0:04

Uh,

0:06

what's up human. Welcome to the revenue real

0:09

hotline. I'm Amy. more

0:14

importantly, I'm excited. You decided

0:16

to do. Today. I know you've got a

0:18

ton of options and I appreciate you.

0:22

This is a show about all the hard

0:24

and uncomfortable conversations that arise

0:26

while generating revenue and how to

0:28

think or rethink what

0:30

you're doing, why you're doing it. And

0:33

then of course, How to execute differently.

0:35

And like I said, I'm happy you decided

0:37

to come along for the ride. Don't forget

0:39

to follow the show wherever you listen. So you can be

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And do me a favor friend. Don't tell anybody

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about the shell. Let's keep it our little secret.

0:49

I'm Amy Rahab check. This is the revenue

0:51

real hotline. Enjoy the

0:58

lady. Welcome to the revenue

1:00

rail hotline friend. I

1:02

am honored that you have,

1:04

have made time for us today for

1:07

your honor. I'm so happy to be here. Thank

1:09

you. Welcome.

1:11

Welcome, welcome. All right. So Kate, why don't you tell

1:13

our listeners a little bit about who you are and

1:15

what you do every day, and then we'll

1:17

dive. We'll take it from there.

1:19

My name is Kate lady and I

1:21

am the CEO of strive Lee

1:23

and I prepare people who are coming

1:25

out of the U S prison system for

1:27

careers in tech sales.

1:30

That was a pretty concise,

1:32

you can count on me for brevity.

1:38

I mean, I just, I respect it so much. I want

1:40

to say that again for listeners, for anybody. Kate's

1:43

mission. She works with people coming out

1:45

of the prison, U S prison system to help

1:47

re-skill them. And I would imagine

1:49

breathing a great deal of belief into them

1:51

and treating them like human beings that are not

1:53

lost forever and giving them

1:56

some hope and a brighter path and to

1:58

not just a pretty baller

2:00

profession, but a high earning profession.

2:03

As well. And so Kate, on the off chance,

2:05

you haven't heard this yet today. Thank

2:07

you for doing what you do. Thank you for being

2:09

the only person that I know. And

2:12

I know a lot of people that's doing anything like this,

2:14

and I think it's fucking awesome. I think it's awesome.

2:17

It's an honor. And a privilege

2:19

RA. So, how

2:21

did this passion for

2:24

incarcerated humans? Like

2:26

I'm, I'm remembering a stat that you said, or that

2:28

we talked about once, but 75%

2:31

of people that are coming out of the prison system

2:33

return return.

2:36

75%.

2:37

That's insane.

2:38

What a waste. And so it's

2:40

like looking for housing, it's a problem.

2:43

Looking for jobs. It's a problem.

2:45

I mean, and even I think about like the, the

2:48

Ray of hope, what was it Florida last year

2:50

that voted to make, um,

2:52

a felony conviction, not bar

2:54

someone from being able to vote, which

2:56

was then, oh, so again, not even being

2:58

allowed to vote, but that was overturned

3:00

by the public, but then the governor like human. W

3:03

whatever it's too disruptive to the,

3:05

the voting blocks. Um, so that's a

3:07

different story, but anyway, I think it's awesome.

3:09

How did this become a passion for you? Elsa

3:12

story friend. Yeah, I,

3:14

I grew up in tech. Um, I,

3:17

I joined my first startup in

3:19

2004 and

3:22

had the opportunity to go from, you

3:24

know, little tiny startup all the way

3:26

through IPO with Rackspace. Um,

3:29

and then I went on to, um,

3:33

Six more startups. Okay.

3:35

Um, and then by the time it was, you

3:37

know, 2018, I was on my seven.

3:40

I was exhausted. I was completely

3:42

burned out. I could not find

3:45

joy in my job at all. I

3:47

didn't want to show up. I wasn't really

3:49

showing up. But I

3:51

had a friend, my best friend shout out

3:53

to IVU Vinson who said. Why

3:56

don't you go be of service to someone and see if

3:58

that helped you to have the opportunity

4:01

to go to Solidad, which

4:03

is a state prison, um, here in California,

4:05

in the valley and volunteer

4:08

with Hartnell college to teach employment

4:10

skills. So how to write a resume,

4:13

how to present yourself in an interview.

4:16

I'd never been to prison. I didn't know

4:18

anyone in prison. I had no idea what to

4:20

expect. And I went in

4:22

that day and beat guys completely

4:25

blew me away. I just, um,

4:27

immediately saw a room full of talent,

4:29

people who are naturally

4:31

curious, who are ambitious, who,

4:34

who asked really great questions.

4:36

And I thought these guys would make fantastic

4:38

salespeople. They would make

4:40

great tech, sales people, someone should

4:43

start a nonprofit. Not

4:45

being me, of course. Um,

4:49

and you know, being a single mom, I'm a mom

4:51

of two, three young

4:54

kids, two young kids and

4:56

one grown kid. And so

4:58

starting a nonprofit, it's not really

5:00

make a ton of sentence, but 2020

5:03

happened and you know, the world came

5:05

screeching to a halt. My

5:08

company immediately, you might not have. Uh,

5:10

my kids when I moved in with my parents,

5:13

um, so that we could do distance learning and

5:15

they could help me and just get through the

5:17

pandemic and in

5:19

a little bedroom, in my parents' house,

5:21

I just started building the program. And

5:24

in November of 2020, we put

5:26

our first group of five women through

5:29

it completely changed my life in every

5:31

single way and the best way.

5:33

Wow. So many things that he has

5:35

had there. I just started putting programs together. I

5:37

just want to write that down. Okay. So. Have

5:39

you ever read conversations with God? Have

5:41

you ever read this book? I know the book,

5:43

but I don't think I've read it. And if I did, I forgot.

5:47

This is like never a book that I would have

5:49

picked up. Okay. So I was raised in a fundamentalist

5:51

Christian household. The only role in high school

5:54

was if you're not in church on Sunday, like you can't go

5:56

out the following Saturday. I did everything

5:58

in my power to try to like bend

6:00

my father as well on this one, nothing

6:02

worked. I speak about this on the other episodes

6:04

of whatever. It's not. But when I turned

6:06

18, I wanted nothing to do with it. Right.

6:08

So I would have never picked up this book, but

6:11

I did one of the, like

6:13

Ryan holiday does these challenges

6:15

and he does this read to lead challenge and it changed

6:18

my life. But one of the challenges that day

6:20

was like, go talk

6:22

to somebody that you respect and trust and

6:24

ask them for the book that changed their life. And

6:26

then when. And so I was working

6:29

with a professional coach at that moment.

6:31

Um, her name was Laura, and so then she sent

6:33

me to conversations with God and I

6:35

was like, God damn it. Like I gotta, now

6:37

I gotta read this. Anyway.

6:40

It was. Life altering.

6:42

And that long diatribe was all to say

6:45

that there's a line in there and it talks

6:48

about remembering. And so think of

6:50

the word, remember, and imagine a hyphen

6:52

in between Ray and member.

6:54

And so this kind of plays on your girlfriend's advice that

6:56

she gave you your friend's advice. They're like go be of service

6:58

to others and see if that helps you like part

7:01

of our experience on this plan.

7:03

It is to remember. That

7:05

we're here for each other. And the

7:07

challenge though, is that in order to make

7:09

that sustainable, right, we need to

7:11

take care of ourselves first, which it's, it's

7:14

very counterintuitive, right? It's like that, you

7:16

know, put your own oxygen mask on or fill

7:18

up your own damn. I have no use

7:20

to anyone. I thought that that was beautiful.

7:23

And I like, I almost want to like, be friends

7:25

with your friend. Like if I could have somebody in my

7:27

ear like that to remind me of that kind of stuff.

7:30

And also just on that note at the

7:32

theme time I was reading, how can I

7:34

help by Ram Doss? So

7:37

it all perfect storm.

7:39

Yeah. And I love it. I just started putting

7:41

it together as you started creating first and

7:43

then like great things come through. Okay. But before we

7:46

go into the Australian, I

7:48

want to talk about this seventh organization

7:50

and being burned out.

7:53

Okay.

7:54

Let's do it. I I'm trying,

7:56

I don't want to put my own like biases

7:58

onto the conversation, but I don't know if

8:00

we've ever spoken about like my, my red

8:03

pill, blue pill analogy when it comes

8:05

to culture, right. When you've worked at a great

8:07

place, it's like you've taken the

8:09

red pill and you can never unlearn

8:12

what that feels like yet. And

8:14

it makes the. Places

8:17

that are not like that, which is about 80%

8:19

of them boy, way fucking harder, way

8:22

harder.

8:22

I mean, Rackspace to me was like,

8:25

it was the greatest job I think I'll ever have.

8:27

And then it's like being in love

8:29

with someone who's super great. And then you guys break

8:32

up and you have to go. Other

8:34

people and you're like, well, no one will ever be as

8:36

good. I stopped person. So every

8:39

company I went to, I was looking for,

8:42

I was looking for a Rackspace and I couldn't,

8:44

I couldn't find it. Um,

8:46

I, I, I, I can relate

8:48

to that. And this is why Ryan Walsh

8:50

and rep you, um, was episode

8:52

number one, right? Because that's the history

8:55

of the Lord's work as far as I'm concerned. And

8:57

so we're going to start with that, but I think a lot of people

8:59

can relate to. Let's talk about though,

9:01

this what happens after. So Rackspace

9:03

was what number was at in the seven

9:06

one

9:11

number one. Okay.

9:14

Okay.

9:19

Um, what did it feel like? Let's say

9:21

on. Attempt number five

9:24

or attempt number six. Talk to me about

9:26

the self-doubt that starts to creep in at that

9:28

point, or like, sort of just where was your head at

9:31

it?

9:31

It's not even like, I don't even think that's the right.

9:33

Okay. Well tell me what it was. I mean, it's

9:35

self doubt. It's like impending doom.

9:38

Like I knew in my heart

9:40

of hearts, I was not, I couldn't

9:42

do it anymore. I was never going to. I

9:45

was never going to be good at it, but

9:47

also if you don't have some, like, if you don't know

9:49

what you can or want

9:52

to do, then it's

9:54

very problematic. I

9:56

had no idea. I didn't know what

9:58

I wanted to do. I didn't know what

10:00

I was good at anymore.

10:02

Yeah. So listeners, if anybody can relate

10:04

to that, one of the things that I found

10:06

to work very well in moments like that is

10:08

to think about what I don't want

10:11

to do first. And

10:13

kind of work my way into it

10:15

from that. I also speak about, um,

10:17

finding sales enablement and kind of going through my resume

10:20

and like looking at all the bullets on the resume

10:22

and forcing myself to put them into three categories,

10:25

loved it, hated it in different. And

10:27

that, that helped me to kind of

10:29

get a little bit closer. Um,

10:32

but like Kate, like where you, like, where

10:34

you hitting her number, like where, where was

10:36

the doom feelings of doom coming from? Was it

10:38

about like I'm a, I'm on a PIP and I'm going to

10:40

be fired again? I've

10:41

been on a PIP, definitely

10:44

messing up. They couldn't care. I just

10:46

couldn't care. I didn't care.

10:48

You may lists, I went

10:50

to the. Trail and I walked

10:53

and cried. That's

10:55

what I would just walk and cry and I would listen

10:57

to podcasts about whatever.

11:00

I don't know, just trying to get inspiration.

11:04

So you just started creating the program. I like, I

11:06

think that that's so baller. All right. So let's

11:08

go back to struggling. So walk us through, like, what happened

11:11

when you created the program? Like, how

11:13

does one even does, do you go and knock

11:15

on a prison door and say like,

11:17

Hey, like I want to, you know, like how do

11:19

you even start to form those relationships? And then

11:22

I'm very curious to hear about

11:24

what the conversations are like with sales

11:26

bosses or sales leaders. Um,

11:29

Who could potentially be pulling from this candidate

11:32

pool. So like, just walk me through the process and then

11:34

we'll go to the, like, how is the market

11:36

received this?

11:37

I honestly, I had, I

11:39

didn't have a ton of faith that it would

11:41

be received. Um,

11:44

but I have, I had a mentor,

11:46

Kathleen Nielsen, who has

11:48

a ton of experience building businesses and I'm

11:51

experienced in nonprofits. And I told

11:53

her my idea and she was like, I love

11:55

it. Let's just start playing. So

11:57

we started pleading and I, I didn't have

11:59

a lot of faith, but I dunno

12:02

it looking back, it's a card to even,

12:05

it feels like a blur. It's hard to

12:08

say exactly how it all happened.

12:10

It's like it just unfolded and every

12:13

single step I've taken in building this program,

12:15

um, it's like the path is

12:17

just like, oh, like just being created

12:20

in front of me. And I am just taking steps

12:22

and it's just. Happening just going.

12:25

Um, and so the first

12:27

group that came to our program, wonderful

12:30

five women. Um, and

12:32

they trusted me to guide

12:35

them. And I will tell

12:37

you, I'll still tell you a story of one

12:39

of them. She's on our board. Margaret Maloney.

12:42

Okay. And, um, when I met her,

12:44

she had experience, um,

12:47

she had experienced, uh,

12:49

she just didn't know what to do with it. Um,

12:52

she really wanted to be in tech, really

12:55

wanted to be in tech. And I was like, I think

12:57

I can help you. And so she came through

12:59

the program and she was the hardest

13:02

working person I had ever met

13:04

in my entire life. I've never seen

13:06

her tire and I pushed her

13:09

really hard. Like I do everyone,

13:12

um, because I want everyone to be the best

13:14

when they leave our program. I

13:17

didn't have any hiring partners. No

13:19

one really knew what I was doing. I'm going to meet a

13:21

few announcements, but I was

13:23

like just doing my, my research.

13:25

Okay. Well, who do you want to work for? And

13:28

we kind of zeroed in on gone. We

13:30

didn't have any connections there. So we just went

13:32

in the old fashioned way, like send

13:35

your resume. And then we did a cover letter

13:37

with a video that she recorded 47,000

13:40

times almost to the point where

13:42

I, like I thought in center breaker,

13:45

but she just never. Okay,

13:47

but okay. And so every

13:49

interview she went through, we

13:51

spent so much time preparing

13:54

and coaching and growing is

13:56

a very difficult interview

13:58

process. They don't it's

14:01

a lot. Um, and so

14:03

when she finally got the offer, she

14:05

called me on the phone. It'd be, I was

14:08

crying. She was crying. We were so excited. But

14:10

then we were like, okay, now we

14:12

have to get through the background part of

14:14

it because no one knows.

14:16

You're having to disclose it yet, or you have a chosen

14:18

to wait until, right. Okay. That makes sense.

14:21

It were a fair shot, but then, you know, when it's time

14:23

to disclose and you disclose because

14:25

we want to be transparent and it's just

14:27

a better way to be. And I will give

14:29

credit to gong. They gave, you know, they gave

14:31

her every opportunity and she

14:34

had the ability to explain herself. They hired

14:36

her. She actually moved

14:38

out from Arizona. She moved

14:40

down the street from me because she doesn't know

14:42

anybody in the bay area with her daughter and

14:45

her daughter and my son go to school together.

14:48

No, they're both at the same school on the season

14:50

break at a sleep over last

14:52

weekend. They're very good friends,

14:55

but more importantly, Margaret's

14:57

got hired as an STR. She got promoted

14:59

to senior SDR and then this

15:02

month she got promoted to AAE

15:04

and she's already. Closed two

15:06

deals.

15:07

Congratulations, Margaret. That is awesome.

15:10

And now she's

15:10

looking a board of directors

15:13

and, obviously Shannon, one of

15:15

many examples of why this makes

15:17

sense. Okay. So. I

15:20

know I've thanked you a bunch of times, but I'm going to say, I'm going to say it

15:22

again. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. But now

15:24

let's talk about how this conversation is

15:26

received. When you go talk to some sales

15:28

bosses or sales leaders that are

15:31

looking at participating

15:34

in the changes on

15:36

the diversity and exclusion front,

15:38

which is now what I call it. What, what are those conversations

15:40

like Kate? Like for real, the good ones,

15:43

the bad. What? Like, where, how is this being

15:45

received? What's working. What's not shockingly.

15:49

I would say like 95,

15:52

90 8%

15:54

of conversations are like, okay, great.

15:57

Let's get him fired. Really.

15:59

There are some times that

16:01

it, HR of course is like, well,

16:04

what kind of backgrounds are we talking about?

16:06

Like the most part they want

16:08

to hire from us. It's

16:11

shocking to me because I honestly didn't

16:13

know how it was going to be received, but I'm

16:15

actually, um, I'm kind of proud

16:18

of the tenant community for

16:20

that.

16:27

that wraps another installment of the revenue

16:29

real hotline. I'd like to thank my

16:31

guest for being so damn real

16:34

and for sharing their insights and

16:36

for, of course, being so much. And

16:38

I'd like to thank you to listeners. It

16:40

means the world. And I appreciate you.

16:43

If you have any thoughts or comments or

16:45

experiences, you feel inclined to share

16:47

head straight over to revenue, rail.com.

16:50

There's a new join. The conversation feature

16:52

on the right side of the page. I am all damn

16:54

ears. Final thought. We are introducing

16:57

a coaching aspect to this. So

16:59

anyone who's brave enough to dig into

17:01

an account strategy or outbound

17:04

strategy set. That's where we

17:06

kick things off. Please do follow

17:08

the show wherever you listen to your podcasts.

17:10

So you'll always have the latest episode. Download

17:13

it. If you want to contact me, I'm at Amy

17:15

at revenue. real.com. If

17:17

you want to follow me on social Twitter

17:19

is Amy underscore Rahab check,

17:22

and LinkedIn is linkedin.com. Backslash

17:24

Amy rev. This episode

17:26

was produced by the fabulous Nian

17:28

Fiedler Iraq man. And

17:30

I appreciate you too friend. And of

17:32

course, whatever you do, don't

17:35

tell anybody about the show. Let's

17:37

keep it at our little secret until next

17:39

time. All I'm Amy. This

17:41

is the revenue real hotline, happy selling.