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Episode 55: Kevin McMaster, The Long Game In Freight

Released on
May 22, 2025
Key Takeaways
  • Playing the long game means calling prospects not ready for six months, investing in carrier relationships whose value will appear in two years, and losing a deal on price rather than compromise service standards that protect your reputation.
  • The over-promise cycle costs more than individual deals: it costs the referral potential of those accounts compounding against you year after year.
  • The three-month lag between outreach and closed business means today's prospecting determines revenue three months from now. Prospecting only when the pipeline is empty creates predictable feast-or-famine cycles.
  • Relationship investment, knowledge investment, and reputation investment compound over time in ways that make freight sales progressively better for those who make them.
  • The freight professionals most successful at year five and year ten are almost never the ones who were most transactionally efficient in year one. They were building things that take time to build.

Freight is a competitive industry and a long game at the same time. The people who build lasting careers in it understand both of those things — they compete hard every day while also investing in the relationships, the knowledge, and the leadership skills that compound over years. In this episode of The Journey Podcast, Will Jenkins sits down with Kevin McMaster, SVP of Sales and Operations at Flock Freight, to talk about what that looks like across a freight career spanning Coyote Logistics, multiple leadership transitions, and now a senior operating role at one of logistics technology's most interesting companies.

Kevin shares his immigration story and what building a career in the United States taught him about work ethic, adaptability, and the specific hunger that shapes the best freight sales performers. He talks about his early years at Coyote — the competitive environment, the mentors who shaped him, the grind that built his foundation — and what it took to develop from a strong individual contributor into a leader who could build and run teams.

The conversation covers the transition from selling to leading in freight: what changes in that shift, what stays the same, and what skills get you to a top performer level that don't get you to effective leadership without intentional development. Kevin also shares how he thinks about building freight sales organizations today — the talent they need, the culture that lets them perform, and the market context that shapes what winning looks like right now.

For freight professionals developing their leadership, explore Journey's executive search or build your career through The Freight Academy.

Episode FAQs
How do freight brokers build a book of business that lasts 10 or 20 years instead of burning out?
What happens to your freight career when you always optimize for the quickest commission?
What should a freight sales rep invest in early in their career to set themselves up for long-term success?
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