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Highlights

• [01:30] - Working for a company for over 2 decades without losing interest.
• [05:12] - From being the brains behind the scenes to taking up a sales role.
• [10:25] - Making the decision to slowly shift towards sales leadership.
• [12:43] - The critical importance of prioritization and time management.
• [17:11] - Great sales teams founded on a culture of selflessness and empathy.
• [22:25] - Never Eat Alone: Why you should mentor and support fellow salespeople.

In this episode of the Transformed Sales Podcast, I interviewed the Executive Vice President of Sales, Marketing, and Strategy at Telos Alliance, Marty Sacks. Marty has been with Telos Alliance for over two decades. He’s held a variety of roles in sales, business, and product development and currently oversees the company’s strategic efforts. 

Marty started his career in radio in Washington in 1976 and has worked in engineering, equipment sales, and trade publishing. He joined Telos in 1999 as national sales director. He will be very candid about his incredible journey from being the behind-the-scenes tech guru making things happen to the effective sales leader that he is today. Tune in to tap into the immense sales leadership wisdom he had to share.

Quotes

“To a certain extent, leading means serving” - Marty Sacks

“The best quality of a leader is caring for the people that are on their team and helping them succeed” - Marty Sacks

“One of the things that are difficult for a sales leader is to maintain the success of a business while you’re trying to change the business” - Marty Sacks

“You constantly have to prioritize as a sales leader” - Marty Sacks

“If you make mistakes, if you learn from your mistakes, I think you’re gonna succeed because most people are afraid to stretch and make a mistake, and they like a comfort zone, but nobody grows in a comfort zone” - Marty Sacks

Learn More About Marty Sacks in the Links Below:

• LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/marty-sacks-17ba99
• Email - Marty.Sacks@TelosAlliance.com

Connect with Wesleyne Greer:

• Wesleyne’s Website - https://transformedsales.com/
• Wesleyne on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/wesleynegreer/
• Wesleyne on Facebook - https://web.facebook.com/wesleynegreer
• Wesleyne on Twitter - https://twitter.com/wesleynegreer
• Email Her at wesleyne@transformedsales.com

Hello, and welcome to another episode of

the transformed sales podcast today I am so excited to have

Marty Sachs with us. How are you? Marty?

I'm well how are you doing?

I am doing lovely, lovely and delightful.

And just a peek behind the hood a little bit. You guys know how

amazing this podcast world is. Marty and I this is my third

attempt to record this episode until I know Third time's a

charm, because we're both so busy. So I am so excited to do

this.

It's good to be with you.

So let me tell you a little bit about Marty. He

has been with Telos alliances. For over two decades, he's held

a variety of roles in sales, business and product

development. He has a sales role where he is over not only the

sales team, the marketing team, and now No, sorry, I think I

might have gotten that wrong. He's over the sales team

marketing team and what we would call is it support Marty? Or did

you just let that part go?

So now I have April overseeing our strategy efforts?

Yep, yep, the support team now works in another group for a new

professional services organization that were standing

up. So that group now no longer reports directly to me, although

I get to talk to them from time to time. So we're still good

friends.

Awesome. So Marty is the Executive Vice

President of Sales, Marketing and strategy. And he's been in

this case been with this company for over two decades. So Marty,

I am so curious, how do you stay with a company for so long and

still enjoy what you do every single day?

That's a great question. And I think the

probably the easiest answer is it's all about the people that

you work with, and the industry that you serve. So in my

particular case, I started out as a technologist working for

radio stations on the east coast of the US, and went from sort of

one set of stations to another and then ended up moving into a

sales role, about halfway through what's now my 40, some

years related to media and technology. And specifically, I

started out as a radio guy. So if you work with great people,

if you're in an industry that you love, if you are challenged

every day, well guess what you can get to these kind of decade

counts, and still love to get up in the morning and be very

excited and have great relationships in the industry.

And just, you know, it's one day at a time, but it really goes

back to my love for the industry and the great colleagues that

I've worked for, or worked with for many years.

So you started your career in on the other side

of the supply chain, as I'll call it. So talk to us about

your early career, what was that like for you?

So the early career, you know, I had a

disappointment early in life, where I ended up getting

eyeglasses, and that's not necessarily such a

disappointment. But if you want to be a military pilot in the

70s, you needed to have perfect vision. So what turned out to be

kind of a bad news thing, right? Getting glasses was a good news

thing, because it allowed me to pursue this interest I had in

electronics, and I ended up hanging around one day at my

junior high school, they call it Middle School. Now, the

audiovisual club, I don't even know if they have those anymore.

But I ended up going on a tour to a TV station, and that was in

1972. So you know, something happened, I got excited about

it. And you know, little by little, you started to work in

the industry that I'm in to this very day.

Wow. So something in middle school is

what gave you that little spark? When your first plan didn't

work? You said, Okay, that's fine. I kind of have this backup

plan that I think may work that I think I might like. So when

you first got into this broadcast journalism world, what

kind of things did you do? Were you DJ making amazing music late

at night? Were you a sports reporter? What did you do?

So I was on the other side of the microphone. So

I was one of the people that made sure the microphone worked

and made sure that even if the microphone work that you could

actually hear the station. So I started out, you know, very much

behind the scenes, and in some respects, did very little in

front of the microphone other than a little bit in college. So

I've always been primarily unseen, and mostly unheard when

it comes to the actual broadcasting. But of course,

what a lot of people don't realize or maybe some people do

is that there's a tremendous amount that happens that you

never see whether you're watching TV news, or you're

listening to a song, there are so many things that have to

happen for you to hear that song or watch that show or view the

news or, you know, have Alexa play you a stream of audio from

something. So there are just so many unsung heroes, and I sort

of had that role for the first two decades of my career, just

you know, doing more and more project work. I went to

different cities and built radio stations, but I always came back

to the technical side and the you know, nobody really You

might name side, which was just fine by me.

So one of the people that I used to work with,

she used to call herself the brains behind the scene. So

that's really what you've described, you are the brains

behind the scene, how did you really take like, I'm the person

who's weighing the bag? I'm not talking is not about me, how did

you take that and transition into a sales role.

So it's kind of interesting. You know, they

often say that there are some things that you cannot control.

But what you can control is how you react to those things. So I

ended up having a pretty significant change. At the time,

I was leading the technology for a specific group of radio

stations in the DC area, which is where I grew up in

Washington, DC, and I got a new boss. And, you know, I realized

relatively quickly that I was probably going to want to do

something different. And so what do you do, you start looking

around, you start working your network. And essentially, what

ended up happening was, I called one of my vendors, looking for

another technology role. And he said, I don't have a technology

role in mind. But I do have a sales role that opened up last

night. So literally, I talked to him the next morning, after

somebody had given notice the night before, day before,

whatever it was, and that's how I ended up in sales. And it was

very serendipitous it, I didn't really know anything other than

the actual products that I would be selling, or the very products

that I was purchasing as a technology leader. So I knew

that particular part really well, the part I didn't know is

now what do I do? What do I say, right? How do I talk to these

guys that, you know, I used to go to picnics with now I got to

try to sell them something, you know, so it was more of the how

do I function as a seller than it was? How do I learn this

industry that I'm going to try to sell products into so a lot

of times people go into sales, and they move from industry to

industry, because they have such great sales skills, you know,

they can make that kind of a change for me, I had to learn to

sell. And I had to learn by knowing what I was going to sell

so that I could focus all that energy on learning the sales

process and how to do that effectively.

So one of the great things that I love to talk

about on the podcast is the fact that a lot of times as sales

leaders, we are looking for that ready made salesperson, right

the person who has some technical knowledge is a good

salesperson knows the market all of that however, you said I knew

the technical stuff, I was on the other side, I was buying

these things. So I know what a buyer actually likes. I know

what annoys the buyer, I know what actually matters to them,

right. And so it's like when you go when you're on that other

side, and then you flip and you're like, but I don't know

how to sell it, you actually really do know how to sell it,

because you know how you like to be sold to and so you do unto

others as you would like to be done unto you.

Yeah, in fact, you're speaking the truth.

Because I said a moment ago, I didn't know what to do. But in a

way I did. Because just as you described, you know, I had a

certain mental image of how I wanted people to do business

with me how to sell to me. And what I realized was that it was

all about figuring out a way to add value in a way that nobody

else can, or that fewer people can. So think about it, if we

all sell the same reading glasses, you know, when we all

sell within pennies of each other, guess what, we have some

limits there, right? We're never going to be able to really

differentiate ourselves. And we have to sell lots of these to be

successful. But if we can figure out a way to sell these, and to

sell these and somehow have them work together, okay, somehow we

can differentiate ourselves, then, you know, we have more

options. And I think that's what I learned was that if I could

figure out a way to put together packages of equipment, and then

that wasn't new in my industry, but I put together packages from

maybe some additional companies that other people didn't put

together packages, including, you know, I learned how to help

people adopt new technologies, they may not necessarily know

all about them. I didn't know all about them. But I knew who

to call to be able to put these pieces together in a way that

would work for these particular clients. And over time, what I

learned was that did my very best to always add more value

than my competitor because most customers will pay for that

value. Gladly, because you save them time you save them hassle.

You save them the embarrassment of something not working because

they save $15. So I think it was a process of me learning how to

create that differentiation. And sometimes I was successful, and

sometimes I wasn't. But I think that over time, I learned ways

to differentiate. And that ultimately was what helped me to

stay in sales as opposed to you know, needing to do something

else because I was not as successful as I wanted to be to

provide for my family and do the other things in my life. So

yeah, that's Lori,

wow. And the way that you kind of took the

autonomy that you had to create packages, not just this is what

you need, this is what I'm gonna give you. But from your

knowledge of, again, on the other side of the supply chain,

this is what a person in this position needs this is what

would be valuable to them. And so as you continue to build that

value and help your customers, understand it, grow your

business and grow your business. And at what point in your career

did you say, I think I want to lead people like me, instead of

just being an individual contributor,

I was probably slower to go more into a leader

role, then, you know, I mean, I had people advising me, I should

think about that, and maybe I didn't listen as well as I

should have. And it's a really, you know, it's a timing thing.

And I think that where I finally, I guess, where it

finally clicked for me was the fact that, you know, I joined an

organization that had more than one employee doing sales. And,

you know, naturally, there's going to be somebody that that

might gravitate more towards leading that team, or, you know,

at least showing up at meetings, helping to lead that team,

whatever it might be. And so it wasn't a click of a switch, it

was much more of a kind of a slow realization. And I think

that to a certain extent, leading means serving. So I

think one of the things I learned was that I never really

led as much as I tried to help other people succeed. And I

think ultimately, you know, the best quality of a leader is

caring for the people that are on your team, or that are on the

team, right? It's not my team, it's the team. And that in the

process of doing that you help them succeed, and you sort of,

you know, then help them more succeed. And, you know, it's

really, you just wake up one day and go, Huh, wow, okay. But it

wasn't something I deliberately said, you know, in 10 years, I'm

going to be a leader, you know, that wasn't really what crossed

my mind on that.

And so how long was that time, though? Like, I

know that you said you weren't jumping up and ready. But how

long were you actually in that individual contributor sales

role?

I guess, probably for good 10 years or so. And,

you know, I mean, depends on how you count it exactly. But

probably nine to 10 years in, I was starting to be a dedicated

leader. And, yeah, that's about right.

So as that dedicated leader, what are some

of those that give us the year, the first 90 days? What are some

of these are like, Oh, my gosh, what am I doing here? What's

happening?

Well, one of the things I guess I learned on the

beginning stages was the company I was doing some of that

original leading for was going through some changes. And so one

of the things that is difficult for a leader, especially a sales

leader is to maintain the success of the business while

you're trying to change the business. So I used to tell

people, it's a little like driving your car down the

highway at 60 miles an hour and change your oil at the same

time, it's a little hard. So I think one of the things I

learned was just this idea that you have to sort of pick the

areas that are most important, because you're not going to have

time to do all the things that you normally need to do to lead

and, you know, institute new comp plans and create new

contracts for your resellers. And there's just a lot that has

to happen when change is upon you. And so you constantly have

to prioritize. And I think that's the one thing I've

learned is prioritize, right? The idea that you can't do it

all. So what's the thing that you want, at the end of the day,

you will be most motivated to have accomplished and that, you

know, some people would say that negatively, what's the one thing

that you would be really ticked off about if you didn't have it

done at the end of the day, but look at it from the positive,

which is you know, what is most important, and that's hard,

that's hard, especially if you have a family, you know, you're

trying to juggle all these balls in the air and not drop any of

them. And that's probably the biggest lesson I learned the

hard way. Because I found myself focusing on things that weren't

as important to the detriment of the things that were so you

constantly have to prioritize as a leader. And even to this day,

there are times where I just go, you know, now it's a little

easier. At my advanced age, I'm able to triage what's important

and what's not a little better than I could when I was younger,

shall we say? And so there are some advantages to a little this

stuff here. And, you know, definitely, that prioritization

thing is huge. I mean, if I had to go back and do it all again,

the one thing I would do is make better use of my time as a

husband, as a dad, as a worker, as a technologist, as a

salesperson, whatever, right? That's the one thing if I rewind

the tape all the way back and be much better use of my time.

I really love that you said your number one

tip is prioritization and time management. It's not figuring

out how to get the troops in line. It's not beating them over

the head with their KPIs or coming up with KPIs. It's me and

as leaders, so many At times we put those things that need to be

done on ourselves on the backburner. We're like, oh, but

this is wrong, and only 50% of the team is producing. And my

boss told me to do this, and this is not working. Let me go,

go go. But when we stop and take a minute, and really just take a

moment to say, How can I become a better human being today? And

every day? That is what helps us lead better?

Yeah, cuz quite frankly, you know, I've heard

this said before, kind of different ways. But you know,

one way to say it is nobody cares how much you know, until

they know how much you care, right? Kind of a trite saying,

right. But if you think about it really makes sense. And I think

that the other thing that I think is, unfortunately, where I

failed as a leader in the past is I haven't always walked the

walk. Right. So I talked the talk, right, I've got all the

right sayings and things, you know, and I can tell you a mile

long, all these things, right. But I wasn't necessarily always

doing the things that I was telling other people to do. So

you know, full disclosure, you know, somebody that's watching

this that knows me, you know, I have to be honest, because

they'll call me out, you know, I've learned because I made a

lot of mistakes. And I think that's the one thing I would

tell anybody, no matter where they are in their career, no

matter what industry, no matter what their line of work is, is

that if you make mistakes, if you learn from your mistakes, I

think you're gonna succeed. Because most people, a lot of

people are afraid to stretch and make a mistake, right? You know,

they'd like that comfort zone, and nobody grows in a comfort

zone. But not everybody is in a safe environment, to be able to

make mistakes and survive them. So you know, there are lots of

stories of people, you know, getting removed from an

organization for making a mistake. And I think that the

idea here is, you know, for anybody listening to your

podcast, that's a leader, make it safe for people to make

mistakes, not integrity mistakes, right? You got to be

honest, you got to treat customers fairly, you can't

compromise your integrity, that's a deal breaker, but other

than integrity issues, I would say that's the one thing that I

would encourage any leader that wants to be successful is to be

a safe place, maintain a safe environment so that people make

mistakes, and they learn from them. You know, guess what?

They're more valuable to you. So yeah, to me, that's a big one

right there,

give us a real example of something has

happened in your current position, or in your previous

positions where you actually had to put this into action. There

are

a few, but I, at one point, I was with an

organization that was running into financial trouble. And at

the time, I had the privilege of leading that organization. And

unfortunately, we were going through a tough patch, and I had

to lay myself off. So you know, and my wife had just been

diagnosed with an illness. So it was a very, very difficult time

is a very difficult choice to make. But it was the right

choice to make because the organization was more important

than one individual. So that's probably the best example that I

can talk about in terms of difficult decision. And it

wasn't easy, but I was rewarded in multiple ways for making that

decision. One was because I could look myself in the mirror,

no, I've made the right choice. So to thine own self be true,

right, the integrity thing, I think the other thing was that I

set an example for people that were closest to me, my friends,

my family, because they knew what had happened. And

ultimately, it all ended up working out just fine. But at

the time, it was a bit painful. And boy, did I learn a lot from

that,

that is very amazing. It really shows your

self, Lis nature and how much you value people. And a lot of

times I say as leaders, for me, it's not just the person who's

on my team, the person who's working in the company, I'm

thinking about their families, right? Like, okay, kids are

going back to school. So I'm not thinking about my kids gonna

write something about everybody, kids who has to go back to

school, everybody who's buy school clothes, and do this and

do that. Because literally as leaders, that is how we impact

lives, day to day. And so for you to look at the numbers, look

at the situation and say, it is better for me to lay myself off

so that five or 10 or 12 other people can keep their jobs. That

is very, very, very, very amazing. I mean, that's Yeah,

it wasn't quite that many, they could keep their

jobs. I wasn't paid that much. But I will tell you, I know I

just had to put that in there. But I will tell you that I'm on

a team now with a number of leaders that during COVID made

some very difficult choices about their own salaries, to

avoid laying off anybody here at our company. So we were very

fortunate, not every company had the flexibility and sort of the

financial wherewithal to be able to do this. But during the

COVID, the worst of the COVID period, you know, say about 18

months there, we didn't lay off a single person. We continued to

pay everybody's health care and all that sort of stuff. And this

was partly because our team did some sacrifice across the entire

team. And partly that's because the senior executives here took

a significant salary reduction for a short period of time to

make sure that we had the ability And so that we didn't

have to lay a single person off. So I'm really proud of this team

and our leaders, not my leaders, right? The our CEOs, co CEOs,

and our CFO banded together and help us ride this through. So

you know, company's very, very strong, always has been strong,

very, very strong. Now, you know, and that's, again, a very

vivid example to me of what leadership is about, because

that wasn't my idea. That was their idea. And I was happy to

jump on board and be a part of that. So yeah.

So what you just demonstrated is a culture,

right? You guys have a culture of empathy, a culture of really

digging deep and figuring out what does the organization need?

Not what do I an individual and maybe my household name, but

what as an organization? How can we ensure that our employees are

all able to continue paying their rent and their mortgage

and their car notes, right? Because that's what it's about.

When you're at a level of being an executive in the C suite,

senior executive? Yes, you make good money. And yes, we know

that we need money to live, but we can cut back and tighten our

belt sometimes, and to have a culture where senior executives

all get online, and you don't have a dissenter, I mean, that

is a great testament to the work you guys are doing there.

The team here is remarkable. And I couldn't agree

with you more just that idea, that sort of that selflessness

that came, it's pretty interesting, because I haven't

always been on teams like that. So I don't take that for

granted. I've been on teams that have been very political, very

siloed, I've been on teams where quite frankly, the people

outside the company, were friendlier than the people

inside the company. So I mean, I've, I've kind of been there

done that probably not as much as some people that are viewing

this, but seems to times I've been in some really funky

places, and boy, what I've learned, and so to be in a place

like telos, and, you know, being working with the people I am is

a great blessing. I don't take it for granted. I'm very

thankful to be here and very privileged to be on this team.

So yeah, no question. I've seen it both ways.

Wow, you've given us so many lessons in

leadership, and accountability and creating a culture where

people want to work where they want to stay and where you as a

leader can show up. So I know when I asked you to tell me

something that has impacted your career, you may not have too

much more, because you give me so much. So now I'm gonna ask

you to pull something else. Why? The way that you lead a

situation personally or professionally,

so I've got one, all I got is one, you've taken

everything that I've got. But I've got one for sure. So one of

the things I learned this was early in my technology career.

So my exposure to technology leaders was largely, you know,

very smart individuals, but maybe a little bit lacking in

some of the social skills, right, sort of how to interact

with people how to get your point met, you know, how to

creatively confront, you know, behaviors, just this idea of,

you know, how to live the rest of your life when you're not

doing technology. And so I came up in the early parts of my

career not having good examples of how to do that, right. My

parents weren't really that way. They didn't really deal with

their emotions at times very effectively. So I was really

lacking that in the beginning of my career. And I ended up

working right as I graduated high school, I changed jobs and

worked for one of the most successful radio stations here

in the Washington DC area at the time. And I met a guy who became

a lifelong friend. I've known this guy over 40 years. And more

than that, I can't do the math, not enough fingers. But I think

the point here is that for the first time ever early in my

career, I worked with a guy who had an amazing people skill. So

he was brilliant technologically, don't get me

wrong, he was nobody's fool when it came to how to do the actual

blocking and tackling of the work we do at that point in

time. But man, did this guy have people skills and I watched how

he interacted I watch how he, you know, I read what he wrote,

I learned to write reading his stuff. And, you know, I watched

him model much of the same behaviors. We've talked about,

you know, selfless leadership and caring for your people. And

I remember him taking me to an executives dinner one time in my

blue jeans in Los Angeles, I didn't have any real clothes. I

was out doing a project, but we had just celebrated something

big. And he said, Look, these guys are celebrating, they

didn't even work on it. This guy, me, Marty. He brought me

along to this ritzy restaurant. I remember, you know, I was like

20 years old, and I'm like, What am I doing here? Right? I'm

looking around and all these people are wearing suits. And

I'm sitting there in my jeans and a T shirt. And the steak was

great. Let me tell you what, it was a great experience. But I

learned how to take care of people from this guy. His name

is Smitty. So he's been a lifelong friend. He's been a

great mentor. You know, when my wife went through medical stuff,

his wife was always sending stuff to her just very caring,

very caring people. And so I learned, you know, I had a great

example. And so that is, you know, when I Talk about

mentorship. I've been fortunate my entire life to have so many

great mentors. He's probably the first major mentor I ever had.

So yeah, big time.

That's amazing,

I think so

that someone helped us get to where we are

today. And so we're responsible to reach back and pull somebody

else up. And it really sounds like in everything that you do

you practice that, right. You remember Smitty, and how much he

just brought just a straggling, 20 year old and jeans and a T

shirt or fancy meeting. And he's literally showing you this is

how you show up. And this is how you talk to important

executives, and he was mentoring you and teaching you. And this

is one key reason why when I work with leaders in companies,

I say you are not allowed to go to a meeting, external meeting

without somebody on your team with you. Like you cannot do it.

It is like a thing that I need you and grant your brand. You

should never go to a meeting alone as a leader, because

that's how salespeople learn. They learn on the fly.

Absolutely, right. I think there's a book that was

written years ago, Never Eat Alone. And I'm pretty sure

that's the principle that they talk about there. So it's that

idea of you're always teaching. Well, Marty,

this has been an amazing, amazing conversation.

I've enjoyed it. Thank you for having me. I

really appreciate it. Me too.

I'm so glad it was we waited a while to get

here. But I'm so glad we're able to connect and to chat. And what

is the one best way that listeners can reach out to you

if they're interested in chatting more?

Best thing to do is email me. It's Marty dot sacks

at TELUS alliance.com. Feel free to reach out I'm happy to

interact with any of your listeners. Hi, Sam,

make sure you tell them in the email that you

heard him on the transformed sales podcast. So he doesn't

think that you're just somebody's trying to sell them

some more stuff. To actually want to learn from him and talk

to him and develop as a leader as a salesperson.

Absolutely, I'd welcome the opportunity. Well,

thank

you so much, Marty, for your time, your

talent, your expertise, and sharing how the company culture

within Telos has really helped you lead and show up. That's the

way you best express yourself. So thank you so much for sharing

that with us today. We definitely appreciate it.

Great to see you. Thanks again for inviting me. I

really appreciate it.

Awesome. And that was another episode of the

transform sales podcast. Remember in everything that you

do every single day, find one way to transform your sales