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Speaker or Listener: Who’s Responsible For Misunderstandings?

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There’s been an age-old argument in the communication field: who’s at fault if a misunderstanding occurs – the Speaker communicating badly, or the Listener misunderstanding?

Let’s look at some facts:

  1. Speaking is an act of translating what’s going on internally into communication that enables others to understand an intent – choosing the most appropriate words for that particular listener in that particular situation. But the act of choosing is unconscious and may not render a full or accurate representation of what is meant.
  2. Listeners translate what they hear through a series of unconscious filters (biases, assumptions, triggers, habits, imperfect memory) formed over their lives by their:
    • world view,
    • beliefs,
    • similar situations,
    • historic exchanges with the same speaker,
    • biases on entering the conversation (like sellers listening exclusively for need).

    What a listener hears is fraught with so much unconscious filtering that their ability to hear accurately what’s meant is untrustworthy, except, possibly, when speaking with someone known over time.

  3. According to David Bellos in his excellent book Is That a Fish In Your Ear?, no sentence contains all of the information we need to translate it. As listeners, are we translating accurately? What parts of what we hear are biased?

    4. Unfortunately, too often we expect listeners to understand us when we believe we have spoken clearly. Listeners might accurately hear the words spoken (depending on many unconscious factors and filters), but it’s another story when listeners attempt to understand what’s meant because our brains don’t tell us what it has unconsciously left out or interpreted subjectively. So while a speaker might say ABC, we might think ABL was said, and adamantly, stubbornly believe we’re correct when we’re not.

    Since communication involves a bewildering set of conscious and unconscious choices on both sides, accuracy becomes dependent upon each communication partner mitigating bias and disengaging from assumptions; the odds of communication partners accurately understanding the full extent of intended meaning in conversation is unlikely. It’s quite a complicated mess of factors and can cause lost business, failed projects, and mangled relationships.

    My new book What? Did you really say what I think I heard?  focuses on listening: how we mishear, misunderstand, and otherwise misinterpret, and where and how the gap between what’s said and what’s heard occurs. I even came up with ways to avoid misunderstanding altogether.

    While researching and writing the book (which took me 3 years)  I realized that the responsibility for effective communication is heavily weighted in the court of the listener. If listeners don’t have skills to catch or prevent their biases or unhook from their unconscious, subjective filters, or at least realize when they might have misinterpreted what’s been said, the speaker’s words and intent are  moot: they may be misconstrued regardless of their accuracy or how ‘clear’ a speaker thinks she is.

    The listener is the wild card given the number of biases he brings to the table. So as a rule, after a speaker speaks, she must then become an alert listener herself to make sure the response received is within the bounds of acceptability. Or check in with her communication partner to agree on mutual understanding. Given there are so many subjective, unconscious filters on both sides, it’s amazing we communicate at all.

    About the Author

    Sharon Drew Morgen is a visionary, original thinker, and thought leader in change management and decision facilitation. She works as a coach, trainer, speaker, and consultant, and has authored 9 books including the NYTimes Business BestsellerSelling with Integrity. Morgen developed the Buying Facilitation® method (www.sharondrewmorgen.com) in 1985 to facilitate change decisions, notably to help buyers buy and help leaders and coaches affect permanent change. Her newest book What? www.didihearyou.com explains how to close the gap between what’s said and what’s heard. She can be reached at [email protected]

How Much Time Do Sales People Waste?

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As sellers, we waste over 90% of our time. We need to find prospects, get them bought-in to the possibility of using our solution, get them what they need to understand our solution and how it might fit, get past gatekeepers, manage objections, get to the right people who will know how to buy us, and wait. And then, we only close a small fraction.

There must be a better way to do this, no?

  1. if we knew who would be a prospect on the first call, and get rid of those who will never buy, how much time would we save?
  2. if most gatekeepers would get us to the right person, how much time would we save?
  3. if we can connect with all of the folks who will ultimately be (or are already) on the Buying Decision Team, how many more sales would we close?
  4. if there are no more objections of any kind, how much time would we save and how much more money would we make?
  5. if buyers could make a buying decision in the time frame that we believe is possible (i.e. those buyers who call up and purchase quickly are good examples of what’s possible for every sale),

how much more business would we close? And why can’t we make these things happen?

The Reasons You Are Not Getting The Results You Deserve

To begin with, you are beginning at the end of the buyer’s journey – the purchasing decision – and must wait while they manage the internal, systems and change issues necessary prior to any purchase. As sellers, you have been trained to find appropriate prospects: you have not been trained to help them begin or traverse their journey through the pre-sales behind-the-scenes decision path that ischange management/systems based, and has more to do with internal politics, relationship issues and time lines than it does with purchasing a solution or choosing a vendor.

As a result, you have learned ways to manage the fallout you’ve received from attempting to offer a solution at the wrong time. (objections, no call backs, stalls, no appointments, no response to appointments or proposals, unwillingness to speak, no purchase) Or from attempting to offer a solution that folks might not know they need.  Or know they need but haven’t figured out how to get buy-in. Or they haven’t figured out all of the right people to assemble for the buying decision team.

Every buying decision is a change management problem.

The only reason you aren’t closing more sales, and the reason you end up wasting time with non-buyers and delayed sales cycles, is not because of your solution. Your solution is fine. So is your care and respect and personality.

You’re wasting your time trying to place a solution before the buyer has lined up the change management issues they must contend with. But that’s the job of the sales model. It was not invented to facilitate the buying decision path. That’s why I invented Buying Facilitation®.

The Buying Facilitation® Model Works With Sales To Manage The Buying Decision.

Buying Facilitation® works as a precursor to sales – it is not a solution placement model – to manage the back end of issues buyers must address privately before they can buy. By starting your prospecting by first helping buyers address change issues on their way to seeking excellence (hopefully with your solution),

 

  • Gatekeepers will help you find the right people to talk to rather than put you off.
  • You can help buyers put together their entire Buying Decision Team on the first call.
  • You will no longer get objections (fallout from the sales model) – price or otherwise.
  • You will be differentiated from your competition immediately.
  • Your buyers will buy in approximately 1/8 the time (sometimes with very large sales the number drops to 1/4).
  • You will know who is a buyer and who is not, on the first call.

Buying Facilitation employs a different skill set; Listening for systems rather than need; formulating facilitative questions that help change rather than using questions; following a coded sequence that enables change rather than gathering information. It’s not sales. But really – do you want to keep having those super long sales cycles and getting objections? Do you really want pipelines that aren’t converting?

About the Author

Sharon Drew Morgen is a visionary, original thinker, and thought leader in change management and decision facilitation. She works as a coach, trainer, speaker, and consultant, and has authored 9 books including the NYTimes Business BestsellerSelling with Integrity. Morgen developed the Buying Facilitation® method www.sharondrewmorgen.com in 1985 to facilitate change decisions, notably to help buyers buy and help leaders and coaches affect permanent change. Her newest book What? www.didihearyou.com explains how to close the gap between what’s said and what’s heard. She can be reached at [email protected]

Becoming referable is a matter of earning, not asking.

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A good friend gave me a book about building your business through referrals. The author believes, “The best marketing strategy is to be referable.”  He is correct. He writes, “Referability means that your very best clients and customers are continually cloning themselves – continually introducing you to those like themselves or better than themselves.”

Well, kind of – but not really clear.

According to the author, your referability depends upon four habits:

  1. Show up on time.
  2. Do what you say.
  3. Finish what you start.
  4. Say please and thank you.

Eh, no. Could being referable be that simple? The author asserts that these four habits convey respect and appreciation toward the customer. He says, if you’re arrogant or erratic, you won’t be referred, no matter how talented or charming you are. He says, if you’re not getting enough referrals, cultivate the four habits. He is partially right. Very partially.

I say his four elements don’t create referability – his four elements are a Given in any business relationship. To be referable, you have to go Way Beyond showing up on time and delivering what you promise.

Those habits may have worked in 1955, when ‘Happy Days’ was in full swing, but becoming referable and earning referrals in today’s times (unhappy days) are far more complex.

In my experience, I have found that a referral is earned, not asked for. When you ask for one, you immediately put your relationship in an awkward position, especially if the customer is reluctant to give you one, and you keep pestering him or her.

Here’s why: The one word definition of referral is risk.

When someone gives you a referral, it means they are willing to risk their relationship with the referred person or company. They have enough trust and faith in you to perform in an exemplary manner, and not jeopardize their existing friendship or business relationship.

Once you understand the definition of a referral, and realize how delicate, yet powerful, it is — you at once realize why you get them (or not) — and that you must become risk free in order to earn them.

Referrals are awkward to ‘ask for,’ and often create discomfort on the part of the customer.

Here are the elements that breed proactive referrals:

1 Be likeable. This is the first prerequisite. Without a friendly relationship, there is no need to go further.

2 Be reliable. The company, the product, the service, And you, must be ‘best,’ and ‘there when needed.’

3 The customer considers you an expert in your field. To be referable, you must have an expertise that breeds customer confidence.

4 They trust you. The customer is CERTAIN that you will do everything in the referred party’s best interest, like you have with theirs.

5 You have a track record of performance. You have already done the same thing with the customer and they’re comfortable that you can repeat the performance.

5.5 They consider you valuable – a resource, not a salesman. Not just, “do what you say.” There’s no real value there. I mean, provide value to the customer beyond your product and service. Value beyond the sale. Helping the customer to profit more, produce more, or some other form of value, either attached to your product or not. Not value in terms of you, value in terms of the customer. Referable value.

And there are telltale signs – clues that you ‘qualify’ for a referral:

REFERRAL CLUE: Your phone calls are returned. This means there was a purpose, a value, or a friendship reason. Returned calls connote respect for who you are.

REFERRAL CLUE: You get reorders. This means they WANT to do business with you, and they LIKE to do business with you.

REFERRAL CLUE: There are no problems with service issues. Your interactions are smooth and your execution is flawless.

REFERRAL CLUE: They accept your lunch invitation. And the conversation is more personal than business.

Here’s the secret: If the one word definition or referral is “risk,” then you must be risk free – or at least risk tolerable.

Here’s the strategy that will work 100% of the time: Give your customer a referral FIRST. It will not only blow them away, they will become an advocate on your referral team.

Here’s the report card: The referral you got turned into a sale.

About the Author

Jeffrey GitomerJeffrey Gitomer is the author of The Sales Bible, Customer Satisfaction is Worthless Customer Loyalty is Priceless, The Little Red Book of Selling, The Little Red Book of Sales Answers, The Little Black Book of Connections, The Little Gold Book of YES! Attitude, The Little Green Book of Getting Your Way, The Little Platinum Book of Cha-Ching, The Little Teal Book of Trust, The Little Book of Leadership, and Social BOOM! His website, www.gitomer.com, will lead you to more information about training and seminars, or email him personally at [email protected].

Assumptions: Why Being Right Is Wrong

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While researching my new book What? I discovered that when listening to others, we naturally assume we understand what’s meant and don’t question our assumption. Yet the filters our brain uses to hear what others mean to convey preclude accuracy, leading to faulty assumptions. Essentially, here’s what happens that makes accuracy so difficult (for more detail and research references read my free digital book What? Did you really say what I think I heard?):

  1. We only retain words we hear for approximately 3 seconds.
  2. On direct listening, our brain automatically and haphazardly deletes portions of what is foreign to our typical thinking.
  3. Our brain then takes what’s left over after the initial deletion and seeks an historic match (from a prior conversation our brain deems similar), and deletes whatever is divergent from that match.
  4. Our brain then takes the remainder from that deletion and filters it through our beliefs, values, filters, habits and memory.
  5. Whatever is left after deletions in steps 2, 3, 4 is what we adamantly assume we have heard.

A simple example of this just happened today. I was introduced as ‘Sharon Drew’ to a friend’s friend followed by this dialogue:

V: Hi Sharon.
SDM: Actually, my first name is Sharon Drew.
V: Oh. I don’t know anyone who calls themselves by their first name AND last name.
SDM: Neither do I.
V: But you just told me that’s how you refer to yourself!

Because a double first name was foreign to her, she put it in an accustomed category, deleting how she heard the introduction, and then wrongly assumed a typical a first name/last name configuration. She exacerbated the problem by then assuming she was right and I was wrong when I corrected her.

Assumptions Restrict Authentic Communication 

We all do this. Using conventional listening practice, it’s pretty difficult to hear what is meant without making assumptions. As a result, we end up restricting, harming, or diminishing authentic communication, and proceed to self-righteously huff and puff about what we believe is ‘right’, potentially getting the context, the outcome, the description, or the communication, wrong. Or we assume the speaker meant something they didn’t mean at all. In business it gets costly when we wrongly assume a task we were never asked to perform.

I recently got a reproaching note from an annoyed colleague when, among several faulty assumptions he made that were far, far from my intent (and in one case making an assumption about my behavior that in fact was a direct response to something he did!), I didn’t behave according to his beliefs: I had asked if he wanted to ‘preview’ my new book before it came out, and he felt my subsequent behaviors insufficient given my request that he ‘review’ the book. When I pointed out his faulty assumption he got quite bumptious until I sent him back to the original email. It cost us both a possible business collaboration.

Assumptions cost us greatly, harming relationships, business success, and health:

  • Sellers assume prospects are buyers when they ‘hear’ a ‘need’ that matches their solution and end up wasting a huge amount of time chasing prospects who will never buy;
  • Consultants assume they know what a client needs from discussions  with a few top decision makers while ignoring some of the important influencers, causing resistance to change;
  • Decision scientists assume they gather accurate data from the people that hired them and discount important data held by employees lower down the management chain, inadvertently skewering the results and making implementation difficult;
  • Doctors, layers, dentists assume foundational, standard certainties that may not be true in any unique patient/client situation and don’t get to the real issues, potentially causing harm;
  • Coaches assume clients mean something they are not really saying or skewering the focus of the conversation, ending up biasing the outcome with inappropriate questions that lead the client away from the real issues that never get resolved.

Using normal listening habits we can’t avoid making assumptions. But we can supersede our brains by taking the Observer/Coach role and listening for the metamessages – patterns, system, structure – of what is said rather than the story line or content (which is what our brains use to acquire the assumptions).

About the Author

Sharon Drew Morgen is founder of Morgen Facilitations, Inc. (www.newsalesparadigm.com). She is the visionary behind Buying Facilitation®, the decision facilitation model that enables people to change with integrity. A pioneer who has spoken about, written about, and taught the skills to help buyers buy, she is the author of the acclaimed New York Times Business Bestseller Selling with Integrity and Dirty Little Secrets: Why buyers can’t buy and sellers can’t sell and what you can do about it.

To contact Sharon Drew at [email protected] or go to www.didihearyou.com to choose your favorite digital site to download your free book.

Tips for Conducting Business Across Continents

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StrategyDriven Business Communications ArticleceIf you’re looking to conduct cross-continent business, know that you can, but the task is not easy. Managing one location has it’s own challenges like keeping up with all of your departments including Human Resources, sales, marketing and the like. Now, think about doing that, but all over the world where there are different time zones, cultures and expectations. Those of you that already run a multi-location enterprise know how difficult this can be. Again, it might not be simple, but with the right frame of mind and the best practices in place, you’ll be able to grow and strengthen your cross-continental presence and allow your business to truly thrive. The following are some tips that will enable you to conduct your global business successfully.

Create relationships and ask for help

Whether you have an established global business or are looking to expand to new markets, you don’t have the advantage of being everywhere at once to meet and connect with your teams and customers. You’ll have to work hard to maintain your relationships, so you should be setting up regular calls to access the tone and satisfaction of those employees at the location. You can even go the extra mile by making sure you’re present for important events at different global offices or utilize video calls for a more in-person feel. You should also be leveraging your connections in the various continents you’re looking to grow in. If you’re looking to expand in a location where the native language is not in your skillset, have a contact or service in place in order to spread awareness about your products and services.

Stay connected with the cloud

The best advice I can give you is to keep your global business connected. With the development of modern business management solutions, it is easier than ever to stay connected with your teams all over the world. The right software will unite your workforce whether they are in finance, distribution or manufacturing so that everyone is up-to-date on all processes. It will allow employees to access data anywhere, at any time making their working hours match up with yours regardless of time zone. With cloud implementation you’ll be able to go wherever your business takes you by accessing it from different technologies, too. You’ll be able to give the right people the information they need in real time in order to spot anomalies and correct any discrepancies.

Do global business but act local

Conducting global business requires businesses to act like a local. Customs, traditions, and legal compliance vary across geographies. Be aware of the legal compliance needs and requirements in the locations you are conducting business in so you are able to continue doing business legally. By learning the area’s customs and traditions, you are able to relate with locals better and establish a positive reputation.

Communicate often and clearly

We all know that communication is key, but are you taking that to heart when it comes to conducting business across continents? Take a minute to think about how often you have a conversation with your various teams and the way in which those discussions are orchestrated. Can it be improved? The business management solution I suggested should also allow you to cultivate and maintain productive communications with your global business. Another crucial part of your conversation is being able to use the right language. Barriers in language are detrimental to your productivity and waste time, so it is important to be succinct so your employees and customers can understand you. This is where language localisation will be a must for your cloud-based solution. Not only will you be able to clearly communicate with your team, but you’ll also be able to better service your international customers by avoiding miscommunications from suppliers or partners. Being able to clearly communicate strategy to your workforce in all markets will aid your strategic confidence and your business’ ability to stretch.

Remain flexible for growth

As a global business, the ability to maintain control over efficiencies—especially in terms of importing and exporting goods—is a must. You can increase your sales by utilizing an interface that is intuitive regardless of language or device, and is flexible enough to track and make adjustments on the spot. The market in one of your locations can change at any moment, and you’ll want to be agile enough to adapt and change with it. This is where keeping an open dialogue with your location will help, as well, because you’ll be aware of any structural changes you need to make. It’s essential that your global employees have mobile capabilities, and staying connected with cloud-based business management solutions can give you the flexibility you need to move forward.

Expanding to new markets and managing your global business is in your forte. For you business leaders who currently conduct business across continents, you know the unique perspective you gain by maintaining a presence around the world. As long as you create strong relationships, stay connected, communicate frequently, and remain flexible for growth, you’ll have everything you need to take control of your cross-continental business.

About the Author

Benoit GruberBenoît Gruber joined Sage in 2008 and is the Vice President of Corporate Communication for Sage Enterprise Market and Sage X3. He is responsible for Product Management & Marketing for Sage X3 globally, and is in charge of ensuring that the Operating Company (OpCo) teams are aligned behind the product strategy. He also serves as the Sage X3 solution expert in relationships with thought leaders, analysts and press. Prior to working at Sage, Benoît worked at SAP (from 2000-2008), where he held a variety of marketing and product management positions before becoming Sr. Industry Principle (Product & Business Development). He was a member of the EMEA Manufacturing Industries Business Group. Prior to working at SAP, Benoît worked for management consulting and technology services companies dedicated to ERP, Business Intelligence and new technologies. Benoît has also owned a company in the Media and Publishing sectors.