Mark: “Okay, listen carefully. Here’s what I’d like you to do. First, reach up to your face and take off your rose-colored glasses. Then get a Q-tip and clean the wax out of your ears. Finally, take off your pink panties and call the fucking vice president right now, because you do not have a deal.” Mark was right. It turned out that we did not have a deal, as the vice president’s peer in networking was blocking it. We eventually got a meeting with him and won the deal. More important, Mark set the tone: Sloppiness would not be tolerated.
