Untap Your Sales Potential

I entered Q4 sitting at 50% of plan my last year at Salesforce. 12 weeks later, I’d sold 1.1M and made Club for the 4th consecutive year, allowing me to retire from sales and coach full time. 

How did I do it? I purchased a book called “The 12 Week Year: Get More Done in 12 Weeks than Others Do in 12 months” by Brian Moran and Michael Lennington, and executed the system to the best of my ability. 

Needless to say, it worked and I’ve been running 12 week years ever since as my system for time management, planning, and execution. 

The system allowed me to grow our coaching business to 5.4M ARR in just 4 years, and make the Inc 5000 as the world’s fastest growing sales coaching company in 2025 and 2026. 

It’s been so powerful that it’s required reading in our coaching program and we even facilitate weekly accountability meetings (WAM’s) for our members to help them execute 12 week years. 

Last week, I sat down with Brian Moran, co-author of the book, who gave a Masterclass on how to properly use the 12 week year. It was a full circle moment for me, and Brian stayed afterwards for a live Q&A with the Untap community. 

Here’s what we covered during the conversation: 

-Why a 12 week execution cycle is much more effective than annual goal setting

-The importance of aligning your 12 week year to your life vision

-How to execute personal and professional goals simultaneously 

-Using the 12 Week Year to improve your marriage 

-Why tactics are so much more impactful than to-do lists

-The core components of a 12 week year 

-Why scoring and accountability are key ingredients to success

We also discussed how to design your life so that work and your personal life exist in harmony, and how to design the life of your dreams using short term and long term visions. 

Best of all, Brian agreed to share this Masterclass with the public on my Youtube channel, podcast, LinkedIn, and newsletter. 

You can access the full Masterclass here, completely free and ungated: https://youtu.be/4p0UWHIVMNI

PS - If you need help implementing the 12 week year with Brian and his team, visit 12weekyear.com/edge or e-mail [email protected] for more details.

Learn more about Untap Your Sales Potential at: https://untapyoursalespotential.com/podcast/

In her first year of coaching, Katie Pierce nearly doubled her income from $250K/year to $500K/year. But what’s most interesting is that we didn’t focus on her sales skills at all. Instead, we focused on her self-care and work habits. 

Prior to coaching, Katie was consistently hitting around 100% of quota, but doing it the hard way and burning herself out. She would put things off for most of the year, find herself at 25% of her number in Q4, then grind through late nights to barely hit quota the last month of the year. On the outside, she was one of the most joyful people you'd ever meet. On the inside, she was exhausted, and she knew something had to change. That’s when she decided to get help. 

In one of our first coaching sessions, we sat down to set her goals for the year. Katie realized she would never reach them until she dealt with something personal she had been avoiding for years. So that's where we started. She found a therapist, and between her therapist, our monthly coaching and her weekly calls with our group, she had support every step of the way.

After courageously facing her demons, we began to work on her mindset. Early in her career, a manager she looked up to told her to land right at 100% of quota so the company wouldn't raise it the next year. She had been playing small ever since and holding herself back. So we set a goal that scared her: $4 million, more than she had ever sold in a year.

Then we built the work habits to get there. She started planning tomorrow before logging off today, running her year in 12-week sprints, and starting every morning with a routine that sets her up to feel her best. 

She also started rigorously qualifying every deal upfront. Her criteria were simple: she needed to be connected to power, solving a significant business problem with substantial pain, and have confirmation that addressing the problem was a high priority for a senior executive.

She blew past her goal. In her first year in the program, Katie sold $4.2 million, finished at 275% of plan, and made almost $500K. This year she's tracking to 150% and on track for President's Club again, while planning her wedding, hiking, and making time for the hobbies she loves. The Q4 scramble is gone.

Near the end of our conversation, Katie said something I loved. Most of us wouldn't think twice about spending $25,000 on a car, but nobody tells us it's okay to spend that kind of money on ourselves. She told me that on her own, it would have taken her 20 years to double her income. She did it in just one year and saw a 10x return on her coaching investment. 

Her story is proof of something I believe deeply. Most people think they need to hit the number before they can be happy. It works the other way around. When you focus on your happiness and self-care first, the results follow.

In this week's podcast, Katie shares how she put herself first and nearly doubled her income in the process.

We discuss:

• What was really behind her cycle of coasting all year and cramming in Q4
• The goal-setting session that changed everything
• Her five-minute reset to avoid procrastinating
• The worst sales advice she ever got, and the $4M goal that replaced it
• Why every deal she works needs an executive connection
• Why facing her demons changed everything
• Her commitment to ongoing health

If you're  barely hitting your number and burning yourself out to get there, I strongly encourage you to watch this entire episode.

If there's something you've been avoiding for years and need to face, Katie’s story will inspire you.

Learn more about Untap Your Sales Potential at: https://untapyoursalespotential.com/podcast/

In this Fireside Chat episode, I sat down with Matty Pauls, an OG member of Untap Your Sales Potential and a 1:1 client who just renewed his membership for a fourth year. Matty is a top performer who has grown his average deal size to 500K+, closed record-breaking deals, and recently took a bold leap to a Series A startup while training for a marathon and showing up for his family and community in a big way.

Normally, our Member Spotlights stay inside the program. The Member Spotlight calls are designed so that highly successful clients can share their story, inspire others, and allow other UYSP members to get coaching from their top-performing peers in the program. The stories are very inspirational, and the reason why I love coaching.

After this particular conversation, I knew in my heart that others needed to hear it. In a world which often feels dark and overwhelming, this particular conversation brought light, joy, and peace to myself and many others in our community.

This conversation was so powerful that, with Matty's permission, I am releasing it to the public for the first time.

Why this conversation matters

We talked about the things that actually make success feel like success: family, gratitude, spirituality, and aligning your pursuit with what is truly important. If you chase the wrong things, you will keep chasing. Hearing that truth from a top performer who is still in the arena makes it land.

Top lessons from Matty's journey

Family first is a choice, not a slogan. Matty reshaped his career to be more present at home. He volunteers at school, serves in his community, and builds rhythms that reflect his values.

Gratitude is a skill. On hard days, Matty returns to a simple gratitude practice to reset perspective and energy.

Spirituality fuels resilience. You need a reason bigger than yourself. Faith, prayer, church, or quiet reflection can give you the courage to keep moving forward.

Imposter syndrome can be a green light. Feeling stretched often means you are in the right room. Use it as proof you are growing.

Executive selling starts with service. Get to power early. Be honest about fit. Focus on the reason behind the reason. When it is not a priority, say so.

Confidence comes from integrity. When you are good with who you are, you can let go of neediness and put the full focus on the customer.

Community changes outcomes. Coaching, brotherhood, and mentors help you remember who you are on the days you forget.

Progress beats perfection. After a setback in marathon training, Matty recommitted. He finished the run by changing the target from speed to finishing strong.

Coaching you will hear Matty give on the call:

Winning access to executives: Ask your executives to engage their peers. Ghostwrite short, direct emails. Senior leaders love to help when you make it simple.

Deal qualification: If there is no executive sponsor, it is not a real deal. Cut cycles early and redirect your energy.

Mindset hygiene: Use meditation, gratitude, and honest conversations to process negative thoughts rather than suppress them.

Career moves: Evaluate roles by impact, values alignment, and the chance to build, not just by brand name or comfort.

Serving beyond sales: Say yes to meaningful work in your community. Service expands capacity and perspective.

A few moments that hit hard:
"I am a leader of my family, my company, and myself."
"Pace is forward."
"Remember who you are."

This one will encourage anyone who is grinding yet feeling empty. It will also sharpen how you sell to power without making it about you.

Learn more about Untap Your Sales Potential at: https://untapyoursalespotential.com/podcast/

Salman Mohiuddin was once put on a PIP.

His manager asked him, “Is sales even right for you?”

He started looking at marketing and finance jobs as a backup plan. 

Instead of leaving, he looked deeply in the mirror, asked what he could do better, and committed to improving every day. 

He went on to spend 17 years as a top performing AE at IBM, Salesforce, and Asana. He closed the biggest deals of his career and finished as the top AE on his team.

And he did it without ever having a drink at a happy hour, without missing his prayers, and with his phone put away for two hours every night so he could be present with his wife and three daughters.

Today Salman is one of the best sales coaches in the world. And I’m thrilled to share he just joined our coaching team at Untap Your Sales Potential.

This episode is two top sales coaches breaking down exactly what it takes to go from average to elite seller, including:

• Why deals are won and lost in discovery, and how to get to the “why” behind the problem
• How to quantify pain using the metrics your buyer is measured on
• Why understanding the problem your clients face is much more important than understanding your product
• Where most reps lose control of their deals (right after the demo)
• How to ensure 70% of your calendar get allocated to revenue-generating activities
• Why he decided to join the Untap coaching team
• How to win in sales without compromising your faith, values, or family

People think you have to choose between success and your values. Salman and I are proof you don’t.

Learn more about Untap Your Sales Potential at: https://untapyoursalespotential.com/podcast/

A few years ago, Eric Cullen wasn't sure he should even stay in sales.

This year, at 50 years young, he's on track to earn $1M.

For most of his career, Eric made around $300K a year and hovered right around his number. Some years a little above plan, some years a little below, but he never broke through to the next level. .

I first met Eric at Salesforce eight years ago. At 47, he joined Untap Your Sales Potential and we started working together. At his first mastermind, I had everyone close their eyes and picture where they would be in 1 year. People were crying and writing in their journals. Eric saw nothing. That moment made him look inward and realize something had to change.

The next two years were the two biggest years of his career. Last year he finished at 155% of quota and made President's Club. This year he got promoted, and he's on pace for the best year of his career.

The biggest shift was why he was selling. Eric used to wake up every day thinking, "I gotta make money, I gotta make money." As he puts it, he was coin-operated, and customers picked up on that. 

Coaching got him out of that mentality. Now he shows up to make his customers the hero of their own story. He does the work to understand what executives care about most in his accounts, and brings them bold ideas nobody else is bringing. The money followed.

He transformed at home too. He used to be impatient with his family. Now he walks out of his office at five o'clock with enough energy left in the tank to throw the football with his son.

As Eric told me, without coaching he'd be in the same place he was a few years ago. Unhappy, frustrated, and probably looking for a new job.

Eric's story proves something I believe with my whole heart. When you put others first and help them succeed, the money follows.

In this week's podcast, Eric shares how he transformed his career and what it took to get there.

We discuss:

• How he let go of the "coin-operated" mindset and the impact it had with customers. 
• The moment that made him realize something had to change
• How to sell consumption instead of licenses, and the transition from Salesforce to Databricks. 
• Why he chose a hunter role instead of a farmer role. 
• How to build a CFO ready POV by understanding a company’s financials. 
• How to get to the business when you sell a technical product 
• How he's become more patient at home, and the marriage advice I shared at the end

If you're a good seller who knows there's another level in you, I strongly encourage you to watch this entire episode. Eric’s story will inspire you and give you the exact blueprint you need to succeed. 

If you've ever told yourself you're too far into your career to transform how you sell, this might be the exact story you need to hear today.

Learn more about Untap Your Sales Potential at: https://untapyoursalespotential.com/podcast/

The night after Ian Mai closed the biggest deal in his company's history, he couldn't sleep.

The deal was about 20 times the average deal size at the time. By every outside measure, it was a massive win.

But instead of celebrating, he felt more beat up and more broken than before. One question kept running through his head: how am I going to keep doing this?

He had built his entire career on pressure, stress, and anxiety. And he couldn't keep pretending he had it all together.

I think a lot of sellers experience some version of this.

When it's the end of the quarter and you're behind your number, you lock in. Pressure is the only thing that gets you moving.

But on a normal day, it's the opposite. You know exactly what to do. Call the prospect. Write the executive email. Build the proposal deck. And you sit there and can't make yourself start.

I deal with this too. Most mornings, I'll find something else to do before I start my workday. For example, right now there's a lead generation project for our business that’s one of the most strategic things we should do for our business, yet I've been putting it off for a month.

Most sellers spend two to three hours a day on RGAs (Revenue Generating Activities). If they could get that to four to six hours, it's game over. President's Club this year and every year thereafter. 

But KNOWING what to do and DOING it are two completely different things. 

That's why I wanted to host Ian Mai on our monthly Fireside Chat.

On paper, he had it all. Valedictorian. President's Club winner. Professional bodybuilder. 

Behind the scenes, he was battling overwhelm, addiction, and shame. After hitting rock bottom, he cleared $60,000 in debt, lost 60 pounds, and saved his marriage.

With a background in electrical engineering and 12 years in technical sales, Ian now helps executives, founders, and sellers understand why they struggle to do the things they know they should be doing. His approach combines neuroscience, behavioral psychology, and faith.

What I loved is that he didn't just explain the problem. He gave us practices we could use right there on the call.

What's actually happening in your brain

Ian explained that getting started takes two things: pressing the accelerator and letting go of the brakes.

The brakes come from the amygdala, your fight, flight, freeze response. It fires in under 300 milliseconds, faster than you can even notice it. That's the numb apathy you feel staring at your laptop screen. 

Why constant dopamine makes deep work harder

Quick hits of dopamine from your phone, sugar, and scrolling lower your brain's sensitivity to it. Then the parts of your brain you need to focus and follow through don't get what they need.

Because your brain is constantly in search of immediate gratification, focusing and doing work that requires thinking feels much harder than it should. 

Instead of understanding the reasons behind why we struggle to get started, I asked Ian to share and demonstrate simple techniques we can all start using immediately. 

Learn more at: https://untapyoursalespotential.com/podcast/

Last week I had my mind blown by one of our clients Ahiman Alexander, who doubled his income during his time in our program from $220K to $420K/year. 

The thing that impressed me most about Ahiman is that he found a way to apply strategic selling skills to his mid-market role at Asana, and scale this approach across 4,000 accounts!

His average deal size is just 15K, yet he will sell over 2M this year. That’s 10-12 deals per month! He set the record for the biggest deal in his division, and closed over 500K last quarter and is very close to hitting his aspiration goal of $750K this quarter.  

Before joining the program, Ahiman was in a dark place, losing his father and mother in-law in a period of 6 months. That’s when he decided to go ALL IN on the program, and applied nearly everything I teach to his sales and personal life. 

Here are the 10 things he applied which made the biggest impact: 

Mindset 

1. He found his why and connected it deeply with a daily mission statement. 

2. He shifted from an inward to outward focus. Instead of trying to sell, he focused on serving

3. Stoicism + Process thinking – he detached from the results and attached to the inputs

Habits

4. He joined a 12 week year accountability group and sold more in 12 weeks than most do in a year at his company

5. Addition by subtraction – he cut out the habits that no longer served him in his personal life

6. He set boundaries around his work hours so he could be present with his family at home

Selling Skills

7. He applied the 80/20 rule and had 80% of revenue come from 20% of his deals

8. He had rigorous prospecting discipline and made sure to complete 50 touches per day

9. Qualifying ruthlessly – every deal had to complete a PREDICT scorecard(opens in new tab)

10. He coached and educated his clients on how to buy software and controlled the process. 

Every month I run a Member spotlight, where our members get the opportunity to receive coaching from our top performing clients. This month’s member spotlight with Ahiman was so powerful that I asked if he’d be willing to share the recording with my public audience. He graciously obliged. 

If you want to change your sales and your life very quickly, check out this video and hear exactly how Ahiman transformed himself and his results in such a short period of time. 

I know you will be deeply inspired after hearing his story. I will also serve as a wake-up call to execute every day, serve your clients, and give everything you got so that you can become a person you are truly proud of and get the results you always dreamed of! 

Learn more at: https://www.untapyoursalespotential.com/podcast

Christi Civalier was crushing it in sales and making half a million a year, but something was missing. Deep inside she knew there was another level of selling she had yet to reach. 

She felt stuck in her career, and had hit a ceiling.. 

Five years ago, while I was still working at Salesforce, she started messaging me whenever I posted on LinkedIn, asking to work together. At the time I had no capacity for 1:1 coaching, and told her to stay patient until I launched my coaching business. When the first cohort of Untap Your Sales Potential opened, she was the second person to sign up. She still calls herself an OG.

We coached together for three years, which turned out to be the best years of her career. She mastered executive selling, and consistently closed large, transformational software deals. She had so much success in the program, that I asked her to coach on my team as a side hustle.

Then her clients started seeing similar results. One of her clients just closed a $34 million deal. He got there because Christi talked him into walking away from a smaller deal he had been chasing for months, which freed up his time and attention to go find a much bigger deal! She found coaching so fulfilling that she decided to quit Corporate Sales entirely this year to coach full time. 

Christi’s story is inspiring and powerful. She's 59 years young, and a single mom to two teenage daughters. She’s the breadwinner in her house, and walked away from a lucrative sales career to follow her passion and make an even bigger impact in the world. She just finished writing a book, which will be released in a few months. 

In this week's podcast, Christi shares how she reinvented herself and how she now coaches sellers to do the same.

We discuss:

• Why successful and stagnant is such a dangerous place to be 
• What she learned at Untap your Sales Potential, and how it helped her reach the next level of selling
• What the million dollar earners actually do differently with their time
• Why she left a successful sales career at 59 and started over
• The book she's writing, Identity Under Pressure, and who it's for

If you look successful on the outside and feel stagnant on the inside, I strongly encourage you to watch this entire episode.

If you have ever told yourself it's too late to become the person you know you could be, this might be the exact story you need to hear today.

Learn more at: https://www.untapyoursalespotential.com/podcast

I get asked all the time how to break into Enterprise tech sales.

Since I don't offer career coaching, I decided to interview my good friend Daniel Borodyansky, who broke into Microsoft with no sales experience.

Not only did he share his step-by-step playbook for landing his dream job, he also broke down how he hit 97% his first year at Microsoft, then used that as motivation to crush his quota the following year. 

This year, Daniel will make well over $500,000 and have his biggest year yet. He is also a father of 3, avid boxer, and launched his own company building AI sales systems for other sellers.

The craziest part? He's only 30 years old.

Here's what we covered on the latest episode of the Untap Your Sales Potential podcast:

• The exact goal-setting and journaling practice Daniel has used since he was 19
• Why the side door beats the front door when you're trying to land your dream job
• How to tell your story so your current experience counts as sales experience
• Why he spent $12,000 on coaching two weeks into his first sales role
• Missing quota his first year, and what he changed to have his biggest year afterwards
• The frameworks that reshaped how he sells: the 12 Week Year, territory planning, and thinking like a businessman instead of a seller
• The buyer-not-seller mindset he runs every call with
• How he uses AI as a thinking partner at every step of the sales cycle
  

If you want to land your dream sales job, this episode is for you.

And if you want to know how to crack $500,000 with just a few years of sales experience, this one's for you.

Learn more at: http://untapyoursalespotential.com/podcast

Nine years ago, a guy I just met at a mastermind was in the middle of a strange challenge. He was handwriting five thank you cards a day every day for a full year. This challenge eventually led to a book “The Mr. Thank You Project,” Ted Talk, and professional speaking business. 

Not long afterwards, I started my own 365-day challenge, where I posted a motivational video every day for a year on Instagram. Those videos became the foundation of my sales coaching business, which ultimately became Untap Your Sales Potential, the world’s fastest growing sales coaching company. 

So it's fair to say this company exists in part because of John Israel.

This week I finally got to sit down with John on our monthly Fireside Chat and hear his entire story. Including why he owns 205 chickens on his homestead outside Dallas, Texas. 

Here's the part about John most people don't know.

John was the #6 seller out of 10,000 reps at Cutco, where he sold gifting services for client appreciation. And in his own words, he had become the most ungrateful gratitude salesman on planet Earth.

One evening he got home ready to complain to his wife about his day, and he stopped. She was nursing their newborn with one arm and handwriting a thank you card with the other. He couldn't appreciate this beautiful moment because he was too stressed and overwhelmed. 

He has a name for that which he calls “perpetual discontentment.” That never-ending feeling that you aren’t where you’re supposed to be in life. 

If you carry a quota, you probably know the feeling. Only allowing yourself to be happy when you’re performing, and typically that happiness is short-lived when you have to start all over again next year. 

That was the catalyst. John committed to five handwritten thank you cards a day for 365 days, and that one year turned into a book, a TED talk, and a career built on a single idea: gratitude is one of the biggest, underutilized advantages in sales.

We covered a lot in this one:

• What he actually does with his 205 chickens 
• The four black-and-white rules that made him finish 365 days straight, when most of us quit a challenge by day nine
• The $1,000-a-day bet that guaranteed he never missed a single day
• The "Story, Significance, Struggle" formula for building real connections fast (it lines up almost exactly with what we teach for executive conversations)
• How to make everybody in your life feel safe, seen, significant, and supported
• How he uses strategic gifting to turn expensive, hard-to-reach executives into lifelong customers 
• The quickest way to get yourself to prospect every single day

If you've been grinding hard and still can't enjoy the results, this episode is for you. 

Learn more at: http://untapyoursalespotential.com/podcast