Amen Corner. Stretch Snippets. Let's Go!
On invisible work, buyer indecision, AI's real impact on revenue, Stoicism, and a football coach who accidentally gave the best sales leadership quote of the week.
👋 Hello Friends…
I’m Grant. Each week I share lessons from the sales leadership trenches. What’s working, what’s not, and what I wish someone had told me years ago.
In this week’s Stretch VP: Weekly:
Stretch Snippets returns: 7 reads, listens, and ideas worth the early tee time
Gong’s 2026 State of Revenue AI: the numbers that’ll make you pull out your yardage book, or throw some grass in the wind…
The JOLT Effect: why 40-60% of your pipeline splashes into Ray’s creek due to “we’ll think about it”
Plus: A new football coach just handed me the cleanest sales leadership framework I’ve heard in a while.
Want to work together? I help founders and revenue leaders build and operationalize the systems and structure behind predictable, scalable revenue. Reply to this email or DM me to explore what that could look like.
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Hello Friends 🌸,
Masters Week is here. And if you know me, you know this is one of my favorite weeks of the entire year. Augusta has my full attention.
There is nothing in sports like a Masters Sunday. The back nine. Amen Corner. The leaderboard shifting in real time. Fortunes and fame made or lost in the span of just those three holes alone! You can play a perfect front nine and still lose it coming home. Ouch.
Kinda like sales. The preparation, the process, the invisible work nobody sees. It all matters. But execution under pressure is what separates the ones who slip on the Green Jacket of Presidents Club from the ones who watch someone else do it from the comforts of their own home.
If you’ve been following, you’ve heard me say that Jim Nantz has opened every Masters broadcast the same way for decades. Simple. Warm. Consistent. “Hello Friends.” There’s something about that phrase that heals.
Which brings me to this. Stretch Snippets is back. One of the most popular parts of this newsletter, and honestly one of my favorite things to put together. Gonna get back to this more consistently - Jim Nantz style.
So here’s a collection of what I’ve saved over the last little bit that I found helpful, inspiring, and maybe you will too. Will this week’s snippets help you finish strong? Maybe. Definitely Probably.
At the very least they’ll give you something worth thinking about while the drama unfolds on Sunday afternoon.
Grab a pimento cheese sandwich and Let’s go.
STRETCH SNIPPETS
Every sales leader reading this knows exactly what Nikki Schanzer is talking about. The reorg you managed through. The rep you talked off the ledge. The narrative you shifted so your team didn't take the blame for a bad quarter. None of it shows up in your quota number. Her point is the one most leaders learn too late: the invisible work builds trust with your team, but the visible work builds your career. You need both.
You know I love me some Ryan Holiday. I listened to this podcast: 12 Stoic Remedies for when life feels heavy, and resonated immediately. Here’s a quick summary:
Focus on the Dichotomy of Control: Separate matters into what you control (your actions, thoughts) and what you don’t (externals). Focus solely on the former.
Practice Amor Fati (Love of Fate): Don’t just accept, but embrace everything that happens, treating obstacles as fuel for growth.
Live in the Present Moment: Confine yourself to the present to avoid anxiety about the future or despair over the past.
Utilize Negative Visualization: Imagine the worst-case scenario to reduce fear and prepare yourself for challenges.
Practice Voluntary Discomfort: Deliberately face uncomfortable situations (e.g., cold showers, fasting) to build resilience.
Change Your Perspective: Remember that it is not things that upset us, but our judgment about things.
Journal Your Thoughts: Reflect on your actions to gain clarity and maintain emotional control.
Break Down Problems: Divide large obstacles into smaller, manageable parts.
Be a Friend to Yourself: Treat yourself with kindness rather than harsh criticism during difficult times.
Maintain the View from Above: Take a long-term view of your life to make current problems seem smaller and more manageable.
Ask “Is This Necessary?”: Constantly evaluate your activities to eliminate unnecessary stress.
Focus on Action, Not Emotion: Focus on doing your duty as a human being rather than staying stuck under the “blankets” of emotions.
Most deals don't stall because of product. They stall because something in the buying process was never fully understood. I put together this MEDDPICC cheat sheet for exactly that reason, and if you missed it in the newsletter, here it is again.
Eight components covering everything from finding the real economic buyer to building a champion who can sell for you when you're not in the room.
Am I late to the party? Just found Intro.co. Cool concept. Think Cameo but for personal convos with experts. Obvious use case is advice or coaching. But I'm also wondering if there's a play here for networking, or using it to ask for an intro to a mutual connection. Pay a small fee, get 15 minutes with someone who can open a door. That's not a bad trade.
Joe Thomas (co-founder of Loom), Emery Wells (founder of Frame.io, acquired by Adobe for $1.3B), and Nikita Bier (built Gas and TBH, both acquired) are all on there. Nikita alone has reportedly made over $122K from bookings on the platform.
Anyone actually using this? Curious what you're getting out of it.
Gong's 2026 State of Revenue AI report drops some numbers worth paying attention to. Quota attainment fell from 52% to 46% in 2025, not because win rates dropped, but because reps worked fewer opportunities. At the same time, reps using AI frequently generated 77% more revenue per rep than those not using it at all.
The bigger takeaway: it's not whether your team uses AI, it's how deep. Teams with AI embedded as a core strategy grew revenue 31% faster than those still running limited pilots.
40% to 60% of qualified pipeline lost to no decision. Not lost to a competitor. Lost to "we'll think about it."
I reference this all the time since reading The JOLT Effect. If you haven't read the book yet, this episode with Matt Dixon is a great intro to JOLT and the whole indecision problem. It comes down to fear of failure on the buyer's side, and most reps are making it worse without realizing it. Worth a listen HERE.
As a passionate fan of my Alma Mater — University of Utah, I was all ears listening to the introduction of our new Head Football Coach, Morgan Scalley. I stopped what I was doing and jotted down what he said about being a leader. Tell me this doesn’t apply to us in Sales Leadership:
“A leader’s job is to provide clarity, accountability, and support. For instance, here’s where we need to be…and here’s how we will help you get there.”
-Morgan Scalley, Head Football Coach - University of Utah
Thanks for reading!
If this was helpful, forward it to another sales leader who might need it.
Want to work together? I help founders and revenue leaders build scalable sales systems through Stretch VP. Reply to this email or DM me to explore what that could look like. — Grant 👋
About Stretch VP: Weekly
Lessons from the sales leadership trenches on what works, what breaks, and how to build systems behind scalable revenue.
I’m Grant. This is where I unpack what I’ve learned leading sales teams for the last two decades.
The wins, the scars, and the things I wish someone had told me earlier. Sometimes tactical, sometimes reflective. But always grounded in real leadership and real life strategy.
I also work directly with founders and revenue leaders through Stretch VP when deeper support is needed. If you’re building or leading a sales organization and trying to do it the right way, welcome.