Dane Dittemore

My interests

when i'm not at work

Staying in shape has always been a big and important part of my life. It gives me energy that I put right back into my work.

I've always been an adventurer of sorts. Scuba Diving has taken me to Cozumel, Hawaii, St. Kitts/Nevis, The US Virgin Islands, the Bahamas, Grand Cayman, Belize, Aruba, Curacao, and Bonaire (twice). 

Boating and water skiing are two of the most calming, yet invigorating things I enjoy. A great combination of nature and speed. Anything "on" or "in" water, whether it be an ocean or a lake is for me.

Not having lived near the mountains hasn't dampened my love for them. As an adrenaline junkie, I've always been drawn to downhill skiing. My travels have taken me many times to Colorado. Breckenridge, Aspen, Vail, Steamboat, Copper, and Winter Park to name a few. I've also been to Park City, Snowbird, Banff, Whistler and Tahoe.

I'm all about music. Rock and blues mainly, but especially live music.

Early in my career, I earned my Series 6 license to sell securities. I'm an avid CNBC fan. Even though I'm more of an investor than a trader, I still love to watch the markets and place a few long-term bets.

I also like plants and gardening. I grew up in a family where my mother was a life-long gardener and Orchid growing champion, so I think some of her green thumb rubbed off on me.

...and it goes without saying I'm a techie at heart. Anything tech, but mainly enterprise corporate tech. Cloud, Web, infrastructure-as-a-service, and marketing tech.

my story

I've always been a computer geek at heart. Even before computer geeks started taking over the world. 

So you may be wondering how an analytical introvert ends up spending his entire career as a salesperson?

If you are, read on.

I consider myself as an odd mix of analytical and expressive. I'd have to say that I was analytical and introverted in the early years. My passions were, and remain, math, finance, statistics, computers, business, water sports, and anything involving speed and adrenaline. Oh, and money. I guess you could say money and freedom were my motivations in the early years. 

During the first two years of college, I ran my own lawn business. OK, so I cut grass for a bunch of widowers and widows, but it showed that I was an enterprising kid from the start. Knowing that minimum wage wouldn't cut it for me (no pun intended), I ran down to the local grocery store and ran 1,000 copies of a handwritten flyer saying I'd cut grass or trim bushes. I delivered those flyers on my bicycle to all the neighborhoods around where I lived. Within a week, wala! Instant business. Soon I was making $150.00 a week for 10 hours of work. My friends were making $100.00 a week working full time. Great life lesson...and a good use of my math skills.

Then everything changed. My life took a different path. I had two roommates in College that sold Kirby vacuum cleaners during the summer. Reluctantly, I went out with them and noticed the most peculiar and foreign thing I had ever seen. Selling door-to door? You gotta be kidding me. Me, a shy kid walking up to a strangers house with a roll of paper towels as a gift - offering to sweep the floor? I sold about 50 vacuum cleaners (we called them home maintenance systems because they were so expensive). This was also a great life lesson, because it taught me the value of hard work. It also taught me that if you wanted money and freedom, you'd better learn how to sell something! And believe me, I learned from the very best. To this day, my college roommate, Davinder Heir sells vacuum cleaners for Kirby. He's been doing it sine the age of 14...and he is hands down the best salesperson I've ever had the pleasure of working with...and I've worked with some of the best sales reps you've ever seen. Seeing all of them in action helped make me better.

After college, my life took a different path. Sure, going to Indiana University and graduating with a business major was all good, but as we all know, then the world gets REAL. Since I wasn't heavily recruited out of college (ok, so no one offered me a job), I reverted to my overarching goals of money and freedom. So, I took a job selling life insurance for New York Life. Great company, but I just couldn't make it work. It's simple economics really. I was selling to my market, which was other 20-somethings with no need an no money. What I did learn from that job is that selling an unsought intangible is THE hardest thing to sell. I also learned the 4 reasons why someone doesn't buy. No need, no money, no hurry, no trust. My social ecosystem had three of the four. So, After 18 months, I was looking for another job. One of my biggest life lessons was that I had purchased an expensive car thinking that I'd be making lots of money. Nothing could be further from the truth. I learned what "upside down" on your car loan means, and I was suddenly $17,000 in debt to my dad. More on that in the next part of the story...

I knew I wanted to get into technology and probably software at the time and all my hard work paid off, because I got lucky. I answered an ad in the newspaper (when they had ads in the newspaper), and landed a job with Computer Associates. What I learned from the interview process is that they might ask "sell me this pen". I'd never heard that before, but whatever I did must have worked, because I landed a job with one of the largest computer software companies in the world. I'd be competing with IBM. Back in the day, this was the big time. One of my biggest life lessons was that after receiving a commission check for $20,000 (my dad thought I'd been dealing drugs), I paid my dad back in full. I paid it back right away out of sheer embarrassment for having owed my dad such a large some of money. Other than a mortgage, I have not paid a single penny of interest to a bank since then. Lesson learned. Accountability. 

Head-Strong, Thick Skinned, Achievement Oriented. These are things that have made me the leader I am. A leader in the sense that I do observe others, but blaze my own trail based on what proves to be effective rather than what is perceived to be effective. A rebel in many senses, yet conservative in terms of avoiding risk. I've often said  "I'm not afraid of anyone or anything". Be bold. Take chances. I'm a thrill seeker in my personal activities and have a keen need for speed. In my business endeavors and roles, I have developed the ability for speed as well. I've grown very thick skin from the sheer volume of rejection. What I fear most is rejection, but I plow the field nonetheless. My success is directly related to the success of my team-members. I've made a lot of money for my teammates and other positions I've created within other departments. Not entirely selfishly, but helping others achieve success has been my success. I've led a lot of other horses to water. Not all of them have taken a drink, but those who have will tell you that I've helped them change their lives for the better. The people who have taken a drink will also tell you that they've learned positive things from me that will last a lifetime. That being said, I am not a self-promoter. I exist for the team and for the company. The money has always followed me and my effort. I'm a doer. I dislike false prophets and false achievement, especially that of leadership that takes credit and payment based on the hard work of others. The reason is that I've done the work. My teams have done the work. Other departments that I liaison with have done the work. 

My passion is sales and marketing. Making the complex elegantly simple and attractive so that prospects and employees "get it", primarily in a visual way. I consider myself creative, yet analytical. I've worked around creative and analytical people my whole life. You know them. Programmers who started as musicians. Extreme introverts. People who you keep in the back room in a dark office. Mensa achievers. People who've never had a date or so obtuse nobody really likes them. I've been the front-man for these types of people for the past 15 years. They are engineers. Internet engineers. Cloud Engineers. Network Engineers. And without me, the market wouldn't be able to buy their creations because many of them can't communicate with people. Their expertise is communicating with the machines. We need each other. A cornucopia of co-dependence. Over the years, I've been one of the few people who can cross departmental lines, trust, and friendships with these employees...because I started life as one of them. And all of that translates to more trust with customers and more business, which has ultimately given me the freedoms and economic benefits I sought all along.