I Suck At CrossFit And What That Taught Me About B2B Sales

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what's up guys it's real early I just finished CrossFit that's a new thing for me sucks been going to the gym for as long as I've been programming but CrossFit totally kicks my butt and uh yeah it's it's good though I wanted to talk a little bit about that and what I got going on today um so there's a I posted some content like on impostor syndrome things like that my window up one sec too much noise by the way I'm getting a mic it should come tonight so going forward all the videos after I haven't tried it out obviously cuz I don't have it on me but videos going forward should be a little bit more clear um but I wanted to talk about this idea of like uh kind of like imposter syndrome but like more around this uh this idea of like

getting comfortable being uncomfortable because I'm very bad at it very bad at it uh but uh you know when I've written about this before I recognize how valuable it is and it's easier like in highsight it's easier said than done kind of thing but um putting yourself into situations where you you're no longer an expert like it's a new domain you kind of have to be a beginner uh and really have you know a growth mindset I think is really important but but it is uncomfortable and kind of like a almost like a paradox I guess you know when we're when we start getting comfortable with things that's usually when we're not really growing much right um when you have these it's really bright when you have these really uncomfortable situations so say you're starting a new job job in a new domain like you're

going to relatively speaking probably have rapid growth um now there's other factors right like you might be on a crappy team and no one's giving you work to do or something like maybe you're not going to grow that much but all all things you know equal when it's a new domain and you're no longer an expert and you have to sort of take on this beginner mindset these are really good opportunities for growth but um the thing is I think for a lot of people like I know especially for myself it's wildly uncomfortable to go from being like okay I know my stuff like starting to feel like I'm building expertise in an area to okay you know nothing and the reason that's relevant today like I want to talk about it today is because CrossFit is a thing like that for me so I

just wanted to give you like a parallel into different parts of life not because I'm like a life coach or something but uh I just thought it was a cool analogy that maybe you can think about so I've been I've been going to the gym since I was like 14 like consistently so um six or 7even days a week um took like I used to do like hobby I say hobby cuz I I didn't like the idea of competing but like powerlifting and then I did like amateur competitive bodybuilding so I've been I've been going to the gym for a long time and uh it's part of my my lifestyle right like when I think about my lifestyle it's it's much like a bodybuilder because I like to eat the same things over and over I like to have a uh consistent diet I like

training like a bodybuilder but I had a recent experience where um this over the past few months my gym closed down unfortunately I not my gym like the gym I was going to so I found another gym locally um much closer and uh long story short they had a bit of a weird trainer SL staff there that was was accusing me of like leaving weights and stuff on machines and and stuff and which I mean on this surface isn't a really big deal if I would have done that um but he was trying to say that I was like a repeat offender and every time I go to the gym I'm doing doing it and uh I just told him like Hey man like that's just not true cuz it's not and uh I just told them that I go to a different gym cuz

like I'm uh I'm 35 years old and I'm not going to be like number one I don't want to be policed like that at a gym especially because I do put my weights and stuff away like that's just etiquette I've been going to the gym for a long time and then to be accused of it I'm like nah like not not for me like I got I got other things to do than you know have to worry about my gym time and being like falsely accused and stuff so I said screw it like you know cancel my membership on the spot and uh I told my wife before like I would do CrossFit with her when I was getting older because realistically I'm not going to be a professional bodybuilder it's not even not an interest of mine and like it's way too much uh

like commitment for your your life and your health so um you know for me I just figured like as I got older CrossFit would make more sense more cardio and stuff like that but kind of happened a little bit sooner than I thought so the reason that that this comes up for like a beginner mindset is like been going to the gym for a long time but I've been not not been doing CrossFit right so uh I'm reasonably strong for my size like I'm 5'4 180 lb my max bench is uh 3 20 lb Max Squad is just over 400 like I'm not freakish or anything like that but I'm I'm reasonably strong for a little dude and uh you know I'm not like a freaky big muscular person but like people generally seem to know that I go to the gym so they can

tell which is nice but I walk in a CrossFit and like I my first crossfit workout was supposed to be 30 minutes long I got 3 minutes in and almost blacked out I've never almost fainted like that in my life and I remember sitting down and my wife had to come over to give me gummy candies so I could like come back to life and I couldn't even open my eyes so she was holding out gummy candies for me and I was like Leah I can't I can't see what you're holding so for me this is like a very much embrace the embrace the uncomfortable right because this is an area like I said I've been going to the gym for forever like I should be very comfortable there but I'm not and it's exposing a lot of things that I am weak at that

I don't have good practice I don't have uh some skills I don't have mobility and uh I just thought it was interesting because in this case sure it's it's definitely uncomfortable but I feel a lot more like willing if that makes sense and I I don't understand why personally but um I'm not like shying away from it I'm like yeah I know I know I don't have Mobility I know I don't have cardio and I wonder if part of it is like at different points in my training over you know the past two decades I have been very mobile at some points I have had good cardio at some points and maybe I'm just like oh I know I can do it cuz I've literally done it before so maybe that's why um maybe that's a little bit of a a difference whereas for us

in software engineering or other parts of your career in life you might be like trying something new and it's uncomfortable and you feel like a beginner um and maybe you haven't proven that you've been able to have some of these skills and stuff before so maybe that's why it's a lot more resistant for us but I wanted to talk about it because I think it's important that not all the time right like you want you probably want to get to a point where you start to build expertise and comfort in areas but um you have to find that sweet spot where you're saying okay like I I feel like I have built expertise uh and it's it's time to try something new so that I can build more skills and have more perspective so this is um is something in my career that's happened law

but it's almost like a forcing function i' I've talked about this before in uh in interviews and uh and written about it but the idea is like I'm pretty conservative so when I do become an expert uh and I'm I I'm I should say like an expert air quotes right like I feel very comfortable in an area I have confidence um I I stay with it like I'm not I'm not living the advice that I'm telling you and like this is me like kind of acknowledging right like and as I said I've written about it and stuff but it's uh it's scary it's scary to like go and like do something that you're you're a total beginner at and it feels like you're giving up being an expert well that's not the case right like for the example with Crossfit for me that I was

giving I've been bodybuilding for forever so it doesn't mean that just by stopping all of a sudden all of my experience regarding nutrition or hypertrophy for bodybuilding like all of that just disappears it's not what it means um and the same thing when you're you have domain expertise like I used to work in digital forensics so sure I'm not up to date on the latest trends and stuff but I built a foundation working in digital forensics like I understand a lot of the concepts because I built the expertise there so generally I just I kind of avoid this discomfort of like oh no I'm going to be a beginner but uh call it fortunately or unfortunately I guess I've had different points in my life where there's been a forcing function that's kind of put me into a spot where it's uh it's brand new

and I just want to like as I'm driving I want to see if I can just recall a couple of them but um I mean maybe not a forceing function but like when I took the job in digital forensics this was a like a new domain um so not necessarily A forcing function but that was a big jump into like here's something brand new so you're a beginner um within within my career in digital forensics right I became a manager very fast so again not quite a foring function and I it's just because no one made me uh forc me to be a manager but it was kind of like hey we need managers and you seem to be able to talk to the team so do you want to do it um so they kind of put me into a spot where it was

you know it was uncomfortable um when we were building digital forensics tools uh I I worked with the coli again we saw a need where we were building mobile acquisition tools so like stuff to recover information from phones and without getting into the details uh just cuz it's I don't I don't know if it's proprietary or not whatever it doesn't really matter but there was a need and did we know what we were doing like no but we came up with the solution and it worked and the next you know many years after that was kind of like I had I had forced myself into this position where I was leading the team that did mobile Acquisitions so it kind of like put me into the spot where I had to do it Microsoft is a another obviously very recent example when I started I

was managing a deployment team and oh man it's super bright um I knew nothing about deployments at all right like I never worked with data centers or anything like that big distributed systems so again my role was this forcing function where it's like look you're going to about to learn it man so there was that and then obviously my most recent team uh is routing plane in uh in Microsoft 365 so you know my manager hired me knowing that I don't have experience with firewalls and and routing like he knew that so there's again this forcing function like we know you're going to learn get on board and start learning so every every single one of these experiences I said this at the beginning of this little video but every single one of these experiences results in like very interesting growth and I'm I'm kind

of saying this on camera to like to tell you and be like I'm sharing this knowledge with you but it's almost like I'm trying to remind myself because I am bad at doing this and when you reflect maybe you've had a bunch of experiences like this too but at least I reflect and I go like yeah that was a forcing function this caused me to be uncomfortable to feel like I'm a beginner um every single one of those opportunities resulted in something like truly great in terms of career growth or uh just experiences so I think that's super important um it's kind of like some some meta concepts for your life and your career I guess cuz I know everyone's got more specific focuses and that's good you know we're all super busy we all got we all got lives to live we got our

careers we got our families we got friends we have our our Hobbies um so this is kind of just like one of those underlying things if you can kind of weave this into different parts of your life you might find like uh I don't know like a lot of uh a lot of passion a lot of Engagement into to different areas that you just didn't realize were like pretty interesting to you so that's that the end no I'm just kidding but uh cuz I still got a drive and you're stuck with me unless you want to stop the video but you wouldn't do that would you would you yeah so CrossFit was this morning um I when I was you know I wanted to say what I said because I was thinking about the CrossFit stuff but I wanted to give you a little update

on what today is it's a Friday so um Fridays are generally lighter for me at Microsoft and I don't mean because suddenly there's no work uh because uh I wish that was the case but it's not uh they're lighter just because uh Fridays and our org are generally like a no meeting Friday and the funny thing is as a manager like most of my job is meetings and I don't meet like most of my job is making Engineers sit in meetings I mean most of my job is like coordinating with other people and meeting with them so when I have a no meeting Friday that means that like some of my things that I do dayto day just don't get done so it looks very different for me that's why I say it's lighter but it's a really good opportunity cuz I have other stuff

I do that's not meetings and it feels like it piles up when uh we got meetings and stuff through the week so be a little lighter today uh it's also kind of funny because yeah it's no meeting Friday but there's a couple of us that we go hey you don't have meetings on Fridays right no okay let's meet um because we know that our schedules are free so I work really closely with one of my PMS on on the team and he's absolutely awesome to work with I don't suspect he'll ever watch one of these videos uh which is fine obviously but I you know I think very of him he's extremely intelligent he's uh he's easy to work with so I feel like we get a lot of stuff done um so I actually I really look forward to our meetings on Fridays because

it's like I get a bit of a brain reset I can recalibrate with him um yeah like I truly feel like I have a partner at work to be able to like push through on on complicated things so uh super awesome guy to work with so I'm looking forward to that today was funny uh cuz I have a conflict this morning and I for our meeting and I remembered like like at 11:00 last night I was like oh man I forgot to tell him so super funny sent him a message at like 11: and for a lot of us we like we like sometimes my boss will me message stuff at like 400 in the morning but like we have a we've all been very clear like don't respond to stuff like it's late it's just that everyone has different working hours some people might

be up for whatever reason and like don't worry so I sent him a message at 11: figured he'd see it in the morning and he responded right away and he was like I literally just moved our meeting because he also had a conflict which is just kind of funny uh uh so yeah it just worked out really well but the conflict I have is because I had going back almost a month now I have an interview scheduled with um with an individual who is an exp DP at Amazon his name is Ethan Evans and uh I can't remember exactly how it came up it was on LinkedIn they were doing a bit of a checking in to see like if he could get on some podcast and stuff so I just reached out and said hey here's my audience size here's what they they're interested

in and got things scheduled so it's finally the day but the reason that this is so funny or interesting is you might recognize the name I don't think every one does obviously but they might recognize the name Ethan Evans because very recently he posted a LinkedIn post that went super viral now if you're not a content creator and I feel like a lot of people watching this aren't there's a generally when you're making like text post or any type of post you usually have a hook and it's right at the beginning of your post you're just trying to capture reader attention because everyone's scrolling you want to Captivate them and his Hook was something along the lines of like I used to work for a CEO that um that seduced my wife and he won and that was the hook so everyone's like dude what

the hell and uh and I'm not I'm not knocking the post I can't remember what the whole post is about but um just like I mean that's a hook because I saw this post all over different social media platforms from non- tech people and stuff so I guess it did its rounds but I'm interviewing him um which I think will be really cool not because of that I'm probably not even going to mention the post um but uh you know he seems like a very interesting individual and we're going to talk about the perspective of sort of like Executives and and a highlevel uh like you know seite kind of uh perspective on on engineers and like what they're looking for for helping uh you know seeing engineering growth and helping Engineers level up in their career so obviously I have an engineering manager's perspective

and uh you know he's going to be trying to share from like that level what people are looking for what uh what quality stand out and stuff like that so I thought that'll be a very interesting topic and I'm hoping people can get value out of that so I'm home I'm going to turn this video off yeah stay tuned for that that'll probably go up in two weeks or or so and uh yeah I think it's going to be cool but yeah hope you enjoy these it's a little little ride home from Crossfit next one's prob oh you know what Monday Monday's a holiday so you'll never see another one of these again until next Wednesday so take care enjoy your weekend if you're watching this before the weekend if you're watching this is some random arbitrary point in the future I hope you have

a good one and I'll see you later