Selling From the Heart Podcast

Simon Severino is the Founder and CEO of Strategy Sprints, where he helps B2B founders and business leaders accelerate sales, increase profitability, and build companies that can scale without burning out their teams.
Over the past two decades, Simon has helped clients generate more than $2 billion in additional revenue by simplifying strategy and focusing on disciplined execution. He is the creator of the Strategy Sprints® Method and author of Strategy Sprints: 12 Ways to Accelerate Growth for an Agile Business.
Simon is also a TEDx speaker, Forbes contributor, and host of the Strategy Sprints Podcast. His work focuses on helping leaders simplify complexity, strengthen sales processes, and create sustainable growth by concentrating on the actions that generate the greatest impact.
SHOW SUMMARY
In this episode of Selling From the Heart, Larry Levine and Darrell Amy welcome Simon Severino for a conversation about preparation, process, trust, simplification, and selling in the age of AI.
Simon defines selling as helping another person make progress. But helping someone make progress requires more than good intentions. Sales professionals need to understand the buyer's world, prepare deeply, and bring a process that can confidently guide the conversation forward. Without preparation, sellers can become reactive, overly focused on closing, and more concerned with their own pipeline than the customer's progress.
The conversation also explores why trust may become the key differentiator in the age of AI. Technology can increasingly support research, strategy, and analysis, but buyers still need trusted people who can help them execute, navigate resistance, and make meaningful change.
Simon also warns sales organizations against using AI to accelerate processes they have never clearly defined. Before automating, teams should document how they prospect, follow up, close, onboard, activate, upsell, and serve customers. Otherwise, as Simon puts it, “the AI will only scale chaos.”
Finally, Simon challenges sales professionals to simplify their offers and rethink high-volume outreach. Instead of sending hundreds of generic messages, focus on fewer prospects, understand what is relevant to them, and create communication that is thoughtful, distinctive, and human.
The message is simple: prepare better, simplify the process, build trust, and use technology to strengthen—not replace—the human side of selling.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
Selling means helping people make progress. Keep the buyer’s desired outcome at the center of every conversation.
Preparation and process build trust. Understanding the buyer’s world and following a clear process helps you guide the conversation with confidence and relevance.
Trust will differentiate you in the age of AI. Technology can support research, strategy, and analysis, but buyers still need trusted people who can help them execute and create change.
Don’t use AI to scale chaos. Simplify and document what already works before trying to automate or accelerate your sales process.
Simplify what you sell. Focus on the central problem you solve and communicate one clear outcome instead of overwhelming buyers with products, features, and options.
Send fewer, better messages. Replace generic volume with deeper preparation, relevance, personality, and communication that demonstrates you understand the person you’re trying to reach.

HIGHLIGHT QUOTES
Trust will be the key differentiator in the age of AI.

If you stick to one process, you are more in service actually, in the service of the other person making progress.

What you want is AI. What you need is writing down the process first.

Instead of sending 200 things, let’s send 20 this week, but let’s go deeper.

Send less messages, but make them more interesting, make them stand out, make them about who you are and what you can do for them.
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES
Explore the secrets of heart-centered leadership and thriving workplace cultures with Culture from the Heart Podcast! Nominate a visionary CEO at https://culturefromtheheart.com/Home

Get Larry's New Book: Selling Food from the Heart, https://a.co/d/07dzlMx8
Subscribe to The Selling from the Heart Podcast Youtube Channel! Stay updated with the latest episodes and leadership tips: https://www.youtube.com/c/sellingfromtheheart/

Get Your Daily Dose of Inspiration:
https://www.sellingfromtheheart.net/daily

Rashmi Airan is a globally recognized keynote speaker, transformation expert, and former attorney whose story of resilience, accountability, and reinvention has inspired leaders and organizations around the world.
A graduate of Columbia Law School, Rashmi built a successful career as an attorney, Wall Street investment banker, entrepreneur, and business leader before a series of decisions resulted in a federal prison sentence.
Today, Rashmi uses that experience to help leaders navigate pressure, uncertainty, and ethical challenges with greater clarity and integrity. Through her Rise Through It™ framework, she helps individuals and teams strengthen resilience, self-awareness, trust, and values-driven leadership.
SHOW SUMMARY
In this episode of Selling from the Heart, Larry Levine and Darrell Amy welcome Rashmi Airan for a powerful conversation about ethical drift, achievement, pressure, and the decisions sales professionals make when the stakes are high.
Rashmi shares how her identity became tied to achievement and how financial uncertainty and the pressure to succeed influenced decisions that eventually changed the course of her life.
She explains how fear can disguise itself as ambition, urgency, creativity, or aggressive problem-solving—making it easier to rationalize decisions that no longer align with our values.
Rashmi introduces her Clarity Loop, four questions designed to create space between pressure and action: What am I feeling? What story am I telling myself? What matters most? What choice can I own later?
Ultimately, this episode challenges sales professionals to pursue performance without sacrificing alignment, integrity, or the ability to look back and own the decisions they made.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
Integrity rarely collapses—it drifts. Small compromises can gradually move us away from our values.
Pressure can disguise fear as ambition. What looks like urgency or aggressive problem-solving may be driven by something deeper.
Create space between pressure and action. A brief pause can change the trajectory of a high-stakes decision.
Use the Clarity Loop. Ask: What am I feeling? What story am I telling myself? What matters most? What choice can I own later?
Move from performance to alignment. Results matter, but they shouldn't determine which values you're willing to compromise.
Practice moral humility. Recognize that anyone can drift under the right circumstances.
Make disagreement safe. Healthy cultures need people who are willing and able to challenge decisions without fear of punishment.

HIGHLIGHT QUOTES
We all have an inner voice. We all have a moral compass.

We need people to disagree with us.

If we’re acting out of alignment with who we are or what we believe, that’s where the bad decisions happen.

Integrity rarely collapses, it drifts.

What choice can I own later?
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES
Explore the secrets of heart-centered leadership and thriving workplace cultures with Culture from the Heart Podcast! Nominate a visionary CEO at https://culturefromtheheart.com/Home

Get Larry's New Book: Selling Food from the Heart, https://a.co/d/07dzlMx8
Subscribe to The Selling from the Heart Podcast Youtube Channel! Stay updated with the latest episodes and leadership tips: https://www.youtube.com/c/sellingfromtheheart/

Get Your Daily Dose of Inspiration:
https://www.sellingfromtheheart.net/daily

Collin Henderson is a mental performance coach, speaker, author, and founder of Master Your Mindset, where he helps leaders, sales professionals, athletes, and organizations unlock peak performance by mastering the inner game.
Drawing from his experience as a Division I athlete, top-performing medical sales professional, and national sales trainer, Collin focuses on mindset, leadership, culture, and sales psychology. A seven-time author and host of the Master Your Mindset podcast, his training has been used by organizations including Nike, Microsoft, Salesforce, Amazon, Zillow, and the Los Angeles Dodgers.
Through his coaching, speaking, and writing, Collin helps people strengthen confidence, resilience, self-awareness, and the mental habits required for sustainable high performance.
SHOW SUMMARY
In this episode of Selling from the Heart, Larry Levine and Darrell Amy welcome mental performance coach Collin Henderson to explore the psychology behind sales performance and why mastering your inner game is essential to sustainable success.
Collin begins with a simple philosophy: “Never sell, serve.” He challenges sales professionals to move from an “I-centered” mindset to a “we-centered” approach focused on curiosity, value, and helping customers succeed.
The conversation explores how limiting beliefs, self-image, confidence, resilience, and self-talk influence performance long before sales techniques are put into action. Collin also introduces The Oz Method, connecting the brain to belief and curiosity, the heart to emotional connection, the lion to courage and vulnerability, and the yellow brick road to the habits and systems that make success repeatable.
Ultimately, Collin challenges sales professionals to examine the stories they repeatedly tell themselves. Your strategy matters. Your skills matter. Your market matters. But your biggest competition may still be you.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
Never sell—serve. Shift from an “I-centered” mindset to creating meaningful value for the customer.
Psychology precedes strategy. Sales techniques are only as effective as the beliefs driving the person using them. 
You never outperform your beliefs. Assumptions about yourself, buyers, the market, or the economy can quietly limit your performance. 
Self-awareness creates change. You cannot challenge a limiting belief until you're willing to recognize it. 
Master The Oz Method. Combine belief and curiosity, emotional connection, courage and vulnerability, and disciplined processes. 
Train your self-talk. The way you narrate wins, losses, rejection, and opportunity directly influences confident action. 
Stop blaming external competition. Before looking at the market, examine the beliefs influencing how you're showing up.

HIGHLIGHT QUOTES
Psychology precedes strategy every single time.

You never outperform your own beliefs.

Our limits begin where our vision ends.

Self-talk is the number one driver of confident action.

The brain doesn't care what is true or false. The brain cares about what is repeated
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES
Explore the secrets of heart-centered leadership and thriving workplace cultures with Culture from the Heart Podcast! Nominate a visionary CEO at https://culturefromtheheart.com/Home

Get Larry's New Book: Selling Food from the Heart, https://a.co/d/07dzlMx8
Subscribe to The Selling from the Heart Podcast Youtube Channel! Stay updated with the latest episodes and leadership tips: https://www.youtube.com/c/sellingfromtheheart/

Get Your Daily Dose of Inspiration:
https://www.sellingfromtheheart.net/daily

Lance Wright is an Addiction Recovery Specialist, TEDx speaker, author, and founder of Life Over Addiction. With more than three decades of personal recovery experience and years working professionally in behavioral health, Lance helps individuals, families, and working professionals navigate addiction, stress, identity, and personal transformation.
Through his concept of “Thought Addiction,” Lance explores how deeply rooted narratives, beliefs, and emotional conditioning can influence behavior. His work helps people reconnect with purpose, resilience, and lasting change through awareness, neuroplasticity-based practices, and honest human connection.
SHOW SUMMARY
In this episode of Selling from the Heart, Larry Levine and Darrell Amy welcome Lance Wright for a powerful conversation about high performance, addiction, validation, and the internal pressures many sales professionals carry.
Lance shares his extraordinary journey from addiction and incarceration to recovery and transformation, along with the lessons that helped him rebuild his life.
The conversation also examines a form of addiction that can easily hide behind professional success: the constant chase for validation. The next sale, ranking, award, or big win may provide a temporary high—but what happens when your sense of worth depends on achieving the next one?
Lance challenges sales professionals to separate who they are from what they achieve, recognize unhealthy coping patterns, and have the courage to seek support before those patterns become destructive.
Ultimately, this conversation is a reminder that sustainable success begins on the inside.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
Your performance is not your identity. Sales results change. Your sense of worth cannot depend entirely on quotas, rankings, or recognition.
Validation can become a chase. The emotional high of winning fades quickly when achievement becomes the primary source of fulfillment.
Pressure can reveal deeper beliefs. Rejection and uncertainty can expose fears around failure, inadequacy, perfectionism, and acceptance.
Unhealthy coping patterns can develop gradually. Behaviors used to escape stress or emotional discomfort can become increasingly difficult to control.
Authenticity goes deeper than professional success. Knowing who you are apart from your achievements creates a stronger foundation.

HIGHLIGHT QUOTES
The win isn't the real thing, it's the chase, it's the hunt.

How do I not use my profession as a casino?

I don't need your validation. I know who I am.

I didn't have that thought. I was taught that thought.

The mirror never lies. Only the person looking into the mirror lies.
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES
Explore the secrets of heart-centered leadership and thriving workplace cultures with Culture from the Heart Podcast! Nominate a visionary CEO at https://culturefromtheheart.com/Home

Get Larry's New Book: Selling Food from the Heart, https://a.co/d/07dzlMx8
Subscribe to The Selling from the Heart Podcast Youtube Channel! Stay updated with the latest episodes and leadership tips: https://www.youtube.com/c/sellingfromtheheart/

Get Your Daily Dose of Inspiration:
https://www.sellingfromtheheart.net/daily

Cory Dunham is an Executive Advisor, Business Growth Strategist, Speaker, and founder of Cory Dunham Advisory. He also serves as CEO of BDB Marketing Design, LLC.
With more than 30 years of business and marketing experience, Cory helps service-based businesses grow through clearer messaging, stronger leadership alignment, and greater strategic consistency. His work focuses on closing the gap between the value a company delivers and how that value is seen, understood, trusted, and chosen in the marketplace.
Cory brings a practical, people-centered approach to helping leaders strengthen communication, clarify positioning, align their teams, and create sustainable growth.
SHOW SUMMARY
In this episode of Selling from the Heart, Larry Levine and Darrell Amy welcome Cory Dunham to explore why clarity, differentiation, and human connection are becoming increasingly important competitive advantages.
Cory explains that differentiation isn't simply about having a better product or service. Sales professionals must clearly communicate meaningful value while leaning into what technology cannot replicate—their stories, experiences, lessons, relationships, and human presence.
Drawing from his experience as a private pilot, Cory shares lessons about self-awareness, situational awareness, and making the next best decision when circumstances become overwhelming. The conversation also explores how sales professionals can use AI, video, podcasts, and social media to become more human and visible—not less.
Ultimately, Cory challenges salespeople to stop adding to the noise and get clear about who they serve, what customers value, and why they deserve a place at the table.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
Clarity is a competitive advantage. Know who you serve, what they value, and how you create meaningful results.
Your humanity is your differentiation. AI cannot replicate your experiences, stories, relationships, or perspective. 
Ask instead of assuming. Better questions and intentional listening reveal what truly matters to buyers. 
Use technology to humanize yourself. Let digital tools increase your visibility without replacing genuine connection. 
AI cannot fix confusion. Technology won't solve unclear messaging, positioning, leadership, or strategy. 
Make the next best decision. You don't always need every answer—you need enough awareness to determine the next right move. 
Meaningful value earns attention. Clearly articulating your value helps build trust and earn a place at the table. 

HIGHLIGHT QUOTES
In any given moment, you have the capacity to make the next best step.

Two ears, one mouth. Let's use them in that proportion.

No one has the exact story or has walked in your shoes one step.

I think we're just all built as human beings to connect with other human beings.

Clarity, clarity, and more clarity, both personally and professionally.
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES
Explore the secrets of heart-centered leadership and thriving workplace cultures with Culture from the Heart Podcast! Nominate a visionary CEO at https://culturefromtheheart.com/Home

Get Larry's New Book: Selling Food from the Heart, https://a.co/d/07dzlMx8
Subscribe to The Selling from the Heart Podcast Youtube Channel! Stay updated with the latest episodes and leadership tips: https://www.youtube.com/c/sellingfromtheheart/

Get Your Daily Dose of Inspiration:
https://www.sellingfromtheheart.net/daily