About Me
I have never written a CV, so let me share a few words about myself. Not to brag or try to impress anybody, probably more the opposite, but to give you a sense of who I am, so you can decide whether we have the potential fit to collaborate or not.
I live in Slovenia with my Danish wife, and we have three beautiful children. Our family culture and our feelings for each other make me profoundly grateful.
As a kid, I was wholly attracted to sports; I tried many until, at age 12, I found the sports love of my life – basketball. I was deeply convinced basketball was something I would do as a lifetime profession; whatever my role might be, it would be connected to basketball.
At 15, I was invited to a professional club and moved away from my family home. Taking care of life made me grow up faster than expected. At that time, being a professional sport still implied going to secondary school and later studies which I took as granted.
I loved driving cars because I spent hours and hours next to my father, a professional truck driver. As I didn’t yet have my own car, I sometimes (during basketball off-season) took moonlighting jobs that required driving. One of such jobs profoundly changed my career path from basketball to sales.
I was hired to drive a company limo for a local executive who wanted to do a business partnership with a global software company. I enjoyed the work even though it was more waiting than driving, especially at late-night dinners and bar visits.
Long story short, after a final chat with the two executives at the airport before they departed from Slovenia, I received the invitation to visit their European HQ. After the two-month visit and some convincing I needed (because I felt I was not ready for the job), I also got hired by the company.
My story “from taxi driver to sales executive” was used by the company’s HR for years to explain the cultural uniqueness of the company
My career started at ground zero, and I made every possible mistake one can make in a lifetime of sales or sales leadership career. The saying “we learn from mistakes” was only partially working for me, and I only learned from mistakes when I figured out what was the cause and how to do things differently.
The biggest challenge I was experiencing in the bumpy first half of my career was, interestingly, not how to learn new things but how to unlearn what I thought (or was told to) to be the right way to be successful in a sales career.
I wish I had a coach back then – someone who would check the ego at the door and see the situation through my eyes, help me reflect on it to find the best way forward.
The irony of my situation was I didn’t even look for a coach. Why?
One reason was my ego, which was not significantly different from everyone in sales I knew back then or today. What do I mean? Few words are “prohibited” in the “normal” sales culture, and “I don’t know” comes on the top of that list.
Another reason was the perception of “coaching,” which back then and nowadays is still associated with: exposure, not being good enough, failure, needs fixing, or alike. If of interest, I am covering this more deeply in my blog.
However, If I had been smarter back then and found a good coach, I probably wouldn’t do what I have been doing for the past 5 years.
Are you still with me? Let’s jump to the second half of my corporate career.
It all started with the book that changed my professional and, in many ways, my private life: Let’s Get Real or Let’s Not Play, by Mahan Khalsa and Randy Illig. It was all there; the mindset, skillset, and toolset I was looking for. Just read the book and do it! I wish I was smarter, and it would work for me so simply.
Bought the books for the entire team, no matter the role, from sales, consulting, legal, and finance to team assistants, and got them excited about our new journey.
Knowing what to do and actually doing it are entirely different ball games, especially when there is no “autopilot” button in the business. The mission gets even more complicated when trying to introduce radical behavioral changes (see-do-get) on a company level. The natural human resistance when the rubber hits the road just shots down the company’s horsepower.
If we work for a company or in a particular job position, let’s say 10 years – how many years of experience do we have? Ten years, five times two years, ten times one year, or all in between?
It depends as every situation is different. The key is in our ability to unlearn, asking a difficult question: “How wrong am I?”. Debriefing ourselves (what worked, got stuck, do differently) is always a valid option; however, the outcome mostly lacks a critical distance. Having a sounding board, a coach or a trusted advisor is an entirely different game.
I was lucky to reach out for assistance, and I found my coach and trusted advisor, let’s call him Jim. We got together to roll out a sales excellence program focused on shifting the success paradigm from “our success” to helping our clients succeed.
I expected Jim to run the show; at the end of the day, he was the most expensive consultant I had ever hired, and as I learned later, his fees were a bargain. Jim gently and respectfully shifted the responsibility back to me and acted (as in sports teams) only as my assistant coach, primarily coaching me.
The magic synergy happened not only who we became as a team and how our clients perceived us, but unknowingly determined my new career.
No, it didn’t happen overnight; it took years as I was a happy captain, finally having GPS working for me in all weather conditions.
Back to sports, basketball, my passion, and life teacher became my burden. Injury after injury is no fun, even if you play for fun. I changed to cycling for fun and fitness. Until one day, I joined for a ride with two local “nuts” preparing for the 1.200km endurance race. Riding a bike for 2-3 hours is one sport, but riding a bike for 40-50 hours in one go was mind-blowing (see-do-get).
I decided to try it and put my mental resilience to a different test. Six months of sabbatical leave to do what? Cycling? This guy went nuts. All in or nothing. I started to practice as I planned to live from professional cycling. Hours and hours of a daily dose of tarmac and when minds wander around constantly repeating the question, “What would I like to do after completing the race”?
The harder I tried, the more straightforward it became. I want to change my player’s career to a coach and help business owners, sales leaders, and sales makers succeed faster and on a grander scale. I gracefully lefta the company and created my own Nolessnomore ltd to help business people find the exact solutions to leverage the potential they have, nothing less and nothing more.
