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It’s not the company. It’s the people in the company. It’s you.

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StrategyDriven Management and Leadership ArticleWhen you walk into someone’s place of business to shop or buy something, what are you expecting?

Most people (you included and me included) expect someone friendly, someone helpful when you need them, to be served in a timely manner, to be given fair value, to be presented with a quality product, to make the process quick and easy, and to be thanked whether you give them the business or not.

Then the question is: What do you get?

Typically, you get a mechanical welcome, someone feebly says, “can I help you?” Followed by people telling you what they can’t do versus what they can do, or what they don’t have. Maybe a bunch of sentences containing the word policy, and an inability to understand that just because they’re out of an item, doesn’t mean you don’t still want it or need it, and will likely go to their competition to get it. All this, and a touch of rudeness.

Now, maybe I have exaggerated a bit. But I can promise you, not by much.

And the interesting part is, many companies have multiple locations where the products are the same, but the service is not recognizable from place to place – one may be fantastic, while the other may be pathetic.

The inconsistency of people-performance can make or break a business.

Here is what will make you or anyone near you, or anyone in a job they consider beneath them, or anyone who hates work, understand the formula for emerging into a better career – certainly a better job. And all of these elements will be reflected in your performance.

1. Your internal happiness. Happiness is not a job, it’s a person.
2. Your attitude toward work. Do you just go to pass the time for a paycheck, or are you there to earn your pay with hard work?
3. Your self-esteem and self-image. How you feel about yourself.
4. Your desire to serve.
5. Your commitment to being your best.
6. Your boss and how your boss treats you.
7. Looking at your job as menial rather than a steppingstone towards your career. It’s not “just a job” – it’s “an opportunity.”
8. Pride in your own success.
9. Realizing that you’re are on display, and that your present actions will dictate your future success.
9.5 Every today is a window to your every tomorrow.

Companies spend millions, sometimes billions of dollars in advertising, branding, merchandising, strategizing, and every other element of marketing that they believe will bring business success. But if there are people involved, marketing means nothing if the people are not great.

When I walk into a business, I ask people, “How’s it going?” I get the most disappointing answers like, “Just three hours to go.” Or, “It’s Friday.” What kind of statement is that? What does that tell you about what kind of employee they are, much less what kind of service is attached to their attitude?

When you go to a hotel, a fifty-million-dollar business rests on the shoulders of shoulders of the front desk clerk. That’s the first impression you have. In a retail business, it’s no different. All the advertising gets you to come into the store. From there, it’s all about the retail clerk. Doctors and dentists now advertise. But it’s the person who answers the phone that gives a true reflection of what the doctor or dentist office will be like.

What is your company like? Do you have any people working there that hate their job? Do you have people with “attitude?” What can you do?

These elements will get YOU to BEST:
1. Set the example by being your best and doing your best
2. Hang around with the winners, not the whiners
3. Create service best practices, and have everyone implement them.
4. Have weekly internal positive attitude training.
5. Look at the best companies in America for best practices you can adapt and adopt.
6. Do your best at everything, everyday.
6.5 Work on your own attitude. You must think you will succeed, before success is yours. You must think you will be happy, before happiness is yours.

The root word of “your” is YOU. Each employee has the responsibility of representing their company to their customers in a way that reflects the image and reputation needed to build or maintain a great reputation and a leadership position.

Anything less than “best” is not acceptable. But here’s the secret: Don’t do it for your company – do it for yourself. Develop the pride in doing your best at your job even if it’s not your career, and never use the word “just” when you describe yourself.

Real winners are few and far between.
And making yourself one is a choice.

If you want a couple more attitude boosters and one major attitude secret go to gitomer.com, register if you’re a first time user, and enter ATTITUDE FOREVER in the GitBit box.

Reprinted with permission from Jeffrey H. Gitomer and Buy Gitomer.

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].

Take Your Values And Make Them Your Cause

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Most companies have corporate values that they hope embody their company, their employees, and the way they wish to be viewed by the public. Unfortunately, many organizations’ values statements are pages long. Too dense to be remembered and too complex to be ingrained in the company culture. Ours were.

We’ve learned there is power in simplicity, and that is why we at National Life Group have shifted our focus to three simple, authentic values: Do good. Be good. Make good. Just six words, but we’ve been able to translate them to a cause and a mission that drives everything we do. You and your company can do the same.

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About the Author

Mehran AssadiMehran Assadi serves as president and chief executive officer of National Life Group. Since taking that role in 2009, he has led major growth in sales of National Life’s life and annuity products and worked to build a culture of collaboration, engagement and empowerment among employees. Mehran and National Life Group were highly featured in the recently published book CAUSE! A Business Strategy for Standing Out in a Sea of Sameness, by Drs. Jackie and Kevin Freiberg, about the power of creating cause-related companies.

National Life Group® is a trade name of National Life Insurance Company, Montpelier, VT, Life Insurance Company of the Southwest, Addison, TX, and their affiliates. Each company of National Life Group is solely responsible for its own financial condition and contractual obligations. Life Insurance Company of the Southwest is not an authorized insurer in New York and does not conduct insurance business in New York.

References

1. American Enthusiasm to Shop with a Conscience at Record-High, but Doubts About Corporate Impact Persist, Cause Marketing Forum, October 2013. http://www.causemarketingforum.com/site/apps/nlnet/content2.aspx?c=bkLUKcOTLkK4E&b=6430205&ct=13344211&notoc=1
2. Culture of Purpose, Deloitte, 2014. http://www2.deloitte.com/content/dam/Deloitte/us/Documents/about-deloitte/us-leadership-2014-core-beliefs-culture-survey-040414.pdf
3. 2014 Edelman Trust Barometer Executive Summary, Edelman, 2014. http://www.scribd.com/doc/200429962/2014-Edelman-Trust-Barometer#fullscreen

Management Observation Program Best Practice 17 – Paired Observations

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StrategyDriven Management Observation Program Best Practice ArticleManagers translate leadership’s vision into the day-to-day actions of the workforce. They do this through their decisions, published standards, and operational procedures. They reinforce desired behaviors through organizational performance measures and management observations. But how do executives ensure their manager and supervisor direct reports understand and properly translate and reinforce their vision with the workforce? One method of doing so is through the conduct of paired observations.

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About the Author

Nathan Ives, StrategyDriven Principal is a StrategyDriven Principal and Host of the StrategyDriven Podcast. For over twenty years, he has served as trusted advisor to executives and managers at dozens of Fortune 500 and smaller companies in the areas of management effectiveness, organizational development, and process improvement. To read Nathan’s complete biography, click here.

StrategyDriven Enterprises Launches an Online Talent Management Program Forum

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StrategyDriven Enterprises launched an online talent management program forum; providing leaders access to decades of first-hand experience in programmatically acquiring, developing, and retaining high-quality employees.
 
StrategyDriven Talent Management ForumStrategyDriven Enterprises, LLC announced the launch of an online Talent Management Forum; providing innovative thought leadership and collaboration opportunities to help executives and managers programmatically drive the acquisition, development, and retention of high-quality employees.

“When highly skilled and knowledgeable people give the full measure of their creativity, intellect, and effort to achieving the organization’s goals, truly remarkable performance results,” explains Nathan Ives, StrategyDriven’s President and Chief Executive Officer. “Thus, talented personnel are the lifeblood of every organization.”

“Implementing StrategyDriven’s recommended talent management practices can help enhance any organization’s ability to attract, develop, and retain top talent,” says Karen Juliano, StrategyDriven’s Editor-in-Chief. “This is achieved through deliberate actions that make employees feel valued and respected, inspired and motivated while at the same time being managed effectively and efficiently.”

Contributed to, by highly experienced business leaders, StrategyDriven’s online Talent Management Forum provides actionable methods and tools executives and managers can use to implement and enhance key components of their talent management program including:

  • Talent Acquisition – identification of near and long-term personnel knowledge, skills, and experiences needed combined with the effective search, vetting, and signing-on of employees whose backgrounds meet these needs
  • Talent Development – enhancement of employee knowledge, skills, and experiences so to prepare a sufficient number of individuals to meet the organization’s near and long-term talent needs as circumstances dictate
  • Talent Retention – creation of a workplace environment that attracts and retains the highly talented individuals needed for the organization’s success while concurrently ensuring the departure of those personnel not contributing sufficient value to the organization

The StrategyDriven Talent Management Forum’s thought leadership documents are being distributed to StrategyDriven’s clients, including some of the world’s most respected companies. These documents are available at: www.StrategyDriven.com/talent-management.

Checklist for Influencers: questions for sellers, coaches, leaders, change agents

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Most of you are really good at what you do: as influencers, sellers, coaches, change agents, or leaders, your intuition, excellent skills, and history of success guide your ability to facilitate change for your clients. And yet… Using conventional models and questions – both designed to drive the predisposition of the facilitator – it’s inevitable that your interactions will have bias, and will unwittingly restrict possible outcomes accordingly. Here’s a checklist of questions to help you determine the extent of your bias:

When attempting to influence someone (as sellers, leaders, etc.) can you be certain that your natural assumptions, unconscious expectations, and goals play no/little role in biasing or restricting the outcome?

Are you aware of, and make allowances for, your full range of biases? Can you think of the role your biases play that might predispose outcomes?

Can you think of any of your Communication Partner’s (CP) biases that were overlooked but ended up determining the outcome? How do you manage your CP’s biases, triggers, filters, and assumptions to expand choice and possibility, and avoid unconscious resistance, fallout, and restricted results? (Not to mention lost sales and difficult implementations.)

Do you know what you’d need to do differently to enter a conversation without bias or assumptions to facilitate your client in determining their own systemic parameters?
Are you aware how your curiosity and questions are subjectively biased toward the goal you think you need to reach – and 1. potentially lose a more congruent outcome, 2. alienate many who might need your solutions?

How can you be certain you’re speaking to all the right people, or using the best questions for them, specifically, to gather the most appropriate information given their idiosyncratic knowledge and culture?

Do your current methods of avoiding resistance work?

Are you aware of how much your brain filters what you hear and how much more is being said than what you’re hearing? Are you aware of the cost of misunderstanding what’s going on outside of your goals and expectations?

How much of the early data you gather turns out to be accurate? How do you know when/if you ever get to the accurate data? How do your expectations and the bias in your questions interfere with the Other’s recognition of the full fact pattern (largely unconscious at the start)?

What would you need to believe differently to consider that your current skill set, biased mind set, and habitual set of expectations is creating a diminished ability to influence the full extent of real change and avoid resistance?

How often do you assume something is ‘working’ or was successful – a coaching client was changing, or a buyer was going to buy – and you were wrong? Do you know for certain what happened behind-the-scenes that caused the failure and you could have circumvented?

Are you aware of how your own biases, assumptions, triggers, and filters, have gotten in the way of success – or do you believe you’re right and the other person wrong/stupid?

What would you need to believe differently to be willing to add some new skills to use less bias? To enable your CPs to recognize and manage their unconscious systems elements that have informed all choices and need to be shifted for change (a purchase, an implementation) to occur so they can easily buy, change or adopt your terrific material?

Facilitating Choice

We’re all in the business of influencing, or attempting to get what we want. Yet we fail a very high percentage of the time; sellers loses 94% of their prospects; coaches lose 70% of follow on clients; implementations fail 97% of the time. It’s not our fault: we fail because our conventional skills are focused on:

  • content push
  • premature goal setting
  • the facilitator’s expectations
  • listening for pre-determined details

and miss the unspoken metamessages, values, history, rules, and consensus issues that make up our CPs status quo. It’s possible to enable our CP partners to do the change work from within, without us biasing and limiting possibility to our own subjective view.

I have developed a generic change management model with a unique skill set that facilitates decision making and change at the core unconscious, systemic level and avoids bias and resistance. I developed it over many decades by coding my own Asperger’s systemizing brain and designing a new form of listening, a new type of question, and coding the steps that happen unconsciously during all change. I’ve trained it to 100,000 sales people, coaches, leaders, and negotiators globally. It’s a model that must be learned and added to your current skill set; it takes some time to learn and practice because it’s so different from conventional models. But it’s scalable. DuPont, for example, trained 8,000 sales people and KPMG trained 6,000 consultants.

Using this new decision facilitation model, you’ll be able to help others determine how to quickly and congruently buy, change, implement, etc. themselves in the area you are facilitating. No more delayed sales cycles or lost prospects; no more failed implementations; no more resistance to change. You can close 40% of all qualified prospects from first call, in half the time; you can help coaching clients discover their unconscious incongruences on the first call; you can implement large change events with no resistance.

I can teach you how to unhook from your personal biases and enter conversations in a way that leads/ discovers/ creates all that’s possible through win/win, servant leadership and congruent change. Imagine being able to enter every conversation and have it reach its most ethical, financial, and creative possibility. Imagine.

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.