Steve Martorano 
The Behavioral Corner is produced in partnership with Retreat Behavioral Health -- where healing happens

The Behavioral Corner 
Hi, and welcome. I'm Steve Martorano. And this is the Behavioral Corner; you're invited to hang with us, as we've discussed the ways we live today, the choices we make, the things we do, and how they affect our health and wellbeing. So you're on the corner, the Behavioral Corner, please hang around a while.

Steve Martorano 
Okay, everybody, welcome again to the Behavioral Corner. Today, I'm hanging in here all the time. Steve Martorano. I hope you are as well. What happens here on the Behavioral Corner is that we are fortunate to run into all kinds of people that we get to talk about the issues that intrigued us here. That quite simply is everything. Because it is everything that ultimately affects our behavioral health. It's a big topic. It's all, of course, underwritten by our great partners Retreat Behavioral Health, about which more you'll hear later. So sit back here, hang with us on the Corner. We got a good one -- one that I think affects a lot of people. And it's we're going back to work. We're going to take a look at the world of work, which makes up so much a part of our lives, and how it is now been impacted as everything else has by the pandemic. So what do you want to find out about work, you go find a worker, you find somebody who understands a little bit about what's going on. In that regard, we were turned on to a fellow who's going to make a great guest and make a great contributor to this topic. Ken Boggis is a vice president, he's vice president of digital sales for a company called Hibu. He has almost 25 years experience, he's been a salesman, he's trained salesman, he's led sales teams, and he's come through this pandemic with the rest of us. So we're gonna find out what the new Willy Lomans look like, here on the Behavioral Corner this time. Ken, thanks for joining us.

Ken Boggis 
Absolutely. Happy to be here, Steve. Thank you.

Steve Martorano 
Can you tell people what Hibu is?

Ken Boggis 
Hibu is a digital marketing agency. We work with small, medium-sized business owners across the country. (We're a) large businesses and you know, we essentially help them compete online for the products and services that they're looking to work with, you know, their local communities. (We've been in) business for a long time and I've built great strong relationships, you know, across the country. 

Steve Martorano 
I'm so grateful that somebody with your expertise here because I've been fascinated by salesmen, in broadcasting, certainly, you know, salespeople are, are no stranger to us, even...even those of us who were never on that side of the building. I always had a bit of two minds. And I've seen good salespeople, I've seen bad salespeople. But I've always been of the mind that and we're gonna get to the meat of this. But I wanted to throw this out. I've been of two minds about salespeople. And give me your impression on this. Are salespeople born or are they made?

Ken Boggis 
I think probably a little bit of both. It's a rare breed, you know, those that get into sales and those that have the ability to, you know, establish a long career. That longevity doesn't happen for everybody. And you have to put yourself in an environment where you're constantly learning. Right? Salespeople have a unique -- there's a unique skill set that you need to bring to the table. You know, it's that...that mindset and that ability to handle rejection, that's something that the human mind is not accustomed to. That's not something that people run toward. Right? That they embrace, right? You know, the human brain and heart do the exact opposite, right? When you...that fear of rejection, there's always that that drive to be wanted to be needed salespeople for both, that's just not the case. So it's your ability to have an appetite for that, to understand, you know what that means in the long run. And really, the ability to put yourself in the position of your clients. Right? There's kind of an old saying, "If you help enough people get what they want, you'll get what you want." And if you keep that in your core, and you're truly genuine in your approach, that you have a product, a service, a consultative approach that can help people, you know, reach their dreams and their goals, then you'll be very successful. It's also again, building up that...that threshold to be able to do it. Day in and day out. And remove that monotony from it that I think comes along for a lot of folks.

Steve Martorano 
You know, I alluded to the archetype of Willy Loman from the...from Miller's play a Death of a Salesman, as a sort of archetype of that, you know, the guy with the suitcase who goes door to door and town to town. That's a very unsophisticated way of looking at salespeople. I also believe and I want to hear your opinions on this, but we're all salesmen. Everybody is a salesman when you're eight year old is trying to get something that they think they absolutely have to. They're selling. They're selling. We're all selling. So I guess in a sense, this topic about sales and work affects us all one way or another. Let's talk specifically about the nuts and bolts. Let's get into the weeds of what happened to people who sell during the pandemic. What was the impact on the business? Clients? What was the impact on salespeople?

Ken Boggis 
Well, you know, I think the experiences vary greatly right across the sales industry. For us, the impact was massive. That disruption hit so quickly and so profoundly that it changed our business overnight. Right? Like a lot of people, everything stopped. In our business, we are forward-facing, we meet with our clients on a regular basis, we are face to face, belly to belly if you will. And overnight that was taken away from us and our clients. And that's a tough spot to be, right? When you really don't see it coming and how do you deal with that, and you know, everything was new. And I think for a lot of people, it's the fear of the unknown, right, and the fear of the unknown drives anxiety. And, you know, all of a sudden, for us in our business, we went from a very interactive environment to you know, all of a sudden, we're kind of on our own. Right? And it forced us, to slow down and really look inward about our process, and it really about our future, and we had to figure it out. There was really no time to waste. I think, like a lot of businesses, I mean, it hit quickly. It hit hard and its material impact, and you had to pivot to figure out, you know, how you're gonna survive this? How will you survive? How will you thrive, you know, going forward?

Steve Martorano 
Yeah, books will be written, they already have begun about what this moment in time did. And we still don't know what the long-term changes will be. I think in your field, the recent profound changes going forward?

Ken Boggis 
No doubt. They've already happened. 

Steve Martorano 
Absolutely. That moment, which is obviously unprecedented. When in a consumer culture, like ours, we were told to stand down. That's different than somebody giving you marching orders, okay, there's a crisis, do this, or we're going to do that that came later, what first game was STOP. And when...and I think that was one of the great challenges for people in your business. What were some of the others -- I'm thinking fear must have been the first challenge you had to overcome. What were some of the immediate challenges of that moment?

Ken Boggis 
I think, again, it goes back to the immediacy of this disruption, right, we've been through these things before. I, you know, I think back to the financial crisis of 2007 / 2008, something that I was impacted with during my career, but we saw that coming. It was a little bit more drawn out, you had more time to anticipate. The immediacy of this disruption was scary, right into your point, everything just stopped. And that's, that's not...that doesn't line up well, with our business model for our clients. And for us, you know, the clients we work with, they were impacted differently. Right? You know some were severely impacted. They were, you know, considered non-essential businesses that, you know, the lights were turned off the next day. Others, you know, fell somewhere in the middle, and others bleed or not had the high-class problem of being more on-demand, because of this type of product or service that now was really needed, based on that environmental change. So we really had to adapt to all of those needs and be able to show a kind of vision, empathy for our clients and ourselves. And we didn't have a whole lot of time to...to think about, he had to figure it out and you had to pivot quickly. And I believe there were two things that impacted the business world. One was, how are you going to pivot in change, personally, right, because your habits had to change you were forced to change. And then also, how would you apply those from a business perspective, right, because they're two different things, but they're uniquely connected. And that, again, that time of looking inward, you mentioned, you know, our friend, the salesman Willie and that was his downfall. Was it not? And that he never looked inward. He never took responsibility, you know, for his actions. And I think that's a hard thing to do, especially when we're moving really fast. You know, prior to the disruption, you know, for most business life, if you're hard-charging, you're moving fast. You don't have a lot of time sometimes, to think about what you're doing the actions that are taking place. When you are forced to slow down, you look inward. I know personally, you know, my day changed dramatically. I went from an environment where I traveled a lot. I was interacting with clients, I was interacting with coworkers on a daily basis. And it was just a lot of energy that came along with that positive and negative, but it's what I fed off of. And then that changed overnight. And all of a sudden I was in my cave, I was in my home office.

Steve Martorano 
Let's...yeah, I want to get into some of that impact straight ahead. But it's the person that I want to take a moment. Adaptation, you know, or die, of course, nobody knows that better than salespeople. (You) can't sit around and, you know, take forever trying to figure it out. You have to adapt. There's an emotional toll on that. You mentioned Willy Loman. Again, Willie, as you point out correctly, he lived in a fantasy world that obscured the real stuff that was going on at the end of his career, what it all meant, but he had this rich fantasy life and when it collapsed, so did he. This is a similar situation, you think, you know, the way the world works? Do you think you know what your role in it is? Suddenly, it changes. Now, you mentioned two ways, the personal and then in the business sense. What was your experience? And what were your colleagues telling you about the emotional adaptations they had to make? Because it wasn't just business? There were emotions involved? Can you share some of your thoughts about that?

Ken Boggis 
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think listen, to be successful in work, right, you have a routine, for me is everything. Right? Routine is your friend, you have to embrace that. You have to be pretty...pretty measured about your approach to routine. And that was something that came, I think, a lot easier for people before the disruption, because your schedule helped kind of dictate what that pace looks like -- what your routine looks like. COVID changed that worlds collided, right? Worlds collide, you know, the living room, became the home office, or the basement became the home office, parents and children colliding. And it's a lot of disruption, it caused a lot of stress. So for me, I think initially, I realized that I recognize it, I was cognizant of it immediately, that this -- this doesn't feel right for me, right? This doesn't feel right, I was almost losing a little bit of my normal daily motivation, you know, what do I do next? You know, my process was off. And I understood that and, you know, I focused on the things that have always served me well, which are the basics like, right was, you know, my sleep, diet, exercise, how I presented myself every day. We're all guilty of it. All we all probably woke up quite a few mornings in 2020 and made a decision not to shower. Made a decision to put on sweatpants instead of dress slacks, right? And I'm a big believer that..that that carries over into your performance in your mindset going forward. So I really, you know, made sure to embrace that to make sure I still had a routine that allowed me to kind of get into that mindset that I know I needed to bring forward to my people right within my business and my clients and make sure I could be the best version of myself.

Steve Martorano 
And in addition to that, in terms of like the people, you've advisor, the people you work with this routine, this going back to your strengths to, you know, to first principles to best practices, that also has got to help lower again, the personal anxiety and stress, because businesses were going under, I mean, people's jobs were, you know, being shattered about this thing, which can lead to all kinds of, you know, unfortunate behaviors to manage that. How do you manage stress, you're in a stressful business? Selling is a tough, tough gig.

Ken Boggis 
Yeah, I think the first piece is understanding that stress and anxiety is normal, right? We all have it, it's always there. It's just a matter of of how it manifests and how you react to it. I think you got to let go of control. I think for a lot of people, a lot of salespeople...

Steve Martorano 
They let go of control?

Ken Boggis 
Let go of control a bit, don't obsess over the things that you have no control over which were an abundance in 2020 is as the disruption hit, and, you know, focus on the variables you can control. And for me, for myself, for my family, for my direct team, we spoke very openly about that. I think it was very important in those moments, I think it's always important to be vulnerable, right to be vulnerable at that moment to recognize that this is okay, I get it. This is what I'm feeling. I can't control all these external variables. But let's focus and prioritize the things that we can impact, right? How do we help our clients? How do we help ourselves? It really always boils down to connections? Right? It's those emotional connections, I think that is at the root of everything we do. And I think, you know, understanding that--understand that you know, the human brain is only capable of so much, there's only so much capacity in any given day in you can't, you know, try to boil the ocean every day, you just can't do it, you can't do it. So let's prioritize what matters, what those metrics are, that we think are the most important for our own personal health, and the health of our business. And if we do that, and we do it day in and day out, you know, we're gonna be pretty successful. And we're gonna, we'll get through this. I think that was an important piece of constantly driving that message home that this is a moment in time this too will pass. And, you know, if we apply ourselves the right way, we'll be better versions of ourselves on the other side.

Steve Martorano 
I was gonna ask you that Next year in terms of coming out the other side of this thing, do you think that ironically, this is an opportunity for people to be better at their jobs to get sharper at what they do? Learn how to manage stress? In other words, this disaster -- were there opportunities in it?

Ken Boggis 
There's no doubt. Listen, disruptions and the challenges that come along with it are excellent opportunities for growth. If you apply yourself the right way. Right? If you recognize them. You address them. And most importantly, you bring them forward, right, you learn from so there's no doubt about it. And we spoke about that. We spoke about that. You know, from a business perspective, we had to really, you know, put ourselves in the shoes of our clients and understand the stress that they were going through and understand, you know, where they were at. And how could we improve our sales process? You know, we believe, you know, here we are, here's it, we're on a Zoom call now. Zoom has become an everyday part of business for us and everybody else out there. But Zoom fatigue, in just this virtual world, is a real thing. 

Steve Martorano 
Yeah. 

Ken Boggis 
How do we change that for our clients? How can we streamline our process? How could we, you know, not overwhelm the client? You know, be able to still present value. Hear them. Understand what they're trying to accomplish. You know, make a smart, responsible recommendation, and do it in less time, understanding that they're under a lot of stress, they're under a lot of anxiety, you know. How do we meet the kind of midway? And we spent a lot of time working through, you know, those conversations to make sure, you know, we could also bring the anxiety levels of our clients down, which we knew that they appreciated, and they would reciprocate as well.

Steve Martorano 
Yeah, too often people think of the sales moment, client -- salesperson, as sort of adversarial, I want to convince you of something you may be resistant to, this was a different kind of dynamic. Everyone's sort of in the same boat, it's interesting to hear you say that your people and you talked about look there is anxious as we are. Let's not overlook that, maybe we can talk them down a little bit. And in doing so we can manage our stress. You know, we're talking about the pandemic effect, because it's the most obvious example. But we're similarly in the world of business at work going through a moment now, which is very scary for many of your clients, I'm sure, and all of us. And that's for the first time in who knows, 20 years, 25 years, 30 years -- inflation has reared its ugly head -- and nobody hates anything more than the price of gasoline going up every 30 seconds and bread and everything else. Which is stressful across the board. How do you guys prepare yourself to do your job while managing that reality?

Ken Boggis 
It goes back to one of our core principles. I mean, when we interact with a potential client, we look to bring somebody on, we talked about in terms of clients for life, and for me for my 20 plus years in this business, your consistency, your ability to set proper expectations, your ability to listen to your clients, and truly understand what they're trying to accomplish, and help them meet that that's, that's what will serve you very well in long term. So what we did find during COVID, during this disruption these last two years, is that you know, we used to rely more on a face-to-face opportunity to connect and that's a great environment to build trust in. That changed. That changed overnight. And we realized that we had to incorporate more touchpoints, more opportunities to connect with our clients, stay in touch with them, make sure we understand what they're going through that cadence had to kinda have to improve it from a frequency standpoint. You know, so whether it's a COVID disruption, whether it's, you know, a new election in the country, whether it's inflation, it doesn't really matter what the disruption is, if you're in constant contact with your client, you understand their needs, you understand what their roadmap looks like, and how to help get them there. You can get through to the other side on any of that, so it's real. But again, you don't hide from it. You have very transparent open conversations, with your clients and we're always talking 369 months down the road, where do you want to be from there? What are the challenges and how do we get faster?

Steve Martorano 
I guest is Ken Boggis. He's the vice president of digital sales with the company Hibu we struggled to us work in the new world that we're living in now. The stresses associated with the emotional toll this can take. Before I ask you what you would have done differently because you've explained pretty accurately what you...what you did do. What's been the impact on your family and your colleague's family through all this disruption? You know, the oldest thing in the world is "Don't bring work home. Oh, don't bring your work home and ruin your family." Well, guess what? Everybody brought their work home. How did you guys deal with it?

Ken Boggis 
Listen, it wasn't easy. I think early on for me for a lot of my colleagues and we spoke about this openly, it was a challenge. It was a challenge. As I mentioned earlier, those worlds were colliding, I felt that stress, I think I projected that stress onto my family at times. You know, the irony of this situation is, you know, the world changed, but you are always on in this virtual world working from home, all of a sudden, you had to be very careful of, you know, those worlds interfering with each other. And I personally found that I was overreaching from a work standpoint, right? It was really starting to drive into my personal life and impact that life, I was kind of cheating on that, on that side of it, it wasn't giving my family, my time. Some of those I mentioned those routines, you know, things before my sleep, exercise, diet. I was pulling from there because work was there was a, it was a constant pull. I think it's something you need to be, you need to really find that balance. You have to learn how to shut it down. And that's not easy. 

Steve Martorano 
No.

Ken Boggis 
Because ironically, the very thing we talk about from a business standpoint, right, we have the attention of consumers today. We all spend way too much time on these devices but they can draw you in, you know, pretty quickly. So, you know, we talk a lot about, you know, scheduling your values. From a personal standpoint, you know, the things that are paramount, the things that are really important to you, whether that be, you know, spending time with your family. Maybe you enjoy cooking with your family. Maybe you're involved with your kids and coaching, that's something I'm very passionate about. Maybe it's your exercise, -- things that you know, you have to be able to be involved in and long term success and mental stability, you have to schedule those into your calendar, and then you have to build everything else around that otherwise, they simply won't happen. So it's a balancing act. It's never perfect. It's something that, you know, I still look at a daily basis to try to measure out and see if I'm hitting the mark, I think some days I am and other days, you know, I probably come up a little bit short. But we're more aware of it. We're aware of it.

Steve Martorano 
Yeah, you have young children too, which add to the kind of stresses that go on, I can certainly understand what you mean about just because you're home and can work from home doesn't mean you should always be at home working. There's your life as well. So this notion of now looking back over the arc of the past couple of years, is there anything you would have done differently during that period? To make it less stressful? Less, less of an emotional toll?

Ken Boggis 
Probably would have reacted quickly and just two ways to answer that. Right. I think it took a while for us. We all froze for a moment, right? And then we had to kind of pick ourselves up and figure out how we were going to move forward. I probably would have reacted a little bit quicker. Some of these things, you know, you mentioned how do you deal with the stress. You know, find time to connect. Finding time to connect. Early on, I focused on my work, I threw myself in headfirst. And before I knew it, it was a little bit of a lonely existence, right. But it would be for the disruption. I had the ability due to due to travel, and just you know, windshield time in and out of airports. I make it a point to contact friends, family members and have these conversations kind of on the fly. And I didn't realize it that was removed that was gone. So again, that kind of goes back to scheduling your values and you know, taking care of your village. Identify first of all, who's your village. Your work family, right, that network. I'm actually tighter Now Steve, with people two years into this pandemic than I was before. Because I've scheduled that time. I make certain specific times during my week I dedicate to making a phone call to somebody...

Steve Martorano 
I'm the least likely guy to go, "Hey, I wonder with Joe's been up to it. Yeah. But now you go -- you better go find out what these people are doing just for the hell of it. 

Ken Boggis 
Yeah.

Steve Martorano 
The other thing that's happened and I get a kick out of this is the rhetorical phrase, "Hey, how you doing?" Never took on a deeper and more honest meeting than during this whole thing. You know, "Hey, how you doing? I mean, no, HOW are you doing? Right? So that'll change.

Ken Boggis 
There's comfort in talking to people in opening your eyes to realize that everybody's going through the same thing. It might be a little bit different based on their world and what they're experiencing. But at the end of the day, it's the same, we're all being challenged. We're all being pulled in different directions. And you have to find, you know, your simplicity in that. And for me, talking to people that help. I also think a big component of this was you know, feeding your brain. Feed your brain. Things...podcasts like this. Reading. Find things that are you know, that are stimulating for you outside of work. They're subjects that are unrelated to work-related or family. That's something I didn't establish in my daily routine before this disruption. And it's an absolute for me every day now. I think it really helps relieve that stress and anxiety.

Steve Martorano 
Just a couple of just one sort of nuts and bolts thing because I've been back... my son's a sales...my son is almost in the same sort of work you are. And I know lots of salesmen, as I said, and now here we are you and I connecting over Zoom. Lots of business is being done this way. And I want to...do you miss the travel, first of all? And do you think going forward, this notion of having to be face to face with somebody in a sales context is a thing of the past? Or is it always going to be with us?

Ken Boggis 
Do I miss the travel? Yes and no. Yes and no. I think the travel was healthy. It broke up kind of the monotony of the role. Right? I think we've in some ways, many of us are day today, it looks very similar. And that's, that can be problematic. Listen, I really appreciate the additional time that I have with my family and my friends, in the increased productivity that I have from work. If you manage your calendar the right way, it's a good environment. I think we all have to be careful of this notion that, you know, work from home is evergreen, that that's a forever thing. I personally believe in our business, we've started to trend back to somewhere in the middle. We found out about halfway through this, that our clients crave contact just as much as we did. Right? For them to move forward -- for them to have that level of trust, to say, hey, we're going to go into business together and move this partnership for, they want to see you face to face, that's still I'm a firm believer, that's still how the majority of business gets done. So I think, you know, for different businesses, different industries, there'll be little different variations and nuances. For us, I think it's going to land somewhere in the middle. I think a big part that's been lost in these last two years is relationships and the culture that you build in an organization. You know, we've all heard of the "great resignation." And I think that's going to happen a lot more often in environments where they haven't made those human connections with their co-workers.

Steve Martorano 
It's another fascinating, we could do another whole show on why people are quitting their jobs, and where are they going? Work is so critical to who we are, and how we feel and behave. That's why we wanted to have you on you've been terrific about this. Ken Boggis. Ken, I'm going to sum it up with this, which I just came across earlier in the day. And you used it in a note you sent me. You talk about work-life - balance. Now that may be a term you people have heard a lot, but I assure you it's new. Because growing up that concept wasn't obvious in my life or my parents' lives. Everybody worked. You just you just worked. I mean, there wasn't even a lot of talk when I was growing up or retiring. Nobody ever talked about retiring. It worked. And then there was you know, life. There was you know, life. So now we have these things that are important to certain people to meld and balance. Work. Life. Balance. You said you were an advocate of that as well. There is a book out entitled Work Won't Love You Back by a reporter and a podcaster named Sarah Jaffe - works at the New York Times, The subtitle is "How Devotion to Our Jobs Keeps Us Exploited, Exhausted and Alone." Her point is that many people in generations Z, and the millennials, have grown up with the idea that work should be more than just making a living, it should be a vocation a calling. This is new. This is a brand new notion. Did you agree with her that it's a con? Or do you think it's absolutely important to have a work-life balance?

Ken Boggis 
Listen, you know, Steve, I think it's important to have a work-life balance. I think, you know, the pendulum somewhere along the line has swung right in one direction, maybe too far. You can't have one without the other. I think what's really important for every individual, is you have to identify your "why." Why do you do this? Why do you get out of bed in the morning, what makes you get out of the shower, put your boots on and go to work? Right? In what is that rooted in? Usually, it's going to be family. It's going to be, you know, the things that you're emotionally attached to. But you can't just jump forward to that. But you do have...I'm a firm believer, you have to put the work in. And I'm a big believer that you can have both. But you have to establish it up to whatever that "why" is. You have to identify what it is. You have to identify what it's going to take to get that -- to provide that environment yourself. And you have to go get it. And I've always been a big believer that you don't have to work 70, 80, 90 hours a week -- sometimes that may be what it takes. And you have to be willing to put that time into grind if that "why" is that important to you? But if as long as you're handling yourself with integrity. As long as you're thinking long term. As long as you're helping enough people get what they want. I'm a believer, you're going to get what you want. So again, it all goes back to balance. Scheduling your values. It's allowed me to enjoy a lot of them...a lot of great things in my life today. But it didn't just happen. I think the harder you work, the more opportunities are created for you.

Steve Martorano 
Excellent stuff. Ken Boggis. ABC. Always Be Closing. You closed this sale. Ken, thanks a lot. The next time we travel into the world of work and the stresses we're going to reach out for -- you're a great guest. Appreciate your time.

Ken Boggis 
Thank you, Steve. Appreciate it. It's great.

Steve Martorano 
All right, the rest of you get back to work. But don't forget about the Behavioral Corner. We're here. We're on Facebook. We're on Instagram. We're everyplace follow us there and catch us next time.

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