Neuromodulation isn’t just about stimulating nerves; it’s about awakening hope and transforming lives—one patient at a time. In this episode, Blake Williams takes us on a wild journey through his career as a Field Clinical Engineer (FCE), shedding light on the incredible impact of neuromodulation on the lives of patients. He provides a fascinating glimpse into what it takes to excel in the field of medical device sales, emphasizing the importance of authenticity and passion. His secret to success? The perfect blend of persistent dedication, a heartwarming touch of southern hospitality, and an innate understanding of the needs of both physicians and patients. Blake also reveals an exciting and groundbreaking development: closed-loop stimulation, a true game-changer in the world of spinal cord stimulation. Tune in and discover how one individual’s dedication can truly make a difference in the world of healthcare.

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What A Field Clinical Engineer In Neuromodulation Sales Does With Blake Williams

We have with us another special guest and he goes by the name of Blake Williams. Blake has a unique case because he was a cardiac, cath lab, critical care, and surgery nurse who got into medical sales. He decided to get into medical device sales within neuromodulation, worked his way up to field sales trainer, and then got to do research in neuromodulation. It was a pretty fast experience, but I’m not going to spoil it for you. It’s a fascinating journey he’s been on. You absolutely want to tune in to this episode. As always, we do our best to bring you guests who are doing things a little differently in the medical sales space. I do hope you enjoy this interview.

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Blake, how are you doing?

Fantastic. Thank you for having me.

Why don’t you tell everybody who you are and what you do?

I am Blake Williams. Contrary to popular belief, I do live in Michigan. My accent throws everybody off with that, but I was born and raised in West Virginia, as I’m representing there. I am a field clinical engineer. That title doesn’t paint the full picture of what that is. There are people with different backgrounds on that. People come from sales, clinical, and engineers. A lot of different people are in that role.

Let’s talk about that. It’s funny because you are in Detroit. I’m like, “This guy does not sound like he comes from Detroit.” Thank you for clearing that up. How long have you been in Detroit?

I moved up right around 2011. I had a nursing job at the time in Ann Arbor at a veterans hospital there. I put in about twelve years of nursing. It’s a great career. I love working at the VA.

Nursing to engineering. We’ll get into the history. Before we do that, let’s establish exactly what you do. Your title is senior field clinical engineer. A lot of people tuning in to this episode have never been in medical sales. They’re clueless. Tell the audience what exactly that means in the context of a traditional medical sales role.

I’ve always been based on neuromodulation. Our field clinical engineers are what we call expert consultants in the field of neuromodulation. That is spinal cord stimulators, deep brain stimulators, and sacral neuromodulation within the company. It is my experience, but we deal with a lot of the new technology and the research side of things. We interact with sales, marketing, and medical affairs. We cover from a national standpoint. I got back from New York. I’ll go out to California. I travel the nation weekly to assist with procedures and health positions.

In your team and within neuromodulation, there is a sales rep and an engineer who you are. You work alongside an actual sales rep.

A lot of us, our background comes from sales. I was on the sales side in the sacral neuromodulation business prior to coming over to the field clinical engineer. They lacked those people because we know a lot about the technology and how to interact with physicians so they bring us over.

Talk to us a little bit about that. Is becoming a field clinical engineer an aspiration of a sales rep?

It can be. It was a promotion for me. It gives a lot of bandwidth to our leadership. I’ve been able to interact with leadership way more than when I was on solely the sales side. That’s the benefit.

The sales rep is selling, what are you doing? Walk us through your day-to-day.

That’s a load of questions. Our day-to-day varies so much. It would be impossible for me to pick one particular day. What we do is work with a lot of pre-market technology, and investigational devices, or hone in on what we already have that’s post-market and making it better. We do work with marketing because it is pre-marketing stuff and launch.

We work with sales in the aspect of finding out where the best areas for research are, like who are the top-end planning docs in whatever particular state. We assist with training the physicians. Because we are considered the expert consultants, we go and teach the physician about a new product or new implant technique, and work with them in that regard.

I’m sales rep Joe. I find Dr. B. I get Dr. B to utilize device A. I say, “Dr. B is using it but I think you can do a lot more with this. I’m going to call Blake. Blake is going to have a discussion with Dr. B to help him find new ways to use the therapy, maybe introduce devices that I don’t sell that he didn’t even know about.” Am I along the lines of what your role does?

There is a lot of it that the sales reps can help identify the best institutions. Everybody wants the University of Michigan Health Systems, the Cleveland Clinic, and the Mount Sinai. The great part about it is the sales reps work with the district sales manager. I work more with the regional sales managers and the district sales managers than I do with the sales reps. That was what I was mentioning as far as the bandwidth with leadership. We work more with the higher-up aspect of the leadership.

In your position, how is your performance measured?

Before when I was on the sales side for inner stem or sacral neuromodulation, that was salary and commission. This particular role is more of a salary with a myth and me trying to get to the plan. That’s over the whole company and based on how all of neuromodulation is doing. We’re putting out the research and we’re helping with these launches, then that is going to be how we’re measured. Everything is rolling along and the operating unit is exceeding. That’s how we’re measured.

Just so our audience can have complete context. If everything went right and you’re like, “I’m killing it.” “ Honestly, I already know you’re killing it. If you had an amazing quarter and you’re like, “This is the best,” what’s happening?

All of our data collection is great. The implants are going well. Our stats are running smoothly. FDA is happy with all of our results and our DMs are expressing that the physicians are happy with how everything is going. To be a PI or an investigator that we use on the research side, it’s a lot of work for physicians. They want to be involved in research because that’s how they tout it, but it takes a lot. That’s what an FCE job is, making everybody happy. It’s an easy task.

When you are a sales rep, I’m sure you have an amazing relationship with providers. When you got promoted, did someone come out and say, “Get me in. Remember what I got you? You watch your numbers in quarter one. Hook me up.” Is that happening?

Absolutely. There has been a paradigm shift. There has always been a separation of church and state from research and sales. “They can work together.” That’s what we said. Everybody wants what’s best for the patient. That’s the main thing. They want to make sure that the data is great and the appropriate data. We have had a shift with our new medical director of affairs. He has helped us be more forward-facing. We are able to have those relationships with physicians and talk to the people who want to be involved and navigate it. I have a lot of relationships with physicians, and you do have to say no to a couple because you can’t have everybody.

You are a pretty hot commodity then when you’re walking into certain institutions.

You could be hated because you haven’t been able to get them what they want. For the most part, it’s great. Everybody understands. It’s the lay of the land, but it’s been great.

Let’s build out the full team. There’s you who’s the field clinical engineer. There’s a sales rep. Who else makes up the team?

In our direct team, there are thirteen FCE or Field Clinical Engineers. We have two managers. It’s such a broad team. It’s hard to divvy all that because we work with medical affairs and medical science liaisons. We have a lot of different people involved but the district sales managers are incredibly important to navigate the research and where we need it. In our particular team, I’m national, but we try to be somewhat regional. I look at it like a four-hour window. I do Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, Illinois, and eventually Toronto. There are some areas that we covered. We try to get a four-hour block in those districts’ sales managers.

You said you’re traveling every week.

We do. The bandwidth has been awesome. Due to some NDAs and stuff, I can’t disclose exactly who but we work with some smaller startup companies. That has been awesome and the CEO of these smaller startup companies learned so much about that. We travel all over the place.

If someone were to ask, “How much travel am I going to be doing if I step into a field clinical engineer role?” What would you say?

You’re looking at probably three overnights a week. It has ebbs and flows to it and sometimes it’s cool. The funny thing about me being from West Virginia is I grew up in a small town and we didn’t travel much. I came onto the team like I didn’t have an Uber app. I didn’t have data points. It’s been great to travel. It is a lot.

Do you have a family?

I do. I have two boys, 6 and 12 years old, and a wife.

You’re like me. I have 8 and 13. You’re three overnights a week with a 6 and 12 and a wife. How do you make it work?

In that last part, you said, “The wife.” She’s very instrumental in that. She was a nurse as well. After COVID, we made the decision for her to stay home for a bit to help with the kids and it makes a lot easier. When I got into the company being that my salary did increase from what I was making for a nurse, it allowed us to have her stay at home, which was huge. She manages all that, the sport, the house, and the kids. It’s a team effort.

She helps you make it work. Is she still in nursing or she’s not working?

Her dad is an engineer oddly enough, not the same engineer as I am. They own their own company. She helps out there about three days a week. It’s nice for her to make sure the kids get to school and all that.

Let’s think about one of our audience and they’re like, “This guy is doing the coolest stuff ever. How do I do that?” Can you have an ambition to go from outside the industry to field clinical engineer or do you need to become a sales at first or do you have to have a Nursing degree? What allows you to do what you do now?

It’s all open. We have people on our team who had zero sales experience prior to coming in. They were engineers by trade or they came from research like academic institutions. We do have a lot of sales reps on our team though. There are nurses. We have a chiropractor on our team. I was fortunate enough to be connected to the hiring manager and he brought me over. He gave me a call and said he’d love to have me on the team. I joined and the rest is history.

Let’s get into that history and then we’ll talk a little bit more about your role. Take us back. You’re in college. You want to become a nurse because you want to get a Nursing degree. You go to college and get a Nursing degree. You’re a nurse now. What happened next?

It’s funny. I tell people all the time. I graduated from West Virginia University with my Bachelor’s. At the time, West Virginia wasn’t paying a ton so I moved to Kentucky. I worked in Kentucky. My first nursing job was in a cardiac cath lab. In walks this guy who was super charismatic, carrying some donuts. I was like, “I like this dude. What is this guy doing?”

At the time before Abbott became what they are, he was a St. Jude rep. I was like, “I want to be that dude.” I’m in my mid-twenties at this point. That was my goal. I did my nursing. I did ICU, procedural cardiac cath lab, EP lab, and different things. I always kept on thinking, “Maybe I should jump into medical sales.” That’s where I wanted to be but it’s scary. In nursing, you always get a job. We don’t have to worry about that.

Medical sale is a lot more volatile. Straight out the gate, probably about four years ago, I interviewed with the company for a full-fledged sales rep within the pacemaker world. It’s very competitive. I made it all the way to my very last interview. It was me and one other guy. They ended up going with the other guy. He had experience. I had none in the sales world. It was the first time that I’ve ever been turned down for a job because nursing got them.

You are like, “This is easy. Whatever I want, I’ll get it.”

It was a little bit humbling.

Your ego is checked at that door.

I was like, “I’m not going to look for a little bit ” You know how they say it, “Sometimes blessings come when you least expect it.” I was working in the PACU at the VA hospital. A sales rep heard me talking with some patients and some of the physicians. She was like, “Have you ever thought about getting into the device industry?” I was like, “Yes.” She’s like, “I’m going to give my manager your name and you’ll expect the call.” You hear that sometimes and you don’t think anything is going to come about, but a week later I got a call. Liz Ezo was my manager and she was phenomenal. I owe a lot to her. She put a chance on me and the rest is history.

Tell us a little bit about what someone can expect. Give us what’s the salary range for neuromodulation and for what you do today.

Neuromodulation is future. We’re living in those sci-fi movies that we watched when we were kids. Everybody’s buying now. I wholeheartedly believe in neuromodulation, but the big thing is now it’s about a $5 billion industry. By 2027, they are projected to be about $10 billion. The money is there for neuromodulation. There are many companies, startups, and big conglomerates. From a salary standpoint, in the sales rep aspect, you’re going to make more money at the startups. That’s a fact. You see that a lot. You see people leave the larger companies and go there but there are more risks.

On the FCE side, you’re looking at anywhere between $130,000 to $200,000, depending on how much experience you have and what background you had prior to coming in. On the sales side, you’re looking at less from a salary standpoint and more on a commission basis. It was a similar range in the $200,000 when you’re on the sales and you’re hitting quota.

When I first came on, my partner was fantastic. She told me everything I knew about sales. What I want to tell people tuning in to this is sometimes, it’s who you fall into with. I was blessed with awesome leadership and great partners. For me, that’s what helped me to succeed. We were fresh in our quotas. We never missed the quota. There were eight quotas that we never missed. One time we were 177% of plan. It felt great.

We both moved on. I moved to the FCE role and then my partner Christie moved into the spine marketing world. I feel like there are two different kinds of people. There are people who love chasing that quota. For a while that can be fun and then you decide you want to do something else. That’s what led me to that FCE role.

Let’s talk about that. I’ve talked to a few people in neuromodulation on the show. What they’ve shared with me is that in deep brain stimulation, for example, you get to work with the providers and you get to work with the patients, to the point where you’re going to patient groups and you’re literally recruiting patients for procedures and surgery. Do you get to do some of that in your role or is it a different side of things?

In our role, we don’t have so much on the recruitment. The other teams are taking care of that. That is being funneled for us, but we do have complete engagement with the patients. A lot of people feel when someone leaves a job like nursing or whatever healthcare position they might have had that they won’t have any patient interaction anymore. I couldn’t disagree more. I have more of a global effect on that now. It’s been amazing for me. I meet some great patients and we can enhance their lives. We are responsible for that. It’s very beneficial.

If you can share please, give us one of the most impactful experiences you’ve had in this role where you got to see what your work did for a patient.

In our inner stem division, some OAB bladder disorders or things like that are things that people don’t think about being life-affecting, but they can be because they affect the confidence of the person or their ability to live a normal life. I had worked with a younger female patient. She was in her twenties and had held off on love and laughter as a result of that.

We had a physician who didn’t have the typical OABs for old ladies. She wanted to help out all her patients. We implanted a device on a younger female. About one year later, we stayed in touch and she told me how she was doing amazing and she was getting to the point where she was going to be getting married and kids were going to be in the future. This was all based on neuromodulation Those things are huge. You affected that person’s life and everybody’s life around them.

You got to see the impact on the quality of life. Just because there are many who have no idea what neuromodulation means, can you describe for us what a patient like her was experiencing and then what they were able to do after the procedure and the implant?

When you think of overactive bladder, I feel like a lot of people think of old ladies. They have leaking. You see all these ads for feminine pads.

Adult diapers.

We try to normalize wearing those and sometimes they have to. For them, it’s embarrassing and expensive to go through all of the diapers that they go through. There are a lot of different aspects of that. Sometimes medications work and sometimes do not. For our patient population, we can put in this device. They have a trial first. That’s the big thing. They test them and make sure that this is going to work. It’s a temporary trial. They check everything out, “Is this going to help that patient?” Once we get those results and it says yes, it’s going to help. Honestly, because it’s temporary, when we get ready to take out the temporary leads, some of the patients are like, “I don’t want that removed.”

It’s like, “Keep me on this.”

Once we implant that, it can drastically improve their life in multiple facets.

For a young woman, I can only imagine that is completely life-changing. That’s a beautiful story. This makes me wonder, are there therapies that are a provider or even you, thinking, “This would be beneficial if we could use it here and it hasn’t been done yet?” Are you in power to create a pathway for that? Do providers come to you and say, “We have to try this here.” How does that work? Does that even happen?

This is the benefit of startup companies. Startup companies can navigate the FDA and things of that nature a little quicker. There are tons of scientists and little think-tank companies that can come up with new indications for whatever device it may be. Physicians do have some input. They might be like, “There is a particular disorder, an autoimmune disease, or something of that nature that we think this could help. What can we do about that?” These smaller companies can look into that, take that, and run with it. I can’t share too much on some of the things. They do come up with potential ideas.

Is it mainly a large company that sees an opportunity and then looks for a startup that’s already in that space to see if there is a pathway?

There are startup companies that reach out to large companies. They are like, “We got a great idea. This is what we’re doing. What do you think?” I wish I was the guy who makes this but I’m not. It’s how it goes. It’s a two-way street. It can be very beneficial to the patient.

You’re coming back to do a follow-up episode when you get there. What are the barriers to access for new pathways? Is it a long arduous process? For example, when you want to use a new drug for a disease state, you’re looking at years. Even if it’s an obvious choice, you’re looking at years for the FDA to say, “Clinical trials have to be on point. The P value has to be significant enough.” You have a lot of stuff you have to make sure it’s in line before you even can tamper in the commercial market. Is it the same same thing with these devices or is there a little bit more flexibility because of how impactful these devices can be in certain conditions?

I wish it was the last part that you said. Honestly, it’s even more stringent because neuromodulation requires an implant. That’s going into the patient’s body. When they’re looking at research studies or the risk that it poses to the patient, then it’s very stringent. It’s very arduous. I understand that sometimes it does get exhausting and how much but they mean well. It’s a very long process.

I can imagine. Share what you can. Do you know of any research that’s being done with neuromodulation and hyperhidrosis?

I would share something if I had something. That one, I don’t have much from my standpoint.

This is for context for the audience. What’s a unique space that people don’t think about neuromodulation playing a significant role in?

One of the biggest and newest, if you’ve seen the company, is for sleep apnea. There’s a company that is working on its neuromodulation. If anybody suffers from sleep apnea, they know that the Darth Vader mask that they have on is cumbersome. Nobody wants to wear it. They came up with one that stimulates the hypogloss on Earth. It’s something that’s newer that came out. Another big new thing is you’ll see various companies that are coming out with what we call closed-loop stimulation. That is the future of a lot of neuromodulation for various companies.

Talk to us about that. What’s close-loop?

The easiest way to describe it is when you think of current neuromodulation and stimulation, you hit a controller and increase the amplitude and the voltage. There are a lot of nuances to the patient doing it themselves, if they do too much, too little, or not enough. If you think about close-loop from an artificial intelligence standpoint, I relate it to that in real-time data. Your body responds to it and then the stimulation responds to it.

We were living in sci-fi movies now. I think about it like a thermostat in your house. You set a thermostat at a predetermined number like 70, which is what my wife likes. It’s too hot for me. The house gets 71. The thermostat and air conditioner kick on and pull it back down to the specified amount. It’s ebbing and flowing based on that preset number. With closed-loop stimulation for these companies that are working on that, let’s say spinal cord simulators. They look at the signals coming from the spinal cord, and the neuromodulation device recognizes it and adjusts accordingly. It’s massive to me.

We’re living in the future.

Star Trek and all these movies, it’s like that. It’s pretty amazing to be part of it.

As an engineer do you get to have input into some of the technologies that are currently being created that are out yet?

They do. We have some great people on our team who have a lot of experience in that. On our team of thirteen, I had the most public health for sacral neuromodulation. We had other people who had the most spinal cord stimulator training and other people with deep brain expertise. We have a wide array of us that all work together, but we do have input on those things whether it’s things coming to market and what we feel like a programmer should have on it from adjustment purposes or what the implant should look like based on our real-world pre-launch scenarios. We do have some input and it’s great to be part of that too.

What does it take to be a top-tier field clinical engineer, then go ahead and share with us what it takes to be a top-tier sales rep.

I know a lot of people might disagree. You get people that recommend reading The Challenger and all these things. To me, on both sides, authenticity is huge. You can have difficult conversations whether you are a soft-spoken individual or not. To me, in both fields, being on point, representing the company’s mission, and always putting the patients first are the ultimate aspects that the physicians will look at.

[bctt tweet=”Authenticity is huge. You can have difficult conversations whether you are a soft-spoken individual or not.” via=”no”]

To me, being authentic, showing up when you say you’re going to show up, and doing what you would want done for you for both. There are some people who are going to say, “Being an aggressive challenger person is what you have to be for sales.” I’m sure that works for some people. For me, my history of being a nurse and interacting with physicians in that regard and seeing them as the people that they are greatly benefited me. I feel the same way about my FCE role. I have the ability to relate to the physicians and patients. I tell everybody I got that Southern grandma living in me. I could be everybody’s friend. It’s served me well.

Neuromodulation is becoming a more popular space. I can sit here and say four years ago, the awareness of neuromodulation wasn’t where it is now. It’s amazing to me how explosive neuromodulation is becoming. You reinforce that belief when you’re saying that it’s going from a $5 billion industry to on its way to a $10 billion industry within the next many years. That’s huge.

I’ll share that a lot of the mystery of medical sales is being demystified. You have our show. When we started, there were 6 or 7 medical sales shows. Now, there are over 38. Quickly, people are putting the knowledge out. There’s a whole career behind the sales and the business of medicine and medical devices. When you think about neuromodulation and the flood of interest, what would you say to people who are like, “I would do anything to do what Blake is doing?” What would you say they need to bring to the table to even be considered in a space like this? Character and skills-wise, what should they be able to bring to the table?

Not just neuromodulation, sales in general, or anything you do in life passion is by far the absolute most important thing that there is. People will see that. If I got up here and during our talk, I was like, “Neuromodulation is cool,” your patients are not going to be excited about that. For me, passion is first and foremost.

[bctt tweet=”Anything you do in life is by far the absolute most important thing that there is.” via=”no”]

I preach in the office about authenticity because I think that is what has separated me from certain reps. We had competitors in our territory. People would say things and they wouldn’t follow through with it. I’m an authentic guy. What you see is what you get. Those two things are huge. I won’t dismiss that skill is important. There are ways to hone those skills ahead of time. I have conversations with people like you and Evolve Your Success. That content has been very beneficial in progressing my career.

The last thing I’ll say before we go to our lightning round is what I love about you is you seem like a man of intention. You have a mission to go out there and do something every day. Share with us whatever that is. What is your guiding light? Why is it that you are able to run a family, run this position, be a nurse, step into this space, and give it your best day in and day out? What is your driving force?

My dad. When I was thinking about this conversation, I was like, “If Samuel comes along with, ‘How did you get where you are? Who do you look up to?’ I already know the answer to that.” My dad was in sales when I was growing up, not medical devices. What’s funny is he probably put a ton of Oreos on all supermarket shelves. He worked for Nabisco at the time. When I was a kid, that was cool. It was fantastic, but he was always those things that I said.

He was very passionate. If you think that I’m a passionate high-energy guy, he’s me times infinity. He’s very much up there but he cares and he’s been authentic. In my whole life, that’s what I had seen. To me, that was important. That’s been my driving force to be a good dad. I take the late flat to get where I have to get to so I can pick up my kids from school or the red eye in the morning to make sure I get back in time for this and that. Funny enough, my dad checks on me every day. He gives me a Bible verse first thing in the morning and if I’m traveling, he’ll text me like, “Where are you at right now? Text me before you land.” He’s fantastic. Surrounding yourself with those people is incredibly important.

[bctt tweet=”Surrounding yourself with passionate and thoughtful people is incredibly important.” via=”no”]

It couldn’t be said better. That’s awesome. Thank you for sharing that with us. Are you ready for the lightning round?

I’ll do my best.

I’m going to ask you four questions. Are you ready?

Yes.

First question, what’s the best book you’ve read in the last six months?

If we’re going to be authentic, I’m not a huge reader.

Fair enough. How about an article?

If we’re looking at articles, I read any sports-related article there is out there, anything related to how these athletes came up from hard-knock lives. Those are my favorite articles. My mind runs a mile a minute. I’ll start a book and I’ll get halfway through and then I’m on to something else.

Maybe you’re a writer.

That could be it.

Best TV show or movie you’ve seen in the last six months.

My favorite TV show which has not been picked back up is Archive 81. I don’t know if you’ve ever heard of it.

I’ve never even heard of it. What is that?

It is fantastic. It’s like a psychological thriller. You got to take it out.

Where is this streaming?

Netflix

Is it a sci-fi?

It’s very much sci-fi. I don’t want to try to do it a disservice and explain it, but it is such a good show. There are gossip girls on all these things that it’s getting renewed. I can’t get a second season. Help me out, Netflix. That would be my top choice.

Hopefully, they catch this episode. What’s the best meal you’ve had in the last six months? It could be at a restaurant or at home.

My wife is a phenomenal cook. She can cook anything but I haven’t been home a lot for her to cook for me. I got back from New York. We were able to go out with one of our surgeons that was there. He’s from Rome and an awesome Italian guy. He took us to an Italian restaurant in New York. I’m not a fancy guy. I grew up in a very small town in West Virginia, but he was ordering all the legit stuff oxtail, and all these different things. It was good. We went to a place called Lupa which is the Greek mythology about she-wolf and Remus. It was phenomenal.

Lupa is next to Columbia University. Is there a recommended dish?

He was not a fan of their tiramisu. It was not correct. That was one thing. Each dish was like one word, but it meant something. One was meant, “Burn your finger,” because it was a lamb and known as hot. When you touch it, it burns.

This place has a lot of culture behind it.

I apologize to him because I cannot remember the name. That lamb dish was one of the best things I’ve ever had. It was delicious.

Last question. What’s the best experience you’ve had in the last six months?

It’s been everything that I’ve been doing with this job. I never thought I would be all these people that I’ve met. I keep on harping on it. The name of the town that I grew up in is Big Ugly, West Virginia. My parents didn’t go to college. When I was growing up, a lot of what you would end up with was Coleman’s or going to the military. It wasn’t a huge college push for that. My parents pushed me to go, but never in a million years that I think I’d be working for a big corporation and traveling like I’m traveling and meeting all these executive leadership people and the progressions. I’ve been doing a lot of that for the last six months. The FCE role, I’ve been in for about ten years, but it’s been great.

It’s been fantastic having you on the show. You are someone we will definitely be continuing to watch. Thank you for the time and keep doing your amazing work.

Thank you very much for letting me be part of this. It was a lot of fun. I look forward to seeing your next show.

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That was Blake William. It’s a fascinating story. What I love about him, if you’ve tuned in to this episode, is as if he’s just getting started and already has the trajectory he’s had. It’s a wonderful thing to hear. Maybe you’re tuning in to this right now and you’re thinking to yourself, “I want to do what Blake is doing. I want to be in Blake’s space,” whether it be neuromodulation, being a field sales trainer in different space or field or whether it be joining a team that’s on the cutting edge of medical device sales, pharmaceutical sales, or any other type of medical sales.

What I want to ask you to do is to challenge yourself to take a step. Often in life, we have these ambitions and these things we want to do. Sometimes we write it down. Sometimes we tell friends and family. Sometimes we wake up and wish it would be every single morning. This time, I’m asking and I’m inviting you to take a step because we have a program called the Medical Sales Career Builder that was created to turn your wishes into a reality, your frustrations into success, and your ambitions into a career.

Stop wondering, thinking, dwelling, and contemplating, and take that step. Visit EvolveYourSuccess.com and select the application button for the Medical Sales Career Builder Program. Fill out that application, set up a time, and have a discussion with one of our account executives. Let us show you how we can take the dream you have right this very moment and make it your reality. As always, we do our best to bring you guests who are doing things a little bit differently in the medical sales space. Make sure you tune in next episode.

Important Links

• Blake Williams – LinkedIn
• Medical Sales Career Builder Program
• Best Restaurant in last 6 months – Lupa, Italian Restaurant in New York (https://www.luparestaurant.com/)

About Blake Williams

Raised in Big Ugly, West Virginia. Yes, that’s really the name of where I grew up. Attended West Virginia University and graduated magna cum laude. RN-BSN with 12 years of Critical Care, Cardiac Cath Lab, and Surgery. More recently, 3 years within Medtech, focusing on Neuromodulation sales and research. Hired to Medtronic in 2020 as a Therapy Support Specialist/TSS (also known as a Clinical Specialist in other operating units), which focused on sales and operating room case coverage. Quickly grew a territory with my partner, and progressed my career from a TSS, to a Senior TSS, to a Principal TSS and Field Sales Trainer in under 2 years. Due to networking within Medtronic, had the opportunity to move into Research and Development as a Neuromodulation Field Clinical Engineer. Cross trained across SCS, DBS, and SNM therapies, where we provide expert consultation, physician education, and data collection for ongoing research studies nationally.

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