Our guest this week has been in that category of serial entrepreneur locally. Unless you know him well, you’ll never guess where it all started (you’ll have to listen for that). Our conversation takes us through his journey, some of the life lessons others could apply, to where he is today, as owner of Sandler Training of Albany. He thinks he’s not a coach/mentor, but we think otherwise. His influence on the business scene as well as his non-profit work tell you a lot about who Matt Scarchilli is. Listen in!

About Matt

Matt has over 25 years sales experience ranging from entry level sales, to sales manager to V.P. Sales to ownership of a sales training company (Winning Process, LLC, dba Sandler Training of Albany). Matt’s sales success over the last 20 years has put him in a position to now be able to share those experiences to help companies grow and flourish. 

Matt has been a Capital District resident his entire life growing up in Waterford and settling in Latham for the last 27 years with his wife Kathleen and three children. On the professional side, Matt has worked as a staff pharmacist for Latham Pharmacy and Supervising Pharmacist with Community Health Plan in Troy before transitioning to pharmaceutical sales. As a passionate soccer guy, Matt became president of Latham Circle Soccer Club. This is where he and John Haller met and together they founded SportsSignup. SportsSignup was a SaaS business that automated the tasks in running a youth sports organization (online registration, scheduling, stats, standings, etc.). While at SportsSignup, the company made 3 acquisitions. Matt’s role was Managing Partner and Vice President of Sales. After building the business to national success with 40+ employees and managing a team of 15 in the sales department, SportsSignup was acquired by Time, Inc. in July of 2015. The company was run as Sports Illustrated Play while owned by Time Inc. The SportsSignup software is now owned and run by NBC Sports. 

After staying on with Sports Illustrated Play to help with the transition, Matt was ready for his next venture. While at SportsSignup, Matt had employed the Sandler Training team of Albany at the beginning of 2014. He was so impressed with the methodology that he entered into a long-term engagement with them to train his sales team, customer service team, and himself as a manager. When he was approached by the previous Sandler owner (Lorraine Ferguson) to purchase the business, it was not a difficult decision.   

Education and Affiliations 

A.A.S. Chemical Technology, HVCC, 1986 
A.S. Math/Science, HVCC, 1987 
B.S. Pharmacy, Albany College of Pharmacy, 1990 

Board Member, Big Brother, Big Sisters, Albany 
Advisory board member, Nerdwise and TROPHECASE  
Big Brothers Big Sister of the Capital Region (https://bbbscr.org/)  

Matt Scarchilli

Owner of Sandler of Albany 
Email
Phone
LinkedIn

Voiceover: Welcome to HR In the Car with Miriam Dushane and Tom Schin of Alaant Workforce Solutions, where exciting HR professionals and business leaders share laughter, insider stories, and maybe even a few tears about HR in today's world. Buckle up for the best half hour of your week.

Tom Schin: So I thought today we, just in our small talk beforehand, we're talking about tattoos and books, and I thought we were going to dive into those sides with our next guest. But I'm glad that he kind of told this whole story about where he got started. I knew a little bit of it, but you were really surprised about where he was coming from.

Miriam Dushane: I was shocked. I had no idea that he basically, like what he does now. Well, here's the thing. What he does now and what he went to school for and had his career in, how many times did we hear that over and over and over again? So in a way, for me, that's fun because I get to hear the origin story of all of these great business professionals that we have on the podcast. So yeah, it was really cool. It was exciting to hear. So Matt, welcome. Thanks for joining us today. I was excited to have you on because I was thinking about this, we have known each other for 10 years.

Matt Scarchilli: You say that with a very high pitch.

Miriam Dushane: I know. Because I'm trying to-

Tom Schin: She does that. She does that with the animals too.

Miriam Dushane: I do.

Matt Scarchilli: I listen to the podcast with Amy.

Miriam Dushane: Oh, the dog.

Matt Scarchilli: Yeah, I heard you talk to the dog in the high pitch.

Miriam Dushane: Yeah, but no I think-

Matt Scarchilli: Probably about 10 years.

Miriam Dushane: Probably about 10 years, right? Maybe a little more.

Matt Scarchilli: It could be.

Tom Schin: When did you sell Sports Signup?

Matt Scarchilli: So I've owned Sandler for seven years.

Miriam Dushane: So yeah, definitely.

Matt Scarchilli: Nine years ago.

Miriam Dushane: Yep. We met at Sandler through sales management with Lorraine. One of my favorite people on the planet.

Matt Scarchilli: She's awesome.

Miriam Dushane: So glad that you're here. This is good.

Matt Scarchilli: Thank you for the invite.

Miriam Dushane: So Matt, give us a quick recap of what you're doing right now, who you are, and then we'll jump into some other stuff.

Matt Scarchilli: Cool. Well again, thanks Tom. Thanks for the invite as well. So I own Sandler. So Sandler is kind of an international company. I own the Albany franchise and have for the last, just about seven years at this point. And for those of you who aren't familiar with Sandler, we train and consult in basically three different areas, sales, management, and that's a first level of management, I'm not a CEO coach or anything, and customer service. That's kind of the nutshell.

Miriam Dushane: And is there an area that's more popular than another? Like sales training? Is that the big demand right now? Is it customer service training?

Matt Scarchilli: That's a really good question. And to my surprise, when I look back and reviewed my '22 income numbers, over half of my income came from customer service and management. And Sandler's always been known in the capital district anyway as the sales training, right? But there's definitely a shift towards training those first level managers.

Miriam Dushane: Thank God.

Matt Scarchilli: Yeah, right? I wish I had it.

Miriam Dushane: How many of us have been put into a role because we were really good at what we did. And since you're really good at what you did, now you're a manager and you get no support and no training. It's still something that employers misstep on often.

Tom Schin: Yeah, they think the read that you think, all right, this person performed well, there's no reason why they can't do this. But again, no learning manual. No how to. Just here, here's the bucket of fire, jump in.

Matt Scarchilli: Totally different skill set.

Miriam Dushane: Absolutely. And customer service. I mean, frankly, from where I sit, and this is just with my own personal interactions, is definitely needed.

Matt Scarchilli: Oh, you got a story for me? You got any good, any stories?

Miriam Dushane: Just the fact that everyone you encounter in any service related capacity just has, they act like they're miserable. So when you actually run across someone that is smiling at you and pleasant, and I get it. I understand when people say this all the time, remember, you're not the only customer they dealt with and they could have had a day. I totally get it. And I don't know if I could do customer service. I mean, we do customer service, obviously, but in that capacity, whether it's a call center or being like face-to-face in a retail setting or whatever it might be.

Tom Schin: And they get beat up the most. You think about them, they take 100-120 calls a day. They've got to have a smile on their face. And the ones that have been doing it five, eight, 10 years, and they're still smiling about it. And I remember, we've done our fair share, Miriam and I, of call center recruitment. And you try, I always look at folks, I'm like, how do you keep this smile about? How are you so happy doing this? Because you don't call customer service because you're happy. No, you call them because you're mad or something's missing or something's broken or didn't arrive and you're angry. I didn't get this coverage. This wasn't paid for. Why is I had to call somebody today because apart from my hot tub was broken, I'm like, oh, this is annoying. I just bought this last year. So that getting beat up all the time and still keeping a smile that that's a set mindset.

Miriam Dushane: So when you're doing customer service training, are you doing it with, is it call centers? Is it that face-to-face transactional consumer to business type sale? What do you encompass?

Matt Scarchilli: So it's not usually the transactional sale. It's not the retail sale type of customer service. It's not even face-to-face. So it's picking up the phone, mostly phone. I deal with a number of managed service providers. So it's things like, hey, I forgot my password, or it's the printer's jammed. So the people who are taking those calls are the people that I tend to work with. And that's just a singular industry. But you get the idea.

Miriam Dushane: Definitely. Is there, when you're talking to those companies who are asking for the training for their team, is there a common theme on what they want you to focus on? Is there a theme across different industries or different positions in terms of, I really want you to focus on this when you're doing the training.

Matt Scarchilli: It's funny because when the conversations start, it's always, hey, I think my team needs this. And then we have a conversation and through the conversations, well, have you thought about this? And how does your team do about this? And at the end of the day, they're like, oh my gosh, this is a much bigger problem than I thought it was.

Miriam Dushane: Always, right?

Matt Scarchilli: Because you don't want to admit it. And then you have this outside third party source coming in as a helper, for lack of a better word, and pointing these things out to you. It's hard to ignore it when someone asks you about it. You're not going to lie as the business owner. Right? Yeah. It's a bigger problem. And it's everywhere from the people aren't using the correct grammar when they're writing emails.

Miriam Dushane: Oh yeah. Sure.

Matt Scarchilli: To XYZ person blows up every time someone gets mad at them. And it's everything in between.

Miriam Dushane: So how did you get involved with Sandler like this? This wasn't your first gig?

Matt Scarchilli: Not my first gig,

Miriam Dushane: No. And like I said, when we met, you owned another company and you were in a sales management class with me. So tell us a little bit about your journey.

Tom Schin: Yeah, how'd you get started there?

Matt Scarchilli: From the Sports Signup Days? So when I started my career, I started in chemistry, actually.

Miriam Dushane: Shut up.

Matt Scarchilli: Yeah.

Tom Schin: I knew this.

Matt Scarchilli: No kidding.

Tom Schin: We've had that conversation.

Miriam Dushane: I did not know this. Tell me more.

Matt Scarchilli: Yeah. So I remember when I was in high school, I really liked chemistry. I didn't know what the hell I wanted to do. I thought I wanted to be a forest ranger for Christ's sake. So I wanted to just go up in the Adirondacks. And of course I didn't. My grades sucked in high school because I was a #%!*# student. So I didn't get accepted into the Syracuse Environmental Science and Forestry program. I didn't get accepted into Paul Smith. I'm like, #%!*# what do I do now? And I really liked chemistry and I was good at it. And I remember telling my high school principal what I was going to school for. And she looked at me and she says, oh, you'll fail.

Miriam Dushane: Are you kidding me?

Matt Scarchilli: Yeah. Good old Catholic school.

Miriam Dushane: That's rough.

Tom Schin: Was she hitting you with the ruler at the same time, or?

Matt Scarchilli: No, we were past the ruler hitting days. All my knuckles are intact and everything. Thank God I'm right handed. So at that point I'm like, well, I'll show you. So I went to Hudson Valley, got a two year applied Associates in Chemical Technology. And I enjoyed it. Couldn't find a job. So when Eastman Kodak was a thing, when you actually used to have pictures printed, they were a big employer, Schenectady Chemical, which is not Schenectady Chemical anymore. They weren't hiring, so nobody was hiring. So I'm like, oh, I don't know what I want to do. So went back to school, got a pre-engineering degree. Because I thought I wanted to be a chemical engineer. Got accepted into RPI, and then it was like, eh, I don't think I want to do this. So I ended up in pharmacy school.

Miriam Dushane: No way.

Matt Scarchilli: Yeah, so.

Miriam Dushane: I didn't know this.

Matt Scarchilli: I have a bachelor's in science and pharmacy. When I went, it was a five year program at that point in my life, I started to get the bug. I always knew I wanted to own my own business, and I thought it was going to be a pharmacy. But I'm an old fart. And when I got out of pharmacy school, that's when all of the big conglomerates were coming in and chewing up all the small independent pharmacies and paying big dollars for them. So that pipe dreamed away on me. So I never owned a pharmacy, went to work for CHP, for those of you who've been around - Community Health Plan. I was the supervisor at the pharmacy in Troy. So that was my introduction to management. And I got lured out of that into pharma sales. So I worked for GlaxoSmith Klein, and I worked for Eli Lilly, and I worked for Bristol Myers Squibb. And that was my introduction to sales. And at the beginning, I loved it. And at the end, I hated it. Because it sucks. But I've always been a soccer guy.

Tom Schin: And this is what he does.

Miriam Dushane: From our sales training franchise owner.

Matt Scarchilli: Let's be serious. Anybody-

Tom Schin: Wait until all your customers hear this.

Matt Scarchilli: Anybody who's been around pharma sales knows that it's not really sales.

Miriam Dushane: Yeah, fair. No, it really isn't. That's what, it's more like a courtesy con… Well, I wouldn't even say that. What would I call it?

Tom Schin: It's the wine and dine, feed me.

Matt Scarchilli: That's what it was when I was there. I don't know what it's like today. I certainly don't want to poo poo anybody's career. If you're doing well at it and you love it, great. It wasn't for me. It wasn't my thing. And I didn't like it. Calling on the same physicians all the time, trying to talk them into something and leaving with a kind of promise and no signed PO. There was no fulfillment.

Miriam Dushane: Yeah. Sounded like those people needed some Sandler training, actually.

Matt Scarchilli: I wish I had known it back then. I know. I didn't even know if Lorraine was in business at that point. It may have been pre Lorraine. So I'm a soccer guy, love soccer, been playing since I was a kid. Played through high school, played through college, played in men's leagues, coached. I was the president of the Latham Soccer Club when my kids were young. And long story short, that's where we started Sports Signup. So myself and my registrar's husband, who is a software developer, and he developed software to help youth sports organizations run. He developed a product, and I was using it at Latham Soccer Club. And I went to him one day and said, John, if we got this problem, everybody's got this problem. Should absolutely talk about bringing this to market. And thinking that I was really smart. And John said to me, he said about freaking time, he came and talked to me about this. Because I was waiting. If you weren't going to come to me, I was going to go find someone else to be a partner. So we built that company up over about 15 years. So we started just the-

Miriam Dushane: Great tool. I mean, I used it when my kids.

Tom Schin: So did I.

Miriam Dushane: My daughter played soccer.

Tom Schin: And then when we met, because we got introduced through, I think it was Mark Rose.

Matt Scarchilli: Yeah, that's right. So Mark and I played soccer together.

Tom Schin: See, everything's intertwined. Yeah, everything's connected. But yeah, we had met just at the point where you were leaving the sports signup piece and you hadn't really decided what was next.

Matt Scarchilli: That's right.

Tom Schin: Okay. Now this is all makes sense now.

Miriam Dushane: So you sell Sports Signup, which is now, isn't it like under Sports Illustrated moniker?

Matt Scarchilli: So we sold software to Time Inc. One of the Time Inc. properties is Sports Illustrated. So they ran it under the Sports Illustrated name. Subsequently, Time Inc. went out of business and they sold the software. Our software is now owned by NBC Sports, which is run as Sports Engine. Yeah. So I think there's actually, yes. I think they're actually sunsetting our old platform and moving everybody to the newer platform. And they should. It's been how many years since we developed that.

Miriam Dushane: Exactly. So what prompted you to, because I know the timing was right, but what prompted you to get into a sales training type of company and owning and owning the Sandler franchise?

Matt Scarchilli: So, as you know, where we met.

Miriam Dushane: Is Lorraine just a really good salesperson?

Matt Scarchilli: She negative reversed me right into it. When I first met Lorraine, I was at Sports Signup and I could see the end of the road coming. I knew that we were going to sell or be acquired or something was going to happen. So I started to network myself in the Capital District, get myself out and around and meet people. And I met Lorraine up at Pat's Barn at, I think it was a Albany Business Review event. Long story short, I hired her to come in and train my sales team. That's when you and I met. So my interaction with Sandler started when I was one of the owners of Sports Signup. I stayed on board at Sports Illustrated Play for about six months, and reminded myself how much I hated corporate America and said, I can't do this anymore and quit, and worked with another startup for a little while. We started again from the ground up. This one didn't have as happy and ending, and we didn't do our market research and outside funding wasn't there to be able to build the product. There was another software as a service. So Lorraine had asked me to sit down for lunch and she said, Matt, what are you doing now? And I told her, she's like, would you ever be interested in buying this? I'm getting ready to retire. And I'm like, well, I already paid for it. I already went through it.

Tom Schin: You feel like a part owner already.

Matt Scarchilli: So I wasn't looking to buy this until she put put it seed in my head. And then I'm like, you know what? I was with Sports Signup. Yes. I was one of the founders, but I didn't know #%!*#. Literally, I didn't know anything. My business partner, John Howard, God bless him, he really took a chance on me. I was an unknown quantity. I was in pharma sales. I never launched a product. I never built a sales team. I never did those things. Yes, I had a little bit of management experience, but he took a real risk. And we started to work together. And actually, quick aside, when we started Sports Signup, I owned Sports Signup. He owned another company called League Sports Services. And we had a mutually exclusive agreement with each other that I could only sell his software and his software is the only one I could sell. If I said that right. You know what I mean? And there were quotas on it, and if we reached certain quotas, then we would consider actually working together.

Tom Schin: It's a good testing ground.

Matt Scarchilli: Yeah. It was a good way to start. And the claim to fame of that business, besides the exit, is the fact that we did it without any outside funding.

Miriam Dushane: That's impressive.

Tom Schin: Big sense of pride.

Matt Scarchilli: And I had no idea how big a deal that was when I was going through it. Again, I didn't have any business knowledge at all at the time. Learned so much in that 15 years. Like unbelievable. We made company acquisitions, we were acquired, met a gazillion different people. It was fantastic time.

Miriam Dushane: That's awesome. That's so cool

Tom Schin: So let's reflect now here on this last seven years with Sandler, and thinking about biggest lesson you learned, but maybe even that biggest success moment, not necessarily from, hey, I got this many dollars from a client, but that endorphin hit the one that made you feel, hey, I had a real impact. That's my proud crowning achievement. Whatever you want to think of, what would that be?

Matt Scarchilli: So I have a client that I've been working with since I bought the business. I met them in the first year, and they're still a client. And I go into their sales meetings every month, and we do a reinforcement training every month. And that business owner refers to me as part of the sales team. That's what I like, right? Yeah. So I'm part of the management team. He comes to me for council, he comes to me for, how do you think we should grow this? Should we hire full-time people, part-time people, should we, and that's not a business coach, please don't get me wrong, but that's what I really enjoyed. That was my kind of moment. And I still have a really good relationship with them.

Tom Schin: And you hang on to those, it makes you know that, hey, it sunk in.

Miriam Dushane: Absolutely. My favorite, and this isn't where we were going to go with this, but it just reminded me, so Sandler, if anyone hasn't had an opportunity to go through a program or maybe go to a conference or anything like that, I highly recommend it if you're in any type of business management, sales, customer service, et cetera. Because I'll, I'll never forget Lorraine, I was sending people through sales training and Lorraine's like, Miriam, get your ass in here. She of course didn't say it that way, but she was like.

Matt Scarchilli: I wouldn't have been surprised if she did.

Miriam Dushane: You are training your people and you don't know what I'm training them. That's not how we should be doing it. Get in here. You need to learn what I'm teaching your people. So one, you can reinforce it. Okay. And two, you should know what I'm doing. What if you don't like what I'm doing? It was a really great conversation. So I reluctantly went and then was a disciple for life seriously. And ended up getting even more training than I originally anticipated I was going to get. And I always tell Lorraine this, and I tell everybody this, there's two things that I always take away from Sandler that have literally freed me and my mind space when it comes to doing sales. Number one, I'm a millionaire.
And number two, go for the no. How many nos can you get? And the challenge of breaking that barrier of that, I don't need that business. That's the millionaire part of it. And I don't want to waste my time. So I want to go for the no. I only want to work with people that want to work with me, has freed me in such a way. And I highly recommend it for anybody who needs help in that area. Or is a fear of rejection. And this isn't even just a salesperson thing, this is just a business thing.

Tom Schin: There's a big confidence that comes with that. When you're talking to somebody you can tell is ready to walk away from a conversation, suddenly there's a little bit of a glue that happens where you're like.

Miriam Dushane: Yeah, it's like that. Yeah. You want to, no, don't reject me. No, no, no.

Tom Schin: It's like dating.

Miriam Dushane: But if you go into it, I don't need your business. I am good at what I do. It was the most eye-opening, freeing moment of frankly my career and my business life of running my own business and having to do sales. And there's parts of sales that are really fun, love meeting people, love having those exchanges. But then there's the parts of sales that's like, ugh, the prospecting or the negotiations and the money talk and all of those other things. And literally changed my complete outlook on sales as a business person. So for anyone who's interested in programs like this, I highly recommend it. And this is not supposed to be part of the podcast.

Matt Scarchilli: The check's in the mail, Miriam. I hope you enjoy your dinner.

Miriam Dushane: Yeah, right, thanks. Thank you. And I think that's really important that this is an opportunity for business owners and other, I see a play for this in using it in an HR department. I see a play for it in using it in like you are already doing customer service and line level management and those types of things. Sales is in everything that we do, and we don't realize that it actually is in everything that we do.

Tom Schin: People don't want to admit it. They don't like the term, they don't like being stereotyped.

Miriam Dushane: It's a negative connotation.

Tom Schin: You think of car salesman, they get the worst rap. Some of them are really, really good at it and they get lumped in. And just as we are in our recruiting industry, there are some that are really, really good at it. And there are some that, and I'm not saying locally, but universally in this industry, across the United States, across the world, a lot of staffing firms get a bad rap.

Miriam Dushane: Bad rap. Yeah, definitely. So let's talk a little bit about the other things that you're involved with. So I know at least one thing that you're involved with, which is Big Brothers Big Sisters. So talk a little bit how, talk about that organization. I think most people essentially know what it's about, but I think it's evolved a lot. And number two, how'd you get involved with it?

Matt Scarchilli: So Big Brothers Big Sisters is in essence a mentoring program for young men and women. The kids that are looking for mentors, the parents put their names in. And I say parents, caregivers. So it could be mom and dad. There are numerous children who are getting mentored that have a mother and a father. So it's not that mom only or dad only. It's not single parent stuff, although it could be. When you're a mentor, you're a role model. And the idea is to pair the child up with a compatible, appropriate adult to have a good role model to look at, to say, here's a situation that I'm dealing with at school. I don't know how to deal with it. Can you help me? Or as simple as, Hey, we're going to the park this weekend. We're not doing anything and anything in between. It's influence on young people's lives.
And that's why I got involved. There are a number of different organizations out there that I could get involved in that are always looking for board members, et cetera. I chose Big Brothers, big Sisters, because this is going to sound terrible, but I'm going to say it anyway. I didn't want to be involved with an organization that was associated with death and pain and suffering like the Leukemia Lymphoma Society. Something in me said, I want to be involved in something that's positive. How can we positively impact the kids as opposed to how do we prevent negative from happening?

Miriam Dushane: That doesn't sound terrible. It's everyones personal preference.

Matt Scarchilli: It depends on the way you look at it, right?

Miriam Dushane: Exactly.

Matt Scarchilli: Provide something good to happen or prevent something bad. And I wanted to provide something good.

Tom Schin: And anyone can spin it in any different direction, right? You think of it from, okay, I'm providing a service to those folks that need it. But at the end of the day, what you want to go home with after you've contributed your time and your energy, you want to think about those relationships with those kids.

Matt Scarchilli: Here's my plug. We have a hundred young men on a waiting list. A hundred.

Tom Schin: Aging from where to where?

Matt Scarchilli: That's a question that I can't answer definitively, but basically seven or eight years old to 16, 17 years old.

Tom Schin: Okay, great. So there's a full range of, oh my gosh, young men, young kids who need some help, some guidance.

Matt Scarchilli: Women are smarter than men are in this.

Miriam Dushane: Thank you.

Matt Scarchilli: And they're more giving than men are. So the wait list for the young women under-

Miriam Dushane: I see where you're going with it.

Matt Scarchilli: Is not like it is for men. Very disproportionate numbers of young men waiting for mentors.

Tom Schin: So where does somebody go now that they've heard this, right? Where do they go next? What's the first step to, hey, I'm intrigued. I don't know if I'm ready to commit, but how do I learn more?

Matt Scarchilli: They can contact me directly. And they could do that a number of different ways. I'll look in the show notes for email address and or phone number. Or you could go right to the Big Brothers Big Sister's website and get more information there.

Miriam Dushane: Gotcha. Awesome.

Matt Scarchilli: But I'm happy to talk offline. A lot of people don't like to go right to the source because they're afraid that they're going to try to get sold on something they don't really want to do.

Tom Schin: What's the biggest misconceptions?

Matt Scarchilli: That there's too much time. I can't donate all that time. Yeah, that's the biggest misconception.

Tom Schin: Good to know. And you could probably do that an hour a week even.

Matt Scarchilli: That's about all it is.

Miriam Dushane: And it could make a huge impact in some young person's life.

Matt Scarchilli: There are stories that would make you cry,

Miriam Dushane: I'm sure. Yeah, absolutely.

Tom Schin: When you think about today.

Matt Scarchilli: It made me cry. But I'm kind of a baby, so I cry easy.

Tom Schin: There's so many good things to get into. But all the wasted time. We talk about TikTok at work jokingly, but you know, get sucked into those videos. Sucked into listening to NPR maybe. Right? An hour is not a big lift.

Miriam Dushane: No, it's not. It's not. So as we wrap up today, we always like to ask everybody what is in their roadside assistance toolkit.

Matt Scarchilli: So what's the coolest thing you've heard so far?

Miriam Dushane: Oh god.

Tom Schin: Well, there's the survival bag, right? Somebody had a getaway bag.

Miriam Dushane: Yeah, that was pretty neat. That was fascinating because the person who was associated with that I had would not have guessed in a million years that he had a 72 hour basically-

Tom Schin: Go bag.

Miriam Dushane: Go bag.

Tom Schin: And it wasn't including his family's needs, just his.

Miriam Dushane: No. Another person that I think has already aired, Mario, it's his gun.

Tom Schin: It's his side arm on him.

Miriam Dushane: His side arm.

Tom Schin: And Jen Massey was the one who gave us this idea. She brought in a giant basket full of goodies.

Miriam Dushane: Basically metaphors for HR. Like this entire basket full of everything, from cleaners to magic erasers to chocolate to the no button or an easy button, whatever. So she was not actually started the trend of us starting to ask who's-

Tom Schin: You'd love Jen, she's great.

Miriam Dushane: She is.

Tom Schin: And some people have gotten figurative as well, just in terms of the mindset.

Miriam Dushane: Mindset or books or, so it could be anything and everything. Something that keeps you going, either gets you through a tough time at work or keeps you focused when you're working. It literally could be anything. Your interpretation.

Matt Scarchilli: So I'm going to go figurative. So for me, the physical is having my phone with me because I lean on other people all the time. I have other Sandler franchisees that I lean on. I have family that I lean on. I have sales peer group that I lean on. I have a small business owner's group that I lean on. I have professional people that I talk to, not only as a mentor but as a mentee. So staying connected is, that's my toolbox. And knowing I learned the hard way, I don't have to do it alone.

Miriam Dushane: Right, exactly. And it's okay to ask for help.

Matt Scarchilli: Yeah. I grew up in a house that was, at least I interpreted it this way, that don't ask for help because it's a sign of weakness. And that's the thing that got me through a lot of times is having a support network.

Miriam Dushane: Absolutely. So it was interesting. I was talking to a colleague today and the individual's partner got a new job and he was starting to get very active in networking. And I said, just because he got the new job, make sure he still networks. It's still important. A lot of times we give the networking on the back burner or our support system on the back burner when mission accomplished new job or mission accomplished new sale or whatever it is. Yeah, yeah. And so I said, if I were to give any type of advice, just don't let your network get stale. Keep interacting with it, keep growing it. And this is a lifetime network. This isn't this year network. Right. When I look back and I look at my LinkedIn connections and I go, wow, that's a lot of connections. And honestly, I don't think I have a lot of connections. Most people, I see people out there with 5,000, 10,000 connections. I have a mere 1,500, but of that mere 1,500, I will tell you about 80% of them, I could pick up the phone tomorrow and they'd have my back. And that's your network. So I love that you brought that up because I think it's so true and people are afraid to ask for help for whatever dumb reason in their brain. And so I love that you said that because it is actually a sign of strength. Well Matt, thank you so much.

Matt Scarchilli: Thank you.

Miriam Dushane: This was so much fun.

Matt Scarchilli: I appreciate the opportunity.

Miriam Dushane: I can't believe you started down a path of chemistry. It's so fascinating to me. I love it.

Matt Scarchilli: Yeah. It was funny. This morning I had a session at the office and I was writing on the whiteboard and I put the delta sign up, the triangle. So that always meant change to me. So something changed. So I put the delta sign up and of course my writing sucks. So people are, they're looking at, they're like, what is that? What the heck are you writing up there? But I still go back to some of the shorthand that I used.

Tom Schin: Math and science.

Miriam Dushane: Love it.

Tom Schin: Never goes wrong.

Miriam Dushane: Well, thank you my friend. We really appreciate it.

Matt Scarchilli: Thank you.

Tom Schin: I loved listening to Matt talk about the Big Brother's Big Sister connection. I knew part of his sales story and how that went through. So there was a little bit, I'm a little biased there, but hearing that connection to ha he has to, why he joined the organization and the almost call out to others to participate, especially the hundred young men.

Miriam Dushane: On a waiting list.

Tom Schin: Looking for some help. It's just inspiring it. Not in the sense that there's all these kids that need help, but that here's someone who's trying to affect change.

Miriam Dushane: Absolutely. No, it was a great conversation with him. I loved, again, I loved his story about going to school for chemistry and having a bachelor's in pharmacy, which hits home to me because my daughter's going to pharmacy school right now. And I didn't know we had that in common. I don't have it in common, and she technically has it in common with him, but you can tell when he talked about Big Brothers Big Sisters, how he got serious, but also inspiring in a way. Right? So it was great to see that.

Tom Schin: I love the part that he said, I'm not a coach. I'm like, yeah, ya are really is you absolutely a coach. You just don't want to admit it.

Miriam Dushane: He really, really is.

Tom Schin: Both with the customers and clients that come into his classroom, you know, and I know some of his kids too, and he's a mentor to them and absolutely all the relationships. He talked about that networking fabric, he's absolutely that sounding board and coach for all those folks too. And so it's definitely, it's kind of funny when you think about it. You're like, oh no, that is completely you.

Miriam Dushane: So for more on Matt, certainly check out the show notes that we'll have with the podcast. We'll have his email address and information to reach out to him. If you are interested in Big Brothers Big Sisters, also check out a lot. com for more information about other podcasts that we have already released or about our organization as well.