we didn’t have cell phones. So it was, so you had to be creative in getting in front of people. So when that first job I while I was on the phone a lot, and I got in at seven in the morning and left at seven o’clock at night I started doing presentations  seminars to possible investors, which allowed me to get in front of a lot of people and do that,

[00:03:41] so I had to be creative in doing that. That company went out of business for various reasons. And then I got into with Kidder Peabody and Dean Witter. 1987 occurred, the market corrected, they closed. Got into a automobile dealership with a friend of mine. So I sold cars for a couple of years, and then they went [00:04:00] out of business.

[00:04:00] I’m not taking credit for any of these companies going out of business. Then I got into the insurance and investment business and I did that for about six years. Then when my daughter, our daughter was born in 1991, my wife’s family practice physician she practiced for about 35 years, but I think we thought we were going to have the kid and then six weeks later she’s going to go back to work full-time and everything, but her maternal instincts kicked in and neither one of us wanted our

[00:04:29] kids to be raised by other people. So she quit full-time private practice and I quit my job entirely and went went to school. I did the doctoral work at the University of Memphis. She went back to work at the health department in We cut our income by about 75%. Oh, but remember, one of the goals I had was to teach college and I never knew if I was smart enough or not, but I figured out how to do it.

[00:04:55] So I got into, I finished in 96 went to [00:05:00] Baylor University, which is the first school in the country that had a sales center. St. Kates. 

[00:05:04] Kristen Wisdorf: [00:05:04] yeah. 

[00:05:04] Terry Loe: [00:05:04] I was writing there, but Baylor started their program in 1985. And I was around a good group of colleagues at that including Jeff Tanner and Larry Tonko, Bill Weeks.

[00:05:16] Some of those guys were really good. So from there I moved on, I’ve been teaching since that time moved to Kennesaw state in 2003. And so I’ve been here since that time. That was, I’m not answering your question,

[00:05:32] Kristen Wisdorf: [00:05:32] No, that’s such a good story, Terry. And it’s interesting, you have a lot of experience. You were an investment, in cars and insurance and you were an athlete growing up and I think you played at, it was Mississippi state, right? That’s exciting. So you played baseball at Mississippi state, you ended up getting in sales and now you teach sales. I want to focus on that bit about being an athlete or being a jock growing up. What do you think you [00:06:00] learned playing sports, growing up, playing collegiate sports, and how do you think that impacted your sales career or did it impact your sales career?

[00:06:09] Terry Loe: [00:06:09] Yes, in a couple of ways. One, I hate losing. I do not want to lose. I hate losing more than I want to win. So it’s I’m gonna, if I’m not the best, which I never was the best, I’m going to work hard enough in order to succeed at whatever as I do. So that in every level, in every career you’re faced with obstacles, the five or six companies went out of business that I worked for, I could’ve, laid down and cried. Wanted to a couple of times,

[00:06:35] but I had a vision about what I wanted to do. I had a goal. In sales, especially, having goals is important in life. It’s important, but not just dreams something that you can actually tangibly write down. So I knew I wanted to be a college professor once you’re the pathway to get there, but it laid itself out.

[00:06:54] All the experiences I had have contributed to whatever small successes I’ve had in [00:07:00] sales. I, the funny thing is every year I was in sales, I doubled my income from the first year, and then the company went out of business. So you have grown all over to do that, and, but I, I kept thinking these are things out of my control. And growing up in sports,

[00:07:18] I worked hard and I had a lot of success. And then you, of course, when you get to college, you realize there’s a lot of really good athletes in college. But even in college, I was, I rode the bench for four years. And then my last year, because I worked every year or worked hard now I was seeing progress. But I started my last year and I was a team captain,

[00:07:41] I made all, I see all this and that and had success. So I always felt like I had some control, at least over the input of what of my success. You rarely have control over the output. So the number of sales I make I don’t have as much control over that as I do the activity that I’m engaged.

[00:08:00] [00:07:59] So that’s a long answer, but, that’s, I think that’s what related to my athletic background and having to get through adversity to to see success at some point.

[00:08:11] Kristen Wisdorf: [00:08:11] Definitely. And your point about just ultimately like your work ethic, having being the reason that you were successful, but also the fact that you said, like you didn’t, play right away, you rode the bench for a little bit. I think lot of people coming out of college, whether they’re entering sales or not, they expect to be successful immediately.

[00:08:32] And that is such a real life example presales of putting in the work and putting in the time to get ready for it. I think a lot of students can take something from that in their first sales job, out of college.

[00:08:45] Terry Loe: [00:08:45] Especially because as we talked to our students here, the prospecting piece and building your pipeline, building a network takes a long time. And the analogy I’d normally uses prospecting is a lot like pushing a two ton Boulder you push and [00:09:00] push and push and put the effort and put the effort in. You

[00:09:03] don’t see, yeah. Sometimes there’s an immediate pay off. Sometimes you get a big deal and it’s great and it helps you, but normally it’s a slow process. But when you get that Boulder moving you really, once you get it going, it’s still hard and you still have to put effort into it. But after a time, and now after doing this for, 30 years and I still sell I have to raise about $200,000 a year for the center at Kennesaw state, but also I have to raise another half a million a year for that national competition.

[00:09:32] So I’m out raising 700, 750,000 a year. Oh. And when I first started, I had to talk to people a lot and get on the phone and reach out to people and start making connections. And now after all this time, and of course living long enough and being old I know a lot of people. And a lot of people have

[00:09:51] been a part of that national competition that we do. So my network’s built up, so I it’s a whole lot easier to [00:10:00] push that Boulder, but you still have to push it every now and then just to keep, keep the momentum going. And I think that’s related to sales that you just have to survive in some sales, you have to survive for five years, and then after that, you understand better,

[00:10:13] the, “What it takes to be successful”, and you can work more efficiently and more effectively. It’s like in sports. When you go from college to, or from high school to college, I’m used to seeing lady five mile an hour, fast ball and an 82 mile an hour curve ball. But now I’m looking at 95 mile an hour fastballs and 92 mile an hour sliders and change ups and all these other things, everything is so fast.

[00:10:36] And when you get out of college, that happens the same way. You get out and there’s all these people who know what they’re doing. And so it’s really moving fast, but the more experience you get, the harder you work and the quicker you get built up your experience. And you can do that faster, if you do research and talk to more people and create more activity. Things slow down for you so that, I can see things more clearly and what works, what doesn’t work, and I can [00:11:00] respond and react

[00:11:01] in a more effective manner, than when everything’s going so fast. So the experience and working hard helps all that.

[00:11:08] Libby Galatis: [00:11:08] Okay. I love listening to your story because you prefaced it saying, “I wasn’t sure where I wanted to go. I had this goal in mind. I knew where I wanted to be.” And you started in sales, that was your first step towards this longterm, you’re still in sales now selling for the collegiate sales competition and building out the program and teaching and selling students on sales. I think that a lot of people,

[00:11:29] to Kristen’s point earlier, a lot of students specifically, they want to move into a closing role and make money immediately. They want to be that big, bad sales rep making thousands of dollars and you have to start somewhere. And that, that first role is often where people realize that they’re good at it.

[00:11:41] So I want to talk about that first sales position that you were in, because I have a feeling that something may have happened during that experience where you were like, “I’m really good at this, this is what I want to pursue”, as a result of, your experience. So maybe walk us through the “Highs” and “Lows” of that first sales position, and maybe why you had that “Aha” moment that you wanted to [00:12:00] pursue it longterm.

[00:12:00] Terry Loe: [00:12:00] I’m not sure if I ever thought I was really good at this. I still not sure if I am, but because of that, I worked really hard. Oh, I did have a and I’ve listened to your past podcast and listened to, to what some of those guys and ladies said about it, and I relate to it. I had a sale where I worked with an account for probably a year and a half, almost two years.

[00:12:23] And the payout was about a $25,000 check to me. Back then that was a lot of money. But I still thought, okay, this and I could see where, this was helping them. My activity goal-driven. I wanted to be successful. And success in sales often is going to mean making a lot of money.

[00:12:43] But as you look at that, if you’re just doing it for the money you, it’s just not as rewarding, it’s not as fulfilling. And at some point in your life, when I graduated, when my wife and I quit our jobs, we cut our income by 75%. Oh, [00:13:00] so we went from quite a bit of money to not a whole lot of money.

[00:13:04] And I realized at that point that the money was not the driving force in what I was doing, because we were perfectly happy on that, on the amount that we were making. When I was in college and she had quit her job and done that, we got to know the people around us in a smaller neighborhood, smaller house.

[00:13:22] And you just realize that’s not what it is to be fulfilled and especially in sales, because I think that’s one of the driving forces to try to make a positive impact on the people around you. Oh, and that’s in sales as a college professor, I think all the faculty and teachers out there realize that when you can see the difference you make in some students’ lives.

[00:13:42] But then also when I worked with memoryBlue and hopefully you guys had a great experience at the NCSC, but it allows you guys to recruit some high quality candidates, cut down on some of the time you have to spend and going to different universities and going all over the country,

[00:13:57] and you get some good quality candidates who are going to make a [00:14:00] difference at your company. I know that, I’m convinced in my heart that’s what we’re doing is we’re making opportunities for students who are trying to create, start their careers. But also I think we’re trying to have a positive impact on the companies that we work with as well,

[00:14:17] so that’s really the driving force. And I think having the goals, not knowing where I wanted to go, I knew where I wanted to be. That’s interesting. You said when we started talking that you knew that you wanted to be a college professor. How, and you had this goal, how did you know that? Was there someone in your life or something in your life where you’re like, “I want to be an educator someday.”?

[00:14:38] No my, I was the first person in my family to graduate from college. And I have an uncle who graduated from college, but where I was from Alabama and we’re a bunch of poor people. Oh. So it wasn’t so much that. But as I as I grew up and as I got out and in my first jobs, I taught in Sunday school,

[00:14:57] I worked with a lot of young people there. I [00:15:00] enjoyed it because you really get involved with their lives and you can see how, what you’re doing in some instances, not every instance that there’s an “Aha” moment to them. And as faculty who teach or teachers who teach, you realize that often you tell your student over and over again, or my kids, I’ve got a 30 year old and a 28 year old, you tell them,

[00:15:22] and then they hear it from somebody else

[00:15:24] Kristen Wisdorf: [00:15:24] And then they believe it.

[00:15:27] Terry Loe: [00:15:27] “That’s so true.” And I think I’ve told you that a hundred times. As a teacher, you get to work alongside, hopefully the parents and society in saying, “These are the right things to do. This is how you have a, not only a successful career, but a successful life.”

[00:15:41] So as I taught in my Sunday school and worked with young people and young groups, and I’ve taught pretty much all my life in church with young adults, college students. Now I’m old, so I’m teaching people your age and in their thirties and forties. It just it’s there’s a lot of reward in that.

[00:16:00] Kristen Wisdorf: [00:16:00] Yeah, you’ve mentioned you wanted to have a positive impact on people’s lives, and you’re absolutely doing that as a professor. But also you run the national collegiate sales competition. Libby and I have both been, you’re absolutely right, there is incredible talent walking around and  competing and

[00:16:20] traveling with their universities there. It’s very interesting. You’ve been running the program for a while and I’m really interested to know how it started, how you got it going and how you’ve grown it over the last, what, 20 years now at this point?

[00:16:35] Wow. 

[00:16:36] Terry Loe: [00:16:36] Started in 1999. Again the athletic background came into mind, because I competed in the world series twice in several SDC tournaments, and a lot of other championship events, and had success at it. But I always thought at that time, when I got into academe, there were only one there’s one school Baylor university had the first sales center.

[00:17:00] [00:16:59] And again, I think I’ve mentioned it St. Kate also had one around the same time. We all knew each other, and we still do. It’s a very small community, is that thank you guys that found out and probably 95% of us have been in sales. So I think all of us pretty much have a passion for impacting sales positively.

[00:17:19] But the competition piece allowed me to watch Ramon Avalose and Scott Inks students do role-plays. And so I can see, “Okay, what are they teaching? What are they doing?” And so as the faculty got together and the faculty always come to that competition it allows us to exchange ideas, watch and see in real life, what their, that role play looks like and what they’re doing to go through the sales process. But also

[00:17:44] another important aspect of it was to get you guys involved. I had IBM and Office Depot, Xerox in the very first competition. I had eight companies that worked with that, but one, we needed the resources from you to, in order to [00:18:00] put it on, but you also judge and buy and participate. And so there’s a great opportunity to exchange ideas, between not only student to student because they develop networks, not only faculty to faculty because we know each other, but also we get to talk to industry. And although all of us have been in industry, most of us, we still need to stay relevant. And so the educational experience that goes along with having the industry involved in our activities really promotes a more effective means of preparing people to be succsesful in sales.

[00:18:36] So you guys, from our in our, on our campus, as well as being involved in these competitions we need you not just cause we want your money, though we need that we need you to interact with and engage our students so they can be better prepared. They develop better business acumen better understanding of what it’s going to take to be successful.

[00:18:56] So all the students systems targeted toward young people coming up, get [00:19:00] involved network get to know as many people as you can, even if it’s not a company that you think you might want to work with, you should get to know them.

[00:19:07] Kristen Wisdorf: [00:19:07] Absolutely. It’s so interesting. I, the competitions are, they’re really incredible to go to. We have a lot of listeners who either their university didn’t have a sales program or they didn’t they got involved later or they didn’t even know that these sales competitions existed or do exist.

[00:19:25] And so I think it would blow their mind, not only is it like as real life as you can get it’s role-plays, but  you take, you make it a game, which a lot of salespeople like, and they’re competitive. And so you add in the real life kind of role-plays corporate partners and the competition aspect and college students all across the country. It is really an experience unlike anything else. It’s really exciting.

[00:19:49] Terry Loe: [00:19:49] It is fun. I’ve told a number of people over the years, having started in ’99 and then, doing it every single year. Since then, I’ve always said, “When it stops being [00:20:00] fun, I’m going to stop doing.” But even this year, and of course we changed to the virtual environment and a lot of people had to overcome a lot of adversity.

[00:20:08] Students had learned how to use pod not podcasts, but different platforms, Zoom WebEx, whatever it is, you’re using, Teams. And you had to learn how to re-, respond or react and be effective in that kind of environment. So it’s a it’s an incredible opportunity for students to do that.

[00:20:25] And I think they need to be able to overcome any kind of obstacles that they have.

[00:20:29] Kristen Wisdorf: [00:20:29] Yeah, I was going to ask how competition has changed over the last 23 years. I imagine given what you just said that this year was probably the biggest change of them all going to the virtual.

[00:20:41] Terry Loe: [00:20:41] Well,it we made some slight changes. I wanted to grow it slowly and not make big changes because we will have so many people working on it, so it’s not like we can make a big production of it and make a huge change. Last year probably was the biggest, because last year, the competition was scheduled for March the 29th, 2020.

[00:20:59] Kristen Wisdorf: [00:20:59] Oh, [00:21:00] yeah.

[00:21:00] Terry Loe: [00:21:00] March 13th,

[00:21:02] we found out we can’t do it face to face. And we normally have about a thousand people at that event. So we had to figure out in 16 days, how to change a thousand people from face-to-face to virtual. So that was the biggest change. This year, we had a little more lead time, to figure out

[00:21:21] Kristen Wisdorf: [00:21:21] Yeah.

[00:21:21] Terry Loe: [00:21:21] virtual and do that.

[00:21:22] So it was, and again, our sponsors and I’m going to mention Gardener because they were, they greatly supported it, but also all the companies who were involved, who did not drop out. Oh, that saved us, allowed us to put on the event and still provide opportunities for students and faculty. So that was the, yes, you’re right,

[00:21:42] this environment was huge, but silver lining everybody had learned this technology.

[00:21:48] Kristen Wisdorf: [00:21:48] It’s going to prepare them for life after college.

[00:21:51] Terry Loe: [00:21:51] It’s not going to go away. I think we’ll still be face-to-face, but this is going to be a great tool, supplemental tool that I think everybody’s just going to continue to [00:22:00] use.

[00:22:00] Libby Galatis: [00:22:00] Diving a little bit more into the NCSD competition itself, doing it year after year, making these improvements as you get through each individual competition and learning from it. What do you think the biggest challenge has been, that you’ve particularly faced as the director, since starting the competition?

[00:22:15] I know we just talked about the transition to virtual in 16 days. That must’ve been a huge hurdle. Would you say that was your biggest challenge?

[00:22:23] Terry Loe: [00:22:23] No in a way, because there’s some side effects to this environment. The biggest challenge is always, each year I still have my nut to crack. I’ve got a quota. I’ve got to raise enough money, so that’s constantly on my mind. We’ve been fortunate and blessed that, enough companies have always been interested in be getting involved.

[00:22:41] And of course I’m biased, but I think it’s no brainer. You should do it, if you’re a company looking for entry-level salespeople. But student engagement has been it is always the challenging part in this environment. And I know on our campuses, it’s been more challenging because when you’re sitting at home looking at a computer it’s [00:23:00] just hard to get the juices up and the motivation up to get engaged,

[00:23:03] so you’ve got to keep them off positive mindset.  Not pollyannic, not so everything just going to be great and fine. If you don’t work, it’s not. So getting students engaged has been the biggest challenge to make sure they understand the opportunities. And I guess our our success has been one of our challenges is because the students coming out of our program and other programs like ours around the country, we have virtually a hundred percent placement rate,

[00:23:30] so they’ve gotten a little more comfortable realizing I’m going to get a job. And they’re going to get a good job, and they will probably going to have a lot of different opportunities. Just to keep their mind open to all the opportunities out there and to get engaged because, we have to provide you guys with some type of ROI. You’ve got to be engaged with high quality candidates and you will meaningful conversations with those high quality candidates, so do you have a chance to to recruit them successfully. So I think student engagement, adapting these things, [00:24:00] I, I, a lot of, you know, we I, a lot of, went from using no phones to, we have cell phones now, and then we’d had no computers,

[00:24:07] now we have computers. We’re using more technology now. It’s, change is always going to happen. You just can’t panic and lose your head, when change happens unexpectedly, you just have to keep your head about it and drive through it.

[00:24:20] Libby Galatis: [00:24:20] Absolutely. And it’s such a great point. The value of collegiate sales talent is astronomical. We’re a business that exclusively hires entry-level so obviously we benefit so much from being able to recruit and participate in these events, just as every other employer out there that engages with these students.

[00:24:38] I’m curious, with all this opportunity in play and you being a mentor and an educator for, the students that you’re working, collaborating with, what advice do you give them when they are given so much opportunity? How do they go through that decision-making process and how do you support them,

[00:24:55] and what advice do you share to help them make that decision?

[00:24:58] Terry Loe: [00:24:58] You talking about students getting [00:25:00] jobs and figuring that piece out? 

[00:25:01] Libby Galatis: [00:25:01] Yes. 

[00:25:02] Terry Loe: [00:25:02] The older I’ve gotten the more I realize, I don’t know that much. It’s hard to, each individual like myself, I need to understand who I am and what I want, what my goals are, what my value system is. And when a student comes to me and I talked to someone yesterday, day before I’ve got these opportunities, what do I do?

[00:25:23] So do, you really have to make that decision on your own. But it’s always better to have more information than less. It’s always better to have more knowledge than less. Which means you need to put yourself out there and really think deeply about where you want to be and what you want become, and where, I had a vision of being a college professor, but also with that competition, I always envisioned that as becoming the world series of professional sales. I didn’t realize all these other schools are gonna, I was gonna start doing these competitions,

[00:25:54] even though we worked together on them. But I had a vision, I saw what it was going to look like. [00:26:00] So as an individual, especially as a young person you’ve got to, and it’s a hard process to really be introspective about who you are, what’s important to you. What’s a value to you as an individual.

[00:26:12] Making a  lot of money is great. But I can promise you in a lot of sales roles you’re going to have a chance to make a lot of money, if you really work hard. It doesn’t fall on your lap. But beyond that, there’s a gonna come a point in your life where you realize, “The money is not, what’s gonna make me happy.”

[00:26:26] I need to think about who I am as a person and what I want to be as a person, and that’s going to translate into where I am in business, where I am in a my social life, et cetera. So I need to, if you’re looking and you’re not sure, think about what you want to be, and then start looking at different comedies and different opportunities and say, “How do I fit?”

[00:26:48] And you’re not, you’re never going to have all the information you need, so you have to make the best decision you can with information you have at hand, and then don’t look back.

[00:27:00] [00:26:59] Libby Galatis: [00:26:59] That’s great advice. Especially, looking back at your career, having to transition to so many different companies, you never know what’s going to happen in whatever position you end up jumping into. 99.9% or 99.9% of people that begin that first role end up transitioning into something different over time.

[00:27:16] So that’s a really great point and I think awesome advice for students to realize as important as the decision is of what you accept coming out of school, there are a lot of moving parts to any career and you’re likely to see a lot of transitions, whether it’s different companies different promotions that you pursue and starting in that initial sales role is just a point “A” in that long journey.

[00:27:36] Terry Loe: [00:27:36] And some context to that when I was growing up, it was a little bit different. So I grew up in the sixties and seventies and somebody took a job and they were in that job for 30 years, 35 years. And that’s what my mindset was, “I’m going to take a position. I’m going to find the right company. I’m going to stay with them because that’s really how you progress and grow”, et cetera.

[00:27:55] Obviously that’s changed. But with my mindset then, the, [00:28:00] the company’s going out of business and me having to adjust and keep insight where I wanted to be. That was a big change for me. That was lot of adversity for me because I was expecting to have, a long career with a single company.

[00:28:14] So when it happened and again, falling back on my background, my, my faith always supported me in realizing God’s going to put me where he wants me to be. I think I’m where God wants me to be right now at Kennesaw state. If he didn’t, if I didn’t feel that way and I didn’t think that way I would be somewhere else. But I’ve always realized if I work hard and do the right things, I don’t have control over everything, but I’m going to be where I need to be,

[00:28:41] and I need to bloom or blossom where I am and do the best I can. And then opportunities didn’t come up

[00:28:47] because 

[00:28:47] you

[00:28:48] show 

[00:28:49] yourself competent and succsesful at wherever you are, and then those opportunities tend to come up rather than being impatient.

[00:28:56] Kristen Wisdorf: [00:28:56] Yeah, that’s such a good point. You’ve talked a lot about, [00:29:00] you had this goal, you knew where you wanted to end up and you had a vision, right? And your advice to students would be to know yourself and have a vision, and then you couple that with how hard you worked. At the end of the day, you can’t control everything around you,

[00:29:13] you can’t control what’s going to happen to the company, but you can control your energy, your effort your work ethic. How do you, had you ever have students who call you after they get into their first job or a couple of years out of school who are like, “Wow, this is not what I expected, or this is harder.”

[00:29:29] Like, how do you help them get through the tough times? Because there will always be tough times in sales.

[00:29:35] Terry Loe: [00:29:35] Again, two parts.  One is, I think you have, if you, your first job, unless the company is doing something radically wrong, unethical, illegal, I’ve got to stick with that company for awhile because you don’t know enough about it yet. I think it takes three to five years to really know a company, figure out your job and move on from there.

[00:29:54] So when you’re in tough times, one, you got to ask yourself, “Am I in this situation because I’m [00:30:00] not working hard and I’m not doing what I’m supposed to do.” If you do then change that behavior. If not stick it out, work hard, do the best you can there. But then, look at where I want to be.

[00:30:11] So you’re quite good. Remind me of your question again. I’m sorry that skipped my head.

[00:30:15] Kristen Wisdorf: [00:30:15] No, it’s all good. I guess what type of advice, or how do you help students who, graduate and they get into that? They hit the tough spot or we all of our new hires here read the book, “The Dip”, because ultimately you’ll have that tough spot, you like, how do you encourage them to stick it out longer and keep trying and put in that work ethic?

[00:30:35] Terry Loe: [00:30:35] I remember now second path that answer 

[00:30:37] sales is highly personal, but it’s also about the numbers, and it’s 

[00:30:42] about setting goals. So yes, all the research and science behind this is about numbers. I know that if my conversion ratio is 10 to 1, I’ve got to talk to 10 people before I’m getting get one sale and that’s simplifying it quite a bit, I’ve, I’m going to hit those [00:31:00] 10 sales or 10 calls every day or 15 or 50 or a hundred or whatever it takes.

[00:31:04] So I know that if my activity level is where it should be, then eventually that’s going to work.  And I saw it in my career and I see it now, as I’ve, as I work in contact people and get my goals in line, that as long as at the end of the day that I’ve done what I’m supposed to do, I’ve made the calls, I’ve made the touches, I’ve done all the research and homework I need to do.

[00:31:29] And I’ve got to go  each day, if I hit so many numbers, whether it’s email or LinkedIn or cold calls or whatever it might be, I know the science is behind me, it’s going to work. You just have to make sure you continue to do that. And then those slumps and dips, the harder you work, the more you realize those slumps and depths, we can begin to get shorter and shallower,

[00:31:50] over time. They always are there. You’re going to have ups and downs, but for the most part, if you do, you put in what you’re supposed to put in, you’re going to get out [00:32:00] at some point in time, you’re going to reap what you saw.

[00:32:04] Libby Galatis: [00:32:04] Definitely. We talked about this a little bit on our podcast episode with April Scofield where she was talking about whether or not sales people are born strong, or if it’s something that can be taught. And your story is really interesting because you were a natural competitor. Your entire life, it seems like you were so involved in sports and,

[00:32:21] what motivated you and what pushed you was knowing that goal in the back of your brain and not letting yourself lose? Another question we ask our students are those that are interviewing for this role as “Do you love to win or do you hate to lose more?” And you answer that without us even having to ask. I’m curious,

[00:32:35] do you feel that strong salespeople are born and they have these traits inherently? Or do you think that there are certain qualities that can be taught in the classroom or, through experience in, in exploring these roles?

[00:32:48] Terry Loe: [00:32:48] Yeah, we answered this question quite a bit and I will hear industry people sometimes saying, “I’m just looking for somebody who’s got that natural born instinct or whatever.” But I’ve seen [00:33:00] attitudes and people change. And again, it gets back to, “I’d rather have somebody who’s inspired rather than somebody who’s motivated.”

[00:33:07] You have to have both. I think you have to continue to motivate yourself each day because bad things happen every day. Nobody has it easy. Everybody’s got it tough. Everybody’s got something going on in their life or will have, if you haven’t and the world can beat you up sales, especially can beat you up.

[00:33:22] So what I recommend and what I’ve done is, I read a lot of Zig Ziglar. He was very motivational. was all about sales. He hit on a lot of what it takes to be successful without all the research we’ve done over the past 30, 40 years. But he hit on the topics mostly you keep a positive outlook.

[00:33:40] I would rather be around someone who’s going to be positive, but I always read those books behind me. I’ve got an index of probably 600, 650 books that I’ve read. And I keep up with what I’ve read and how much I’ve read of each one, and whether they’re leisurely, and I’ve read a lot of leisurely books.

[00:33:59] Spy [00:34:00] novels and detective novels and stuff. But I’ve read some “7 Habits of Highly Effective People”, “How to Close a Sale”, Carnegie’s books. So I can, you got to continue to put good stuff in your head. The music I listened to I listened, I was listening to opera when you guys came on.

[00:34:16] I don’t understand what they’re saying, but it’s inspiring to me. I listened to a lot of classical music, but also listened to a lot of contemporary Christian music, which is always most, always about hope and what can happen positively. You don’t have control, but I know things in the end, if I do what I’m supposed to do, or God is going to work out.

[00:34:34] So you’ve got to keep putting good things in your head. Again, not being pollyannic it’s not a, it’s not a magic trick. But the more I think about positive things and more I envisioned being successful and positive, again that’s, it’s not a, it’s not smoke and mirrors it’s

[00:34:53] Kristen Wisdorf: [00:34:53] It’s true. Yeah. 

[00:34:54] Terry Loe: [00:34:54] more positive things.

[00:34:56] And therefore, when something bad happens, I say, “You know what?” That happens, “What do I [00:35:00] need to do now in order to get everything back on track?”

[00:35:03] Kristen Wisdorf: [00:35:03] Yeah, the mind is powerful, and the power of positive thinking, especially in sales can have a huge impact.

[00:35:11] Terry Loe: [00:35:11] Yeah I don’t want to, because my wife hates it because her mother was a Mary Kay director all this positive thinking stuff, there’s truth in it, but it’s not a magical formula in itself. You’ve got to really understand that the world is bad and or can be bad things can happen, and they will.

[00:35:29] I’ve got to work through that. I think Yogi Berra said it best. You guys know who Yogi Berra is? 

[00:35:35] Or there’s he’s baseball player. And I actually saw him play some but then he became the Aflac guy, but always said funny things, but he said, “Baseball is 90%, half metal.” And I think that’s the truth in sales, in anything else, the way you think about what you do is going to have an impact on how you do what you do.

[00:35:54] And so I seen people at very high levels of skills in sports and baseball, [00:36:00] especially. But there’s somebody with an equal level of skills. If they have a different attitude, the ones who look work at it hard, and have that kind of positive attitude, they always succeed, or they always are better off. ‘Cause I’ve seen so many people with skills that fail because they weren’t willing to work hard enough and they just didn’t have that vision about where they wanted to be,

[00:36:23] and “I’m going to get through this and I’m going to make it.” And I believe, I’ve heard it on your other podcasts that, I’m trying to impact lives in a positive way. Companies, individuals even when I’m working, I want everybody around me to feel better when they’re around me.

[00:36:41] And not blowing smoke up their skirts or anything, so to speak. But I just want to have others around me behave better, work better, and feel better about who they are and what they’re doing. That doesn’t mean you don’t have disagreements and you don’t, you can’t be direct with someone, ’cause

[00:36:55] when you’re a leadership position, sometimes you do have to tell somebody, “You know what, you, [00:37:00] you need to make an adjustment here.” So anyway that’s it.

[00:37:05] Libby Galatis: [00:37:05] You’re, learning about your story has been super enlightening because everything that you’re sharing, I feel that you, I feel you’ve learned it from personal experience. Being the first person of your family to get a college degree, you mentioned that your uncle did, but going from there, setting this goal for yourself, facing all the adversity that you did and now being the accomplished professional that you are,

[00:37:24] I think that you just have a wealth of advice and personal experience to, to be able to talk to which we appreciate you sharing so much. I’m curious in all of the different roles that you’ve been able to tackle in your career including your education career, what do you think has been the most rewarding?

[00:37:40] Or biggest win for you so far?

[00:37:42] Terry Loe: [00:37:42] Having my children succeed, and my wife being happy. We’ve been married 35 years. We actually got engaged, we dated for about four months, got engaged, got married. So I’ve met her in October of ’85, got married in April of [00:38:00] ’86.

[00:38:00] Kristen Wisdorf: [00:38:00] Wow.

[00:38:01] Terry Loe: [00:38:01] I was a pretty good salesperson. But it takes a lot of maintenance to continue that sale and keep your keep them satisfied.

[00:38:08] Just from a personal standpoint I’d rather be known as a good husband and father. And not that I haven’t, failed at that at times, but that’s my most important. And then I guess second th that competition is interesting because I really wanted to do it just for fun,

[00:38:23] ’cause I thought it’d be, I thought everybody liked it and be a lot of fun. But I think is that I’ve looked at over the years, as other schools have started competitions and they’ve been successful and they provide a lot of value to companies like yours and to students. Being able to be on the front end of that was, seeing how it impacts lives is very rewarding.

[00:38:41] It too because you realize there’s a lot of people that supported me and helped me out. I can think of 15 people right now that were in this profession or me who provided opportunities for me to be successful, and I took advantage. There’s a lot of what we’ve built on the [00:39:00] foundation of those before

[00:39:07] Kristen Wisdorf: [00:39:07] Okay, Terry, when you, way in the future years and years from now, when you look back on your career as an educator between Kennesaw and the NCSC and the thousands and thousands of not only students, but also, other professors, other educators, and corporate partners, the people that you’ve had a chance to work with, and  help, what do you want to be remembered for? When you look back and when they look back on your years of educating and running the sales program, what is like the one thing that will make you most proud?

[00:39:46] Terry Loe: [00:39:46] That’s a hard question. Again, I, my family is very important to me. But in this, I do think that this sales education community and higher education, I do see us as a family. Oh, I [00:40:00] think we’re close. Most of us know each other. I think we work together. I’ve always wanted to be able to share realizing that others have shared with me in the past.

[00:40:07] So I guess, looking at some of the guys and ladies that I work with I just want to be one of the guys and I’m no better, no different from anybody else, but I’ve had some, I’ve been blessed in a lot of ways, and I have some resources I’ve been able to share. So I guess I, sharing and being a part of the family and being a positive contributing member to the sales education community is something that I value because I value the opinions and and respect the people that I work with

[00:40:36] out there. And I learn every day from, Greg Ricardo. I’ve picked up that video editing our video email thing from him and Pat Powelltino’s always got good ideas, Scott Inks I’ve learned a lot from him here. So there’s a lot of people that I look to learn from.

[00:40:52] But just being a positive contributing member of the community, is what I guess the best answer I have.

[00:40:58] Libby Galatis: [00:40:58] I think that is [00:41:00] an incredible answer. And in our few years of working together so far, Terry, I can definitely say that you’ve left that impact on me. We appreciate you taking the time and joining us for this podcast episode and letting us pick your brain. I know that the listeners will be able to take a lot away from

[00:41:14] the advice that you were able to share today. Thank you so much again for being here with us and we will see you guys next time.

[00:41:21] Terry Loe: [00:41:21] Thank you Libby. Thank you, Kristen. Appreciate it.