Tag: Leadership

3 Keys To Better Decision Making

On By Joe DeRosaIn LeadershipLeave a comment

We all make choices.  Everyday each of us decides what we will do, not do, where to spend our time, who to share our love with, and who we choose to ignore.  The decisions we make are informed by our experiences with people.  Bad experience leads to one set of choices in how we act, good experiences lead to an entirely different set of choices.  No matter, life is about choices.  The goal is to make better choices more often than not.  Doing this takes practice, self-reflection, and perspective.  Try these 3 things the next time you need to make a difficult choice.

  1. Get it on paper.  Put the circumstance in writing.  Frame it.  What’s the problem, the choice that needs to be made?  Who are the people involved in that choice?  Husband?  Wife?  Boss?  Co-worker?  
  2. List the various choices, or decisions, you could make and what the pros and cons are of each.  Your internal compass is critical in this step.  Often times making the right decision is difficlt to do.  Beginning the decision making process by burdening yourself with what others will think will often times lead you to making a poor decision.  Having the courage and intestinal fortitude to make the tough calls are what separates good decision makers from the bad.  
  3. Finally, after you’ve identifed the best decision…your decision…consider its impact on those affected by this decision.  The purpose of this step is not to second guess your decision, that’s already been made.  Instead this step is necessary in order to create your story…your logical, intellectually sound story, that informs those impacted by this decision as to how you went about making your decision.  

Difficult choices are never easy, and regardless of how logical your reasoning is you will never please everyone.  Great leaders are those who can make difficult decisions, communicate those decisions, and get most people to buy into the decision they’ve made.  Those leaders who focus on trying to get everyone to buy in to their decisions instead find themselves following more than leading.  After all, if my choices were based upon what others did, felt, thought, etc, would I not by definition be following?  Be a leader.

Stop Selling, Start Asking: 3 Questions That Will Improve Your Results

On By Joe DeRosaIn SalesLeave a comment

Ask

For many companies January represents the start of a new year.  A new beginning when all numbers are at zero and the uphill climb to reach the new year’s sales quota gets under way.  And whether your company sells cars, computers, insurance, or consumer staples it’s likely its increased its goals in 2015 from the prior year, and to you that means a bigger sales quota.

How do you reach that new number when last year’s number seemed big enough?  Where will you find the time to sell more and still have a chance to see your family, hit the gym, travel a bit, or simply sleep a little?  The fact is, making more calls isn’t the answer.  The more calls you make, prospects you talk to, emails you send, or LinkedIn invites you issue won’t be enough to hit a higher quota.  You’ve got to operate differently.  You’ve got to change your approach.  The most effective way to increasing your sales results is by asking better questions…the right questions.  Start with these 3 questions below when meeting with a prospect for the first time.

  1. In looking back on your results last year did you accomplish what you hoped?  Asking this question provides insight into the prospects priorities and values.  It also offers you a glimpse into how likely they are to provide you with the critical information you’ll need to construct a proposal or recommendation that adds tangible value to their business.
  2. What are your top goals or priorities for this year?  If you don’t understand your prospect’s business you have little chance of doing business with them.  Likewise, how much time, effort, and energy is wise to spend on a prospect who doesn’t know where he or she is headed?  With limited hours in the day, and that big goal in front of you, your best chance of success lies in working with people who all have clear goals…grow revenue, reduce expenses, improve turnover, etc.
  3. How do you currently determine if you’ll buy again from one of your providers?  It’s important to know up front if the prospect makes their decisions based solely on price, service, future product improvements, or ease of use.  Whatever their criteria is in sending you more business, be sure to take note and not only build it into your proposal but more importantly deliver on that expectation.  If innovation is important to the prospect don’t promise product changes if your product hasn’t changed in years or has no planned changes on the horizon.  Once you lose trust and credibility your reputation becomes worthless.

If you’re not comfortable asking these questions there’s likely a good reason which most of the time will be due to the lack of rapport built immediately on the front end of your interaction with the prospect.  Remember, if you approach a prospect like a typical sales person their natural defenses will be up, but if you approach them as a business person who has passion around your product and deep-rooted beliefs and experiences that showcase the value of that product you’ll find your prospect will be more open, more engaging, and inclined to forge a relationship with you.  Authenticity is your key to success and its something that has to be real and heartfelt, it can’t be pretend.

Your Doctor May Be Your Best Sales Coach

On By Joe DeRosaIn SalesLeave a comment

doctor

In my previous blog post I talked about a selling strategy that helps to eliminate lost sales.  Lost due to a disconnect between the prospect and the sales person.  A communication miss fire on either end is responsible for every sale not made.  If the sales person is communicating and observing the prospects response, or reaction, there should be no last-minute surprises of lost business.  In fact, if you were really honest about it, most of the time you knew deep down that sale was going nowhere.  But the sales gods have been clear for decades that you never give up, never walk away, always be closing, and never take no for an answer.  If you’re into self-deprecation that might be exactly the approach you’re looking for.  But for those of us who are interested in transcending the age-old image of a product pusher to one of a true sales professional, looking for the “no” is how you should approach each sales opportunity.

For years I have taught and coached sales teams across a variety of different industries to approach a prospect as a doctor approaches a patient.  Curious, thoughtful, prescriptive and honest.  Here’s how:

  1. Curious.  The first thing a doctor does when he/she enters an exam room is begins asking questions.  What’s going on?  When did it start?  Is it like this, or like that?  Do the symptoms increase in intensity during certain times or are they constant and unchanging?  The doctor is beginning to diagnose your problem.  Asking questions, no matter how uncomfortable they may be, is the first step to a proper diagnosis.
  2. Thoughtful.  In my experience (and to be completely honest I believe I have the world’s greatest doctor) great doctors never provide knee jerk responses.  They go through their diagnosis phase and take a moment to process the information they’ve just gathered.  Sure this process step may take seconds, but in most cases pay attention the next time you go to the doctor and watch for that “medical processing pause”.  This refers to the time it takes for the doctor to thoughtfully provide their assessment and prescribe next steps.
  3. Prescriptive.  Depending on the assessment of what’s wrong with the patient the doctor may have one to many different prescriptions to offer the patient.  The prescription may not be solely medicine related.  A doctor may prescribe physical therapy, or eliminating a specific food from your diet.  He/she may also prescribe a mobility aid such as crutches or a walker, or even a sling or splint depending on the injury.  The point is that in many cases there are a variety of paths forward and the doctor presents these options in the form of prescriptions.
  4. Honesty.  This element of the doctor-patient relationship is the most important.  No matter how good the doctor is, if there is no trust that exists between him/her and the patient the above 3 ingredients are useless.  By the time the doctor gets to the prescription phase of the patient examine, he/she is presenting options along with their personal choice.  How many times have you heard a doctor say, “if you were my son”, or “when my mom went through this we decided to do…” The trust and honesty that exists between a doctor and patient – their ability to communicate transparently with one another – is the ingredient that results in the patient’s ability to improve their condition.

The relationship between a doctor and patient exists for one of two reasons:  to fix something currently broken, or to avoid something breaking in the future.  Isn’t that the relationship between you and your prospect?  The prospect has either agreed to meet with you because something in their business is currently broken or because something may be changing that may cause something to break that they’re trying to avoid happening.  Regardless of whether it is a current problem or future, follow the 4 steps above and you’ll find a more engaging, trusting, and action-oriented relationship develop between you and your prospect, soon-to-be customer.

The Most Important Sales Question You Need To Ask

On By Joe DeRosaIn SalesLeave a comment

important

Selling is a combination of both art and science.  It requires intelligence, curiosity, study, and practice.  Unfortunately too many books have been written by self-proclaimed gurus who are running around promoting persuasion, influence and manipulation.  As a life-long sales professional I cringe when I hear these tactics being promoted as the Holy Grail of selling.  Learn how to persuade a buyer and you’ll be golden.  Wrong.  Persuasion is only temporary if it’s not grounded in something more significant or substantive to the buyer.  While beating the buyer into submission is one way to approach sales I’d suggest a much different path.  Something that requires a fair amount of mental horsepower, patience and agility.  This approach can be summed up in one question…So What?

Sales people have been trained…brainwashed…into force feeding a prospect through a rigid selling process.  The problem is that most sales processes are inward focused and aligned to what their organization does and is capable of delivering.  They rarely take the customers viewpoint into consideration.  This results in the sales person trying to find a way to wiggle into the prospective buyers wallet, often times not knowing or caring whether there is a real or tangible need for their product.

So how can you avoid falling into the stereotypical sales rep persona?  Ask this one questions before and after your customer interactions – So what?  This product has  a 98% satisfaction rating!  So what?  My company has been around for 100 years.  So what?  We pay the highest commission rates in the industry.  So what?  I’ve helped many business owners like you improve their profits.  So what?

I’m sure many of those statements sound familiar.  You may have even used one or two of them before.  But so what?  What does your satisfaction rating mean to me the buyer?  Why should I care?  Too many times sales reps lob a one-liner out there and let it hang.  They believe that it’s such a powerful statement that the buyer must believe it too, yet we know this isn’t the case.

Once you begin to challenge yourself with the “So What?” question you’ll find yourself having different conversations with your customer and asking different questions.  You’ll begin to interact with your customer on a different level.  Your genuine new-found interest in what’s important to your customer will be seen and felt.  And while this may not guarantee a sale it will guarantee that you’ll be better prepared to separate the true prospects versus those who simply clog our pipelines who are not fits, matches, or beneficiaries of the value we provide.  Having this power will help you close more business that is a true fit while quickly sorting through the business that isn’t, saving you time, money, and energy that you can then direct toward those prospects who can truly benefit from the value you offer.

Happy selling!

5 Tips for Running a Better Business Meeting

On By Joe DeRosaIn Business, LeadershipLeave a comment
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We’re all busy.  The last thing we need is to attend another meeting. The minions gather around the board table and talk, ponder, and pontificate.  Time seems to stand still.  We’ve all been in meetings when we felt an overwhelming desire to be watching paint dry than to hear one more syllable uttered in the dungeon the business world refers to as “The Conference Room”.  In fact, so ineffective are most meetings that we’ve taken to naming our conference rooms with fun names so as to distract those weary attendees into thinking fun is on the other side of the door to Pebble Beach or Gilligan’s Island. So is there any way to spruce up our meetings?  Is there such a thing as an effective meeting?  Yes there is.
The next time you call a meeting follow these simple 5 steps:
  1. Prepare.  Know your material.  Know the salient points you’re trying to communicate.  Anticipate questions and formulate responses.  People hate showing up and feeling like their times been wasted because the leader doesn’t seem to have a clear agenda.
  2. Get revved up.  Have some energy for goodness sake.  Attending a meeting where the leader is monotone, or worse distracted or bored is a fate worse that death.  Show some energy, and respect, to those who have showed up at your request.
  3. Take frequent pauses and solicit responses.  No one likes to be lectured to, especially for 90 minutes – the average length of a business meeting in the U.S. according to the University of Tulsa.  Asking questions like “does that make sense?”, or “what do you think of that?” will keep people engaged and thinking.
  4. Take notes.  At the end of the meeting circle back to those who raised comments, concerns, opportunities, etc.  This lets the attendees know that when they are invited to one of your meetings they are engaged and expected to interact.
  5. Acknowledge great ideas.  The definition of “conference” is; a meeting of people to confer.  If you didn’t want anyones opinion you wouldn’t have asked them to join the meeting.  Even the best ideas, the best laid plans, the best strategies can be improved if you’re willing to listen.

Following these steps will keep your co-workers active and position you as a leader by demonstrating first and foremost your respect for everyone’s time, highlighted by your ability to efficiently navigate the team from topic to end-state.

 

5 Things Every Salesperson Should Focus On

On By Joe DeRosaIn SalesLeave a comment

focus

Sales people are an interesting breed.  They’re high-strung, often funny, and witty, sensitive and many times high maintenance.  I know this because I am one.  I’ve sold, managed, led, and built sales teams for the better part of the past 2o years.  I’ve had months when I hit my numbers and months when I’ve missed.  I’ve had sales teams that have blown the number out of the water and those who have drowned while trying to hit the number.  Yet over the years I have heard one question that continues to be asked over and over again…”what is the secret to success in sales?”.  Here’s the answer…there is no secret.

The difference between successful sales people and those who fail in this profession is simple.  Over the years I have identified 5 traits that separate those who succeed from those who fail.

  1. Clarity of goals – knowing exactly what you want to achieve and when.
  2. Discipline – being committed to perfecting your skills.  Starting your day before others and ending it after they’ve long given up.  Putting in that extra time when others are out having fun.
  3. Curiosity/Inquisitiveness – an insatiable thirst for knowledge.  Betterment.  Desire to outsmart, or out-understand others.  Constantly absorbing, learning, refining.
  4. Time Management – successful people know that time is their biggest asset.  They don’t waste it.  In Sales this means selling when people are available to be sold to.  Don’t do paperwork at 10 am.  That’s a waste of time.  Sell at 10 am and do your paperwork at 10 pm.
  5. Self-Reflect – 15 minutes a day to reflect on what you did, what results you generated, what you learned, what you’ll do different tomorrow.

Make these 5 things part of your life and success will find its way to your doorstep, not because it simply wandered over but because you attracted it through these strong and powerful habits.

 

Can Really Anyone Succeed?

On By Joe DeRosaIn LeadershipLeave a comment

Doubt

It all begins with setting clear goals.  Knowing what you want along with a rough idea of the time frame in which you want to accomplish those wants is where success begins.  No one stumbles into success.  Without clearly defined goals even winning the lottery will lead to failure as the bankruptcy rates for lottery winners seem to indicate.  We’ve managed to create a society in the United States where success is demonized and those who acquire it are viewed as the bad guys.  Lines continue to form for hand-outs and entitlement programs.  We’ve more than doubled the ranks on government assistance in the past 8 years, and the news is littered with stories on just how little the rich and successful do for those less fortunate.

Those who don’t succeed often whine about the who, the how, and the what.  Who prevented them from succeeding how they were derailed from success, and what’s missing from the system that if there would enable them to succeed.  These folks just don’t seem to get it.  They must have slept through history class…not just ours but civilizations across the globe.  Remember the caveman wasn’t born with fire or a wheel.  It took thought, vision, hard work and persistence.  Our country was founded on the basic principle that anyone willing to work hard while applying their God-given talents could succeed.  We never guaranteed success…only a chance at it.

People who complain about success will never attain it.  I’d propose that the biggest reason they will not achieve success is that they haven’t taken the time to identify what success is.  They simply look at the material things that they associate with success.  They have no idea what is required to obtain those things, they see only the after-results.  Whether it’s a heart surgeon, a mutual fund manager, a business owner, or a school teacher, those who are successful have a clear idea of what success means to them and for most it’s never about the money or stuff.  It is however always about the personal accomplishment, achievement and having the ability to say “I did it.”  That alone defines success.  You know, Frank Sinatra got it right in his song My Way, more people should listen to it.

So if you’re feeling low and not sure where you’re headed remember it’s up to you.  You have to think about what you want.  You have to answer the question how hard you’re willing to work to get it..  You have to be willing to put the time in.  You have to take complete responsibility and accountability for your successes and failures.  Once you do that success will find its way into your life.

 

A New Game Show: The Blame Game

On By Joe DeRosaIn LeadershipLeave a comment

Look around you. Put your iPhone down, stop your online shopping for just a minute, and stop posting on Facebook. Take a deep breath, look up, look around, watch, and observe. Listen to what you’re hearing…or not hearing for that matter.

A new gameshow is building both momentum and popularity amongst our Country’s leaders. It’s not Family Feud, it’s not Price is Right, nor is it Let’s Make a Deal. This new gameshow is called The Blame Game. The object is to point as many fingers as possible toward other people and escape both responsibility and accountability. The winner is crowned Teflon Don…or Donna. It’s the ultimate game for losers, and one that is gaining popularity because we allow it to. And the worst part is that there’s not just one winner…there’s many, many, many, many….

Our Country has moved toward a shallow ignorance. A state of numbness where we’ve insulated ourselves from the misguided missteps of our leaders. Everyone gets an unlimited number of “free passes” in The Blame Game, because we allow it. We give a free pass to those who inherited a mess, or those who just can’t make the tough – often times unpopular – decisions. We shrug our shoulders and continue on with our lives moving further and further away from our Country’s founding principles which include very specific references to God, power emanating from the people, a Constitution, private property ownership, and a republic rather than a direct democracy. (How many people would you guess don’t know there’s a difference?)

Our leaders of today are often times winners of a popularity contest. Great orators, sharp dressers, charismatic charmers, and savvy politicians capable of weaving in and out of distressed situations so as to not get to entangled in them whereby they must roll up their sleeves, jump in, get involved, and work toward a solution. They are a group of master delegators not for the sake of efficiency but for the sake of creating political insulation for when things go sideways.

While hope is not a strategy, I do hope (and pray) for a true leader to emerge soon. One that our Country can rally around. One who wants to be held accountable. One who makes decisions based upon their beliefs and convictions, not on polling numbers. One who possesses the character and integrity that promotes family values, personal responsibility, and self-improvement. One who other countries respect and in some cases fear…or at least know they mean what they say. Does such a leader exist? Is he or she already on the path to leadership or are they awaiting a nudge from family or friends to “just do it”? While we can wait and hope for things to get better, we should all go back and re-read our Country’s founding principles. Then and only then will we know whether our hope is possible or misplaced.

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Is a Leader a Solo Act?

On By Joe DeRosaIn Business, LeadershipLeave a comment

alone

Yesterday the Wall Street Journal published an article on Bill McDermott, the CEO of SAP. The article profiled McDermott’s rise within SAP and the fact that this German company will now be at the hands of an American CEO for the first time in its history.

McDermott has placed his beliefs front and center, stating that SAP must move quickly and innovate. “There is no speed limit on innovation” McDermott told a crowd at a recent event. But herein lies a fundamental problem that challenges  the “believability” of that statement. Can innovation happen through the efforts of one person alone or does innovation require a team?

Today’s most admired companies are those that innovate. Companies like Amazon, Google, Apple, and ExxonMobil are all at the forefront of their respective industries due to constant innovation. Additionally, their ability to innovate is often credited to their employees and the teams they have assembled to drive some of the best innovations and inventions of our times. Yet McDermott seems to have chosen a “go it alone” strategy having terminated most of SAP’s previous leaders of innovation.

SAP’s advisory board seems to be in full support of Mr. McDermott and has done nothing less than support him in his me, myself, and I strategy. But will it work? Here are 3 areas where McDermott’s strategy may go awry:

1. Collaboration breeds innovation – even the late, great, Steve Jobs saw the benefits of team collaboration when launching the first iPod as referenced in the book Inside Steve’s Brain by Leander Kahney. Teams were assembled to take a raw idea and bring it to life. Contrary to popular belief, Apple’s success wasn’t Steve Jobs alone.
2. Checks and balance. Not having a #1 or #2 on your team can lead to beliefs of invincibility and disillusionment. Every leader needs a strong next-in-line. Believing that only you have all the answers or ideas is very risky. Beyond the benefit to the business, having the right #2 will stretch and challenge the leader to explore options he or she might have otherwise dismissed.
3. Competitive Intelligence. Much like the reasons for #2 above, it’s highly unlikely for one person to be “in-the-know” on all things at all times. I rely on my team as a unit to keep us all up to speed on current and trending market conditions. Having multiple inputs from different folks minimizes bias and assumptions.

So will SAP’s strategy work? Time will tell.

Where Chemistry and Leadership Intersect

On By Joe DeRosaIn Leadership1 Comment

Chemistry

Chemistry focuses on the relationship between atoms and other phenomenon. Cause and effect. How does an atom change when external factors are introduced. Had I only known then – 30 years ago when I took Chemistry in school – what I know today, I would have paid more attention.

Team building is all about chemistry. After all, the human body is made up of atoms and when two bodies are interacting it represents millions of atoms interacting with one another.  Interaction reactions are just as varied between atoms as they are humans.  Sometimes you just don’t know what will happen.

From our early childhood, to adult life, chemistry is at work in the choices we make and the outcomes they render. Remember those days on the school ground picking teams? Who did you pick, or at what point in the team-picking process were you picked? When you got your first management position how did you feel about your team? Were you able to make changes or new selections? If so, how did you go about doing that?  If not, how did you assimilate to your team?

I’d submit that chemistry is one of the single most important factors in establishing a successful team. The team’s ability to interact with one another given internal and external influences is a necessary requirement for a high performing teams. And like explosions that can occur when atoms are rammed together with great force, so too can human interaction experience similar explosions if not careful.

Here are 3 points to be aware of when navigating team chemistry:

  1. Have a clear vision.  Make sure that you’ve created the “destination postcard” for the team.  This represents where you are headed, why, how you’ll get there, and by when.
  2. Have clear rules of engagement.  Demanding honesty and input must be balanced with diplomacy and humility…even if it must be forced.  The team must understand what is expected, as well as, how they are expected to accomplish the “what”.
  3. Have clear values.  Stating your values and then demonstrating those values on a daily basis…walking the talk…is critical for your team to see.  You can’t state that you despise cussing and yet at every meeting use language to the contrary.  Your actions and values must be aligned at all times.

Be careful to not confuse good chemistry with the belief that you can only hire those that “think” like you.  That’s not the case.  Instead focus on attracting people to your team that “feel” as you do, hold similar values, work ethic, and attitudes.  Specific skills sets MUST be varied across a team but common values must be woven into the team’s fabric to succeed.  And that’s chemistry.