I didn’t know it, but when I hit the legal working age of 14 years and 9 months in the state of Michigan, my career began.
I was a grocery store bagger; stock associate; restaurant host and waiter; marketing intern; ticket sales account executive, vendor operations lead; and now a Partner Enablement manager.
On the surface, the path looked easy. However, one event in particular set course of my career backwards, and in hindsight, made me all the better for it.
Fresh out of college, I fell for a marketing scam job.
In 2007, I didn’t have any full-time job prospects. I decided to cash the little airline miles I had to check out Chicago as a possible landing spot for a fresh start in September. The prospect of leaving my hometown of Detroit, Michigan was scary, but I found solace in the fact that I had family living in Elmhurst, Illinois, which was about fifty minutes away from the city center.
Limited on funds, I made a plan for an efficient day trip, where I’d fly in early and schedule three interviews at 10AM, 1PM, and 4PM, so I could catch the 7PM flight back to Michigan. (Hindsight: I wish I would have at least spent the night.)
On the 36 minute plane ride to Chicago, I vividly remember sitting in the window seat (suited up with my briefcase like one does when flying for business), when I noticed two friends sitting next to me — both dressed to impress, talking about the latest news as a copy of the Wall Street Journal was open on the tray table.
I looked over, and asked, “Hey guys — this is going to sound weird, but I just graduated college, and I’ve got three interviews ahead of me today. You two seem to have it all figured out — how did you do it?”
“I majored in art history, Kevin” one of the friends started. “And today, I do nothing with art or art history. I’m actually in finance.”
I was intrigued. Up to this point, I had thought “Okay, I majored in Marketing Management; therefore, I should do something in marketing.”
The friend continued. “One night, when I was thinking about a career change, my father asked me ‘Could you work at McDonald’s?’ I looked at him and said, ‘Of course.’
Then he asked me ‘Could you make a solid living working at McDonald’s?’ I said, ‘Well, possibly not. I think it would have to be a manager role or something to make what I want to make.’
My father looked at me and then said ‘Well, if you became a manager at McDonald’s, could you survive and make a decent living?’ And I said ‘I think so.’
My father looked back at me and said ‘Well, what are you afraid of? You can always work at McDonald’s.’”
The friend continued on about how he was afraid to take a chance, but that it all worked out, and while it was pretty bold of me to take a flight to do three interviews in one day, he saw some potential in me and wished the best of luck as the plane’s landing gear was being lowered.
I really wish I got his business card. (If you’re reading this, email me.)
When I landed, it was show time.
The first interview was with Xerox for an entry level marketing sales associate role in the suburbs of Chicago. (I was rejected because I didn’t have any formal sales experience outside of retail.)
The second interview was with a local law firm, looking for a legal assistant to help with the day-to-day. (I was rejected because I didn’t have any law experience.)
The final interview was in downtown Chicago, on the 46th floor of a massive high-rise, on the corner of Wacker and Michigan Avenue with a company called Schofield Media.
When the elevators opened, you saw a floor to ceiling windows, flanked by stacks of magazines around the entire room. “Oh man, this is big time,” I remember telling myself. The role was for an Editorial Marketing Researcher, and after a 1.5 hour interview process, my main point of contact said “Well, Kevin, we think you’d be a great fit here — when can you start?” I felt like I won the jackpot.
Walking out of the building, I thought “Well, this is kind of like marketing, but with a little investigative journalism, which could be pretty cool.”
It wasn’t cool.
On my first day, fifteen of us were brought into a conference room for orientation to discuss the process, scripts, and compensation. I was told there would be a 401(k) package, and immediately I thought “401(k)? What does that even mean!?”
In the afternoon, I was brought into a smaller room with two other people and my new manager where we would practice our scripts. The responsibility was to find unique and local small and medium sized businesses across the United States and feature them in a publication. After doing mock calls with them with the beautiful background of Chicago and the river behind us, I figured that this job was going to be amazing, and that I had “made it.”
However, about two days later, I realized quite the opposite.
I had not made it. When we finally started to call real prospects and business owners, they gave us a phone and a stack of phone numbers and names.
There was no computer access.
If you wanted to email a business prospect, you had to write down what you wanted to say before management let you have fifteen minutes with the computer in the middle of the office.
On the second week of the job, one of my fellow colleagues and I came to the conclusion that we were selling editorial space for a magazine that didn’t exist.
At this point, I tried to tell myself “Well, there’s always McDonald’s” but it was too late. I was in full panic mode.
What do I do now? As the days turned into weeks, the feeling became even more mortifying. I felt like the scum of the earth going to work each day. I left my hometown of Detroit, Michigan with all the pomp and circumstance filled with “Good luck” and “Go get ’em, Kevin,” and I felt like I let them all down.
I let myself down.
For a full three day weekend, I was incredibly down on my luck and myself.
I gave myself the permission to sulk.
I let myself remember this feeling.
I’ve felt adversity before.
I know how to work through this.
And then, I took action.
As Harvey Specter said on the TV show Suits, “There are only two things you can do when your back is against the wall — break the wall down or use it as leverage to come out swinging.” I did both.
Looking at my experience, I knew that working in sports would be the path of least resistance given my unpaid internship with the Detroit Red Wings in my last semester. However, instead of going to the common sports job boards, I decided to go rogue and invested in three UPS (not USPS) envelopes to send my resume to the inside sales managers at the Chicago Bears, Chicago White Sox, and Chicago Blackhawks.
After two days, I heard back from the Chicago White Sox inside sales manager. I was brought in for an interview a few days after, and during the interview process, I asked them “If you could give someone who is just starting out in a sales career some advice, what would you tell them?” They responded with something that I’ve never forgotten:
“The person who makes the most calls, sends the most emails, and does the most to get their name out there will inevitably be successful in this industry.”
(I immediately wrote this down, and since, I’ve had this taped next to my phone in the office as a reminder to put the work in everyday.)
Two days after, I heard from Ildegardo “Al” Esparza from the Inside Sales team at the Chicago Blackhawks. One of the team members from the seasonal full-time team just left and my resume happened to land on his desk that day. I was asked if I was willing to come in for an interview, and two days later, I met with “Al” to discuss the job and its remit.
Two days later, Al called me back and gave me my first real career break — my first sales job in October 2007.
The rest was history, and on the NHL trade deadline in March 2008, I was able to rejoin my hometown Detroit Red Wings as a full-time account executive. We ended up winning the Stanley Cup that year.
Through the uncertainty, I learned six lessons that I’ve applied to every sales and sales leadership role I’ve carried:
- Mentality is everything. We get to choose our attitude every day. Since I was behind the starting line with the rest of the summer sales team at the Chicago Blackhawks, I approached the day as follows: “Give me a phone, a computer, and a name, I will make contact with someone.” I slowly worked my way up the sales charts by choosing my attitude to get after it everyday. (It also helped that working in downtown Chicago meant that I needed to earn that commission!)
- Motion creates emotion. If you’re not excited about the product or service you’re selling, how can you expect the other person on the line to get excited too? In order to be successful in sales, you have to be committed to getting the work done, but also passionate about the product or service you are offering.
- Ethics will always win. In good conscience, I couldn’t work for an organization that made its bank on preying on small and medium sized businesses. As a good friend Steve Taylor told me, “Integrity is the one thing you can’t buy because once you’ve bought it, it’s gone.”
- Resiliency matters. Reflecting back on my largest career failure reminded me that failure is never fatal. When I look for sales talent, I’m keen on asking them about their failures and what they’ve learned from them. Someone who hasn’t failed isn’t trying hard enough, and I want teammates that are go-getters just as much as go-givers. Take a chance — “…there’s always McDonald’s.”
- Some will, some won’t. So what? Next! Sales is a contact sport, and I used to take “no” personally, until I realized it was just a common act of business. I made 80–100 cold calls a day working for the scam job and the Blackhawks, but only heard back from a fraction of them. Keep going.
- We can’t do this alone. When I went from earning a guaranteed salary of $25,000 a year to $7.50/hour + commission, I had to depend on others to keep me upright as I built my savings back up. For me, that was my family in Villa Park, Illinois. (Nick, Dustin, Paul, and Stacy — the support you gave me during my brief time in Chicago was everything and more— I’m forever grateful.)
Let’s get after it. — KL
