It’s our 100th episode of this podcast! Can you believe it?!
We decided to turn the tables for this very special offering of INSIDE Inside Sales and for the first time ever, Darryl will be the guest. Now, who could we possibly find that would be up to the challenge of interviewing VanillaSoft’s dynamic, bombastic, and fashion icon of a Chief Revenue Officer?
All-Star guest and fan favorite Benjamin Dennehy joins us for his record-setting 4th time to dig deep and dive into all things Darryl Praill. Learn everything you wanted to know about the who, why, and how about your humble host as we celebrate this milestone episode of INSIDE Inside Sales!
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Host Guest: Darryl Praill, VanillaSoft
Guest Host: Benjamin Dennehy, UKsMostHatedSalesTrainer.com
Darryl Praill: We did it. My friends, my fellow tribe, lo and behold, we did it. Here we are episode number 100. They said it wouldn’t make one let alone 10, let alone triple digits, baby. Come on, can you imagine? Episode 100! I mean, candidly, sit back, relax. Think about this. I will have interviewed 100 brilliant, industry-shaking, life-altering, career-making individuals who have spent time with me, little old me, and actually shared their wisdom, shared a few laughs, had a few debates and along the way made a ton of new friends. It’s crazy. Now, admittedly, it’s probably not a hundred individuals cause we have had the occasional guests on more than once and that’s often due to popular demand.
Darryl Praill: And, it’s so funny because I’ll have people come up to me, whether we’re out and about, we’re at a trade show when those things used to happen, or even talking online and they’re like, man, how is it you know what you know about sales? And I’m like, dude, I’m stupid. You need to understand this. I am not a bright cookie. I am not gifted in the knowledge of sales. But, what I am is I’m able to have a conversation with people who are. So, whatever you hear me talking about sales, you need to know if you’re not clear on this already, that I am simply repeating, regurgitating, reissuing, resharing content that I’ve heard from them. And, I have been blessed along the way.
Welcome Benjamin Dennehy
Darryl Praill: So, if you’re not aware, I actually reached out on LinkedIn not too long ago and I said, kids, guys, and gals, friends, those in the community, I’m about to do episode number 100. What shall we do to celebrate this amazing milestone? How should we approach this? Different format, different guests, different construct? What do we wanna do? And overwhelmingly, I had a number of people saying, “Darryl, you spend all this time interviewing all these people, let’s turn the tables. For episode 100, why don’t you be interviewed?” And I thought to myself, hm, that’s interesting.
Darryl Praill: And I went home to my wife and I said, “Do you wanna interview me?” She’s like, “I don’t know a damn thing about sales.” And I say, “I know, but that’s part of the charm.” And as you imagine the answer there was no. So, my wife said no. So then I said, okay, fair enough. So then I said, okay, who do I want to interview me? Someone I trust, someone I respect, someone I think we’ll have a lot of fun and celebrate this event with us. And candidly, it goes back to the most popular guests we’ve ever had here on the show. I believe this will be appearance number four for him. Nobody else is like, I think the closest is, there’s a few appear twice, this will be appearance number four. That’s because you guys love him.
Darryl Praill: And because you guys love him. I reached out to him recently and I said, “Dude, I need to be interviewed. Do you wanna do it?” And his response was, “I’ve never interviewed somebody unless I’m trying to approach them for a sales role.” And I said, “Well, you can interview me.” So, we’re gonna wing this together. Folks, across the pond joining us today, live from the studios at his fine home, wearing his trademark red cap, his red braces, what we call suspenders, and his, I don’t know, is it a plaid lumberjack shirt? I’m gonna now pass control over to this fine production to my good friend, the UK’s Most Hated Sales Trainer, Benjamin Dennehy, my friend! Welcome to the show.
Benjamin Dennehy: Ah, it’s good to be here. Thank you for having me. I’d like to say, I would like to say that to be asked to interview you on your 100th is, you know, it’s a real honor. That’s what I’d like to say. But, unfortunately not.
Darryl Praill: I was waiting for the other shoe to fall. I knew it was gonna happen.
Benjamin Dennehy: It feels more like a bail application hearing over Zoom.
Darryl Praill: Yeah, it could be. You’re not that far off I think. Oh, this is your penance. You’ve done some ill, some ill-gotten things and now you have to interview me.
Benjamin Dennehy: Yeah. This is what happens when you kill fairies in a previous life.
Darryl Praill: Fair enough. Well then, are you up to the task, or are you just gonna wing it like you always do?
Benjamin Dennehy: Oh, I am.
Darryl Praill: All right. I wanna see it, I’m happy. I’ve got high expectations.
Benjamin Dennehy: Well, if you would just shut up for a bit and let the guy who’s supposed to be doing the questioning actually ask something. In fact, it’s funny cause when I found out that I was gonna do this, I asked people, you know, what should I do when I interview Darryl? What, sort of questions should I ask him? And people said questions where he only has to give one-word answers. Cause frankly, if you’ve ever watched one of Darryl’s shows, you know that he probably talks more than the very person he’s interviewing, but that’s why we love him. And that’s why we’re here today.
The man behind the mic
Benjamin Dennehy: We wanna find out a little bit more about the person behind the voice. We wanna find a little bit more out about him. And I’m gonna be honest, Darryl, I can’t remember when we first crossed paths. It’s in the last three years, four years, it’s purely through LinkedIn. And somehow I don’t form a lot of friendships. I generally hate people, but Darryl is one of the few people from LinkedIn where we’ve managed to form an offline sort of bond and relationship. But one that isn’t just purely transactional. So, I am really pleased to be here. Why don’t I start off with my first question? And I ask this of everybody in sales cause I like to know and I get asked it, how on earth did you get into this Darryl? No one at school wanted to be in the sales. The odd two or threes, so don’t write to us if it was you, but most of us didn’t. So, how is it that you found yourself to be in sales and have rather brilliantly managed to escalate your career all the way up to Chief Revenue Officer? So tell us a bit about that. Paint that picture for us.
Darryl Praill: Candidly, I’ve shared this with a few people before, I am a computer programmer by trade, a systems guy. But, when I finished school, I finished university, I was like, I’m so burnt out of coding and being a developer, I don’t wanna do it anymore. What do I do? And I had zero idea of what to do. And I asked friends and family and they all said, oh, you should try sales. Now, I don’t think they suggested I should try sales because they said, Darryl, you’re a natural-born salesperson. I think what it was, at least back in that era especially, it was we don’t know what to do with your career, so when all else fails go into sales. And that was how I got my first taste of sales and I lasted six months selling photocopiers door to door. And when I came to my senses and I said, this is bloody hard, I’m not having fun and I went back and I started coding again for the next four or five years. But here I am, it drew me back eventually.
Benjamin Dennehy: Right, and so let me ask you this then cause there’s always this argument going on, I was actually recently accused of being a good marketer and I commented I didn’t realize I’d stooped that low. So, my question to you is, are you a salesman or a marketer? Which do you see yourself more as and why?
Darryl Praill: That’s a really good question and I’ll be candid, it’s funny you say that cause that has been something that I have been revisiting if you will since being appointed CRO here at VanillaSoft because clearly I own all sales and marketing and I’m responsible for the number. I have spent so many years, much more so as a marketer than a salesperson. If I had to choose, I default to marketing, however, the difference is I would give you a third answer, neither sales nor marketing and this is the honest to goodness truth because the two occupations and disciplines have merged so much over the last several years, I view myself as a revenue guy. And I understand that both have a role to play, and I understand the roles, I understand them well. So, I tend not to take a sales side or a marketing side. These last several months I’m the revenue guy, which, but yeah, if you get me at a pub with a few pints into me and I look around me and I see there’s no cameras and there’s no recording devices going on, I would probably say I do bias to the marketing side.
Benjamin Dennehy: I knew it, I knew it, I knew it.
From CMO to CRO
Benjamin Dennehy: So, tell me this thing. You’ve recently been appointed CRO which I had yet to ask you what that stood for cause it sounded like a made-up title. Apparently, it’s real folks.
Darryl Praill: It’s a real title, Chief Revenue Officer. That’s right, yes.
Benjamin Dennehy: Clearly created by someone in marketing cause it doesn’t actually say anything.
Darryl Praill: Absolutely, we’re not stupid, but yes. Go ahead.
Benjamin Dennehy: How has your life changed? What are you doing differently on a day to day basis that you weren’t doing when you were Chief Gob?
Darryl Praill: Well, I was Chief Marketing Officer and now I’m Chief Revenue Officer.
Benjamin Dennehy: Oh!
Darryl Praill: Yeah.
Benjamin Dennehy: CMO, sorry.
Darryl Praill: CMO, that’s okay. It’s just a marketing guy, now I’m the sales guy. That’s a really interesting question. So, cause I get asked that. I got asked that again even last night. We had friends over to steal our internet cause theirs was out and they had some online learning to do. And from a social distance, we were talking with one another and they asked that, how has your life changed? And I said, “I’ve never been as busy as I’ve been in my entire life since this job came on.” Which is hard to believe cause candidly, I work crazy hours, I worked a lot of hours. I did a lot of stuff and I thought I couldn’t possibly get more busy. But, the fact of the matter is, lo and behold, I could and I have. So, that’s the first part that’s changed.
Darryl Praill: The other parts changed, now this is, I would look, I would love to get your answer on this, your insights on this one, how it’s changed for me is I now view myself as a psychotherapist, which I didn’t do that before when I was a CMO. So, what do I mean by that? I mean, my sales team has the tools. They have the techniques, they have the processes, they have everything they need to succeed and those who aren’t succeeding or achieving their maximum potential, it’s just between their ears. That’s where the problem is. And so, I find myself nonstop thinking about what do I need to do to change their mindset, to change their approach, to build their confidence, to build upon the little incremental wins, which is bizarre because I never thought it before. It was like, you know, what campaign do I need to do? And how do I do this? And how do I get Benjamin Dennehey on my show so I get his audience to get exposed to my brand and blah, blah, blah. So that’s probably the two ways, working hard and now I’m a psychotherapist.
Benjamin Dennehy: Well, welcome to my world. I’m not a sales trainer, I am a therapist, I’m an actor, and I’m a communications coach. Sometimes there’s a bit of selling in that, but yet most of your time is spent dealing with the head trash that salespeople bring you that prevents them from doing what they’re meant to do. For every dollar paid in Canadian, you get about 80 cents worth of head trash.
Darryl Praill: I’ll be honest with you. I’ve actually reached out to some of my colleagues in this space and I’ve said to them, “Is this normal?” Cause I’m like, you know, it’s been a few years for me and is this normal? And they’re like, “Yeah.” In fact, it was really interesting was I was having this whole conversation with people about do I let certain reps go or not? Because I see, that they may not get past their own mental obstacles. And their response was, “Oh no, no, it’s just sales, Darryl. You get used to it.” And I still struggle with that. I think a lot of sales leaders today accept mediocre performance because they think that’s just sales and I cry bullshit on that. That’s just my opinion.
Benjamin Dennehy: No, I totally agree. And a lot of sales managers don’t know how to fix it. Just to talk about me briefly cause I don’t do that a lot. But, the people that hate me the most within any organization are the sales directors or managers because I’m doing the job that they’re meant to be doing. And when a managing director or CEO realizes why is he doing what you’re meant to do, they suddenly become superfluous. Those people never reach out to me believe it or not, sales directors or sales managers.
Darryl Praill: That doesn’t shock me because it’s true. Cause that’s the first reaction. Aren’t I paying you to do this? Why do I need to hire a consultant to do your job? And that’s a valid point.
Benjamin Dennehy: Yeah. And why do we put up with this? He’s right. Why do we put up with this? And the sales director goes, well, you know, you gotta give them a bit of time. It’s been three years!
Darryl Praill: Yes! I had a conversation with my CEO the other day saying, you know, expert A says that this is the way it is, expert B says we may wanna do these little tweaks, and then expert C says something in between. And I’m looking at that and he’s asking me, he’s legitimately asking me cause of the new role, you know, “Darryl, how’s it going? You know, what’s consuming your time? What’s on your mind? What’s bothering you?” He’s checking in with me which is what he’s supposed to do. And I say to him, I said, “I’m spending a lot of fricking time being introspective, trying to figure crap out.” And he said, “What do you mean?” And I had this conversation and I’m like, so do I listen to expert A or expert B or expert C? Because they’re way more famous, way more accomplished sales mavens in this. And I’m like, I disagree with them all. And I said, and this is where I’m at. In the end, any success I’ve had is cause I did listen to my gut and my gut says I’ve taken their input and maybe I’ve tweaked my position, but I’m going with my gut cause it’s never let me down.
Benjamin Dennehy: All right. So, let’s move on.
Darryl Praill: Before you move on, whoa, whoa. Before you move on, just before you move on, we’re gonna go for a commercial break. We’ll be right back.
A little piece of advice
Darryl Praill: See, you all thought I was gonna give him a hard time. Nah, we’ve gotta pay the bills here, folks. But, we’re back, over to you Benjamin.
Benjamin Dennehy: Right, so, moving on. You are known, in fact, it’s ubiquitous with you and the internet and LinkedIn that you are known for giving advice and every now and then it’s actually good. So, let me ask you this. Who do you turn to for advice? Who do you go to for guidance?
Darryl Praill: Oh, wow. Oh, wow. That’s a brilliant question. Who wrote that for you cause you didn’t sure as hell come up with it? I’ve got a handful of people on the marketing side. People like Neil Patel, Sangram Vajre. I was on the phone the other day, literally yesterday with a guy named James Gilbert. If you haven’t met James, look him up. He’s incredible. That’s on the marketing side. On the sales side, I have an eclectic number of people. I have Benjamin as you know here. I have Randy Riemersma. I have Scott Leese. And what’s interesting, as we look at Benjamin and Scott Leese, there’s a good example, right?
Darryl Praill: Scott is like this surf and sun bum who’s a kind of laid back really, really probably liberal socialist leaning. Then you’ve got Benjamin who’s like in your face, the most hated training, a little more let’s call it conservative. So, that’s my point I’m trying to make here is I have a diverse set of friends because they’re all damn smart at what they do. But these are people that I can pick up the phone any time and have literally. Before I took the job, I reached out to the vast majority of these people and I said, “They’ve offered me this job. What do you think? What would my plan be?” And that’s that imposter syndrome coming up where I’m going, I’m like, I don’t know if I can do this job. I don’t know if I have the skill set.
Darryl Praill: So, for the love of God, coach me. And then, the last thing I do and I laugh because I made a post the other night on LinkedIn or it was my first LinkedIn story and I had a picture of a whole bunch of stuff that I was reading. And I said, you know, bedtime reading, whatever. And someone said to me, and they said, “Where did you get all this research? This is amazing.” And I said, “Okay, I did this thing called Google.” And they were like, “No way.” And I’m like, “Yes.” And so, you know, Google is also a trusted advisor, just so you know.
Benjamin Dennehy: That’s a great answer. And, let me ask you this then. What is the worst piece of advice you’ve been given in your career other than become CRO?
Darryl Praill: Oh yeah, so that is definitely a bad piece. This is a short term gig now once I took that job. The worst piece of advice I ever was given? I don’t know if I was given like terrible advice ever. I know what it was, I know it was. And it was given to me many times by many people. Worst piece of advice. Just let it go. Just, you can’t change it, just accept it, it is what it is as Donald Trump likes to say, it is what it is. And that’s bullshit cause you know, if you let it go, you become one of the minions. Now, I wanna be clear here. You need to be smart. You need to pick and choose. As I like to say to my wife when she gets upset with our kids, I will say, “Is this the hill you wanna die on?”
Darryl Praill: Some hills it’s okay to retreat, lose a battle to win the war and you’ve gotta be a little shrewd about that, but just to let it go and accept it as status quo, I refuse to accept that. And if I had accepted that over and over again, I never woulda had the success I had. One of the things I told my, both of my kids are now young adults in the workforce and they’ve come back and they said to me, “Dad, it was the best advice ever.” Was I said, “Stop waiting for permission to do something. If you know something needs to be done, just fricking do it, then go to your boss and say, I did it. Don’t yell at me, but here are the results of my doing it. And it’s pretty damn good.” And I said, “Trust me, they will take note of you when you show them the results. Whereas if you ask for permission, they would’ve said no.” So yeah, don’t accept it. That’s my answer.
Benjamin Dennehy: That’s a good answer. I mean, surprisingly from you too.
Darryl Praill: I know.
Benjamin Dennehy: I know, it’s interesting.
Darryl Praill: I’m trying to behave myself. It’s killing me. I wanna be in control, but you’re in control.
Overcoming challenges
Benjamin Dennehy: I know, it must be hard for you to talk so less in an interview. What are the odds? So, let me ask you this question then. You’re in a pretty nice, easy business. You sell software. I mean, it’s a dot. We all know that. And I’ll be honest, I originally thought you sold ice cream as I think most people do. But, what are the biggest challenges? Cause you obviously, you sell a software and there’s a lot of competing products out there that say they do something similar. So, what are the biggest challenges in what I would suspect is a fairly crowded and competitive marketplace? What is it that you see as your biggest challenge as a CRO?
Darryl Praill: Whether if your bias is toward sales or your bias is towards marketing, the challenge is the same. And this one is what keeps me up at night. And it’s what’s caused my entire strategy since I joined the company, which is in every single industry, there’s only one or two leaders and everybody else is a contender or even worse, a wannabe or a niche or call it what you will. But, basically, there’s only two leaders. So, my biggest challenge as a CRO is how do I compete when you’re not the acknowledged leader? When you’re not Coke and you’re not Pepsi? How do you enter the race and actually drive new business and acquire market share? Cause what’s working against you are so many things.
Darryl Praill: The investment community wants the leaders to win because they’ve got money on them to succeed. So, that influence is happening. The brand is known and people wanna minimize risk. So, they choose the brand they perceive as less risky, even though the product may not be as good. Because they have the funding, they’ve acquired some market share. Now, market share can be changed, but in the near term, they’ve got a hell of a lot more customers than you have that creates a loyal following. So, even when the renewal process comes around, it’s not so much that you’re winning the business as they’re possibly losing the business cause of bad customer service or what have you.
Darryl Praill: So, how do you make sure that you’re top of mind to be considered at that renewal stage? How do you compete when you don’t have enough money? How do you compete when your brand is an afterthought? That’s been my biggest challenge and over and over again, the only way for us to do that, especially in this time and era is through personal branding and noise. So, you talk about I’m known as the guy who has advice? That’s brilliant because that was a total tactic to say.
Darryl Praill: I can’t outspend my competition, but I can out brand them, I can out social them, I can out content them, I can out influence them because all of that costs nickels, dimes, nothing. That’s dirt cheap, but I can’t hire more employees. I can’t throw gobs and gobs of money at Gartner and Forrester. I can’t be the premier platinum sponsor to every single trade show. I can’t have an advertisement for every single publication. I can’t do that. So, I’m a contender trying to survive in a field dominated by a handful of leaders and that’s what makes my life hell sometimes, also makes it fun cause you get to try stuff you wouldn’t normally do.
Benjamin Dennehy: I’ll tell you what that sounded like the most scripted, rehearsed, CRO/marketing officer spiel I’ve ever heard, crikey. I mean that worked in board meetings folks, but I’ll tell you, I’ll give you some free advice. How do you compete in a crowded competitive marketplace where you’re not market leader? It’s very easy. It’s just hard to learn to do. It’s to ask better questions and your prospects will discover very quickly that you do a better job than their competitors. No fancy marketing, no sponsorship, no days away at some guru. Just learn how to ask better questions and get your prospect to realize they need what you have. That’s a skill. It can be learned. In fact, it’s what I spend my life teaching people to do. So, when I’m in Canada.
Darryl Praill: Before you leave that topic, are you suggesting that we should hire you, but we shouldn’t judge you based on your interviewing skills, but you’re better at that other thing you claim to do than this thing you’re doing now.
Benjamin Dennehy: I don’t think your Canadian dollars could afford the British pound.
Darryl Praill: I have a substantial UK staff. I want you to know that. They all love me even though they tease me on my outs and my abouts. So, there you go.
Benjamin Dennehy: Well, I’ll tell you what, if you qualify, if you pass my test and I’m happy to work with you then I’ll let you know.
Darryl Praill: I love it! And your test is simply can you cut a check? Isn’t that the sum total of your test?
Benjamin Dennehy: No, no. You’ve gotta convince me you can change.
Darryl Praill: Oh, I love that cause let’s explore that for a second. You gotta convince me you can change.
Benjamin Dennehy: Go for it. Gotta convince me you can change.
Darryl Praill: And that’s no different than me saying I spend my time being a psychotherapist and I look at my reps and I say, can you change? I’m not convinced some of them can.
Benjamin Dennehy: No, and that’s just it.
Darryl Praill: How do you do that?
Benjamin Dennehy: If they can’t convince you, then it’s no point. The first step, if you wanna do this, seriously, if we were to work together, first thing I’d say is ask your guys to pay towards their own training. The ones that refuse don’t wanna change. It’s that simple.
Darryl Praill: I love this. I love, love.
Benjamin Dennehy: Yeah.
Darryl Praill: And I’ve actually, I’ve shared cause I know you’ve shared that story with me before about that’s one of the questions you’ve asked, and I’ve shared that with others, and I even gave you attribution cause I’m a big advocate to say you have to invest in your own career. I’ve done it over and over and over again. I buy my own gear. I buy my own technology. I buy my own courseware because I am my own mini business. And if you sit around waiting for your employer to make you successful, you’ve already lost. So, I agree with you and I’ve said this to you folks before, I know I’m taking over the show again, I’m sorry here.
Benjamin Dennehy: There’s a surprise.
Darryl Praill: Learning is earning. You’ve gotta invest in yourself. Okay, I’ll shut up, back over to you? You’re the interviewer, interview away. Oh, by the way, I shouldn’t warn you we’re down to less than five minutes, my friend, just so you know.
Benjamin Dennehy: For those of you listening at home, those are wonderful words aren’t they? Just to hear that sound, there’s only five more minutes of having to listen to Darryl waffle on. Anyway, waffle on we shall, which by the way, isn’t that the Canadian dish, waffles?
Darryl Praill: Oh, no, that’d be more of the International House of Pancakes I think in the U.S., but we are maple syrup would be the condiment that goes on that dish?
Benjamin Dennehy: Maple syrup.
Darryl Praill: Yes.
Benjamin Dennehy: And to all the listeners, I’ll let you in on a secret. I actually do import my maple syrup from Canada. I won’t buy the stuff that’s on shelves in England.
Ghosts of futures past
Benjamin Dennehy: So, couple more questions then if you were to go back and see your little 18-year-old self, what advice would you give him?
Darryl Praill: That’s a really good question. So, I could give a couple things and this is gonna sound trite, but it is true. I’m 53 today, folks. So, you do the math.
Benjamin Dennehy: Happy birthday.
Darryl Praill: Not today, today, but as of this recording, 53, but about a month ago it was my birthday.
Benjamin Dennehy: Oh, I take that back.
Darryl Praill: So, thank you. So that would be like what, 35 years ago. I mean, I was a very different person back then and you change so much with every decade. To going back to my 18-year-old self, I would say a couple of things. I would say you have to believe in yourself cause you’re all you’ve got, that’s number one. Number two, you have to get over any pride or ego you have and ask as many questions as you want to and don’t worry about sounding stupid. Ironically, you won’t, they will respect you more. Just trust me on that one.
Darryl Praill: Number three, it took me a long time to figure this out. Trust your gut. I made this mentioned before. If you think something’s right, do it. Number four, take risks. You never will have massive success unless you take massive risks. Number five, be prepared to fail, dust yourself off, get up, and do it again. Don’t take stupid risks. They’re calculated risks. But, that means when I say calculated, it means, if you fail, this is what’s gonna happen. So, you have a plan. And number seven, it would be to surround yourself with really smart people. This is gonna sound trite, always hire people better at their skill than you are, always hire people better at your skill.
Benjamin Dennehy: I would imagine would be tough for you.
Darryl Praill: It’s just, it’s one of those things cause we are so insecure and we so doubt our own abilities, yet we’re so gifted as people you just gotta believe in yourself and that’s the honest to God truth.
Benjamin Dennehy: I mean, that was a great answer. I mean, it’s almost verbatim the post I wrote the other day, what I’d say to my 18-year-old self.
Darryl Praill: Really!
Benjamin Dennehy: No, I made that up. But, it’s good to see the look on your face.
Darryl Praill: It’s gonna be a post that’s ready tomorrow, there we go.
Benjamin Dennehy: Thank you, Darryl. We’ll end on this question then because we know where you’ve come from. We know what you’re doing. So, the question is where are you gonna be in five years? What will Darryl be doing? Who will Darryl be?
Darryl Praill: I’ll be an ink stain on the LinkedIn Chronicles. Remember that Praill guy? Wasn’t he the guy with the white hair and the beard? That was a lame beard. That beard sucked. He had those stupid glasses. Yeah, talk to me. And he hung out with that really cool cat, Benjamin Dennehey. What happened to Dennehey? Oh, he’s the Prime Minister of the U.K. now. So, that’s what’s gonna happen in five years I suspect. Either that or I will be blissfully retired and living in my trailer or my caravan, and traveling the world or I’ll be the CEO of another high-tech startup. So, I don’t have a full game plan, but I have some thoughts, but who the hell knows? You know, candidly, I’m not thinking that far ahead. And that’s an honest truth. I’m not thinking that far ahead, but I am giving myself options.
Darryl Praill: So, honest statement, when the job offer for CRO was given to me, one of my considerations was, well, if I took the CRO position that would round up my resume and therefore, if I wanted a CEO position after this gig ends for me, now I’ve got the pedigree and the experience to actually get that. So, that was a natural, honest to goodness factor in my decision of accepting the CRO position. Doesn’t mean I’ll become the CEO, but it means I now have an option to become a CEO. And that’s what you should always be doing. So, that’s my five-year game plan. If we’re here doing episode number 500 and it’s you and I again, then the game plan is out the window and I suck.
Benjamin Dennehy: Yeah. Okay. And last question then, is there anyone you wanna give a particular shout out to? Someone you just want to thank for all their support, their help, and their guidance that has enabled you to become the silver fox that you are?
Darryl Praill: This is gonna sound trite, but my wife has been with me through thick and thin, good times and bad times, richness and poorness. I can’t tell you the hell she’s gone through with me. And I don’t know why she did this.
Benjamin Dennehy: I can imagine.
Darryl Praill: She’s really funny and she’s attractive and she could have anybody she wants to. I don’t get it. So to her, I tip my hat and I thank her and she will probably listen to this and she’ll get all misty-eyed and who knows, maybe I’ll get lucky. So, there you go.
Benjamin Dennehy: Well, I think there’s one person who I think you’ve failed to mention who’s long-suffering, I mean long-suffering, and that’s Daniel.
Darryl Praill: Daniel, the Producer. I thought about mentioning him. But, then I gotta go through the whole team. Daniel, the Producer on show number 100. It’s true. He is the secret behind this. He edits out all of my bloopers. He is the man. And he, I gotta tell ya folks, how he puts up with me, I have no idea cause I’ll come in last minute. I’ll wing stuff. Like this is how it’s changed. I showed up like two minutes before this recording was supposed to start and I walked in the studio and there was a time in the early years when he would have been texting me and panicking me and calling me, are you coming? And now like, I don’t get it cause he just knows this is who I am. So, Daniel, big shout-out, could not do without him. I may be the guy in front of the camera, in front of the microphone, but Dan was the guy who actually makes this thing rock every single week.
Benjamin Dennehy: Perfect. Well then, on that note, congratulations on your 100th episode. Congratulations to all of those who’ve managed to get through this 25 minutes of listening to Darryl in overtime. And I’m sure all of us look forward to listening and hearing from you in the comments and in the re-shares of this video. Thank you.
Darryl Praill: And with that, we’re outta here. Episode number 100 is in the books folks! That’s my friend, Benjamin Dennehey, give him a follow. He is the UK’s Most Hated Sales Trainer. This is another week down of the INSIDE Inside Sales Show. You take care.