195: Phebe Trotman on Business Lessons Learned from Playing Soccer

What does soccer have to do with building a successful business? Everything, according to Phebe Trotman.

After being inducted into multiple Sports Hall of Fame and winning championship titles, Phebe spent 17 years building a thriving network marketing career using the same principles that made her successful on the field: resilience, clarity, and genuine connection.

In Episode 195 of Gratitude Geek, she reveals the “go hard for five” mentality, why you should never quit on a bad day (but sometimes should quit on a good day), and her surprisingly simple daily practice for maintaining gratitude.

If you’re a solopreneur who struggles with networking, feels burned out, or wonders how to build authentic business relationships without being salesy, this conversation will shift your entire approach.

🎧 Listen to the full conversation:

The “Go Hard for Five” Mentality

In soccer, when the game gets tough and your team needs momentum, someone calls out “go hard for five.” It means exactly what it sounds like: for the next five minutes, everyone levels up. You go in for every tackle. You win every ball. You hit your passes. You just…do more.

Phebe brought this mentality from the field into business, and it’s transformative.

“Sometimes those little things—can you go hard for five?—and that might be a season that you’re going for a promotion where everybody just does a little bit more,” Phebe explains. “That’s where that stretch comes from where you really grow.”

The beauty of this approach is its flexibility. Can’t do five? Start with one. Can you do just one more? That’s the mentality. It’s not about massive overhauls or burning yourself out. It’s about intentional stretches of focused effort.

In business, this might look like a concentrated push for a product launch, a week of intensive outreach, or even five focused minutes of work when you’re feeling overwhelmed. The principle is the same: small, intentional bursts of elevated effort create growth.

Never Quit on a Bad Day (But Sometimes Quit on a Good Day)

The title of Phebe’s book series, Never Quit on a Bad Day, isn’t about never quitting anything. It’s about timing.

“Don’t quit on a bad day. Quit if you’re going to quit something, quit on a good day,” Phebe clarifies. “Oftentimes we quit when we’re frustrated, we’re angry, we’re disappointed, we’re disheartened.

It’s all these negative emotions and then we’re like ‘I’m done with this’ and you just leave it blind and move forward. That’s not necessarily the best time to quit something.”

When you quit from a place of frustration, you’re not making a strategic decision. You’re reacting. Instead, push through the negative emotion, get to the other side, and then evaluate with clarity.

I experienced this firsthand years ago when my husband and I fired our best customer. We’d been dealing with a series of challenging circumstances, but we didn’t make the decision in the heat of frustration.

We were on vacation, driving through Michigan, genuinely enjoying ourselves. We were calm. We talked it through for an hour, pulled over, crafted an email, sent it, and kept driving.

We never looked back. And the following year, even though our gross income went down (she was our number one customer), our net income went up. We were actually losing money by keeping her.

That’s the power of quitting on a good day. Clarity. Peace. Strategic thinking. Not emotional reaction.

Building Your Board of Directors

If Phebe were starting a new venture today—whether network marketing, a traditional business, or writing a book—she’d start by identifying her “board of directors.”

These are 12 to 24 people who are sharp, ambitious, driven, and who she has an existing relationship with. Not strangers she admires from afar. People she knows, trusts, and has already built connection with.

“I want the board of directors, the people who I know, I trust, I’ve built a relationship with. Those 12 to 24 people are people I’m going to reach out to. ‘Hey Kandas, this may or may not be for you, but I have something and this is what’s happened for me. Can I just share it with you? You have full permission if it’s not for you to say no, but you’re someone I admire and respect.’”

Here’s what makes this approach brilliant: everyone on your board will fall into one of three categories. They’ll become a customer. They’ll become a partner or distributor. Or they’ll become a referral source.

Even if they never buy from you or join you, if you approach them with respect and genuine relationship, they’ll likely know someone who needs what you’re offering.

This isn’t cold pitching. This is leveraging authentic relationships you’ve already built.

The Daily Gratitude Practice That Shifts Everything

At 9:10 PM every night, Phebe’s phone alarm goes off with a simple reminder: “I’m so happy and grateful that…”

She pauses. Closes her eyes if she’s not driving. And identifies one thing she’s grateful for in that moment.

“It’s so easy to go through the day and yes, we’re all grateful people and we have things to be thankful for, but sometimes we’re just not as intentional. So I started doing that so I was always going to be intentional at least once in a day.”

I used to do something similar at 12:34 PM—listing five things I was grateful for. But it kept going off during coaching sessions, disrupting the flow. Phebe’s 9:10 PM timing is genius because for most people, it’s a moment when you actually have space to pause.

The practice isn’t about performing gratitude or creating a long list. It’s about intentional pausing. Even in hard seasons (and Phebe and I have both had plenty), there’s something to notice. Something to appreciate. The alarm is just a gentle nudge to remember.

Pour Into One Person Every Day

When I asked Phebe about her favorite marketing tool, her answer was beautifully simple: reach out to one person every day.

“Every single day, reach out to someone. Let them know ‘hey, you know what, I was just thinking about you. Hope you’re doing well. Want to put a smile on your face.’ It might be a video message, a text, a card, a letter. Just every day, look for someone you can pour into and add value to.”

This isn’t networking with an agenda. It’s not “touching base” because you want something. It’s genuine connection for its own sake.

Phebe taught me years ago how powerful a simple video message can be. She sent me a 20-second video once, and it completely made my day. I thought, “That didn’t take her much effort. I could do that too.” And now I do.

The ripple effect of this practice is impossible to measure. When you make someone feel seen and appreciated, they carry that energy into every interaction they have afterward. You’ve shifted their entire day, and they’ll shift someone else’s day, and on it goes.

“People who feel appreciated appreciate,” Phebe says. And that simple truth changes everything.

The Gift of Your Time

Phebe’s approach to business and relationships is exactly why I featured her in my article “5 Gifts That Cost Nothing (But Mean Everything).” In a world obsessed with growth hacks and automation, she’s built a 17-year career on something radically simple: genuinely caring about people.

No fancy funnels. No complicated systems. Just consistent, intentional connection. Reaching out. Showing up. Pouring into people because it’s the right thing to do, not because you expect something in return.

The Law of Reciprocity will take care of the rest. You’ll be on the receiving end of someone else’s ripple eventually. That’s how it works.

Connect with Phebe Trotman

Ready to dive deeper into resilience, gratitude, and building a business that doesn’t burn you out?

Website: https://neverquitonabadday.com
Book: Never Quit on a Bad Day – inspiring stories of resilience from thriving entrepreneurs

Phebe’s book includes reflection activities at the end of each chapter and QR codes that link to short video messages from contributors. It’s interactive, inspiring, and exactly what you need when you’re navigating a hard season.

Related Episodes You Might Love

Episode 186: Larry Wilson on How to Talk to Humans

Episode 201: Curt Tueffert Teaches Sales

Want more on meaningful connection and giving gifts that cost nothing? Phebe’s insight on pouring into people is one of five powerful lessons I share in “5 Gifts That Cost Nothing (But Mean Everything).”

Stay Groovy!

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