Travel’s been picking up for me lately over the last few months. I’m back to averaging about one flight a week.
Nothing bad. Nothing crazy.
But it was a nice run for a year and a half there when I didn’t have to vacate any airports. But alas, the world keeps spinning, and we keep dancing to the rhythm of its turns.
Prior to COVID, I’d usually chat up the people next to me often on my flights, same as when I take an Uber or Lyft, I like to engage my drivers and see what I can learn about them. I’ve mentioned this before, even though I consider myself more of an introvert the older I get, it seems such a waste to ignore people and I still enjoy plucking what ripe fruit I can from the orchards of humanity while navigating my fateful surroundings.
But when wearing a mask, it’s a lot more difficult to talk and understand fellow travelers. So, I’ve settled into the “I’m-wearing-earbuds-guy-don’t-bother-me-look.” Rarely, do I chat on my flights now.
However, the other day when I was heading back from Phoenix, I was treated to a gem of a conversation (a gem on my end, not so much his I’m thinking).
Enter, the entrepreneur…
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When he plopped down in the seat next to me, he had that look. That clean shaven techie look of I hope I can be the next Mark Zuckerberg or Brian Armstrong someday.
Which I have no problem with. If you want to lose your soul to win the world, all the more power to you. (Plus, wasn’t I doing the same by working in corporate America anyway? Oh, hypocrisy.)
He was doing that normal, fidget and move-my-stuff-around routine, that que-ed me in on he wanted my attention. (After hundreds of flights, you become a body language expert on the fellow travelers that are invading your personal space because a cheap fucking airline can’t give you a little more breathing room from the seat next to you).
I looked up at him, but under my mask I wasn’t smiling.
My flight home was only an hour. It was 9pm. I’d been up since 4am catching the 6am flight over in the morning. I wouldn’t reach my front door until 11pm. I was hoping this flight would go smooth and uninterrupted. Hopefully I could humor this guy for a little bit and then he’d leave me alone.
“Hi, I’m John.”
He offered the introduction with what I imagined was a beaming let’s-be-bros smile underneath his mask. That’s the cool thing with wearing masks. You get to invent who the person is next to you sometimes…. hahaha. and with an imagination like mine, the sky is the limit.
Slowly I took out my air-pods and responded kindly, “I’m Q.”
“Looks like we’ll be seat buddies tonight.”
Seat buddies? Yeah, that’s what he said. Like we were two elementary school kids that needed a hall monitor on our way to recess.
This guy had to be a tech-bro.
“Yeah,” I responded curtly. “Looks like it.”
I figured that would give him the hint that our conversation was done. But before I could look back down – our eyes still connected as if by some invisible tractor beam that just wouldn’t let me go – he shoved another few words out of his mouth with the desperation of a child that wanted to show off their favorite toy at Christmas.
“So what do you do?”
He asked it in the way that I have become accustomed to hearing it. He didn’t give a fuck what I did nor care in the least bit. His tone said, I’m going to ask you this question solely so that you can ask me what I do for a living.
I really didn’t feel like playing along. But I did. I’m a good guy sometimes hidden deep down underneath.
“I do M&A work.”
Usually that answer will go one of three ways.
One, they are embarrassed they don’t know what that means, and the conversation stops (which I was hoping for). Two, they do know what it means, and interested follow-up questions ensue. Or three, they ignore what I said and start talking about themselves.
Yep, you guessed it, it was what-is-behind-door-number-three with this guy.
“Oh,” he said with feigned interest before sliding right into his favorite line smoother than Jeff Bezos’s bald head. “Well, I’m an entrepreneur.”
Hahaha, he didn’t even give me the chance to ask him what he did. He was so excited he shot the words at me as if they were coming out of a fucking cannon pointed at my head. If I wasn’t careful, this guy’s ego might blow a hole through the fucking plane’s window and kill us all.
Little did the rest of my flight know that I was saving their lives by engaging this guy in conversation.
Now, I didn’t mean to be a prick, I really didn’t, but I said exactly what I thought.
“Cool, so you’re a salesman.”
You could see the corner of his eyes crinkle up in disgust, as if I had just said he murdered babies down in his basement for fun or kept Hitler on retainer as his top consultant.
He didn’t like what I said at all.
“No, I’m an entrepreneur.” He stated this time, not said, as if it were a fact recorded on Wikipedia. As if a more serious tone would wash away the words I had previously uttered like a high tide cleansing the shoreline.
But I had nowhere to go. So, I was curious what this guy thought? Did he really think there was a difference between an entrepreneur and a salesman?
So, I endeavored to find out.
“Oh, okay.” I agreed with him. Choosing a more soft and soothing tone as if I were speaking with a small child. It seemed that might be all that he could handle. “No offense meant, it’s just when I hear the word entrepreneur, my first question is always what are you trying to sell me? The point is to sell a product or service, right? So, what’s your business? What are you selling?”
He paused and looked at me as if for the first time, as if all of sudden I was really there sitting right in front of him. Like I was confusing him, and he didn’t understand why the conversation was traveling down this path. Why wasn’t I high-fiving him and giving him accolades for being an entrepreneur? It had always worked before. So why not now?
His eyes had become an operating room, seeming to be assessing me carefully, pinpoint pupils’ black scalpels, checking off assumptions, weighing calculations like I was some algorithm he couldn’t quite figure out. Was I fucking with him? Which I wasn’t. I said it in a conversational tone, which was exactly what I was trying to have – a conversation. What did this guy think? Was he trying to save the world without selling anything? Does entrepreneurship not have to cashflow?
“I run a service business. I create jobs. I help people. That’s how I see it. I’m an entrepreneur.”
“Okay,” I nodded.
For some reason he seemed to be avoiding what his actual business was. That was fine, I wasn’t going to press. But I wasn’t sure if he wanted to discount the sell side or he actually believed an entrepreneur wasn’t synonymous with salesman.
I had become rather fascinated… could denial be that thick and obtuse?
Maybe magic dollar bills floated down from heaven for him. Who knows?
But I thought I’d take one last stab at it.
“So, you help people by charging them money?”
Apparently, I wasn’t going about this the right way. He looked even more perturbed at me. Daggers glaring from his eye sockets.
“No, we help people and a byproduct is we make money. We’re providing them a service they need. It’s a mutual relationship.”
Perhaps I should have just left it at that. Let him win. It was no sweat off my back. But I couldn’t help myself…
“Alright, but it’s a transactional relationship. If they don’t pay you, you don’t help them.”
He nodded.
“Then don’t you have it backwards? You don’t help people if they don’t pay you money. So first and foremost, your goal is to cashflow. It doesn’t matter what your intentions are, even if you are donating or giving all the money away. You still must sell something first, then you help people. Or at least in your mind you’re helping them.”
Then I winked at him, the icing on the cake, “Maybe you’re just a really good salesman and they’re helping you more than you’re helping them.”
I said the last line as a joke and laughed. I can be a righteous comedian sometimes… or blatant asshole. Conceivably it was a little overboard, but entrepreneurs not realizing they were marketers dressed up in sheep’s clothing had been driving me nuts lately.
Just call a fucking spade a spade.
Let’s be clear there is nothing wrong with making money. Entrepreneurship is a great thing. But at least be up front about it. Handle your disclosures.
He didn’t seem to think it was too funny and that killed the conversation right there.
It was late and I was tired. Possibly I was being a dick. Oh well, at least maybe I had accomplished something that night…
He had come and sat next to me as an entrepreneur, but perhaps he’d leave that seat understanding he was a salesman?
-Q-FI
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What do you think? Is entrepreneur synonymous with salesman? Have I got this all wrong? Any entrepreneurs out there that want to chime in? I guess the real lesson is don’t sit next to me when I’m tired and cranky on a plane. =)
“So, you help people by charging them money?”
My eye gets twitchy when people say their passion is saving/helping/fixing. But in order to be saved, first you must pay. Perhaps their passion was cash all along.
We should drop most of the pretensions about what we’re in business to do. My large employer is all about helping people, changing our communities and society, etc., but, funny enough, that’s not what our performance metrics are built around. They’re built around sales and revenue generation.
We also help people by charging them for our services.
Internal propaganda is a hell of a drug.
I agree David. It’d be cool if that could ever happen. But like you’re essentially saying, the message doesn’t match the incentives and the bottomline is all that matters for most companies at the end of the day. Corporations are masters of dancing around the truth.
Thanks for the comment bud!
Hey bludger and valid point. I’m always for people making money, and think there is a right way to make money AND “help”. But it has to be done with “full frontal nudity” so to speak… hahaha. Full disclosures and be honest about the transaction, which is exactly what it is, a monetary transaction for a product or service.
The word “entrepreneur” has become such a marketing catch phrase that it’s almost like people forget what it even is. It’s about business, nothing more and nothing less. I am an entrepreneur is the same as I am a business man. I feel like people should own it more.
I like the attitude promoted by Mark Horstman of Manager Tools: organizations exist to serve society, and an organization’s profit is [but] one measure of how well it benefits the portions of society it chooses to serve.
Lots of “entrepreneurs” (my past self included) want to make cool stuff but don’t work out how to make it serve others well enough to keep us afloat and growing. The “founder who can’t/won’t sell” is necessarily a dead-end, in terms of value. (Barring a great sales co-founder, who then, just as inexorably, ends up seen as the ‘senior partner’.) A harsh dynamic? Yes, and humbling as all get-out. Reality’s a bitch, as it’s said 🙂
Hahaha, yes reality can be a bitch and that’s a harsh dynamic indeed. Also a pretty cool perspective I might add.
I like the idea and have not heard it put that way before. There’s definitely a lot of truth in that attitude, but I wouldn’t necessarily 100% agree that the founder who doesn’t sell is entirely a dead end nor that just because a different founder is better at sales that more “value” is created. I guess it comes down to splitting hairs on value/metrics and how much worth society might attribute to master salesmen so good they can sell you something you don’t need. Hahaha.
I appreciate the share. This is a topic worth further contemplation. Good stuff Joseph.
Have you ever heard of the Gervais Principle? All organizations are made up of losers, clueless, and psychopaths. Psychopaths are the cutthroat, backstabbing executives who pull all the strings, and losers are the average Joe individual contributors who have no ambitions. To prevent the organ from melting down, a buffer of clueless needs to form. They are the ones with no real personality outside of work, the ones who simultaneously swallow and regurgitate the company culture like a momma bird. The ones who suck up to the executives, but are usually the first to go during a layoff. Sounds like you ran into a classic clueless type.
Or maybe that’s just the nature of sales. It pretty much requires you to sell your soul to the company, and to be a flesh offering to the organization. Not quite human sacrifice, but more of a corporeal effigy, devoid of personality, and completely embodying the corporate values, reciting them like a cultish creed every night in the hotel room before and after a sales pitch like some sort of ritual. I have no idea where I’m going with this anymore but I’m sure you get my point.
That is quite the comment Dominic. Thanks for descriptive elaboration… I loved it.
First, I had not heard of the Gervais Principle. Makes perfect sense. You need many different parts to feed the machine and keep it running while replacing the old with the new.
Second, great creative and visual description of the corporate ritual. It can be all that and more sometimes. Conformity and order are usually at the top of the list. If you don’t fall in line, then most likely you won’t be around long. A sad reality, yet necessary trait for longevity within the corporate maze of circle dancing.
Good stuff bud.
i well may have gouged his eyes as soon as the words “seat buddies” came forth. conversation skills get worse and worse in the world if you ask me. where is the sense of humor? why so serious?
I’ll be honest that I was tired and a dick. But I was trying to make a joke as well. Yeah, some people take themselves pretty fucking serious. Let’s just laugh it off and move on.
Thanks for swinging by Freddy.
Your seat buddy just wanted to be congratulated and have you admire him for a while. I think when entrepreneurs have to call themselves entrepreneurs, this is where the red flag is lifted. I have great respect for people who can start a business and thrive, but I think it can be hard to turn off the sales switch for some people. They repeat their sales line over and over and soon they brainwash themselves. It’s also a status thing, somehow he’s better because he works for himself type of deal.
I can remember a few years back there was a financial advisor making his rounds through word of mouth around my previous company. Lots of my colleagues were using him. He got my number and I talked to him. He also had a way of not charging me any fees for his service. This was a major warning sign. I asked him, then how do you make money from me? He insisted he didn’t make money from me, then slyly admitted that he was paid by the mutual fund fees. He was either a really good liar or a brainwashed salesman. He believed so hard that it wasn’t me paying him if he got paid from a fee, because it was skimmed from the market return. Somehow in his demented mind, the market return on my money was less my money than if I paid him in principle.
I’m more than willing to pay decent money for a product or service, but if I’m told the service/product is free, I instantly feel like I’m going to get scammed.
This was definitely a status conversation Noel. He wanted some props and I was too tired to play the game by his rules. Like I told Freddy, I know I was being kind of a dick. I try to share the good and not so pretty side of myself on here. This is probably one people might cringe a little at, but hey, gotta tell the stories how they play out… and the readers will make up their own minds. Haha.
Like I told Bludger. Entrepreneurship is great. Making money and starting a business is awesome. Like you, I have mad respect for someone doing it. But be humble and don’t try to trick people. I think in a lot of online businesses people aren’t as forthcoming with disclosures as they should be. That’s what really ruffles my feathers.
Great example about the financial advisor. Thanks for sharing it!
As you mention, free stuff is usually a dead give away.
You’ve reminded me why I never proactively talk to people sitting next to me on a plane. And when someone tries to talk to me (rare, given that I always make a point to wear headphones, and am almost always reading something), I give them terse, one-word answers and then go back to reading. For those who persist even after that, I know they’ll never take the hint, so I fake sleep. Jerky of me? Meh. I’ve no regrets.
Hahaha… maybe I should adopt your methods of circumvention. Love it. Thought through and implemented like a true lawyer.
And no, nothing wrong with not wanting to talk or be bothered on a flight. To each their own!
Great tidbit on the fake sleep. I’m now envisioning you pretending to fall asleep in mid conversation. Ha! That shit cracked me up.
Thanks for chiming in FFTP!
Loved this one. Can totally relate to all those zillions of flights with people always wanting to engage in banal discussion, particularly when it centered on the “What do you do?” I sometimes used the brilliant Bukowski line to immediately shut down all conversation by replying, “I drink and I fuck.” Sucked all the O2 right out of the plane so I could get on with reading.
Anyway, yes entrepreneur’s are most certainly salespeople. Period. In fact, of all the successful entrepreneurs I know or have met, not one describes themselves an an entrepreneur, rather they’ll say “I started a company that does ABC” or “I invest in XYZ type of start up” or “I’m a CEO at a company I founded”. And none of them would ever say “seat buddy”. Sheesh.
Love the term “status conversation!”
Hahahaha… classic: “I drink and I fuck.” I might just have to bust that one out some day.
I agree, most small business owners/investors, talk about their business and don’t relish in a catchy phrase. I think it mostly comes down to humility. Or some people just really enjoy talking about themselves.
I think you might be on to your next traveling adventure by now – I think I remember PHX was in the cards. So safe travels Mr. Fate! I saw your new post and will be over there in a sec to drop you a line.