Power Play #6: This One Simple Factor Can Change the Game in Your Sales Strategy
Do you ever feel like you’re falling behind in sales because you don’t have the latest knowledge or skills?
Lifelong learning isn’t just a buzzword—it’s a mindset that separates high performers from the rest. In this episode, Cindy and Lisa break down why staying curious is the secret to long-term success. They dive into overcoming common learning roadblocks like time constraints, lack of motivation, and knowledge gaps, while also sharing actionable strategies to make learning a daily habit. Whether it's leveraging technology, seeking mentorship, or attending industry conferences, this conversation will inspire you to never stop growing!
Tune in now to power up your career with the ultimate success tool: lifelong learning.
Episode Chapter Markers
00:00 Introduction: The Importance of Lifelong Learning in Sales
03:06 Power Play #6: Lifelong Learning
04:00 Overcoming Obstacles to Lifelong Learning
04:52 Real-Life Examples and Technology Challenges
15:31 The Role of Curiosity in Lifelong Learning
17:45 Practical Resources for Lifelong Learning
21:43 Conclusion and Call to Action
Must-Hear Insights and Key Moments
The Learning Mindset – The Girls of Grit explain why continuous learning is the foundation of success in medical sales and beyond.
Overcoming Knowledge Gaps – Addressing the fear of the unknown and how to stay ahead in a fast-changing industry.
No Time to Learn? No Problem! – Creative ways to integrate learning into a busy sales schedule.
The Danger of Complacency – Why thinking you’ve “made it” can be the biggest career mistake.
The Power of Staying Curious – How curiosity fuels success and keeps you ahead of the competition.
Game-Changing Learning Resources – Must-have tools like Google Alerts, Audible, and industry conferences that can keep you sharp.
The Power Play Challenge – A simple action step you can take this week to build your learning habit.
Words of Wisdom: Standout Quotes from This Episode
"High performers don’t just work hard—they learn hard." – Cynthia Ficara
"Complacency is the enemy of success. The second you stop learning, you start falling behind." – Anneliese Rhodes
"Technology is changing everything. If you don’t keep up, you’ll be left behind." – Cynthia Ficara
"The best sales reps aren’t just experts in their product—they know their customers’ world inside and out." – Anneliese Rhodes
"If you’re struggling to find time to learn, you’re making an excuse. There’s always a way." – Cynthia Ficara
"Curiosity isn’t just for kids—it’s the trait that keeps top performers ahead of the game." – Anneliese Rhodes
"The most successful people are students for life." – Cynthia Ficara
"Never stop asking questions. The more you know, the more valuable you become." – Anneliese Rhodes
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A Team Dklutr production
Blog Transcript:
Note: We use AI transcription so there may be some inaccuracies
Anneliese Rhodes: Welcome everyone to another episode of Secrets in Medical Device Sales™ brought to you by the Girls of Grit™. We're so happy you guys keep joining us
Cynthia Ficara: Welcome back, everybody. Do you believe we're already on Power Play number six? I feel like when we first said this series, it was like ten, and now we are on the latter five.
And it's been, it's been so fun. So we've gotten some really great feedback that I think people have gravitated to our Power Play, thinking of how we really put together You know, again, a power play, two quick minutes when you've got the advantage in an ice hockey game. Where's your advantage in medical device?
Where are you going to go out today and have a great advantage? Yeah. I don't know, Lisa. What are you going to do today? Or tomorrow? Exactly.
Power Play #6: The Key to Sales Success—Lifelong Learning
Anneliese Rhodes: Tomorrow's Monday. Exactly. Um, it makes me like, it's actually these power plays have made me think about things a little bit more, Cindy, like as I was driving, you know, I listened to our podcast.
I mean, I know we record it, but every time I'm in the car, I'm like, listen to us. I love listening to us. Um, but it's actually like invigorated me a little bit and made me think, you know what? I'm really glad we actually are taking the time to spell this out for everybody because It's not like you guys don't know, you know, kind of like once you hear it, you're like, Oh yeah, duh.
But it's really nice when you have it written out or, or spelled out for you guys in these episodes so that you could really concentrate on one thing this week and really be really great at it. So this week's, um, is really cool. I I'm extremely excited to talk about this. I remember my girlfriend telling me, you know, how many books she's always reading and she's always doing crazy stuff.
And I'm like, dang, how do you find the time? But you know, it's a really good habit to have. And so our power play number six to being a highly successful sales person or a high performer is lifelong learning. And that is all about just, yeah, just continuing to. You know, educate yourself in every which way possible.
And you guys, it doesn't actually just mean professionally. It's also personally because the two go hand in hand, I really think. So today we're going to talk about that, why it's important. And if you are struggling to be like, well, I don't know where to go, you know, to find these resources. What do you guys do?
How do you operate? I think we're going to, I know we're going to talk about that today. And I, I'm hoping that that kind of helps outline everything for y'all.
Cynthia Ficara: Oh, I think it's awesome. And you know, I think you said something that warrants a little bit of addressing the it's so true lifelong learning.
That sounds like probably the most simple thing in a conversation. But if you don't stop and think about learning and think about how we can learn and grow and what it can actually do for you. And we're going to give you a little few little hacks in how you can just. You know, steal a few moments of each day that can make you grow exponentially over the course of time.
So, yeah, I, I think one of the things I want to kind of talk about first, if you're good with this, Lisa, is a few of the things I think that keep us from thinking we can't learn. Does that make sense?
Anneliese Rhodes: Yep. Absolutely. There's always excuses for everything. Cindy .
Cynthia Ficara: There
Anneliese Rhodes: you
Cynthia Ficara: go. We could, and we'll, we'll get, we'll get you in your power play to get over it, so.
Yep, yep. When, when we were talking about lifelong learning, one of the things I think that, uh, one of the first things is how people tend to, whether it's excuses or um. Or not feel they've grown into the times as knowledge gaps. So how many people do you know that hide behind not knowing technology like on your computer or on your phone?
That is just, well, I don't know how to do that. So then it becomes, I'm not going to learn. And If you think about a lot of the advancements we've had, whether it be in apps, in, you know, um, organizing your, your workload, what if you didn't find a way to, once you actually do it, you're like, that was so much easier.
The Competitive Advantage You Can’t Ignore
Anneliese Rhodes: Okay, I have a great example for all of you guys and Cindy and I were literally just laughing about this. So we started, so, okay, you know, real quick, we both are like, Oh, let's start a podcast. It can't be that hard. Okay, holy crap. Are you kidding me? Like, we're like, I kept calling it a garage hero or I don't even know, but it's garage band and like a guitar here.
I kept calling a guitar hero. Like we had to learn you guys, we had like a tutorial. Remember Cindy? We paid a guy to like, teach us how to use GarageBand and like, edit in GarageBand and record in GarageBand. Oh my god, you guys, that was like, super tough. Because, I mean, we're not spring chickens anymore. I mean, I'm not saying we're super old, but we're not, we're not in our 20s and we're not, my daughter can work a phone better than I can.
Yeah, so we literally had to take the time you guys to really learn the technology and it wasn't easy. It was, it took time, but we were committed to learning it because we really wanted to create this podcast to put it out for all of you and give you what we're doing now. But it took us a little while, Cindy, didn't it?
I mean, we had, we have a lot of bloopers, by the way,
Cynthia Ficara: a lot of bloopers. You know what? We should probably put on some bloopers. If you guys want to hear a little, because, you know, lifelong learning is part of that. Like you fall, you trip, you get up, you laugh. Here we are in medical device years and years, and we know what we're strong in.
Well, when it came to podcasting, like. What do we know about media platforms? Remember RSS feeds? I'm like, what on earth? I had to Google it. I'm like, I don't even know what that even means. The amount of time we spent. Thank you, YouTube. I tell you to all those things out on YouTube. By the way, our podcast is also on YouTube if you want to watch us, but you know, YouTube was amazing.
The amount of weekends we'd sit in the morning and just be like, my husband would be like, what are you doing? He's like, you're still YouTubing. I'm like, I don't know how to use GarageBand for all of you that don't know what that is. It's on Mac book air and it's your recording. And like. Say you, say you, um, are a singer and you're recording music, you do that in there.
Well, we have the ability to do our podcast in there. It was
Know Your Customer’s World: Staying Ahead in Medical Sales
Anneliese Rhodes: really cool. Yeah, it was really cool to like mix and match and do the sounds. But anyhow, you know, you're talking about technology and You know, there's a lot of, there's a lot of stuff that we all as medical device professionals are using, you know, we have hand scanners, we have phones, we have laptops, some people have other devices, apps, all sorts of things to be more efficient, more effective, and you know, I can think of a couple people that I know, Cindy, that are really hesitant to learn that stuff.
And it's like, Oh, well, I'll let so and so teach me. And the truth is, is like, You guys, we are in an ever changing, fast paced world of technology, and it's only ever going to get more fast paced. I mean, with AI coming It's crazy the leaps and bounds that we're going to see, I think, in the next 5 to 10 years.
And so if you guys don't know how to operate at the very basic level, all the things that are given to you with your company, you need to learn them. You need to call up your IT people, spend that 30 to 45 minutes with them, and allow them to teach you how to do it. It's really important. You know, and I think another thing along with that is that when you are in the medical device arena, or in any type of sales for that matter, you You not only should know about your field of interest, but you should know the field of interest of your customers because, for example, when you're calling on a cardiothoracic surgeon or a vascular surgeon, they aren't just doing your one procedure.
They're doing multiple procedures and they. Kind of expect you to know about them, right? I mean, you need to make that part of your world. So if you don't know something, go and learn it. You just mentioned YouTube, Cindy. It's amazing what YouTube can teach you. Go and learn it so that you're never caught off guard when you're talking to your surgeons about a certain procedure.
They may be infiltrating another procedure and you should be aware of that. You never want to be caught off guard.
Cynthia Ficara: No, you don't. No, you don't. You know, it's, it's so crazy when again, lifelong learning, something so simple, but it's literally surrounds us all day every day. So, all right, we mentioned knowledge gaps, maybe an excuse or an obstacle that you may think that I don't want to learn this.
Okay. So let's talk about another one that, um, maybe some of you listeners out there are going to say a very common. I don't have the time. There's these time constraints, like, I'm so busy, I gotta get up, I gotta do this. Well, you know, that's a really good excuse, but there's still 24 hours in a day. And we've done different episodes on, you know, we touched on time management and being efficient with your time.
But, you know, time constraints is a perfect excuse that I could hear from people that don't want to learn. Yeah. Do you agree?
Anneliese Rhodes: Oh my gosh, absolutely. I mean, it's easy to get caught up in your world of sales. You're running and gunning. You're going from here to there. You know, you're trying to get all of your goals met for the day, for the week, for the month.
And it's like, Oh, I just don't have time. And I'm so tired at night. Or, you know, I get up so early as it is. I've got the kids. I've got to cook dinner. Whatever your excuses are, they're easy to make. But the truth is you guys, we just talked about technology. There are so many great things that you can take advantage of, you know, I think just, I mean, and we're talking, we're kind of giving you guys the solutions in the problems, but you know, one of the things that I do a lot, and I know you do Cindy is Audible.
Like literally you can go and download the Audible app. And I'm sure every one of you has the Audible app. And I will tell you, I'll be honest, there was a lot of times, there's, there are a lot of times, when I don't really, my brain feels overloaded, and I'm like, I just need to escape. And so, I will be honest, those are the times when I listen to just a random book, you know, a thriller, and I'll just listen to that.
But, I have found that once I start getting in the groove of listening to a really good educational book, man, it is, it is really getting my thought, my brain going. There's nothing wrong with a little bit of relaxing time, but I'll tell you what, during the day when I'm on the road or up in the morning early prior to my cases, I really find it helpful to listen to things that are really engaging my brain versus letting me just kind of space out, because you really need to set yourself up for a good day.
So I think those excuses of time constraints are, they don't, they don't sit well with me, because you can excuse anything, try and find that time, it's so important, your customers are, your competitors are, so if you really want to be highly successful, you need to discipline yourself to really take advantage of those down times, quote unquote, when you're driving, and
Cynthia Ficara: you know, you're very self aware, there's times, I mean, think about it, um, I'm going to use myself as an example, I am much better first thing in the morning.
So if I'm heading to an early case and it's like five 30 and it's dark, I will put in the most intense, highly, whatever. Nobody's calling me. It's still dark outside and I can really pay attention and listen. But by the time I've been up since, you know, leave the house at five, you've been in cases all day, you've worked, you've answered phones and conference calls, and then it's four 30 at night and you're driving back and you're tired.
But sometimes it's, it is the lightest amount of information. And maybe that's the time that I say, you know what, this is where my brain recharges that I'm not paying attention to learning. I'm just going to take a minute and chill to the radio or flip off. You know, you mentioned, um, you know, audible and while we're thinking of solutions, um, This kind of flips into time constraints very well.
Have you heard of the Mindscape app where it's short books? Oh my gosh. It's great. So it'll do like 15 minutes shortcuts of books. Like the 5am club we've mentioned that book is on there of like. You know, like I forget which like atomic habits is on there, but you can do like a 15 minute summary of a really good book on the mind escape app.
Yeah, we should put that in our little show notes. So that's crazy. That, that sounds
Anneliese Rhodes: like headspace. I've used headspace. I bet it's like the same thing. Yeah, that's really, that's such a great, that's such a great thing. You're exactly right. When you don't have the time to listen to the whole book, you know, you get the cliff notes.
I love cliff notes. Yeah,
Cynthia Ficara: I know. I totally
Anneliese Rhodes: use cliff notes. I didn't use them a lot, you guys. Did they? But oh my god. Do they still have cliff notes now? I don't even know. You know what? It's probably chat. No, you know what? It's more like chat.
Cynthia Ficara: It's more like, Oh, chat me this summary of this book. Oh, okay. So we used to, when we were in school, we have these little, they were yellow, right?
With yellow and black. Yes. Like a playbill. It was like a playbill. Yes. Oh my God. Oh my God. Anyway, we're making, we're making your own cliff notes here for lifelong learning. You're listening to this. This is your cliff note of the day. I love it. Okay. So. Knowledge gap, time constraints, our third excuse, problem, obstacle that somebody may try to say, um, is a reason for, they don't want to learn it's motivation and just being engaged, how many people struggle with all not motivated to learn this and et cetera, et cetera.
But you know, what, what do you think goes. Behind motivation. I, I, I truly believe it. What do you think it is? I know what I think it is. Well, I'll tell you what
The Danger of Complacency: Why Learning Never Stops
Anneliese Rhodes: I was actually just going to flip the script a little bit and say, you know, sometimes when you've reached that quote unquote pinnacle, you're like, Oh, I know it all.
I got it all, baby. I'm super successful. I hit president's club. I am on top of the world. There is nothing that I don't know. And that right there will be your downfall because we've talked about being arrogant. And not having humility and medical device sales, which is. So important. Um, and I think this goes right along with it.
You know, there are a lot of people out there that they're like, I don't need to learn anything more. I'm great Right where I'm at, which to me is complacency. Um, yeah. And I've seen that a lot, Cindy. I mean, I can think of a number of people that I know that are just like that, that they just don't wanna learn anymore.
And I feel like, man, you're gonna get passed. You are absolutely gonna get passed by your competition.
Cynthia Ficara: Yes, you will. That goes along with exactly what I was thinking. And it's really your why. What are you going for? And you know, every time you hit a goal, what's the next one? Or where are you going? And sometimes it's small goals.
And then you have, you know, the big finish line. And it's like, if you're not, you're always in the present. But I think to grow, you've always got to have something to look forward to, to keep you on a path of growth.
Anneliese Rhodes: Great point. Which
Cynthia Ficara: Which I think it kind of brings us to a good time to reveal our secret to lifelong learning.
I love to reveal our secret. Lisa, I'm going to give you the honors today to reveal the secret to lifelong learning according to the Girls of Grit.
The Secret to Lifelong Learning: Stay Curious
Anneliese Rhodes: According to the Girls of Grit. And, you know, it is so, I love this, it's staying curious. So our secret is to stay curious. You know, is, I think it's, God, it's so, it's such a great.
Saying, and I think it was Albert Einstein that said it best and he said, I have no special, this is Albert Einstein, by the way, I have no special talents. I am only passionately curious. And I feel like that is something that I have heard people like, I'm pretty sure Elon Musk. His, his first ex, his first wife, his ex wife said that he is always curious about solving the world's problems.
And it's like Elon Musk, holy crap, if you think about that guy, like he could literally run the world. But the point is, is I feel like the people that are the biggest leaders, the most successful, the people that we look up to, you know, they're staying curious. They never stopped learning. I mean, if you take that into sports and you talk about like Kobe Bryant.
Who, bless his heart, you know, had a tragic accident in his family, but I love him, loved him. Um, he never stopped shooting baskets, practicing every day, you know, day and night, dribbling drills. I mean the, just the basics, but it goes to show you, you guys that people that are highly successful never stop learning.
They're always curious. They're always trying to learn something new, whether it's a, it's a language, it's a medical procedure. It's, you know, I don't know, learning something about engineering or devices or whatever it is, it is so important that you guys stay curious. And I feel like that is such a childlike.
Behavior. You know, kids are so curious. Why? Why? Remember Cindy, we were just talking about this. Why? Why? Why? Why? Why?
Cynthia Ficara: You know, they're like, you remember when your daughter's like, why? But why? Why? Why? Why? Why? And you're like, it was like so common at age three. That was every other word. Why? Why? Why? Why?
Anneliese Rhodes: And you're like, please stop asking me why.
I don't know. But the truth is, is they want to know. And so should you. So should you, you should keep the childlike curiosity at all times in your job. And we know it's not easy. We know you can struggle with some of the stuff that we just talked about, but it's so important to remind yourself that if you want to be highly successful, you have to stay curious.
Using Conferences & Networking to Stay Ahead
Cynthia Ficara: Absolutely. You know, so, okay, let's think about some, a few resources just for medical device. Of course, stay tuned to us. Thank you. Thank you. We try to bring you all of our up to date, greatest and latest, but let's think about medical device. Where can you go? Absolutely. Journal. If you think about what drives physician, it's research.
It's the clinical practice out there. So if you want to know what's up and coming, you know, you can You can have a subscription to, um, even just whatever area is in your field, whether you are orthopedics, whether, you know, and anything that's like the journal of that makes it really important. And, um, what is it now?
I'm just blanking, not Medscape. Oh my goodness. Cause I was just thinking of headspace. I don't know. I don't know. Oh my gosh. It'll come to me. When I look online, Medline, and you can, and you can look up all the different journals. Oh my gosh. I just blanked out. That's funny. But also, um, I think one of my favorites that I look back, if I think, okay, what did I learn this year?
Going to conferences in your field is where the experts present the latest and greatest. But tell me this, Lisa, when you're around those physicians, I do get a chance to speak to them. Don't you feel that you always walk away with something great, like something else to learn and something else to know?
Anneliese Rhodes: Always humbled. I'm always so humbled by customers of all, you know, fields. It's like, Holly, they really know so much about what I yearn to continue to learn about, you know, it's really, yeah, it's amazing. And, and when you have a chance to ask even your customers, you know, I mean, if you've got a good relationship, even if you don't, this will help build that relationship.
Teach me, you know, Dr. Smith about this procedure. I don't know much about it. I'd love to learn about it. You might get invited into the OR to watch a procedure that isn't part of what you sell, but it's so a part of their lives. They, it may be their favorite procedure to do. I think it's so key to spend that time with your customers.
Number one, you're bonding, but number two, you're learning. You're learning about them. You're learning. Yeah, you're learning about their interests, their loves, and you're learning about the procedure itself, and you never know when you might need to call on that amount of knowledge for something else.
Maybe it's a personal thing, maybe of a family member that then suffers from that, and now you know a lot more about it to make a more informed decision. So I think absolutely, Cindy, going to these meetings, listening to these. Speakers. I mean, I can, I can attest that sometimes it gets really data driven and I get like, Whoa, that it was a lot of information.
But, you know, a lot of these times you can pull them aside after they talk and just really talk to them about it. So I love that idea. I think another, um, Oh, I was just going to expand
Cynthia Ficara: on the conference part about networking. So absolutely with the physicians, but think about your coworkers and sometimes you only see them, maybe they're a different part of the country and then you learn something they've learned and just kind of talking can really help.
But then on the third part of being at conferences, if you're a lifelong learner, what else do you need to know? You need to know what your competition is up to. You need to know what they're doing. And if you see what they're advertising and you start thinking, okay, where are they going to position this?
What does this mean for me? And what do I need to learn about that? So, you know, conferences reveal a lot of information that you can really network in many, many different ways.
Anneliese Rhodes: That was a great point. Actually, you just totally made me think of something else, but I won't overload you guys. So, but another, another great.
Um, solution that Cindy and I both use is Google alerts. So it's really easy, you guys, if you don't know how to use this, you just go into Google and you click on alerts and you can type in whatever key word you want. Like you can say medical devices, you could say AI, artificial intelligence. You could say venture capitalists.
You could say FDA approvals. You could say anything you want in that alert. And put it to your email, your personal email, and you will start to get emails every day. I get them. I think I get like 10 or 12 Google alerts every day. I'm going to admit, I don't always read them, but I try to at least look at them a couple times a week.
And you know what? Sometimes I learn about it. Something that's been released by a competitor before my company knows, because I'm just, I'm looking at the Google alerts. So it's really, really important you guys to definitely set yourself up for success in that aspect. And it's so simple to do.
Cynthia Ficara: I love that you remember to say that because you're exactly right.
I mean, that's a great tip. If you take nothing else from this, always be curious and remember to look at Google. Yeah, but I think we can, we can summarize, you know, we talked a little bit today about, um, lifelong learning and our secret is being curious because when you're curious, it leads to overcoming what you might think.
Is a knowledge gap, a time constraint, lack of motivation. I mean, it's amazing when you pulled it all together, but it is a process of continuous learning and growth. So, you know, a growth mindset will get you there always improving and learning new things. You can set a goal to have something to look forward to.
Even once you achieve one goal, what else is behind there? And don't forget to just be adaptable. Pivot when you need to, if something doesn't go the way you thought, Oh, well, just. Move on. And I also think that, um, a lot of times some of the information that we get, if we apply critical thinking to how this applies to what we can do, that can really, really help us get, um, a better understanding, you know, sometimes even if you're listening to podcasts or listening to different things, you can take from one context and apply it actually to your business in what you are trying to achieve.
Staying motivated is always fun. And I think that if you keep listening to us, we will keep you motivated. What do you think, Lisa?
Anneliese Rhodes: Absolutely. Yeah. We hope that we bring you guys every week, something that inspires you, something that makes you greater, more, you know, effective and efficient in your life and your sales world.
We want every single one of you guys to be high performers. So we really hope that our podcast is one of those resources for you. So thanks again for tuning in to another episode. We love hearing from y'all. Don't forget to write in to us. Have a great week. And
Cynthia Ficara: our call to action for today for Power Play number six.
Oh yeah, that's right. I challenge, yes, I want every one of you to find one, just one avenue of continued learning. Whether it's Audible, Mindscape, Google Alerts, A conference. I want all of you to come up with just one this week. Feel free to email us, or drop it in our DMs, and we cheer you on to a healthy curiosity of lifelong learning.
Anneliese Rhodes: Hey, Declutter, this is our snippet. Nobody wants to feel like they're behind the eight ball in sales, struggling to gain that crucial edge for success.
Cynthia Ficara: Does
Anneliese Rhodes: this resonate with you?
Cynthia Ficara: Well, if that's the case, then tune in to today's episode as we are diving into why lifelong learning is a game changing mindset for high performing salespeople.
Anneliese Rhodes: All right, we're going to record that one more time, McLetter. Nobody wants to feel like they're behind the eight ball in sales, struggling to gain that crucial edge for success. Did this resonate with you?
Cynthia Ficara: Well, if that's the case, then tune into today's episode. We are diving into why lifelong learning is a game changing mindset for top performing salespeople.
All right, Declutter, I
Anneliese Rhodes: want you to use my first and use Cindy's second. Thank you.
