### PRINCIPLE #001:
#### PROXIMITY, LUCK, TIMING

The week didn't surprise anyone.

The attempt was made. The numbers were checked. The outcome landed where everyone expected it to land.

People pretend sales is a craft. As if technique controls the result. As if personalization moves the needle. As if effort guarantees anything. It never has.

Every week a new guru repackages the same tricks as revelation. The costume changes. The odds don't.

The truth is basic. Proximity gets you in the room. Luck decides what happens next. Timing decides if any of it matters.

Everything else is just us trying to feel in control.

Cold outreach makes this obvious. You can write the perfect message. You can follow every rule. And still get nothing.

A broken clock is right twice a day. Cold outreach works the same way. When it hits, it's usually coincidence, not mastery.

Everyone knows this. They just don't say it out loud. It keeps the routine performance intact.

**ASSESSMENT:**
 The work changed. The math didn't. The results followed the same pattern they always follow.

**RECOMMENDATION:**
 Do what you can. Accept what you can't. And when the normal options run out, do what most people do quietly anyway. Throw a hail mary.


### CONFESSION #001:
#### THE NETWORK I DON'T HAVE

People assume I am well connected. They see the title. They see the tenure. They see the numbers from a different decade. They decide I must have a network that can open any door.

I have let them believe it. There is no value in correcting the story.

The truth is simple. My so-called Rolodex is a list of people I have known long enough to text without an introduction. Some are former co-workers. Some are distant acquaintances I met at a conference where nobody learned anything. Some are classmates from a school that did nothing to prepare us for actual work. Most respond out of habit, not interest.

The team treats it like an asset. They come to me when a target stops replying. They come to me when a deal will not move. They come to me when the outbound engine falls apart in front of everyone. They believe I can produce a warm path on command.

I play the part. I scroll through names in my phone as if each one might solve something. I pick the one who still answers every few months. I craft a polite message that suggests I am checking in for personal reasons. They usually reply with a thumbs up. Sometimes they do not reply at all. This is what strategic outreach looks like behind the curtain.

The team never sees the silence. They only see the one or two introductions that land each quarter. Survivor bias keeps the illusion stable. They think I have reach. They think I have influence. They think I can get anyone to return a call.

The reality is that I can open a few doors, and only the ones that were already cracked. Everything else quires time, leverage, or an alignment of circumstances that has nothing to do with me.

When those doors stay shut, the room gets quiet. The team waits for me to announce the next move. I pretend to think through options that do not exist. Everyone already knows how this ends.

Someone suggests we try a hail mary. I nod as if the idea is new.









### OBSERVATION #001:
#### PERSONALIZATION IS THEATER

We got another message in the team Slack this morning. Someone shared a post from LinkedIn about "the perfect personalized opener." The comments were full of the usual excitement.

> "Saving this."
>
> "Stealing this."
>
> "Love the empathy here."

Management pinned it for visibility.

The post showed an email so hyper targeted it might as well have been a biography. The rep had referenced the prospect's hometown, podcast, old job, and a line from an article they wrote three years ago. Everyone applauded the craft.

Someone finally asked the question. "Did you take the meeting?" The poster replied an hour later. "No, but it stood out."

We get versions of these every week. A podcast mention. A stray line about their favorite team. A compliment disguised as relevance. It is personalization, but in practice it feels like flattery that took too long to write.

We try it anyway. We rewrite subject lines. We hunt for details the prospect forgot they shared online. We add emojis the gurus say "humanize the outreach." Sometimes we even use their own phrasing back at them because it "shows active listening."

Most replies, when they happen, are corrections.

> "I haven't lived in Chicago in years."
>
> "I'm not with that company anymore."
>
> "Please update your notes."

More often there is nothing. No open. No click. No reply. Just radio silence.

Around noon, someone posted another "god-tier cold email" from a different guru. Long thread. Lots of analysis about tone, cadence, flow. More praise for the craft. When asked if it led to a meeting, the answer was the same. No.

By the afternoon, leadership reminded us that "personalization drives conversion." The said it with confidence. The chart they attached had no labels.

We still do it. We try to sound thoughtful. We still perform the effort. Not because we think it works, but because no one wants to be the person who sends a generic opener and proves the quiet truth.

Most days end the same way. No matter how personal the email is, the silence is identical. When that happens, the team starts looking around for whatever comes next.

It is usually a hail mary.








### DIRECTIVE #001:
#### WEEKLY FORECASTING

Forecasting is a performance, not a prediction.

I update the forecast every Monday. Not because it tells the truth. It doesn't. I do it because it gives the appearance that someone is steering the ship.

The reps send me their numbers in Slack. Most of them copy last week's and push a few dates forward. A couple inflate their deals so I will stop asking questions. One of them sandbags because he thinks I will not notice the pattern.

I consolidate everything into one spreadsheet. The VP does not read the notes. He scrolls straight to the totals. If the delta looks survivable, he nods. If it does not, he asks what "our plan" is, as if there is a plan that fixes basic arithmetic.

We all pretend these numbers mean something. The team pretends they can be coached into accuracy. Leadership pretends trendlines are destiny. No one wants to admit the obvious. Forecasting is theater. Everyone lies because everyone has to. That is how the machine stays upright.

I am expected to motivate them through it. To run pipeline reviews. To run stand ups. To run "discovery workshops." To run whatever keeps the illusion stitched together for another quarter.

I know most of these deals won't land. They know I know. We perform anyway.

**Recommendation:**
 We will call these numbers committable for now. We will refine the narrative before next week's meeting. And when this show collapses like it always does, someone will suggest the usual hail mary.

### EXPERIMENT #001:
#### THE DONUT INCIDENT

Sales gurus claimed baked goods could bypass gatekeepers. "Prospects remember the gesture," they said. "It humanizes you." We disagreed, but we ran the experiment anyway.

At 08:00, a dozen powdered donuts were picked up from a shop with a name we immediately regretted saying out loud. The instructions were straightforward: deliver to Company XYZ's office with a short note saying, "If you love these, you'll love what we're building."
The message was chosen for maximum clarity and minimum self-respect.

The courier delivered at 09:02. Reception accepted the box with a look that suggested she'd seen this tactic before and hated all of them equally. The donuts were taken somewhere we couldn't see. Likely a break room, possibly a trash bin. Hard to know.

At 10:23, an internal contact confirmed the donuts never reached "decision makers." They sat beside three other boxes of pastries from three other hopeful vendors, all competing for attention in a room no one wanted to be in. One muffin was half-eaten. Everything else was untouched.

By 12:49, our contact overheard fragments of a conversation. They weren't flattering.

> "Most people are remote anyway. Why send this here?"
>
> "I'm doing keto."
>
> "Donuts? Are we cops?"
>
> "This feels like that LinkedIn crap where reps pretend to care."

At 15:12, someone opened our box, took a single bite from a chocolate donut, put it back, and removed the note. No one claimed responsibility for either action.

By 17:44, the entire box was reassigned to janitorial staff. They accepted it with a level of enthusiasm we never once received from company XYZ's leadership.

No reply.
 No acknowledgement.
 No meeting.
 Not even a courtesy "appreciate the gesture."

**ASSESSMENT:**
 Pastry-based outreach collapses under modern workplace conditions. Remote work killed communal break rooms. Dietary restrictions killed baked-good neutrality. And corporate cynicism killed whatever "delight" this tactic supposedly delivered.

The tactic makes the sender look desperate and the recipient feel monitored. At best, it creates confusion. At worst, it triggers an HR thread.

Could have thrown a hail mary instead. Cheaper than donuts. Less theater.

**RECOMMENDATION:**
 Do not repeat. Nothing good begins with a pastry.

HAIL MARY

PROPAGANDA

PRINCIPLE #001:

PROXIMITY, LUCK, TIMING

Archive - Q4 2025

HAIL MARY