I'd like to call this installment "ego is a bitch" because I have so much material to share on this egotistical jack ass. It was clear he had a big ego early on - way too big for his 5 foot 5 inch frame.
Rewind to early 2011, and this guy was in charge of a one month redesign project. The company prior to us had completely fucked up their one of many attempts to redesign and came crying back to us to fix it. I've learned this is a normal process for asshats. The husband-wife owners are the sweetest people alive, but they are also the dumbest internet people I've ever known - they are ignorant to the fullest and unfortunately for them, they are constantly getting screwed over and making terrible decisions for their website.
The website gets launched extremely quickly without a lot of hiccups and they're jazzed. I go through the project with asshat for several months, and didn't notice his weird forceful antics - probably because I'm just as forceful. Then he began to complain about their lead capture form, complain about not getting email leads, complain about conversion, and complain about the VP of sales breathing down his neck. How do you tell a client everything they chose to go live with was terrible? That was their problem. They had a shitty form that asked too much information, they never planned properly for a call-to-action, and didn't ask the correct vendors to fix things (i.e. email server issues). Of course, all things that we are supposed to deal with but asshat thought he knew everything.
This was just the beginning of the madness, but exactly where it all started. I remember it got so bad to the point that they took it upon themselves to redesign the call-to-action. They had no idea what they were doing and stupidly we let them do it because asshat was so demanding. We got back control of the CTA, but asshat was still whining about conversions and forcing us to talk to the VP of sales. To this day, I have no idea why he kept making us answer to a sales guy.
Enter problem #1: Ego
I invited the sales guy to a meeting, because duh - asshat asked us to talk to him. Why was that such a problem? I don't know, but I will include what asshat wrote me right after that meeting:
Subject Line: What are you doing?
"I dont like being blindsided, and I did not ask you to pull [sales guy] in each week. I'd appreciate it if you run these things by me. [sales guy]is not in my department, and I'd like to talk to him about things in advance. But it looks like it’s a done deal now as he's been invited, so thanks. I'm flying to Florida until Saturday for the NASA Juno launch so we can chat next week when I'm back."
Are you kidding me?? AND WTF is up with him telling me he's flying to Florida for NASA Juno launch - really? Does he think that I think he's cool for saying that?
And here's the real kicker, he was also a Dale Carnegie graduate coach! WTF! The only time he was nice was when I asked him about the course because he was so proud of being a Graduate Coach.
"It was amazing, and I am still using tools and principles I learned in that class. I took the class in 2010, and after that I have also become a Graduate Coach for two other classes since. I just finished my last class two weeks ago, and I would sign up again to teach in a heartbeat."
I made lifelong friends and networked with many, many different companies and individuals. I left all of my course materials at home this week, but when I get them I'll give you a better idea of what the class covers. I may also forward a few old emails from my original instructor that will give you a sense of how fantastic the classes are. I cannot recommend taking this course enough. And just so you know, you are likely to run into many people who took the course earlier in their lives - and they never forget it. I remember when I told my favorite Uncle that I was taking the course he was just so enthusiastic for me and told me how he had taken it at about the same point in his life, and how it had affected his entire professional career.
This course works, and the rewards for you will be great, and they will be measurable. It's usually a 13-week course and you even receive college credit for taking it. But the best part in my mind is how you will find yourself just dying to get to class each week. You will find yourself changed, but in a very good way. Thanks for asking and I hope if nothing else I can share some more information about its topics later on. Well, that's my pitch for now. Talk to you soon!"
Based on his attitude and how his career ended at this company - even Dale Carnegie can't help an ASSHAT!
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