Staying True to Yourself: Fulfillment vs. Money with Ian Koniak | The Better Than Rich Show Ep. 43

Be Authentic ~

Staying True to Yourself: Fulfillment vs. Money with Ian Koniak

Part of succeeding in growing your business is having a talent in sales. Whether you’re a salesperson for a Fortune 500 company or a small business owner looking to add clients, the art of the sale is one you need to fine tune if you want to grow your business.

Many perceive successful salespeople as sleazy and opportunistic; people just focused on the commission. What if it didn’t have to be that way? What if succeeding in sales simply meant showing up with integrity in all areas of your life, including the conference room?

Shifts in perception like what we just described may appear radical, but they are all in a day’s work for Ian Koniak. Ian is a sales coach helping executives improve their sales and their lives. Ian was a TOP performer at Salesforce (ever heard of it?) and while he was crushing quotas, he realized he was lacking a sense of fulfillment.

Ian then launched his own successful business at which point he found himself wildly indulging in a myriad of vices and risking his family in the process. One day, he made the decision to “do the work” and work on his faith and battle his addictions head on.

The story of Ian’s journey toward a life of true fulfillment is one worth hearing. In this latest episode of The Better Than Rich Show, Andrew Biggs sits with Ian for an interview full of refreshing candor and valuable insight.

Andrew Biggs 0:00
Do you want to win back 13 to 37 hours of your week, every single week? If you do, please join us we are going to be teaching the foolproof method to identifying the bottleneck in your business and teaching you how to resolve that we're going to teach you all about our three epiphanies around systems. Mike, where can people learn more and tell about the program?

Mike Abramowitz 0:18
Well, you're gonna want to go to automate delegate systemize.com. And you will learn our three epiphanies, which is automation sequencing, how to delegate and use a virtual assistant, and how to step back as a CEO using strategic retreat. So again, go to automate delegate systemize.com That's automate delegate systemize.com and get more information now.

Ian Koniak 0:43
Yeah, so I'm a pure selling skills are kind of interaction skills. I mean, my number one tip, for anyone listening read a book. If you're a b2b. For b2c, it might not apply as much but it's still worth reading. It's called sell without selling out. Okay? And it's really about how to authentically show up as yourself right? You do not want to, the more pressure you apply to people, the more likely you know that it's going to break right you do not want to apply to pressure. So the way I sell is like this no pressure selling mode, where it's like I'm here to help.

Mike Abramowitz 1:17
Welcome to the better than rich show with your hosts Andrew Biggs and Mike Abramowitz. The better than rich show helps ambitious leaders who are on a mission to leave the world better than they found it. change their perspective on what's important, increase their income and impact and systemize your life and business. If you've ever struggled with finding your purpose have felt disconnected or distracted or found yourself going through the motions. This show will remind you that what you do matters and will re inspire you to chase your highest dreams. It's time for you to become better than rich.

Andrew Biggs 1:52
What's going on everybody? Welcome to the better than rich Show. I'm your host Andrew Biggs here today, and I am so excited about our special guests. Ian Kodiak here today is a dear friend of mine is somebody who I go way back with and he's currently helps b2b Account Executives perform to their fullest potential to crush their quota, master their mindset, their habits and their skills. So they can perform at the highest level. He has an amazing story. He did over $100 billion in sales at a little company called Salesforce. He was the number one account executive there for years and years. And Ian, I'm so excited to dive in with you on your story on what you bring to the table what it means to be better than rich. So welcome to the show, man. I'm so glad you're here. Good to

Unknown Speaker 2:33
see you, brother. And for anyone listening. My whole story started with well, it didn't start it started with my parents was a big part of the story because he introduced me to personal development and masterminds. And he actually was the sales rep who got me to sign up for at the time, a mastermind called Epic impact. And that was kind of my journey into personal development, which has continued intensely for the past six years. So I would not be here doing this podcast, we're not for you. So it's great to reconnect after all this time. I know we've talked a lot in between, it's all coming full circle, of course.

Andrew Biggs 3:06
And so for any of you who think cold emails don't work, it's a testament, some random email that Tony Robbins ended up transforming his life. And obviously, my life as well as I've gotten to know you, man. So I'm just so glad you're here. And I'm excited to dive in. So one of the more interesting parts that I would love to dive in with as a starting point, I remember when I first chatted with you, you're like, Look, man, I'm doing well, I made $4 million a year, I got some good thing going out here in the in the Southern California area drive my Maserati, like life is good. And also there was something missing. And I just think it's so perfect for the better than rich to talk about what life is like when you are successful, but you still feel empty. I'd love to maybe start there. What was that like for you? And how has life been since you had some of these big realizations that you've had?

Unknown Speaker 3:54
Yeah, well, it's interesting, because what was empty at the time, frankly, I was comfortable. But I knew that I wasn't performing to my full potential. You see, there are people in Salesforce that were making seven figures that were the top of their game. And that's why I got into Salesforce, I left a pretty successful position. I had 80 employees and was working in the Fortune 500 company before going to Salesforce, I wasn't going there to make 250 I was already doing that I was going there to actually get to the elite level at sales. And when I went and joined epic impact at the time, you know, I'd come off missing quota for three years in a row. And the third year I missed it just barely. And it was the most painful feeling in the world. Okay, the feeling that you're not performing to your full potential that you were put on this earth to do great things and you're just kind of living a mediocre life. Now I know. 250k may not sound mediocre, but in the world of Salesforce that's smack in the middle. I mean, if you're doing that you're probably not even hitting your plan. So fundamentally, I was not feeling good about myself, regardless of what that income was. I knew I wasn't performing as good as it could and that's why I initially joined is so I could perform better and frankly, I did, I performed I went from average to number one globally, I crack seven figures, and there was still something missing. So at first, what was missing was the ability to achieve what I knew I was capable of. But once I achieved that level that I knew I was capable of, I still didn't have what I was looking for. And that's the interesting thing. So really, the answer to your question is, what's it like to chase money and not feel fulfilled? Right? It feels really crappy. It feels like Man, why am I unhappy? I should be more grateful I have a great life, things are going well, why do I feel like there's a void in my life. And that was something that I really, frankly, didn't actually ever find that inner peace or find that true mission or purpose until I had done some very, very deeper work later on myself through therapy through addiction recovery through some of my faith, where that void actually finally got filth. So I would just say, for people chasing money, or success, or external reputation, or status, but you can spend all your time thinking it's gonna get you what you want. But once you get there, you'll realize, hey, maybe this isn't actually what I wanted. And that was kind of my journey up to that point. And once I realized that, that's when the real work began that I started to do.

Andrew Biggs 6:15
Yeah. Do you mind telling us a little bit more like, tell me a little bit more about? What does that mean? Like, what did the real work really entail? Because I'd say it's probably like, Yeah, a couple years into your personal development journey. First off, you went from making a quarter of a million to a million dollars plus a year, which is obviously incredible in and of itself. But then, at that point, something shifted even more, right. You mentioned therapy, you mentioned addiction. What were you looking for? And how did you actually find it? Part of the work,

Unknown Speaker 6:45
so I felt like, you know, my career, what I was doing was great. I was making money, I had a good lifestyle for my family. But it wasn't very fulfilling. So I was helping companies improve their efficiency, grow their sales, grow their revenue, but I realized, like, I really wasn't helping people at the level that I felt like I was called to do. And so part of the work was in 2018, you and I entered, I go way, way back, we joined a program called brandbuilders. Group. And it was how do you actually and that evolved into what you're doing? And what I'm doing now? It was really like, how can you be serving others right? So that was something I was just serving myself was very, fairly selfish. I thought the work that I wanted to do was like, how do I use the blessings that I've had the gifts that I've been given and the experiences I've gone through to actually help others improve their life and better situations. And I started to do that work and I created a personal brand and I spent the better part of 2019 after having two great years at Salesforce, starting a business and coaching others. Well, all that came crashing to home in 2020. And this was right around the time of the pandemic. And while I was building a brand, and continuing to perform at Salesforce, what happened is my ego got fairly big I got into this place where I thought it was God's gift to the world if I was this great salesperson, and oh, my brand was doing well. People wanted to pay me for my time. It was really ego boost and anytime your ego gets really big that's when the devil will come for you really hard. I say the devil I mean energy. I mean, the dark side. I mean, there are forces when you go too big you fall on your face, right? So whatever you believe, fundamentally, there is this common thread when ego but the higher you fly the farther in the harder you fall. And that's kind of what happened to me. I was getting into a place where like, I was thinking I was great. I was also stressed out a lot and I started turning to addiction as a way to like it wasn't even like a way to cope. It was like yeah, I deserve this. I'm gonna party hard going benders at Vegas, go get drunk, go like, celebrate it was I remember, I'll tell you so my addiction was sex and porn, okay. And obviously, I also had other addictions and tendencies to gambling, pot alcohol, you name it, right? It was this like kind of sales culture of like wild craziness. But one time, I just closed the biggest deal of my career. And it was like, I went out with my SE and we went and celebrated and I just remember getting so drunk and I was flirting with women. I took off my wedding ring at a nightclub. I was just acting completely inappropriate for a married man and for and I remember flirting with this girl, I had a woman on my arm around her. I mean, she must have been half my age. And I'm like, I thought that was like this bro, kind of frat boy, culture thing. Like I wanted to get my satisfaction of knowing that I was a badass. So like, my worth was always coming from like, making a lot of money or respect from other people or attention from women. Okay, and that's a empty existence. Okay, so fast forward to 2020. And my marriage was actually suffering. I been distancing myself from my wife because I worked so much and I had personal brand. I kind of like wanted her to change. I was like, Look, I'm doing all these great things. Why don't you do these great things too. And I wanted her to like, stay busy and make friends. And all she wanted was my time and my attention and actually, my presence and love. And I was so consumed with myself that I couldn't give that to her. And frankly, that's something that had to cause a pretty big rift in our marriage. And all the while I'm hiding my addictive tendencies, because my wife previously married to an alcoholic, and I made her a promise that I wasn't going to do that. Certainly, the porn and the sex was not something that I was sharing, and she is Christian. And that was definitely against her idea of what faithfulness and marriage was. And I was doing things like going to strip clubs, I mean, no longer my story. But fundamentally, I was living this wild double life, okay. And I started feeling really guilty about it. Through the bulk of 2019, I made some horrible choices did some things were out of integrity with my marriage. And I started wanting to like ease my content. So I started telling her about the porn and telling her about certain things, but not telling her all of it. And I hit a rock bottom, it was February 13. It was 2020. And I started telling her about my porn habit. And then I told her, I'd actually gone on web cameras, where live women were, there's a lot of sites where it's like interactive. And so I had gotten to that. And she collapsed, fell to the ground, she was pregnant and started having contractions. Like at that time, my world stopped. This was my rock bottom, you always hear about this and addiction. But for me, that was the time when you only think you're hurting yourself. And when you see your partner collapsed to the ground, shaking uncontrollably, literally, like she was having a seizure, and then start to have contractions. And then you think you are going to murder your unborn child through what you did. Your world just gets flipped upside down. And that's what happened to me. That was my rock bottom, we rushed to the hospital. And all I could do is pray. I'm hadn't been a religious person up to that point. But I started praying and I said, God, do not take this baby. I don't care what I need to do. I don't care who I need to become, please do not take this baby, I will do whatever it takes. And I'm so proud and so proud of the man I am now versus who I was then because we get to the hospital, we get to the doctor, he puts on the ultrasound. And I swear to you, it was probably 30 seconds of him looking around. And the whole time I'm just thinking there's no heartbeat, the baby's dead. It was just the longest period. And then he goes he says there's a heartbeat. He looks up. He's like, there's a heartbeat. I'm like, Oh, thank god like what is it? Doctor? What's going on? He's like, these aren't labor contractions. And she's not in labor. These are stress contractions, your wife is body's under so much stress that her stomachs contracting, because of shock. And like, what happened? Did you cheat on her like you got a girlfriend like what's causing this and I'm like, well, she I told her some things that she didn't know about. And at that point, I was like, that was it. That's when the Lord came into my life. That's when God did His work. And that was the deep work. The deep work for me was looking at myself not as how I wanted to project myself, but in the true way, which is a sinner, looking at myself as somebody who was not loyal, who is not honest, who actually wasn't good at all, I humbled that work is humbling myself and realizing everything I thought mattered. And all the values that I had, none of that mattered. Because I nearly caused the death of my unborn child through what I was. So me thinking I was great, my ego just dissolved in that time. And that got me into my path of recovery that got me in my path of finding my faith, finding a path to recovery. It's been over two and a half years now since I've last viewed porn, I haven't gotten drunk during that time. I haven't smoked pot. So I've made some major changes, I got off Adderall. And it's only possible through my faith and through, frankly, the humility of realizing that all these things that I thought I want in life, none of it mattered if I wasn't a person who could look in the mirror and be happy with the person I am and live with integrity. And now I'm living a life of integrity where I have nothing to hide. I went through a process with my wife, where I told her everything. I went through a full disclosure, where I told her everything I've ever done, that was a secret. And that was like, truly, truly the most liberating, biggest weight off my shoulder. And you know what I risked her leaving and losing my family. But it's the right thing. Because then it was her choice, knowing who I was, whether she wanted to stay or go versus staying because of a liar what she didn't know. And that's the work I challenge any man in America to do. If you have secrets or things you've done, if you come clean, I wouldn't challenge you to do it. If you've done some really disingenuous or really things that are out of integrity, like don't do it by yourself and just go tell her everything go get the help that I got. This was a gradual process. I had a therapist that was in 12 step meetings, but fundamentally, the most free man in the world is the one with nothing to hide. And I truly do not have anything to hide with my wife anymore. And it's like the best feeling in the world because she did leave and then she came back and she said I want this to work. We have a beautiful two boys and now I've done the work that is going to change the generational A pattern that was in my family coming from my grandpa to my dad to my brother to me, that work is now stopped with me and my kids will have a man of integrity as a father, and not someone who's living a lie. So yeah, that's the work that I'm referring to really find peace and fulfillment in life.

Andrew Biggs 15:17
Wow. Well, thank you so much for sharing man and just being willing, be so open. And obviously, you have nothing to hide with your wife, you have nothing to hide to hear on this podcast.

Unknown Speaker 15:26
It's, it's right. It's like, I don't mind sharing this, because that's not who I am anymore. That's the beautiful thing about it is the man can listen to this and get or a woman or whoever's listening and get some value and get some inspiration to not only change but like to be real and honest in your life and your marriage holy. I just did the work God put me on this earth to do and that happens all the time I get people through sharing the story opening up and their lives transformed. So that's why I share it. It's not because they're ashamed to help other men who struggle in silence, frankly, with exactly what I struggled with.

Andrew Biggs 15:59
Absolutely. And I mean, porn is just, it's so pervasive these days, if you haven't read Your Brain on Porn, if you're listening to this, and whether you struggle or not, with porn, I would really recommend is a book by Gary Chapman. And when I read that, I was like, Holy shit, this is way more corrosive and insidious than you think. It's way more pervasive. Like, I think it's estimated about one every three men is addicted to porn, and with at least the people that I chat with on a regular basis, there's a lot of guys who struggle with it. And it's something that I've struggled with. It's something that I think a lot of people have, and it's so pervasive in our culture, it's almost expected, right? At this point, yeah,

Unknown Speaker 16:37
it's just accepted period in repipe, a porn now. I mean, it's, again, I was looking at live women. And to think that not extremely common, it's not just me some of the job sites make, that's what they do. And I'm not going to name sites, but like, they're very popular. And that's not okay. For anyone in the relationship to be looking at real women. It's not fantasy, it's not a video, it's a real woman who's live with you. That's cheating, to say, but it's cheating. In my denial, convinced myself it wasn't. And that's just the addiction, because it's not about what you're doing or what you're not doing. It's about what you're not telling your partner. That is the important thing. I want people to take this, if you have something to hide, it's not right. So if you can do it with your partner watching, by all means, if they don't care, go for it. But if you're hiding stuff, because you know what's wrong, then you're out of integrity with yourself, and you're not going to go out and do your greatest work, because there's going to be an inner conflict that you're still dealing with.

Andrew Biggs 17:25
Absolutely. I mean, one of the things you said is you wanted to ease your conscience, right. And so again, this is kind of a better than rich principle, in theory, because one of the things that we teach is that somebody who's really practicing self leadership has an intimate relationship with their conscience. They're constantly checking in, they're constantly kind of measuring their actions on a daily basis against their conscience, and really tuning in and listening. And that makes it's a tough standard to hold yourself to, but the reflection that I've seen from you in the last several years, because of your willingness to have the courage to listen to your conscience, and be convicted by your conscience, and to take action, and it's just been amazing. And now it's like, boom, the chains are set free, and you're all your addictions, which is just truly amazing. So far

Unknown Speaker 18:08
with the porn and then it went to the Adderall. I flushed it down the toilet, the alcohol has no desire to get drunk or check out. It's like, what am I checking out from I got a great life. So that's the deep work, it's therapy. It's sharing your demons. It's realizing, you know, you're not alone. It's going to meetings. And again, it's not just addiction, it can be depression, or anxiety or whatever. But if you don't give this attention, whatever, that you struggle that's holding you back in my case, this was the thing holding me back, then you can't break free to go and do whatever God put you on this earth to do so. I mean, I love that rich principles. And that's why I'm here. That's why we're talking about that doesn't matter making millions of dollars and being badass salesperson don't matter if you if you frickin can't look in the mirror and be fully open about who you are. I was looking.

Andrew Biggs 18:52
I mean, it's interesting. You bring up faith prior to a lot of this things. You never struck me as a religious guy. You never struck me as somebody who is took his faith unnecessarily, all that seriously, and maybe something. Maybe you believed in something I'm not sure, but didn't strike me as something that was a cornerstone of your life. It's something that for me growing up in the church, that I kind of had a phase where I kind of left and experimented I studied. I moved to India, I looked at Eastern religions, I studied Buddhism, I looked at, obviously, like things like Eckhart Tolle, I looked at Danta, which is basically not to meaning oneness, like we're all one. And I found all these things to be super helpful and studied some Hinduism and some polytheism. But in recent years, I've kind of like come full circle, and then when I was like, back in the church, and we were back into like, small group, and we're having conversations about Christianity and faith and salvation. I'm just curious, how does why religion like because it really matter, because I think a lot of the world's problems it's like, there's almost like this renaissance happening that I've witnessed, saying, if you're paying attention, people are sick and tired of what the world is offering to them and a lot of them are running back. Have faith, even though that's not the narrative that maybe is being told that often why faith for you like, what's your experience like there.

Unknown Speaker 20:06
So there's a big difference between faith and religion, I want to call it out. So faith is what connection, your belief and your higher power. And it's that moral compass that guides you to be the honest, loving, kind, genuine, caring person. That is really what Christianity calls Holy Spirit. And I'm sure there's a lot of other terms for it, but it's the God inside of you, that causes you to go out and do things to help others and to really operate from a place of love and abundance. And that's it polar odds and opposites with the achiever, often that the world is telling you to go out and hustle and grind and go make a lot of money and go do all this. So I've kind of been living in is this achiever where I didn't have religion growing up, I didn't have faith, I didn't have spirituality. And so I was taking what the world said, would make me happy and fulfilled and look where it got me a life of addiction and lies. And yeah, I had all that success. But it's exactly right. I'm like, I was craving something else. And I didn't even know what it was, I always believed that there was something bigger than myself, I had always said the universe or serendipity, or wherever you want to call it. But the getting into a 12 step recovery, specifically, you have to put put, let do they say let go and let God right. And so that's kind of the principles like accepting that we can't do this on our own. Whereas the world tells us everything you want, you have to do on your own right, this appeal of faith was like, hey, well, there's a couple appeals the first appeal for me, which really struck a chord, especially with Christianity, which I relate to, but I don't think Christianity is superior to any other faith. And I don't think it's the only way I think whatever relationship with you have with your God, if it makes you a better person and guide you, that's great. And so that's something for me, that I want to really call out is for me, the doctrine of the gospel and Christianity and the Bible resonated, because I didn't understand why I did all these things, right? I am literally looking in the mirror and I couldn't recognize myself and I'm like, What is wrong with me? Why do I go and do things that are out of integrity with my character? Why do I repeat these bad habits, and for me to like learn that we were born into sin, and that human nature is to sin, and that only through accepting God and Christ and really understanding that he died for our sins. For me, that was like a really nice explanation of why I was doing the things I was doing. So it appealed to me, especially in this moment of like, ego disappearing, and really like needing something I needed to give some explanation of what had happened because I felt so horrible and ashamed of what I had done to my wife and what nearly the tragedy that nearly caused so that was how I got became a Christian is really just understanding Hey, you know what, we were born into sin and only through really the fruit of the Spirit, right and understanding like what the world tells you, and what God tells you, the fruit of the Spirit are very different. So the fruit of the Spirit is kindness, peace, love, patience, mildness, self control, faith, right. Those are the things that I lacked, that I was impatient, I was high, definitely wasn't mild temper definitely didn't have the inner peace. So that was like the voice that I was looking to fill in, like, hey, if I practice this, those are things that are promised to me. And so I just made a point to like, really, not just like, read the Bible, but incorporate my daily routines and habits and shift towards those things. So I shifted to daily prayer, I shifted towards walks with my wife and time with my family and acts of love and develop patience. And just like tried to, I didn't know a lot about Christianity, but I tried to practice and apply the principles, not just going to church and reading some stuff. Because I didn't go to church, it was COVID. And nothing was going on. But I did study the Bible with my wife, and I didn't learn all these new things that, frankly, gave an explanation as to what I had been living before and why I was so miserable. And then what I was doing now, and again, I'm not here to preach and to tell people that there's only one way to live. I know everyone has their own beliefs. But I'll tell you, not believing in anything and only believe in yourself is not. For me, it's not as nearly as fulfilling or as satisfying, I guess is believing that there's a purpose for us and that God lives within us and we need to follow his will and understand His will for us because that's like a forever thing. So every day step 11 and 12 step recovery is pray for knowledge of God's will in the power to carry it through. Right so every day I pray for knowledge and say, Well God, what do you want me to do if God is love? And God is like kindness like where's the downside and showing up that way and treating people that way and that helps me watch my temper and helps me keep my cool and helps me kind of stay in this like middle ground where the highs are much lower than the lows are much higher. But you know what? I feel good every single day that's sustainable versus this crash and burn and crazy chaos that probably would have killed me. So that's The appeal for me of faith versus religion, religion is just a way to practice it with like, like minded people and connect to a community, right associated with whatever religion that that gives you. That makes the most sense to you, I would say, but I'm not I wouldn't call myself overly religious. But I do think my faith and spirituality is extremely strong.

Andrew Biggs 25:18
Yeah, that's such a good explanation. And I really appreciate that. And I think that if you're listening, I hope that that appeals to you. And we're not here to try to, you know, sell you on anything. But like Ian said, not believing anything is not a great solution. And I love what you said around step one of the 12 step recovery that you need support, I think that's one of our biggest issues as human beings. It's just like, pride, right? We just are so proud of ourselves. And so I can relate to like, when I want to achieve, it's like, I want to do it on my own, I don't want your help. And I don't want God's help, I don't want anybody's help. I want to do it on my own, so that I can boost my ego and make sure that I'm inflated through this achievement. And hey, there's no way that live, right, because you're basically alienating people throughout the process and be so we live instead of impossible to do it on your own, you're standing on the shoulders of giants, you're standing on the shoulders of your ancestors, and think about all the people who have been supporting you your entire life that if you're not grateful for them right now, just think about, you know, every single teacher you had every single person in your life who did something kind, every single person at your job, who sometimes maybe they annoy you, but guess what they're doing their job, too, and they help you stay employed and do what you need to do. So there's so many different ways that we are supported.

Unknown Speaker 26:29
One other thing, which really resonates and like to your point is, if you think you're relying on yourself, like where did you get the courage? Where did you get the intelligence? Where did you get the charisma? Where did you get the way you're wired, you're born that way. You're just born, you're just lucky to be born, where you were to the parents, you were with the gifts you were? No, you're born probably in the US, you're probably born. Hopefully, parents that tried it, maybe they're still around, maybe they're not, but they tried to do their best and how to place you a home, you could have been born in Africa starving with no parents, right? So you were gifted your situation, whatever that is, by something or someone I call that gift God, God put me with my parents, one of whom suffered from addiction. The other one was very hardworking and successful in a worldly way. For me, so I could do the work that God wants me to do in the future like that is so liberating and encouraging, and just makes you feel great about your situation, because it's all happening for you, right for you to become the man that we're supposed to be or you're supposed to be. So I think just giving some credit that like, this isn't just you, who's making it happen, you are gifted with whatever it is that's putting you in the situation is really humbling. And it's just a good way to glorify God, who made us all very different with each of us having unique gifts and strength that ultimately he wants us to use for the betterment of this planet.

Andrew Biggs 27:55
I love it, man. Thank you so much. I do want to shift gears slightly. And I want to ask you a few questions about what you're up to now. Because there might be some people listening who would say, hey, it's really cool that you were able to make a quarter of a million and then even all the way up to seven figures, as an account executive for Salesforce be number one, and then have this sort of discovery. But I'm not that far along yet. And of course, I want to try to incorporate many of the things that I'm learning here and maybe avoid some of the landmines of that culture of being successful and just chasing achievement. And that's why I listen to the better the rich every single week. But at the same time, I want to make more money to man, like give me some tips, like the only goods for people. And I'm looking here at your catchphrases, and one liners like if we want to dive into those we can or if you want to get more of a meta frame around this, you can, I can give

Unknown Speaker 28:45
some framework. So what I do now is I teach people how to be successful in both business and in life. And I know that sounds like very generic, but I'd like to say I teach success principles that apply to sales and entrepreneurship. And where I see the biggest impact, frankly, is not by teaching sales tactic. Because if you build sales tactics on a poor foundation, and lacking integrity and lacking honesty, and some of the principles that I realized what matter most like nothing, it doesn't matter, you're gonna maybe you'll get the money, but you're not going to actually be happy fulfilled. So when I see a lot of people were kind of in my situation where they're making pretty good money, they know they can do better. And the bulk of the people that have these massive, massive leaps in their income, and in their life, are the ones that actually shift their mindset and shift their habits. Okay. And once they do that, frankly, their work ethic shift and with work ethic, ethic shifting, you get more at bats, you get more experience, you learn and learn by doing in the skills cup. So I'd say 95% of success is mindset and habits. It's what we do and the other 5% is the skills that develop through doing the right things and having the right discipline and having the right Like, perseverance and the right resilience. So I'll give you kind of some pointers on the mindset side, and then some pointers on the habits side that I teach a lot of principles. So the first principle I teach on the My mindset side is called Living with integrity. And I don't mean living with honesty, and just like the stuff that I just talked about, I mean, what integrity means the word integrity comes from the Latin word integer, which means whole or complete. So the way I define integrity is when your thoughts and your beliefs in other words, your identity, who you are, okay, aligns with your actions and behaviors. So a lot of people have conflict inside, in the work that we do is to resolve the conflict. And the conflict is because they say one thing, or they think one thing and they do another thing, and so they literally are beating themselves up over all the things are not doing. Okay. So, the, I'll give you a couple quick examples. Let's say I am a person that is honest, and I see myself as honest, but I'm hiding things in my marriage, or from clients or whatever, like, I am literally a hypocrite, okay, and I'm out of integrity. Let's say I think I'm a hard worker. But I'm actually procrastinating and not getting shit done and playing on my phone and messing around, I am completely out of integrity. Because I'm delusional at that point, I think I'm one thing but then my actions. So the work you do is, on the one hand, you have your identity, how you see yourself what you say, and what you think. And then how you show up every day. So we identify how do you see yourself? And then are you showing up this way every day? So if you see yourself as healthy, are you eating healthy? If not, what needs to change? Are you working out? If not, how can we incorporate those routines? Those are the things that I do a 30 day challenge. And so what can we do in 30 days to change and make that integrity? I have a chart, it's called Living with integrity. And in the there's two lines, one is the identity line and one is the action line, right? And what the two don't line up, like you're screwed, the bigger the gap between the two minds, the more out of integrity. So we say, well, how can we bridge the gap? Well, we have to change our actions. So if my identity is someone who's healthy, I need to make sure I'm eating healthy, and exercising, right. So that's what we do, let's get on the treadmill do 30 minutes exercise for 30 days straight, and that then compounds and other changes that people make, but it starts with taking one dramatic action that will change everything, right? So that's an example of the concept that is living with integrity. Another concept I teach is, it's called the golden rule of time management, okay, and the golden rule of time management states that the quality of time you work

Unknown Speaker 32:48
determines both the quality and quantity of time you have outside of work. Okay, so in a simple explanation, if I'm working, you have to set boundaries for work. So people say and how do you build a seven figure business in a year, I built my seven figure coaching, this average coach makes about 85,000 a year I've done over seven figures in coaching. It's not because I was this amazing coach, I think I talked to you, I was about 350. When we were, it's blown. Fundamentally, it's not because I'm a great coach or a great business person. It's because I have really focused activity during the day, I only work 40 to 45 hours a week, I don't work 90 hour weeks, like most founders, okay, but when I work I'm working. So that's the golden rule of time management is when you're working, you are really working, you're working on the right things, you're focused on what I call revenue generating activities. So my work is either delivering coaching, selling coaching, or building my pipeline for coaching. That's it. So my calendar reflects that. I'm not doing a podcast like this as much as I would love to. I'm working core on the fundamentals of my business, I'm not doing other side work, I'm not selling an online university to businesses, I'm not like there's a million directions you can go as an entrepreneur, but for me, I decided what I'm going to do is be focused laser focused on one area. And everything I do is to build that area, right. And then when that gets to a certain point, I'll shift and do some other things. But there's so many opportunities. It's not about what you're saying yes to it's about what you're saying no to that matters. So I said no to writing a book. And I'm saying no to running addiction groups and saying no to a lot of things that frankly, I would like to do, but are not in the core mission. So that concept of the golden rule of time management just it's really simple. If you work a full day on the right things, you will have inner peace at night. If you don't work a full day you will have to work at night and you won't be as present with those that you love your family, your spouse, and you're basically taking work home because you didn't get it done when you were supposed to. So for me, I don't have that problem. When I'm done. I'm done because I actually executed what I was supposed to because I know if I don't I'm robbing my lovely kids and my wife, my time and my presence and that's not fair to them. So that's another principle I teach and I have a lot of these frameworks and principles, and I teach all about my mindset habits. And we optimize calendars we look at where time is spent, and where what we say no to and what we say yes to. And by making those fundamental changes and making sure our calendars are filled with our gas' with revenue generating activities, you will transform the results, especially if you're in business or sales, because that's what's driving the results, right, the revenue generating activity. So those are three concepts I have about 15 that I teach and that I've copyrighted, and they're very powerful. But those are kind of the three that a lot of people apply right away.

Andrew Biggs 35:31
Yeah, those are awesome, man, thank you so much. I mean, I love to pick golden rule of time management, because so often, especially as we get a lot of entrepreneurs, or salespeople who listen to this podcast, and so often we can feel like we're being productive, but we're really not. Or at the very least, we're not being productive on the right things. Sort of like productive procrastination, if you will, right. Oh, look how much I got done today. But none of them were revenue generating,

Unknown Speaker 35:56
none of that matters. That's the funnel. Where does it go? When you're browsing online, you're going down a rabbit hole, you're doing this thing got 20, windows open, you didn't finish anything. So it's like, focus less is more, fewer. But better, right? That's a huge principles like focus on the critical fields, the 8020 rule, right? We get 80% of results from 20% of our activities. So I'm not on Instagram. I'm on Insta for family stuff. And I'm not doing my coaching business there. I'm not on Tik Tok just on LinkedIn. But I went all in on LinkedIn. And that's where I got all of my revenue from my coaching business. So it's like the few but do it really well, the few things that you do.

Andrew Biggs 36:31
Absolutely, absolutely. I mean, one of the things that I think is interesting about the level of game that you play at, right, because I remember we were talking about a particular deal you're working on, you're like, oh, yeah, I guess Bill Gates gave him a call and like swooped in the last minute and stole the business away, sent it to Microsoft instead of Salesforce. And like, That's interesting that like a call from Bill Gates is like your competition. What would you say is some tips maybe I have here, the one of the things you wrote down is like, be interested, not interesting. Like, how do you walk into a room full of like C level executives at a fortune 500 company, and hold your own and not be intimidated? What are some tips you have there?

Unknown Speaker 37:09
Yeah, so I'm a pure selling skills are kind of interaction skills. I mean, my number one tip, for anyone listening, read a book, if you're b2b, or b2c might not apply as much, but it's still worth reading, it's called sell without selling out. Okay, and it's really about how to authentically show up as yourself, right, you do not want to, the more pressure you apply to people, the more likely you know that it's going to break, right, you do not want to apply to pressure. So the way I sell is like this no pressure selling mode, where it's like, I'm here to help. Okay, if you don't want my help, or you don't need my help, like, I got plenty it comes down to value in your time, I got plenty of people who do so you have to know the value of your time. And when you're desperate, or when you have like this neediness when you show up with clients, they can smell your commission breath a mile away. So remember, it's not about you, part of like letting your ego dissolve is like realizing your goal as a sales professional is to help your clients achieve their goals, or solve their problems. And that's it, if you cannot understand what their goals are, or what their problems are with the areas related to what you're selling, then don't pitch, do your discovery first. So when I go into a room with CEOs or sea level, I don't treat them any different than I treat you. And I don't treat them any different. I talk to them like a human, I try to be interested in learning about them. You don't want to like be interesting to them, you actually become more interesting to people when you're interested in them. Because most people just show up and they think they need to throw up and they give their pitch and they talk and they don't listen. And that's what sustains our industry. That's what destroys the reputation of salespeople is that flush talking pressure selling us this tactic say this like sleazy salesperson, and frankly, that's the opposite. I mean, I'm here talking about my faith and talking about addiction recovery. And it's like, that's how I would talk to clients. I don't like care, it's truly being authentic and making it about them. Okay, I'm not here to impress you see, you leave the best impression with people when you stop trying to impress them. Okay? Because if you're not pressuring them, if you're genuinely there to help and understand what's going on and what their world is, you can very quickly see, is this a person who wants or needs my help? And if not, like Bob, I, I got plenty of other people who do, right. So that's this being mission driven around, like, what you sell, and how it helps other people versus trying to hit your quota, or trying to make this money, right. That's the shift every salesperson needs to make to go from average to elite, right? The Elite salespeople, they shift from inward to outward, they shift from me focus to you focus. And so when I'm on a call with a business client, or whether it's a coaching prospect, or whoever, I'm just trying to get to know them and see where they struggle, see their challenges, talk to them, give them support, and then hey, if it makes sense for them to work with me it At more deep capacity, then that's going to naturally happen. And I'm going to go through my offer with them and tell them how I can help. Right. So I don't do that until I know their situation, I think that's the main principle that I teach is like, Look, don't be attached to the outcome. This is not your outcome, it's their outcome be attached to their outcomes, not yours, versus like having to close the deal or make this much money in a certain event or the other day, if you've got a big pipeline, right? You want to stress about one deal so much, it's like you're you're busy. That's also another principle. But it really is about seeing people Eye to Eye not putting someone on a pedestal just because you look up to them. And they're successful. If you just see your customers as people, whether b2c or b2b or whether it's an exact or just a pure, like, if you just treat people as humans, and just get to know them and understand where they're at and see if you can help like, there's no pressure, it's gonna happen naturally. And like if they don't want to, like their loss, seriously, their loss not been. And I think that takes a real quiet confidence. And it takes a real belief in yourself and what you do to be able to get to that place. And I certainly didn't get there most of my career, it only really happened, frankly, when I started working on myself and realizing like, I have nothing to prove, like I'm here to help and did coincide with my recovery, frankly, because that's how I started thinking, and then that's how I started selling.

Andrew Biggs 41:22
I love that. Yeah, and those are not coincidental, right, like your results, and your recovery and everything that went along with that. They were definitely correlative, and it's pretty cool to see. So we always ask three questions, or every single one of our guests, the first question we ask is, what do you think the world needs most right now?

Unknown Speaker 41:41
think the world needs love. And I know that's a song right? What the world needs. But like, really, if fundamentally, if we just show up from a loving place, and treat our neighbors and our friends and our family with love, like everyone did that? I mean, what would the world like? What is more, what is more powerful people are so toxic and angry and filled with the opposite of love, and finding reasons to argue and hate and troll and whatever, like, I don't play any of that. Honestly, if I get some of that it's like, takes two to tango. So I just don't engage with with those type of people. But I try every day I pray to show up with love and kindness for my clients. And then that gets reciprocated. And it comes back to you. And that's to me what's missing the source of people's misery is they're just so bitter and angry and holding on to these negative toxic emotions, because the quality of your emotions and the quality of your life. So if you're filled with love, and joy and gratitude, and that comes out in your interactions, like it's only going to help everyone else and have a ripple effect.

Andrew Biggs 42:45
A lot of man, thank you so much. What 123 books do you think people should read? I know you mentioned sell without selling out what other books should people pick up? In your opinion?

Unknown Speaker 42:54
My favorite book of all time is the Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. That is a classic. It's got time management, it's got vision setting, it's got human interpersonal connections. I mean, it's just so good. That's my favorite. And I would say, in the spirit of what we're talking about the Bible, I mean, there's just so much wisdom in the Bible in terms of how we can interact with others and where we can focus and what brings us joy in what doesn't, and just so many wise lessons. No, I haven't read the Bible myself. But I know a lot of captions and scriptures in the areas that have been really inspiring for me and I have a little Bible app that I look at in the morning. And it's a daily devotional it takes a second and so I draw inspiration from the Bible. And there's there's one book that we talked about the last one I know this is for, but if time management and procrastination and bad habits are struggle for you, I would highly recommend a book called Eat That Frog by Brian Tracy, which is all about how to overcome procrastination and focus on the critical few. It's got the 8020 rule. It's got time management principles, daily planning, weekly planning, I read one book a month and I have a massive library accumulated over the past four to five years of personal development and it's almost always around like success principles time management. There's one I just downloaded I'm giving you a whole list but I know it's hard. Yeah, it's Viktor Frankl right, who was in the Holocaust. And it's called Man's Search for Meaning right? Finding it no matter what situation you choose, the way you want to respond and how you want to think about it in the Holocaust. Someone could keep their inner peace and keep their mind strong. Like you can do it during the work day. Okay, so man search for meaning Viktor Frankl as well. Those are five I'll give you a couple bonus ones.

Andrew Biggs 44:37
I love it. Final question. What does it mean to you to be better than rich?

Unknown Speaker 44:43
For me, it's just to be a good person, like be a person of integrity of character. Just show up and be kind if you can show up that way. Also, if you have inner peace, right, because chasing riches, there's always another level there's always a bigger house. There's always them higher level of success in a worldly way that you know you can achieve. But if you don't have that inner peace, or if you're not happy with yourself like, that doesn't mean anything. So being better than riches, like being, you could still be ambitious. But being at peace with who you are, and realizing and having that patience to realize, like you're doing all you can not keep chasing and chasing and chasing the ever looming goal of money or wealth, if you will. So, I think having Inner peace is a lot better than being rich, personally.

Andrew Biggs 45:29
Beautiful, man, thank you so much. And this has been an amazing opportunity to get to know you more, and just thanks for being so real and adding so much value to our audience. Where can people kind of follow you and find you if they want to learn more about you?

Unknown Speaker 45:41
Well, if you're in b2b sales, you can go to my website, it's called untap, your sales potential.com. And you can learn all about my coaching program if you want to have access to me or work with me or anything I shared resonates just go there, it's sold out. But there is a waitlist, I'll be taking clients in December. So you can sign up for the waitlist, if you want to work with me, if you just want to consume some of my content, you can go to my YouTube channel, it's www.youtube.com/en koniec. And then if you want to engage with me, on LinkedIn, I'm not really doing much on Instagram, unless you want to see pictures of me and my family. But LinkedIn and YouTube, and my website are where, you know, I coach and I provide every single week new videos that I put out to help the sales community really tap into their full potential in mindset habits and selling skills. Those are the three areas that I make videos on.

Andrew Biggs 46:32
Awesome. Yeah, your videos, they come to my inbox every single week. I don't watch every one. But when I have time I click on it. I'll watch it. They're quick kidding. And so he's a great, great follow up every person to have sign up for his email list and just check out the content in general, because he is a game changer when it comes to these sorts of things. So thank you, Ian, this has been amazing. Thank you, audience. We appreciate you. And remember, it's all next week to leave today. better than you found it. We'll see you that. Bye.

Mike Abramowitz 46:57
Thanks, everyone. Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed this episode and you'd like to help support the show, please share it with others post about it on social media or leave a rating and review. To catch all the latest from us. You can follow us on Instagram at better than underscore rich and join our Facebook group at the better than rich show. Thanks again for listening. We look forward to seeing you next time and remember, leave today better than you found it .