I’ve spent the last few decades working with college students, training them in the field of life. My history is varied: I was a mild-mannered lecturer in the Univ. of Kansas English department by day; by night, I was the Rhythm Keyboardist in a glam rock band, complete with a cape, thigh-boots, and light makeup.
Life has calmed down. I’m a dad, a manager, a husband. I enjoy reading (both books and faces), music, and God-stuff. I swim and train as a Masters swimmer with Excel Aquatics. (Be thankful I’ve elected not to include my Speedo photo portfolio.) I had the chance to share some ideas recently at Southwestern’s Great Recruiters Seminar, specifically in a workshop on communication strategies. One of the points I stressed to student managers was to teach new team members how to treat you, from the start. First impressions are tricky. People make rapid assumptions about new acquaintances. Oftentimes, you can [...]
And now for a departure from my normal sales blog for a chance political encouner: I was running a Leadership Retreat for Southwestern student managers in Des Moines, IA last week. As we wrapped up lunch and were heading into the conference room, one of the managers remarked, “Rick Perry is in the restaurant.” Didn’t [...]
Last blog, we were discussing how to break out of the state of being stuck mentally in a Southwestern context. We talked about using the phrase, “What would it be like if I could ________ (insert impossible thing)?” By pretending you have the skill or ability which you currently believe you lack, your brain opens [...]
Many of you Southwestern managers may have already seen this if you’re paying attention to youtube…Kenny Brooks, a self-styled comedian who uses a barrage of funny one-liners to sell his cleaning product, has gone viral. Kenny’s sales technique is caught on camera by a prospect. From the looks of this, he didn’t attend a conventional [...]
Hey Southwestern friends! Have you ever been selling or recruiting and gotten stuck mentally? In other words, you thought: “This can’t be done.” Or “Hitting that sales level is impossible.” Or “I could never approach that person for my team.” Of course you have. We all tend to limit ourselves at times–we get stuck in a [...]
Why is the Southwestern experience so valuable? One reason is the program gives students so many opportunities to fail. Yes, fail. There is value is stumbling! Failing can be useful long term. I ran across this bNet blog from Suzanne Lucas, entitled “Why Failure is the Secret of Your Success”. Here are the main bits [...]
I ran across an interesting sales blog in bNet from Geoffrey James. He calls it, “Why Sales Scripts are a Waste of Time”. It definitely runs counter to what we teach and use at Southwestern! I’ve reprinted it almost in its entirety (I added the nifty photos). Any thoughts or comments are welcome–especially if you [...]
Here is an installment of Seth Godin’s blog that I found pertinent for Southwestern executives and student managers alike. Think about these seven questions he poses: “Do you let the facts get in the way of a good story? What do you do with people who disagree with you… do you call them names [...]
In the last Southwestern sales blog, I explored the notion of 4 conversational levels, and how it helps to get a prospect to a feeling level when you are selling. People buy products for a variety of feelings: Peace of mind Love A sense of security Fear of loss Providing a good environment for their children [...]
People won’t buy your Southwestern products unless they’re clear that whatever you’re presenting feels intuitively right to them. In other words, your selling proposition must fit their vision of what they want to create in the long term, and combine with their most deeply held values. So, as Sydney Walker tells us in his book, [...]
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