It’s about focus. It’s about being in the game. And it’s just as important for your organization as it is for you. It’s about what we tell our clients: there are no casual moments!

How many times have you sat in a meeting, or worse yet, talked to someone directly and you sense that they are just not there? Think about the person doodling, reading something or checking email on their Blackberry during a meeting. Their body is there as you witness it in front of you, and they may even be staring at you and nodding their head – but their mind is elsewhere. Annoying? Absolutely – and insulting to everyone near them. This by the way is not a sign of how busy and important you are; it’s a sign of how uninterested and unimportant you are to the conversation or the meeting.

This sabotaging behavior does not apply only to meetings in a corporate environment. We see it in other areas as well. Such as team selling situations, where one member of the team isn’t focused. Do they really think the prospect, client or buyer doesn’t notice? If they do, hubris would best describe their behavior, and loss of business the outcome.

When you experience this behavior in someone, what’s your immediate reaction? Do you want to engage or buy? Hardly. You will likely dismiss them and silently deselect them or their company: a costly self sabotaging behavior.

Organizations also suffer from focus problems. The strategic plan that gets written, introduced with great fan fare (remember the T-shirts and slogans on coffee cups), but never implemented. The new idea that will save the business only to be replaced the new idea that will save the business. For the employees it’s like riding a roller coaster: one minute you’re clanking up a steep incline, the next you feel like you’re in free fall. Great for thrills; horrible for managing a company.

Ideas on ways to increase focus:

ü      Organize yourself and de-clutter your workspace to make it more focus-friendly

ü      Take control or you will lose control

ü      Be diligent and identify times when you are losing focus and understand  why – use reflection and self-assessment techniques

ü      Stop thinking that multi-tasking is a good thing, and stop multi-tasking

ü      Use accountability partners to help you understand why you are having problems focusing

ü      Give yourself small rewards for task/projects accomplished to encourage momentum

ü      Take frequent mini-breaks

ü      Get a good nights sleep

ü      Eat appropriate meals at appropriate times

ü      Hydrate throughout the day

ü      Exercise

ü      If you cannot engage enough to stay focused at work – find a new job

If leaders and employees in an organization have focus management problems, so will the organization.

Copyright 2009 Kubica and LaForest

We have to be perfect – right? Wrong. Maybe if you’re dealing with life and death situations, but how many of us really do that? Not many. And some professions do require a high degree of accuracy. But in the overall scope of things, there aren’t many of these either.

The World War II General, George Patton, had an interesting observation. He said: A good plan initiated immediately and with vigor is better than the perfect plan initiated after a two week wait. How many reading this wait for the perfect plan, the perfect proposal, the perfect client pitch. If you do, you are wasting your time and other’s time. Good is often good enough.

We found that the pursuit of perfection was a useful crutch. It serves multiple purposes. It prevents rejection; it provides a reason for working long hours; it provides an opportunity to avoid other less comfortable interactions. Yes, what we are saying here is that perfection can be avoidance behavior wrapped in the veil of the presumed sacred. After all, who isn’t for perfection?

Alan Weiss, the Million Dollar Consultant^®, talks about the 80% factor – 80% ready and go. Think about it. How often is the extra 20% you put into a proposal, a product, a service, recognized, appreciated or even needed. What happens, however, is that costs go up: the cost of time, dollars and lost opportunities.

Perfection has a more insidious impact on organizations when it manifests in leaders who believe by virtue of their position that they must have all the answers. They are reluctant to ask for help for fear of appearing not to be the “perfect” leader to their employees. Opportunities are forgone; decisions are delayed or poorly made.

Here are some thoughts on what you can do if the need for perfection haunts you:

ü      Review and edit three times, max, or use a professional editor

ü      Develop and use standard templates so you don’t have to recreate each time – just tweak

ü      Avoid “creep” – that is, doing more and going beyond scope. Ask yourself – does it meet the key objectives?

ü      Say no to things you don’t like and aren’t good at to avoid procrastination and obligation to over-do

ü      Know the industry standard (minimum to get an “A” / accomplish the task or goal

ü      Adopt the 80% and go rule

Copyright 2009 Kubica and LaForest

Let’s face it, rejection is tough. It hurts psychologically. Nobody likes rejection, Sometimes, however, our fear of rejection is so strong we hear rejection when it isn’t there.

Quitting at no is a behavior we find most often in individuals new to business, new to sales, or new to client facing responsibilities. Too many people feel that no is a rejection of them: personally. In business, no often is a reaction to your initial approach, a first meeting, a first discussion. It is also a common reaction when there is no relationship. Of course, no can in fact mean no, but we firmly believe that this is rarely the correct first interpretation.

Learning how to interpret no is an important success skill. Many people think that an objection is a no. An objection is an objection – to an idea, thought, proposal presented at the moment. It often is a sign of interest; a sign to continue the discussion. If you interpret an objection as a no, then you are responsible for ending the discussion.

A no may also be the result of not finding the buyer’s real need. If you are not asking questions, probing, exploring options with your buyer, you are not working to understand their need. Once a real need is found, the discussion turns quickly to how best to address it.

Here are some ideas to help you deal with no:

ü      First build a relationship with your buyer. If you do not have the time or the interest to build a relationship, stop reading here.

ü      Adopt a new paradigm of no – see no as an opportunity to listen, learn and understand. And it helps build relationships.

ü      Listen more than you talk – much more

ü      Prepare and use scripts (practiced and remembered or written to reference possible responses)

ü      Look for the economic buyer and find the need

ü      Don’t try for an all or nothing approach. “Peel the onion” and get approval at each layer before moving to the next layer

ü      Be confident, persistent (not a pest), and patient

ü      Don’t waste your time with gatekeepers and people who have no authority (or self-confidence) to say yes.

Copyright 2009 Kubica and LaForest

Hardly. Talk without action is an expensive self-sabotaging behavior. Talk without action leads to:

• Lost opportunity – both personal and organizational
• Annoys other people
• Self-delusion – the belief you are doing something when in fact you are doing nothing
• Failure

Talk is about the strategic plan that never gets implemented. It’s about the “flavor of the month” (that new idea that will save your career or your business, that changes frequently to a new idea that will save your career or your business). It’s about the book you’re going to write, the new business you’re going to start, the new career you want to pursue. It’s about what can be, but somehow never is.

Talk does have its positive side, but only when followed by action and results. And, talk about intended action can build momentum and help fuel results.

But, how expensive is talk with no action?

• The opportunity cost is high (foregone success)
• High cost of losing credibility with you friends, colleagues and employees
• Loss of your job (talk and no action leads to cost reductions – you)
• Inability to get a job because of your reputation of “talks a better game then he/she plays”
• People stop believing in you, and may even stop listening to you
• And, at some point, you will likely stop believing in yourself.

Is this a problem you have? Maybe you’re not sure? Consider:

• Asking someone you trust if you are seen this way-ask for specific evidence / examples
  • Be careful asking your spouse or significant other. They may be so supportive that they are unwilling to tell you what they see.
• Be open to honest, and perhaps uncomfortable, feedback
• Be willing to address the issue
• Stop the excuse “well this is just who I am.”  The simple fact is that is not who you are, that is who you choose to be, and, what you enable yourself to do (or not do). Clearly your choice, but an expensive one.

Remember what Emerson said: what you do speaks so loudly I can’t hear what you say. Your actions determine how people eventually perceive you. And, if your actions are silent and your mouth is not…

Copyright 2009 Kubica and LaForest

Sales are the lifeblood of a company. Nothing happens until the product or service is sold. No service delivery; no revenue. No product sales; no revenue. No revenue; no business. So why would you risk the success of your company by sabotaging your most important process for generating revenue? Yet putting your company’s future in the hands of “the pusher” is exactly what you are doing. Nobody, and we really mean nobody, likes a pusher.

Yet we meet them every day. Typically we see them:

• Selling beyond getting the agreement to buy
  • These people have an acute case of hearing loss and reality detachment!
• Trying to sell the buyer more than he/she needs
  • These people fail to understand that growth comes from thinking about the return sale and not maximizing the first sale!
• The high pressure sales person
  • These people believe that the “buy now while the supply lasts” approach will lead to a long term customer relationship. It won’t.  Creating a sense of urgency can help move a sale forward, but at this risk of the relationship if they go away with buyers remorse.

All of these strategies can lead to short term success. The initial sale. But few businesses are built on a “one and out” sales model. When I was buying a car a few years ago, the salesman took my keys and wouldn’t return them until he gave me his high pressure sales pitch. I had two reactions, one I would prefer not to recount in this blog and the other was to call 911 and report the theft of my car. Needless to say, this auto dealership does not get my business.

We all want a competitive advantage in the marketplace. We want to grow our business, but we won’t do it by being a pusher. In fact, a major differentiating strategy is to:

• Listen first and more than you talk.
• Understand the buyer’s needs and motivation. You do this by listening, perception checking and asking meaningful questions (probing) to better understand their interests, needs and priorities.
• Move through a series of small yeses.
• Always respond to the buyer’s expressed need as priority (verses their want).
• Always have the buyer’s best interest in mind – how will they be better off from having done business with you.
• Always think of the third sales- meaning return business. That means go slow, don’t push and always think of building a long term relationship.
• Finally never, never, never “take my keys”, which is becoming our metaphor for the pusher poster child. Because if you do, my reaction will be “get me outta here” – every time.

Copyright 2009 Kubica and LaForest