In this episode of Executive Connect, host Melissa Aarskaug talks with Justin Vandenbrink, President
of Mercenary Sales, about his journey from the rugged oil rigs of Canada to the polished boardrooms of
Houston. Justin shares how a foundation in geology and a passion for building authentic relationships
helped him shift from technical roles to high-level business development.
Key insights include:
● How to pivot from field operations to executive sales.
● Why building trust beats “closing the deal.”
● The shift from transactional selling to consultative partnerships in upstream oil & gas.
● How Justin balances high-performance selling with mental wellness.
● The future of work in the energy sector: project-based roles over permanent hires.
Whether you’re in the trenches of oil & gas or leading a team through change, Justin offers real-world
strategies on building credibility, leading yourself, and creating long-term client value.

Chapters:

1. [00:00] From Geologist to CEO Whisperer
Justin’s origin story from field geology to business development.
2. [05:00] Taking the Leap: Canada to Houston
How a candid moment with leadership changed his career path.
3. [07:00] Sales Isn’t Selling—It’s Strategy
Redefining sales as relationship-building in complex industries.
4. [11:00] Navigating Tech Shifts & Client Needs
Adapting to software’s growing role in upstream oil & gas.
5. [15:00] High-Trust Selling for High-Stakes Clients
Earning credibility by telling hard truths.
6. [18:00] Wellness in the Hustle
How to avoid burnout while chasing sales goals.
7. [22:00] Lead Yourself First
The art of time blocking, focus, and managing your own performance.
8. [28:00] When Selling Looks Effortless
Why good salespeople make it look too easy—and what’s behind it.
9. [32:00] Rethinking the Sales Process
Justin’s idea for a vendor “casting call” to streamline upstream sales.
10. [36:00] Future of Work in Oil & Gas

Melissa Aarskaug (0:2.124)
Have you ever wondered how to go from an oil rig to the boardroom of a super major oil company? What are the skills needed to make the jump from the field to the office? We may have just the secrets today. We’re gonna talk to Justin Vanderbrink, the president of Mercenary Sales, who used his education and experience to move from working on rigs as a geologist to working with CEOs.
major oil and gas companies.

Justin Vandenbrink (0:33.740)
Hold on, you gotta stop. You called my name wrong.

Melissa Aarskaug (0:37.324)
Vanderbrink? Vandenbrink. I messed it up again.

Justin Vandenbrink (0:41.094)
Van Den Brin.

Melissa Aarskaug (0:43.330)
Van Danbrink. Okay. All right. Well, let’s take two. Do you want to just stop it, Raph, and then restart it? Or you want to cut it?

Melissa Aarskaug (0:58.296)
Okay, let’s start over, take two. Have you ever wondered how to go from an oil rig to the boardroom of a super major oil company? What are the skills needed to jump from the field to the office? We may have the secrets for you here today. Today we’re talking to Justin Vandenbrink, the president of Mercenary Sales, who used his education and experience to move
from working on rigs as a geologist to working with CEOs of major oil and gas companies. Whether you’re looking to close deals or navigate complex corporate landscapes, Justin Insights will help you sharpen your strategy, build trust and lead with confidence. Welcome, Justin.

Justin Vandenbrink (1:53.202)
Hey there, Melissa, how are you doing?

Melissa Aarskaug (1:56.108)
Great, excited to talk to you today. Now, Justin, your career has taken you in a lot of places from physical grit of working on the rigs to working on the boardroom. Let’s talk a little bit how you were able to do that and share your story with us.

Justin Vandenbrink (2:17.125)
Yeah, sure. Please excuse the background behind me. I had to move locations for this shoot. I’ve got two Bernese dogs on the bed behind me. So if you hear yelping, it’s not me and I don’t think it’s you, Melissa.

Melissa Aarskaug (2:33.998)
Thank

Justin Vandenbrink (2:36.161)
Yeah, bottom line, I started out in Canada as a geologist. I got into geology because I loved the thought of being able to be in science, but not in the pure science in the sense that I was never a mathematician or I was never interested in physics. They were just too pure for me. I combining the outdoors with a possible vocation that would allow me to make some good money and have a career.
So I got into geology instead of going the arts route and it turned out to be very valuable for me. So I started out in Vancouver, got my degree there and then moved into the actual, I was trained as a mining geologist, structural, and then moved and wanted to be in oil and gas. So I moved to Calgary and there were no jobs for what my head thought I should be doing because
I was young and dumb. And I had to start from the bottom and work my way up. And that’s one of the lessons that everybody learns when they get out of school. So I started the way most people started, you know, 30 years ago, and that was going out to the rigs and learning the trade the hard way. And I was a well-site geologist on the rigs in the Western Canadian sedimentary basin, and actually had a lot of fun doing that. I was on the rigs off and on.
with the company I was with for about seven years. And then as the years went on, I spent more and more time with my clients back in the office towers in Calgary. And my boss started to see that there was a benefit to having me do more business developments and get jobs for his company instead of do the actual science and well-said geology on the rig. There was a multiple there for him and for me.
So I moved into a business development role. I understood the job that I was now selling operators on, which was hire some really quality well site geologists to be your eyes and ears at well site while you’re drilling wells. So that took me about 11, well about eight years around 2008.

Melissa Aarskaug (4:48.170)
Okay.

Justin Vandenbrink (5:1.209)
It’s a funny story. The company I was working for was basically owned by the Brits and the big boss from the Brits came over one day and walked around the office and poked his head in my office and said, Hey Vandenbrink, how are things going? And at that time I was single, doing really well in his company and bored out of my mother.
I just didn’t really like what I was doing. was, I I needed more stimulation. So I told him the truth as anybody who knows me kind of knows that’s what I do for good or bad. And I just said to him, I said, Mick, not good. And Mick is a very proper put together, well-dressed man. And he wasn’t expecting that answer. And that led to him and me having a good conversation. He said, well, what do you want to do? And I said, I want to get the hell out of Canada.
want get the hell out Calgary, and I want to apply my skills internationally. So he said, you’re in luck. We’ve got a guy who’s about to retire in Houston. Have you ever heard of it? And in six months, I was down there working for that company doing Deepwater International work for them. And it was a placement agency as well. We were putting geoscientists all around the world on deepwater rigs to help with a 10x level

Melissa Aarskaug (5:58.822)
So,

Justin Vandenbrink (6:27.831)
of exploration. long story short, I moved from that company to a couple other companies within Houston, gaining experience in different areas of upstream oil and gas, continuing to do business development, continuing to work around the geology and drilling areas until present day, where I’ve taken all of that information, all of that experience, and I run my own company now.
doing the same thing but more boutique style. So I connect people in upstream oil and gas business to business, if that makes sense.

Melissa Aarskaug (7:6.655)
Yeah, I love your story. I love talking to you because so much of my, you know, young dumb years in the trades, our stories are so aligned on how we flipped from field to sales. So sales is not just about selling things. It’s putting the deal together.
understanding the client and actually creating a relationship. I think a lot of times people look at sales like they’re transactional. Go out, get somebody a sign of paper and it’s really easy. I know you have so many strategies for professionals that are working in sales and high-stake environments. Can you share a little bit about some insights you’ve learned in sales?

Justin Vandenbrink (7:58.364)
Yeah, I mean, it’s a broad subject, right? Depending on the industry, sales are very different. So I think a lot of people in their everyday life are used to getting sold by their mechanic or buying a car or getting sold by their realtor or having to deal with an air conditioning guy who wants to upsell you on a unit you don’t need. And those all have negative connotations. And I think…
in upstream oil and gas and just the energy industry, the sale is much different. It’s more of a solution sale. So it’s very technical what is happening in upstream oil and gas software is becoming a very big component of how you drill well and how you produce. And so in order for operators to do that to the very best of their abilities,
they have to have a lot of pieces working together. And so any vendor who is approaching operators wanting to sell their solution, their service, their product, has to know how to integrate into the operator’s overall game plan. And they also have to know, they have to spend a lot of time on selling and understanding the project. So you can’t just pull something off the shelf.
You can’t just get $4.99 for it, and you can’t just go home at the end of the day and watch TV and go, oh, let’s do it all over again tomorrow. So the sale is not really the sale. It’s just a relationship. You are building relationships. You’re on the same boat going in the same direction to the same destination. And you’re just hopefully giving them what your product or service is. You’re giving them a better version of what they might not.
be able to get if you weren’t around. So that’s kind of how I look at sales in upstream oil and gas. I don’t really sell. It’s greasy to me. The word sales is kind of greasy to me. What I do is I find out what problems they have that my experience can maybe help solve. And then I put them together with the right people. And that’s where I get all my fun.

Justin Vandenbrink (10:18.165)
is watching my clients accelerate and be more successful and drill more wells.

Melissa Aarskaug (10:27.435)
Yeah, and one thing I love in talking with you is you’re changing with the times. You’re changing on how you respond to your clients and interact with your clients. You’re understanding their pain points. And like you said, you’re creating that relationship. So when they have a problem, they don’t even think anybody else. They just think to call you, Justin. And really the sales kind of are walking in their door. So I want
Do you think it’s changed? Like has that been something that’s changed for you on how you’re dealing with operators over the last several years? it like a new way of dealing with that?

Justin Vandenbrink (11:5.814)
I think software has made a huge impact on the upstream oil and gas community. I think a lot of the sales now are not just, everybody knows the hardware part, but the software links it all together. So yeah, it is changing and the younger generation is doing a great job figuring that out. What I really like to do is to bring
I’m kind of in the middle. So I’m Gen X. So I still understand what the baby boomers, how they did things, what they need. Can you hear my dog? scraping right now. So I understand where they’re coming from, but I also understand that there’s a bridge that they have to cross to get to relate to the younger generation that’s coming in. And so I’m in a unique position to be able to look behind me, understand what they’re doing and also look forward and relate to the
to the younger kids in front of me and kind of bridge that. But know, sales and business development is always, it comes down to the same thing. It’s just trusting the person, like building that relationship. And there’s a lot of times I can’t help a lot of my clients and I’ll just refer them to other people that can. So you don’t always win, but you your reputation is very important in this industry. And so far I’ve had a good one.

Melissa Aarskaug (12:29.656)
Oh, that’s so good. have to repeat it. I think a lot of times
people show up to a client and they’re like, okay, here’s my things I sell, which one do you want? In your case, you’re saying I can’t provide the thing and here’s somebody else who does. So you’re building trust within that client. It’s so, so important, I think, in long-term relationship building, because you don’t just want to build a relationship today for that one thing, you want to build it long-term.
And I think that’s so different. It takes the transactional relationship away and you’re actually building a long-term relationship. And I think the companies that do this really well.
Building a high performing sales team and high performing salespeople isn’t something that just we’re gonna hire a salesperson, they’re gonna go out and visit our customers and things are gonna happen. I wanna talk a little bit about how you help leaders and drive that kind of culture to people and where you actually have continual sales from clients, where they’re coming to you and thinking of you.

Justin Vandenbrink (13:41.787)
Bye.

Justin Vandenbrink (13:45.660)
Yeah, right. So it is interesting driving that culture and how things have evolved. I’ve done a lot of reading too as the older you get, you get to these plateaus. It doesn’t matter what career you’re in. You get to these plateaus and you’ve got to advance, you’ve got to advance. And talking to what we said in the last little segment there.
I’ve found in some of the best business development people that I’ve been around and salespeople, if there’s one thing that is kind of consistent throughout that is
when an operator comes to you or when a vendor comes to you or somebody that is hiring you to do some work for them, you have to be really honest with them. They don’t want to pay you for lies. You can give them lies and you can get paid and that’s a three month contract. Or you can tell them the real truth because they’re coming to you because they think you know what you’re talking about.
and it might hurt in the beginning. But in the end, it’s beneficial for them. And I prefer to do that. And I’ve lost some clients like that, but they have come back to me for those reasons. Hey, doggies. You might not be able to hear them, but they’re still barking in the background. So in terms of leaders, I find that the leaders that I work with in the companies, I deal with CEOs in

Melissa Aarskaug (15:16.366)
.

Justin Vandenbrink (15:29.487)
super majors, I deal with CEOs in very high-end vendor-based companies, service companies. And I find, and I think we were talking about this previously last week, they’re very good at knowing what they don’t know. And I think that’s really important for a leader. You have to be able to defer to the expert in the room at the right time.
or else you’re really in trouble and you can get in a lot of trouble. Some of the best salespeople I know are just focused on really niche things and that’s all they know to sell and they will make sure that their clients know that and then their clients come back to them and they have a great relationship. In my business right now at Merck sales, I know a lot about a little and if I don’t know because I only know that little,

Melissa Aarskaug (16:14.990)
.

Justin Vandenbrink (16:27.789)
I am one degree or six degrees of Kevin Bacon separation away from putting you in touch with the person who does. So fear not, even if I don’t know, I do know how to get you to the person who does know, if that makes sense.

Melissa Aarskaug (16:42.177)
Yeah, absolutely. I think that makes a lot of sense. think
You know, that whole analogy, fake it till you make it doesn’t work in sales because people really sense. Yeah, they really sense when you’re, you’re not being straightforward with founder. You know, you might be able to trick some of the CEOs temporarily, but over time people can sense it and they, it just doesn’t work. And I know, you know, I’ve been in sales for a long time. I’ve led people for a long time.

Justin Vandenbrink (16:51.045)
Day in, day

Melissa Aarskaug (17:14.634)
It’s a lot of pressure right now in today’s world to make sales, to lead people. It’s a very unique time.
get some of your insights on balancing selling high performance going out and getting the business with mental health, your wellness, so you’re not burning out and struggling on. I find that sometimes people spend their career making a bunch of money, then they get the money.
and then they’re spending that money on getting their health back. So what I wanna talk about is how do we manage and juggle that so we’re not spending our money to recover our health?

Justin Vandenbrink (18:3.761)
Well, one of the benefits of being in any type of sales or business development role is you are somewhat your own boss and you’re in control of your time a lot more. It’s not a nine to five factory job. It’s a 24 seven job. So if you are a self starter and you can compartmentalize and do work in bursts, it’s somewhat.
easier on your overall psyche and I don’t think there’s as much burnout. I will say I have worked for employers where they were publicly traded companies. They were running their business from quarter to quarter to quarter. And the last week before the quarter and the earnings announcements came out as a sales director, super stressful. And that’s not really, it is definitely not a way to sell.

Melissa Aarskaug (18:51.006)
Yeah.

Justin Vandenbrink (18:57.365)
Because all of our clients knew that and they knew they could hold out and wait and get the best deal at the end of the month type thing car salesman type stuff so yeah, I have Gotten away from that style of selling. It just doesn’t work. It’s very it’s very transactional and commodity driven So luckily I don’t do that. Have you ever watched a movie with Hugh Grant in it? It was called about a boy

Melissa Aarskaug (19:26.364)
I haven’t tell us about it.

Justin Vandenbrink (19:28.515)
So Hugh Grant halfway through his career, he had already done Notting Hill, he was successful, he took on this project. It was set in London and he was a failed musician songwriter and he had one hit song and everybody knew him for that one hit song. He had a lot of money and he basically had no ambition. So after he made that money, he had…

Justin Vandenbrink (19:56.612)
in front of him the prospect of just living off the money and not doing anything ever again. And he was very selfish, very introspective. And the interesting thing in how it relates to sales is he literally had nothing to do every day. So he devised a program to keep himself from going crazy because he was so bored. So he would live his life in one hour or half hour segments.
So he knew that getting a haircut was one hour. And he knew that if he built a haircut into his week, he could take that block and it would always be there and he would have some semblance of sanity. And he built all these blocks like lunch was an hour meeting. This guy was a half an hour, all this stuff. That is kind of how sales is. You have to focus on blocks of time and be very, very productive and very efficient very quickly. And then there’s a lot of time that’s downtime. So you have to learn to
maneuver these blocks so that you have this continuous workflow in your sales life. And you can have days where you’re going super hard, and then you can have days where hardly anything seems to be happening. But what you’re doing is you’re building the blocks later down that week, that month, when you get the meetings, when people get back to you, and then you really have to rush and hurry. So it’s kind of fun that way. If you like working in bursts, it’s a great job.
So mental health wise, getting back to that question, you have to kind of have…
You have to be able to tell yourself that everything’s going okay, even when there is nothing happening around you. You cannot affect when a customer or a company will get back to you. And you have to be able to be okay with that.

Melissa Aarskaug (21:52.896)
Yeah, I love that you talked about the blocks. I think that’s a really good point. I think a lot of times I know I’ve experienced it myself in sales where, you know, I shut down my inbox. Like I literally shut the inbox down. And so I can do exactly what you said. I could focus on what my plan I need to put a plan together and I need to focus. And what’s really interesting to me, and maybe you can talk a little bit about this is

Justin Vandenbrink (21:53.039)
Thanks.

Justin Vandenbrink (22:8.881)
Right.

Melissa Aarskaug (22:22.700)
We’ve become a world that needs everything immediately right now today. You started, today’s your first day, where’s your sales? And so what you were saying is such an important point. If you’re not managing yourself and leading yourself and working in blocks, you’re getting to the end of the month because you’re only answering emails, taking calls. You’re not really working your plan and solving the client’s problems to make the sales.
So I think that such a really good nugget is working in blocks and managing yourself because if you don’t, you can get kind of caught up in the minutia of paperwork, answering all these emails of all these pop-ups we’re getting. I know I’m subscribed to like a thousand things that I’ve never subscribed to nowadays with people scanning my badge at conferences or what have you, but.
I wanna kind of talk a little bit about what you started to talk about is leading yourself as a salesperson and how one could do that.

Justin Vandenbrink (23:34.829)
Give me a little more insight leading in what sense?

Melissa Aarskaug (23:38.638)
Cause really, as like you were saying at the beginning, if you’re a doer, your boss is saying, I need you to do this thing by Friday. When you’re in sales, how you’re measured is what you’re selling, right? So there’s not like, okay, Melissa was online at eight and she finished at five. At sales, really, if you’re a sales person, you’re closing deals. If you’re not closing deals, therefore you aren’t a sales person.
In sales, you have to really lead yourself, manage yourself. So let’s talk about how a salesperson could lead themselves and what strategies they need to have in play to be a good salesperson.

Justin Vandenbrink (24:19.345)
Well, I think I’ll ask you this question before I answer the one you want me to answer. Do you think salespeople are created from nature or from nurture?

Melissa Aarskaug (24:36.440)
I think sales, well, I would not identify as a salesperson. I was like you, I was a technical person. I was an introverted kind of doer and on paper, nobody would have hired me as a salesperson because I was an engineer and an introvert. So I was grown as a salesperson, but like you, I had the technical knowledge to communicate.
with people, therefore it made me a very dangerous salesperson.

Justin Vandenbrink (25:9.563)
Right, right. I think in upstream specifically in the oil and gas industry, I was just on a call with a client today and she’s a CEO and she needs some sales support and marketing support and she’s technically very good at selling her product, but she’s not really good at like opening doors, getting in to do the sale and following up. So that’s where, you know, she might need my company. It’s
To me, I think there is no need for a salesperson in upstream oil and gas. What there is, is a need for people who have been doing the science of upstream oil and gas, whether they’re geophysicists, drilling engineers, reservoir engineers, geologists, but who are tired or burnt out from that part of their job and are just curious and just like to talk.
Because that to me really is how you get things done in oil and gas. You ask a lot more questions and listen a lot more than you talk. And eventually the person across the table from you will come back to what you were there to do, which is to kind of enlighten them on what your company does. Maybe it’s a fit, maybe it’s a not. So.
The nature nurture thing is very interesting because I’ve, I’ve handled a lot of, a lot of, I’ve inherited a lot of salespeople in my time as a sales director. And I’ve been a sales person for sales directors. And as a sales director, I also have a boss, which is usually the CEO. And kind of the reason why I started Merck sales is when you’re doing it right. It seems like it’s a job that doesn’t need to be there all the time. When you’re doing it wrong.
It seems like an awfully tough job. And there’s somewhere in between where it’s just the right type of job. So when I’m really good at selling, I’m not selling at all. And the bosses in the past that have paid me a lot of money to work for them have thought, VanaBricks not doing much. That seemed way too easy for what he brought in.

Melissa Aarskaug (27:15.494)
So

Justin Vandenbrink (27:28.741)
That is actually when you’re at your peak of selling. It’s kind of like watching Michael Phelps swim. You’re like, it doesn’t look that hard. He’s just going through the water, but it is. And you’re just doing it on auto and making it look fun. there’s a lot, for example, when I take clients golfing, my wife will say, oh, you went golfing again. Oh, what a great life. Let me tell you, some of my clients,
I would rather talk to a bag of hammers and they have the same personality. Four hours in a golf cart on a lonely strip of grass with somebody who doesn’t want to be engaged, that’s work. don’t care. $1,000 an hour is too little for that type of job. So you have to be curious. You have to be knowledgeable and that’s about it. And then you get in and the cell will take care of itself.

Melissa Aarskaug (28:29.580)
Yeah, I think that’s a really another fantastic point. It made me think back when I was a young engineer and the field, the actual doers were saying, you need to get out in the field to see how to actually do this as opposed to just using your education to think it’s going to just magically show up. But it’s like you were just saying with sales is a lot of times people looking out in.

Justin Vandenbrink (28:29.841)
sorry.

Melissa Aarskaug (28:54.424)
to good salespeople, they wanna make judgment on how they’re selling and how they’re getting deals. And a lot of people think, oh, it’s so easy to do sales. They just, you know, magically come. And I think the one secret to sales is exactly what you said at the beginning. Sales isn’t sales, it’s a relationship. And kind of correlating it back to what you’re saying now is sitting and talking to people that don’t wanna talk to you.
and getting information out of them is like wizard stuff, right? Because a lot of people, like you were also saying at the beginning, like a car salesman or how we deal with being sold to, nobody wants to tell the car salesman all the information. The car salesman needs to get the information out of the person. And so being so shut down from your vendors actually hinders
company, companies long term, but it’s really up to the salespeople to get that information like you were saying on the golf course. You’re sitting there asking questions, getting information from someone and he’s like one word answering you, right?

Justin Vandenbrink (30:9.403)
Yeah, and I think we were talking about that in the pre-call too, and we were both in agreement. I think this is important. The industry knows this. You know, the operators rely on the vendors to be successful. The vendors are stocking the kitchen that the operators have built in their house. So an operator might have the best kitchen in the world, but if they don’t have a microwave or they don’t have the right knives or they don’t have a fridge that works, they ain’t making a meal.
yet there’s this common theme where the operators don’t tell the vendors what they really want, where they do this dance where they make it so hard for the vendors to find out exactly what they need. I’ve many times thought there’s gotta be a better way. There’s gotta be, and you know, sometimes that’s my job is to be the broker between the two, but I almost feel like,
There should be a job out there in upstream oil and gas. And this applies to like say military for contracts, procurement, big, big bids, big deals. Like we have requests for bids and proposals that are hundreds of pages long, right? And they, they outline the drilling, the completions, the geology, all the stuff that they need. I almost feel like
Instead of me picking up the phone as a vendor and trying to get a hold of my expiration manager for the hundredth time, and he doesn’t want to talk to me, he doesn’t want to pick up that phone, even though he knows he’s got to make a decision on say hiring or picking up a piece of equipment for this job that’s about to come up. Instead of all this, you know, I’ve always thought what if there was a way where an operator or a group of operators would perform a consortium and they would pick one broker.
say in the city of Dallas, there’s one broker that they give all of their war plans to. So this broker knows when the wells are starting, how many wells are going to be, what services they need and all of that. And then he holds an open call. He rents out a convention center and holds an open call and says, today it’s like a casting session. Today we’re going to be casting for the role of XYZ.

Justin Vandenbrink (32:27.065)
and you line up in all of these lines and you lay out all of the requirements for the role of wireline logging. So now the salesman’s kind of taken out of the picture. The salesman doesn’t have to talk to the expiration manager anymore because the expiration manager has already given that broker all the information that he wants on his desk. The broker interviews all of these actors and then picks the top three actors for every category. Then brings it back to the operator and says,
You didn’t have to do any of that. I’ve dealt with crazy people. I’ve dealt with smart people. I’ve dealt with people in the middle and I’ve picked the top three in every category. Now it’s up to you and your team to look at the prices, to look at the service and make your choice. That kind of sounds like a way to do it too, right?

Melissa Aarskaug (33:17.649)
Yep, I love that you said that. think that’s such a good point. Great point, right? I’ve been on so many RFP processes where the client has 150 companies submitting for a whatever.

Justin Vandenbrink (33:35.599)
And they’re just, it’s just too much. They’re just taking it all day long. They’re getting fired up.

Melissa Aarskaug (33:40.570)
Yes, and your point is spot on. Pick a number of vendors, give them, know, definitely don’t just go with one. Like I agree with you. think get more than one quote, you know, do your due diligence. Yeah. And

Justin Vandenbrink (33:52.242)
Well, the casting call, but at least give them the opportunity to know what the operator is thinking. Half of the battle in sales is figuring out what your client wants, right? And they don’t always give that to you unless you’re good at getting it from them.

Melissa Aarskaug (34:9.742)
100%, like I know a lot of times in my space, I put things that were not in an RFP in the RFP as a value add. And the clients are like, yes, can we have more of that? And we won just because I added something in an RFP that wasn’t even part of the RFP. so, you know, that’s such a good point. I think, you know, don’t give all your vendors some information.

Justin Vandenbrink (34:25.766)
Yeah.

Melissa Aarskaug (34:38.456)
so they can best serve you. The more you give them, the better they can rally around what you need. I think if we’re playing this guessing game, you know, it’s like going to the doctor. If you go to the doctor and you don’t tell your doctor what your symptoms are, they can’t diagnose you and properly treat you. And so think of it that way. And I think the better you’ll get from your, the more you’ll get from your providers.

Justin Vandenbrink (35:3.685)
And so that’s kind of what I’ve done with Merck sales and what I’ve done in all of my jobs in the past is I indirectly know what the operators need, even if they’re not telling me. And then I can clutch down or clutch up and talk to the vendors in a specific way to make sure that they might have what is needed or might not. So we can be a valuable asset to the operator to
cull the herd before the herd runs them over. And conversely, we can be very beneficial to vendors and their sales teams. As one of my favorite sales guys always told me, the second best response I want from anybody is no, right? Because if you’re telling me no, means I’m not wasting my time selling to you anymore. And I can go on to somebody who needs my services. So if I can do that on behalf of the operators to vendors and say,
you’re not right for this job. But I’ll tell you, there’s another job that might be perfect for you. And they’re doing this up in the Bakken or they’re down in Eagleford. You might want to talk to these people. So I like being that in between and helping both sides make some money.

Melissa Aarskaug (36:21.146)
Such great insights.
Justin, I wanna ask you any final thoughts or anything that you actually wanna share about sales listeners.

Justin Vandenbrink (36:32.309)
Um, no, not really. I think, I think the, industry is, is morphing though. And I think what’s happening, just like, um, the professional, um, careers, like the geologist, the geophysicist, the petrophysicist, the, reserves, uh, engineer. We are, we are piecemealing as an industry, these jobs, and they are no longer becoming salaried positions. They’re becoming project based positions.
And I think that’s actually beneficial. So for the people out there who are in sales and for the people out there who are in sciences for upstream, don’t worry if you don’t have a full-time salary guaranteed job because you can make more than you’re already making.
as like a consultant or a freelancer if you’re doing the right things and doing the networking. So stay connected, attend your local societies, and just do more for other people than you expect them to do for yourself, and you’ll have success.

Melissa Aarskaug (37:46.959)
That’s great, Justin. Now, how can we connect with you? How can our listeners connect with you and where could they find you?

Justin Vandenbrink (37:54.502)
So the best way is LinkedIn is my tool of choice and my phone to be honest. I love just being on the phone. You can call me and text me. So you go to LinkedIn and you can find me on there. And then you can also see our business page on LinkedIn, Mercenary Sales. And we’re in the process of redoing our website and you can find that on LinkedIn as well. I’m sure you will have some on the bottom of this podcast as well, emails to contact me with. And that’s about it. Pretty simple.

Melissa Aarskaug (38:23.864)
Justin, I wanna thank you so much for being here and sharing your time and your knowledge and wisdom with our listeners. That’s the Executive Connect podcast.

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