Why your employee makes excuses instead of making sales calls

Question

I run a company, and one of my employees refuses to do sales follow-ups or book appointments no matter how many times I tell them. Whenever I ask why, they give me some plausible-sounding answer, but none of it is an actual reason not to do the work. What is going on here? It makes zero sense to me.

OK Man · Accepted Answer

Ah, yeah—that’s the #1 cause of premature baldness among founders.. You ask, “Hey, did you make that follow-up call?” and they hit you back with some strangely articulate *getting-ready poetry* like, “Oh, I’m currently researching trends in their sector so we can reach out at the optimal moment…,” or “I want to tighten up the lead list first and then hit them all at once!” And then you check back a week later and they’re still “cleaning the list.” Bro, I’ve been waiting 168 hours here lol You’re probably clutching your head going, “Why can’t they do something this simple?! It makes no sense!”—but the real reason is dead simple. They’re scared. That’s it. A grown-ass adult is so terrified of making a single phone call that they’re about to pee their pants. Think about it, though: a thirty-something professional cannot look their CEO in the eye and say, “When I call a stranger and they go ‘Not interested, click,’ it hurts my feelings so much that my fingers start trembling on the receiver…” If they said that out loud, you’d just go, “What are you, in third grade?” and that’d be the end of it. So to hide the fact that they’re chicken, the human brain spins every remaining neuron at max RPM to fabricate a *plausible reason for strategic retreat*. “The timing is premature.” “The lead quality isn’t there yet.” “We risk diluting the brand.” Translate all of that into plain English and it’s just the cry of a five-year-old: “But if they’re mean to me, I’ll be sad!” Or rather, the groan of a 35-year-old toddler. I call this the “Ivy-League Pickup-Artist Syndrome.” You know those guys who stand on a corner downtown on a Friday night trying to talk to girls, fail to approach a single one, retreat into a coffee shop, and sit there sipping an oat-milk latte earnestly explaining, “Man, the talent pool out there tonight is just super mid”? That exact same thing is happening inside your office right now. Well… not that I can talk—I once spent eight straight hours at a college festival at UCLA and only managed to say hi to one girl... That said, you should probably accept that you, the founder, are the crazy one here. Founders are freaks whose pain receptors for “getting rejected” and “getting ignored” came factory-numbed from birth. When your company is gonna go under next month unless you book meetings and bow your head, you don’t have the luxury of having pride. Normal employees aren’t wired like that. Whatever happens to the company next month, they figure direct deposit is still hitting their account on payday. Which means their #1 top priority isn’t “company revenue”—it’s “making it to 5 p.m. today without a single scratch on my tiny little ego.” Given the choice between risking a cold shoulder from some random receptionist and getting yelled at by you while adjusting Excel borders by one millimeter, getting yelled at over Excel is way easier on the heart. So stop grilling them on “Why haven’t you done it yet?” starting today. All that does is make both of you miserable. A solution? ...Nah, there isn’t one lol. Basically, all you can do is leave that person in the corner adjusting Excel borders by 1mm, and go hire a pain-numb Terminator who feels zero shame hitting on strangers for a living.