People always ask me what it felt like to walk off that stage. Honestly? It felt like closing a deal I had been working on for months. Because that is exactly what it was.
Let me give you the numbers first, because numbers don't have feelings and they don't lie.
I had 3 months to prepare. I worked with a coach through 12 sessions. My talk was under 10 minutes. There were over 450 people in that room. And before I stepped on that stage, I had rehearsed 180 times — 3 times a day, every single day, until the words stopped feeling like words and started feeling like breathing.
180 times. Let that sit for a second.
Now here's what happened after. In one week, my follower count grew by 0.9%, post impressions jumped by 72.1%, and newsletter subscribers grew by 200%. And more importantly, the conversations I was already having got sharper, warmer, and more intentional, because the work I had put in was visible. And 180 rehearsals don't lie.
So what does any of this have to do with sales? Everything.
Sales is not guessing. It is not winging it and hoping your personality carries the room. It is about showing up consistently, doing the behavior, checking your attitude, and learning the techniques that actually make you better. It is about measuring what you do so you can analyze it, repeat what works, and fix what doesn't.
I didn't walk into that TEDx and hope for the best. I prepared like the stage mattered, because it did, and that is the exact same energy the best salespeople bring to every single call, every meeting, every follow-up. Not just the big ones. All of them.
Radical Accountability
That stage was not my first one, and I'm not going to lie, when I got selected, I thought I had everything it took. For a few days, I didn't think about hiring a coach or doing the extra, exhaustive work I ended up doing. But experience has a funny way of humbling you right when you think you don't need it.
Here is what most people get wrong. They think preparation is what you do when you are new. Once you have enough experience, enough deals closed, enough years in the game, you start to rely on instinct. Instinct is valuable, don't get me wrong. But instinct without structure is just improvisation with a good track record. At some point, it stops working, and you won't even know why.
When you don't measure, you can't learn. When you don't rehearse, you can't improve. When you show up without doing the work, you are not selling. You are just talking.
The TEDx stage taught me that trust is built in the preparation, not in the performance. The audience doesn't see the 180 rehearsals. Your prospect doesn't see the research, the strategy, the intentional follow-up cadence. But they feel it. Every single time. That is the part nobody talks about enough, the invisible work that makes everything visible, and it counts.
So here is my question for you. Are you treating your sales process like a TEDx talk? Are you measuring, rehearsing, and showing up with that level of intention? Or are you still winging it and calling it instinct?
Because instinct without preparation is just luck, and as I said before, luck is not a sales strategy.
Want to talk about radical accountability? Message me and let's chat!
Talk soon,
Tati
