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The Shift Control Sales Podcast

The Shift Control Sales Podcast

By: Shift Control
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Helping ambitious SMEs and sales leaders unlock performance through strategic coaching, sales training, and practical growth advice rooted in 20 years of real-world experience. I’m Paul McAnallen, founder of Shift Control, a consultancy that works with SMEs, sales leaders, and founders across Ireland to improve sales performance and leadership effectiveness. Over the last 20 years, I’ve helped hundreds of businesses accelerate sales through strategy, coaching, and leadership development. From creating go-to-market strategies to developing SDR teams and mentoring senior sales professionals, I bring a no-nonsense, high-impact approach to driving commercial growth. With deep cross-industry experience and a commitment to clarity and action, I work as a trusted growth partner — not just a trainer — helping businesses turn potential into performance.All rights reserved Economics
Episodes
  • It's hard to fix what you cannot see
    Aug 5 2025
    I used to work with a business man who was as good at coaching as he was at growing a multi-million pound business. “I really pity the man that doesn’t know he doesn’t know.” He said to me one day, almost 20 years ago. It took a while to land but he was talking about that thing everyone is afflicted with – a blind spot. The phrase ‘blind spot’ comes from the Johari Window, a psychological model developed in 1955 by Joseph Luft and Harrington Ingham — the name “Johari,” comes from a blend of their first names. It was originally created as a framework for understanding and improving interpersonal communication, particularly within group dynamics and team settings. As a coach, a manager to as a sales person intent on improving, it's important to spend some time looking for that which is harder to see - or those characteristics that you have been spending a lifetime trying to avoid
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    19 mins
  • Who do you trust?
    Jul 29 2025
    Having invited guests over last week, I found myself without some key ingredients for a vegetarian dish I had planned to make. Taking the list of ingredients I challenged CHAT GPT to create a recipe for a similar meal - and it did. At no point did I question the recipe and it made me realise how much trust I have placed in this technology in such a short space of time. Research suggests that almost 60% of people in sales believe that AI tools sometimes provide inaccurate or misleading information. The big question to sales leaders becomes are you constantly regulating the veracity and quality of the information used by your sales people (and lets face it, yourselves)? If not giving you a competitive edge just yet, AI has given you the chance to reclaim some of your time each day - if you are not integrating AI in your sales function you are missing out. If you haven't given your team the authority to use AI, work on the basis that they are already taking some short cuts - you need to make sure if those short cuts aren't going to case long term damage.
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    12 mins
  • Sales Isn’t About Activity — It’s About Awareness
    Jul 17 2025
    Plenty of the recent episodes focus on the importance of process, from pipeline management to presentation formats. We can get caught up with the lure of CRM, believing that data and data management is everything. It gets tiring, sat in another sales meeting, discussing pipeline and nothing has moved from the previous meeting. A slow agonising death. Data is important, process is important but when it comes to influencing sales decisions, awareness and emotional intelligence matter most. In this episode I talk about the importance of awareness and being present when it comes to closing out on deals in your pipeline.
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    31 mins
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