Channel Partners: How would you describe The Klymshyn Method?
Klymshyn: The Klymshyn Method is a philosophy toward communication and creativity that impacts people ... and their performance. It's all about the language.
Ultimately, The Klymshyn Method focuses on Intersections. The intersection between the brain and the mind, the head and the heart, and the intersection between music and language. My philosophy and methodology have been installed in technology leaders such as C3 Technology Advisors, T Mobile, Altice, Wallbox and Indeed.com. It’s been used by enterprise sales organizations from Toronto to Miami, Mexico City to Maui, Manhattan to Killington Vermont, via live experience.
Your journey begins with an examination of your mindset, with an eye on your team’s future development as professionals, and as contributing humans.
CP: How did you become an executive coach and sales performance expert?
Klymshyn: By discovering and embracing what I consider to be my path of inquiry, which is how language and music intersect and interact. After conducting seminars around the globe for more than seven years on topics ranging from Moving Conversations Forward to Ultimate Sales Management, I was asked fairly often how much deeper I might be able to go with organizations and individuals.
My path of inquiry led me to reading a variety of books about how the mind works, where language comes from, how it is structured, and why it works the way that it does. This informed me and helped me to form a philosophy that I am proud to say has impacted people, which impacts organizations.
What has been really exciting is how my musical background fed into this and brought me joyous experiences of helping people understand how to craft and deliver inspirational language. This has turned out to be the bulk of my practice today and it is the focus of most of what I write about, including my upcoming book.
CP: What is your musical background?
Klymshyn: As an extremely active kid, I was handed a pair of drumsticks and a rubber pad when I was nine years old to keep me occupied. Apparently, I took to the rhythm and repetition of the exercise I was asked to do for the ensuing week.
Four beats in a row, staying in synch with a metronome spoke to me. After just a few months, my music teacher had me reading and performing. By sixth grade, I was playing tuned percussion (tympani, xylophone) and had a drum solo performing in the Jazz Band.
My first paying gig as a musician was in a Progressive Rock Cover Band … as the lead singer. We played major universities around New York, New Jersey and Connecticut and we played a lot of clubs. Most recently I picked up and learned guitar. I now gig 10 to 15 times a year, singing and playing guitar at wineries, parties, and other events.
CP: Besides your own experiences, where did you learn the ideas, techniques, and attributes of people who excel in sales management?
Klymshyn: When publishers John Wiley & Sons invited me to author a book for them, they asked what I was most passionate about and at that time I had been spending a lot of time with people that ran successful sales organizations. When I say successful, I mean they had low turnover, they consistently hit their quotas and the culture was fun, competitive and collegial. When I came up with the idea of a mythical creature called the ultimate sales manager I went and interviewed 24 of these leaders who were very generous in sharing their philosophies, mindset, approach and language.
In the final edit, 18 of those folks are quoted in this book which has been selling consistently, every week - week in, and week out - since its publication, both in hard copy form and in the audio version …which I narrate.
CP: Can you share a few tips on hiring the right salespeople?
Klymshyn: Here are five:
- Identify 5 single words that describe your ideal rep.
- When interviewing, use those five as a template to hold potential new hires to. If they don’t possess at least three … end the interview process.
- Look beyond the resume and ignore their social media. Find out who they are. We will offer some fantastic interview questions during our workshop.
- Conduct the first interview over the phone.
- Listen for whether they have called from a quiet environment.
- Interrupt at least twice to see if they can stay with you.
- Always end the interview with: “What questions do you have for me?” Because if they don’t have any, that means they have not looked into your company, or you. This tells us a lot.
