Just before I began my first summer with The Southwestern Company, I had the opportunity to meet Anthony Burgess when he came to our campus. Who is Anthony Burgess you ask? He is my favorite British author, most famous for writing A Clockwork Orange, later made into a movie by Stanley Kubrick. (Assignment: go attempt to read this short novel–it’s brilliant and violent–all written in nadsat–a teen slang with Russian roots that Burgess created.) His novel took just two weeks to write.
OK, enough literary background. This is a sales blog. Right.
I had lunch with him and some other grad students, then had the good fortune to hear Mr. Burgess give a lecture that night. It was called “The Author’s Daily Damnation.” Intriguing title! What did Mr. Burgess discuss? How authors need daily discipline–how they need to write, regardless of how inspired they feel! How they need to plant their rear ends in the chair and crank out a minimum of a few pages a day–even if it’s not great material. In short, he was, in Southwestern parlance, citing the value of “30 demos a day” or “putting in the hours.”
Burgess stressed how, as an author, you worked, you wrote, you typed, every day. Your inspiration, your creativity, listening for your muse–were all secondary to the task of sitting down and working. (He also proposed that part of the author’s daily damnation was to become famous for your worst work–in this case for his Clockwork novel, but again that’s for another literary blog.)
So, my sales droogs, think about your daily disciplines–those activities which determine your success as a salesperson. Are you motivated to make calls? To approach people? To conduct info sessions? I welcome your thoughts.
How do you regain perspective when you are in a sales slump? When I was selling as a student with Southwestern, I had attitude adjustments made from within and from without. Last week, I was taken by a touching story from the Olympics . It reminded me how we can get perspective when we’ve lost it.
Alexandre Bilodeau won Canada’s first Olympic gold medal on home soil recently in the men’s moguls ski competition. Canada had failed to medal when it hosted both the ’76 and ’88 Olympics. When he won, the nation went crazy. The back story I found as compelling as the actual race.
Bilodeau credited much of his success and all of his sports inspiration to his older brother, Frederic, who has spent his life challenged by cerebral palsy. He was diagnosed with cerebral palsy at age 10 and doctors told him he would lose the ability to walk. Although he spends most of his time in a wheelchair, Frederic still walks — and skis.
Alex and Frederic are best friends, and the young Olympian adores his older brother. Frederic was there to cheer on his younger brother, and during the final of the men’s moguls, cameras showed Frederic cheering enthusiastically for his brother, jumping out of his seat and waving his arms in the air as soon as Alexandre crossed the line at the end of his gold-medal run. (OK, Canadians, heres is a bonus report just for you):
Alex calls his older brother his inspiration.
His brother has helped him keep things in perspective all these years, especially when he was disappointed by an 11th-place finish at the Torino Olympics in 2006.
“Even if it’s raining, I’ll take it, I’ll go train,” Bilodeau said. “He doesn’t have that chance, and he’s having a smile every morning he wakes up.”
Alex said whenever he was upset and unmotivated to get up and ski, he thought of his brother, who, although suffering from this disease, never complained: “He is the happiest guy in the world. Frederic wakes up every day with a big smile and goes to bed with a big smile. He puts everything in my life in perspective.”
How do you maintain your perspective when sales disappointment strikes? What questions do you ask yourself? How do you get unstuck? Share a thought!
Flip a coin. Flip it again. And flip it 15 times after that. What are the chances that it landed on heads all 17 times? Slim to none, I’d guess.
Just as with the coin, sales is a numbers game. It is 100% guaranteed that you will experience both the winning, and the losing, sides of the coin. You will hear customers say ‘yes!’ to your product and you will also hear customers tell you that your product is rubbish and, ‘no, I’m not buying’.
Matter of fact, you will likely hear the latter more often than you will hear the former. This is not bad news; it simply is the way it is. But how bland would your job be if you heard ‘yes’ all the time? The reason making a sale feels so good is because you know that we’ve worked for it. You put the time and energy into it, and you earned that sale. Hearing nothing but ‘yes’ would take the excitement away. Just like it wouldn’t be much fun flipping that coin if it always landed on heads. You will hear a ‘yes’ eventually… if you are willing to stick around long enough and see it through. It is statistically impossible for you to go at it day after day, time after time, try after try, and not make a sale. It may take a day or a week or a month, but it will happen. It’s got to happen.
Colonel Sanders drove around the US for two years trying to sell his chicken recipe. He was turned down 1,009 times. Talk about believing in the numbers!
The people who excel in this world are not the lucky or the smart or the naturally gifted. They are the patient, the persistent, and the tenacious. They are the ones that got back up after they’d been chewed up and spit out.
So get used to the word ‘no’. Expect, embrace it, and learn to enjoy it. Because that ‘no’ means that you are now one ‘no’ closer to your long-awaited YES.
Haley Price sold books for three summers (2003-2005). She is the author and illustrator of Today is the Best Day of My Life. This book contains bite-sized life principles, presented in a light and simple way, that are intended to help guide people toward a more productive, more meaningful, and more fun life. She tailored a version of this book specifically towards Southwestern students, and it was used for the first time in their sales kits in the summer of 2009. While not writing, Haley works in global advertising sales for Microsoft in New York, NY.
What can we learn from Super Bowl XLIV that could apply to Southwestern student managers? For me, one principle stood out: the value of attitude and confidence! The game was a classic case of the technically-flawless Peyton Manning and his confident Colts losing to the underdog Drew Brees and the formerly-hapless Saints.
I fully expected Peyton Manning to win, and handily. He is one of the best quarterbacks of all time, a true “student of the game”. Even during games the Colts are winning, he is on the sidelines studying photos of the opposing defenses. Manning is the consummate professional–cool, calm, collected. He gets annoyed when his team doesn’t perform perfectly.
As I watched (with all my American Airlines friends at O’Hare airport), I have to admit I nearly gave up on the Saints in the first quarter after they fell behind 10-0. Manning was taking them apart, moving his offense down the field with the customary surgical precision. History was against any team overcoming a ten point deficit. It looked like the confident, technical master was going to prevail over his upstart emotional opponents.
My plane took off and I knew I’d land to hear Colts celebrating on ESPN.
Was I shocked when the pilot announced that the final score was 31-17…and the Saints had won! A first time victory for the Saints in their first trip to the Super Bowl. It was inspiring to hear Brees and his coach, Sean Payton, share their emotions about winning the Lombardi Trophy.
My assessment? Attitude and emotion prevailed over technical execution. The New Orleans Saints simply would not be denied. They wanted it more. The excitable Drew Brees and his teammates took on the pressure and prevailed. He commented after the game:
“Along the way, people have asked me so many times, ‘Do you look at it as a burden or extra pressure? Do you feel like you’re carrying the weight of the city on your teams’ shoulders.’ I said, ‘No, not at all. We look at it as a responsibility.’ Our city, our fans, gave us strength and we owe this to them. … There’s no people that you would want to win for more than the city of New Orleans.”
The Saints had decided in advance they were supposed to win, and their collective positive attitude won the day, and the championship.
Have you known sales people who knew their stuff, who made their calls, who did the demos, but were not performing well? Sure. Technically masterful, emotionally flat.
When I was recruiting as a young sales manager, it seemed every spring my closing percentage would drop off around April. I got frustrated. Inevitably, I lamented, “I’m not doing anything different—my presentation is exactly the same as it’s always been! I don’t know what’s wrong.” My sales director would fly in, watch me do a presentation, and say, “No enthusiasm.” Every year I’d then make the fix and my results improved.
If your sales have dropped off, or your recruiting is not up to your own high standards, take a look in the mirror, it may be time for an infusion of emotion and a winning attitude. Take a lesson from the New Orleans football franchise. Now all the Colts fans can rail on me. That’s what the comments are for…. As a bonus, here’s a sample of Drew Brees getting his team ready emotionally.
Focus. What do you focus on? This blog seemed to tie in to Valentine’s Day coming up, so…
How can you fall out of love with your job? At Southwestern, you can notice how few people say yes, on the heat, on random negative thoughts, on how you dislike the feeling of failure, on the weight of your bookbag. If this is what you notice–what you give your attention to–soon, you will be falling out of love with your sales job.
Now to your significant other. Remember all the habits that you once found cute, or overlooked? His inability to ask for directions, his talking with his mouth full, his leaving his dirty clothes all over the floor? Early on in your relationship, you overlooked these foibles and concentrated on what you loved about him. You were noticing his strengths and ignoring his weaknesses. (You could fix those up later, right?)
Now, what you ignored you notice–all those habits become irritations. The crumbs on the counter, never replacing the toilet paper roll, all the time he spends with his friends…what a schmuck! (How did I ever like him?) You are noticing what you don’t like. You will fall out of love at some point and may not know why!
So, since this is a sales blog and not eHarmony, it might be time to refocus your focus–in other words, if you’re tired of your sales career, you may want to notice what you’re noticing. You may need to decide to be grateful.
Here are a few good questions to ask yourself at the end of the day:
What have I given today? (not gotten, given)
What have I learned today? (people who are learning are liking what they do)
How has today been an investment for my future? (not just a day closer to the weekend)
What do I love about what I do?
After you have been in a love relationship or a career for awhile, the shiny newness tends to wear off. When it does–and it will–you have to be deliberate in your focus. You have to affirm what you want, consciously. Left to my own devices, my mind automatically drifts into negativity. It’s far easier for me to notice what’s wrong than what’s right. Are you like this? I have to consciously make an effort. At times, I have to notice what I like/love about my job–and my wife. I’m sure she has to do the same.
A sales career, a loving relationship–both take energy and investment to work over the long haul. Action point: Send your sales opportunity some flowers or a nice box of chocolates. It deserves it.
I welcome your thoughts and comments. What are your strategies to stay in love with what you do?
This is something I probably say 50 times during each checkout season at Southwestern. During that time, hundreds of student salespeople are finishing their summers and are considering returning for another summer. Or not.
“I think I could learn this stuff somewhere else.”
“I don’t like selling.”
“I hated it.”
True, more or less. But what I often remind them about is that our program didn’t create the personal shortcomings they experienced—it simply revealed them. Difficult circumstances reveal what you’re made of. So we (I do the same thing) tend to rationalize away our sub-par behavior and blame our situation.
“Southwestern made me this way.” Nope, sorry. Southwestern (better yet, the challenges) revealed your character.
Oftentimes, the desire to move on to other opportunities is another form of “the grass is greener” syndrome. You can change your job, you can switch your role, you can get a different spouse–but you still have to live with yourself. You take your luggage with you.
If only the weather were better, people were friendlier, there were more folks employed, less traffic, a different administration, better prospects, a new sales territory…we’d probably be happy right where we are. The problem is there’s too much pressure here, too many frustrations. The answer seems simple enough—move, switch, change jobs, quit!
The problem is that when we move on in our search, we take ourselves along. Where we are is where we’ve chosen to be. If we don’t look at ourselves, we’ll choose the same people & predicaments again.
There is enormous freedom in realizing this truth. So, own up. Remember, you take your luggage with you.
Whether you sell books with Southwestern, or sell real estate, cars, clothes, insurance, stocks, or sales seminars, you experience frustration from time-to-time. When it happens, we make blanket statements which convey our upset. We declare our negative feelings through our self-talk. Our self-talk, in turn, leads us to an emotional state which then affects our behavior. Welcome to a potential Sales Slump.
So how do you regain perspective? I’ve found one great way to bounce back mentally:
Ask “Compared to what?” Compare your situation to someone else who has exponentially more to deal with. Using the “My life stinks” example above, yes, your life does stink until you compare your problems with a Haitian citizen who lost everything in an earthquake, or with someone you know whose child has died. When you make that quick comparison, you think, “Well, my life isn’t that bad.” If you think, “my job sucks,” then ask compared to what? Compared to not having one? I’m sure you would appreciate your sucky job more when you ponder being one of the millions of Americans who are out of work right now. See? Instant gratitude.
My fifth year as a bookman, there was a week when I really hated my life, my team, & my summer work. I mean I was seriously negative. My self-talk was crap. My expectations were low, to say the least. Obviously, my sales were tanking. I wasn’t getting in doors, customers were not responding and I was FRUSTRATED! I’d even forgotten my “compared to what” technique….
God then decided to help give me some perspective: I trudged up to another house, glancing at the ramp to the front door. After I knocked, a young boy opened the door—from his wheelchair—gave a big smile, and cheerfully said, “Hi! Can I help you?” Wow. Ding! New perspective! Instantly! I thought I had problems—until I met this young man whose legs didn’t work. Yet he was happy, and I had my head up my butt.
So the good news is you can make this shift without God having to intervene. We are constantly evaluating what is going on around us, labeling experiences, talking to ourselves, making judgments…it’s impossible to turn our minds off, but you can keep the negativity in check, by asking, “compared to what?”
“Any act often repeated forms a habit; and habit allowed, steadily gains in strength. At first it may be but as a spider’s web, easily broken through, but if not resisted it soon binds us with chains of steel.”
–Tryon Edwards
“I’m getting ready to commence to begin to start to recruit.” This isn’t an exact quote, but I’ve heard several excuses from Southwestern Company student managers over the years regarding recruiting and getting their teams started. Confusion and procrastination are often just cop-outs (“cop-out”, for my international friends, means “excuse”).
Usually we know very well what needs to be done and we even know how to do it. As we’ve often said, “Recruiting/selling is simple—but it’s not easy!” Oftentimes, if we’re honest, we have to admit the “what am I supposed to do?” isn’t the real question at all.
Any young athlete knows what to do: you don’t miss practices, you sacrifice video games after school, and you drill new techniques over and over until they feel natural and automatic. Good students, too, understand that they need to hit the books no matter how they feel. They practice good study habits until they have good study habits.
Achieving your sales goals, reaching your recruitment goals, having an improved new year consists of conscientiously repeating positive actions—nothing real mysterious or confusing about it. We must be willing to exercise the discipline if we want to reap the rewards.
Today, I will welcome the patterns that lead to success, and this will lead to a very Happy New Year. As always I welcome your comments!
It is incredibly common to hear people at self improvement seminars trying to discover their “strengths” and “weaknesses”. Everyone–including Southwestern Company trainers–has their own philosophy on how to deal with these. Some life coaches will tell you, “The key is turning your weaknesses into strengths!” Others insist, “The only way to reach your potential is to focus on your strengths and find positions in life that minimize the impact of your weaknesses. Focusing on your weaknesses is a waste of time!” These are only two examples of a whole multitude of options on how to get to know yourself better and improve as a person. None of these are bad philosophies, and all of them have lots of good ideas to draw from. The problem is that most people fail to recognize the difference between a specific skill that can be developed and a mental or emotional characteristic they would like to change in themselves. The unfortunate reality is that it is far easier to get better at a specific skill than it is to completely shift the way your brain operates.
In reality we all have points in our lives when we are so on that our “weaknesses” are barely noticeable or are completely non-existent. Our strengths are all that we see. We are in the zone. And then there are some points in our lives where we are just off. At these times we have no discernable strengths and our weaknesses seem overpowering! So trying to think through your weaknesses and fix them, or attempting to isolate your strengths and maximize them, can often times be a very frustrating endeavor. When we are in the zone we feel like we have arrived! “I did it! I conquered my weaknesses!” Then we later get in a funk and the logical conclusion we come to is, “I have accomplished nothing. I really thought I was getting better this time!” Instead of isolating what our strengths and weaknesses are, a far more productive exercise is to spend some time answering the following questions:
1) What am I like when I am on?
2) What am I like when I am off?
3) What are my habits when I am on?
4) What are my habits when I am off?
The first thing that happens after really spending time diving into this exercise is that you will begin to notice when you start to be “off” and will no longer continue to think thoughts that go something like, “There I go again. I always do that!” The biggest obstacle most people face in living the life they want to live is taking ownership of their “weaknesses”. People think that the things they dislike about themselves are somehow hardwired into their DNA. That isn’t you! That is you when you are off. This is empowering because it allows you to take a step back and think through questions 3 and 4. What have I been doing recently? What have I not been doing? For me personally, if I work out first thing in the morning and read a motivational book before breakfast, it is going to be a great day! If my thoughts are primarily focused on others or focused on long term goals then I am loving life. I absolutely love my job if I am spending most of my time in front of people, truly listening, and learning new things from every person I meet. If I am spending a ton of mental energy focused on trivial problems or manifesting negative situations in my mind that “may” unfold; I am irritable, easily frustrated, and generally don’t enjoy life. This is true in both my career and family life. This knowledge is power.
So catch yourself. Notice when you are starting to slip. However, it takes more than simply catching yourself in a destructive pattern. You have to take immediate action! Get back to the habits that lead to the best version of you. Go do the things that give you confidence and lead to you loving life. This seems obvious, and yet the truth about human existence is that it takes much less effort to be neutral or negative than it takes to be positive and optimistic. But it is worth it. Life is more fun and more rewarding. It is all about your habits.
The reality is that you are always in habit patterns whether good or bad. If you wake up every morning and decide whether or not to exercise, it is tough! You are in the habit of indecision. If you just wake up and do it every single morning for 3 weeks, it will be hardwired into you. You don’t even think about it. It is like this in all of your habits. This is not just about what you do with your mornings. You are constantly forming habits at work, with your family, with your friends, and with your own thoughts. So form good ones! If you struggle in forming these habits in any area, get an accountability partner. Find some way to hold yourself accountable. Do whatever it takes. The key is, DO IT! Stop procrastinating. Stop saying that you will form good habits next week. Don’t wait until it becomes convenient. There is nothing more important than you being the best version of yourself. It impacts everything. So what could me more important than forming the habits that lead to this? Anything that is worth doing in life is bound to be challenging. However, if you will stop banging your head against the wall trying to determine why you can never get rid of personality trait x, and instead really hone in on the habits that make you great, the battle you will be fighting will at least lead more directly to living life the way you want to live it!
I consider myself a documentary aficionado. I watch them all the time – regardless of the subject and it is probably my favorite genre of film. This last weekend I found myself in utter amazement watching Ultramarathon Man.
For those of you, like me, who were out of loop – Ultramarathon Man follows Dean Karnazes on his goal to run 50 marathons, in all 50 states, in 50 days. You read that correctly. 50/50/50. I couldn’t believe the goal, much less the fact that anyone was in the conditioning to complete such a task. His goal was to finish this unbelievable achievement to raise awareness for youth obesity and to get America active.
Dean starts his journey with the Lewis and Clark Marathon in St. Louis and never stops from there. While watching this film, I couldn’t believe how effortless Dean made this look! He just runs nonstop. It’s captivating how relaxed and affable he is throughout the entire movie. Every city he ran in, he had what looked like 5 to 50 people show up and run the distance with him. It was astonishing how many people he inspired.
Dean set the bar for human endurance by finishing his goal of 50/50/50 by running the New York City Marathon on the official day of the race and finished in 3 hours and 30 seconds. He overcame physical hurdles and logistical problems to finish what he started as a champion.
While watching this movie I kept thinking of the similarities to the Southwestern Company and the philosophies we teach. Dean set a goal, trained hard to reach that goal, and then finished strong. Admittedly, the average bookman/woman doesn’t run 50 marathons consecutively but there is comparison that can be made to a Southwestern summer.
I mentioned Dean Karnazes and this film to one of our Directors Chris Adams. He excitedly told me that he actively uses one of Dean’s books as inspiration for his organization during the summer. One of his Slovakian Sales Managers (and a exceptional runner himself) Mike Ulicny initially told Chris about Dean and his outstanding accomplishments.
What about you? Have you seen Ultramarathon Man or read any of Dean Karnazes books? What philosophies or life lessons can you take from his remarkable story and apply to your everyday life? This may be a great source if you look for inspirational material for your sales organization. I’m looking forward to reading your thoughts!
Burgess stressed how, as an author, you worked, you wrote, you typed, every day. Your inspiration, your creativity, listening for your muse–were all secondary to the task of sitting down and working. (He also proposed that part of the author’s daily damnation was to become famous for your worst work–in this case for his Clockwork novel, but again that’s for another literary blog.)
Southwestern, I had attitude adjustments made from within and from without. Last week, I was taken by a touching story from the Olympics . It reminded me how we can get perspective when we’ve lost it. 
Flip a coin. Flip it again. And flip it 15 times after that. What are the chances that it landed on heads all 17 times? Slim to none, I’d guess. 
This is something I probably say 50 times during each checkout season at 
“Any act often repeated forms a habit; and habit allowed, steadily gains in strength. At first it may be but as a spider’s web, easily broken through, but if not resisted it soon binds us with chains of steel.”
I consider myself a documentary aficionado. I watch them all the time – regardless of the subject and it is probably my favorite genre of film. This last weekend I found myself in utter amazement watching 
Dean set the bar for human endurance by finishing his goal of 50/50/50 by running the 
