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The
Maturity Factor In Sales
Bill Brooks |
Winners in any venture are willing to
be held accountable for their own actions and results.
Also-rans have no desire to be part of any equation for
failure. The success stories in sales are certainly no
different.
As I look around the Triad, where my business is located,
it is easy to see how successful ventures grow, proliferate
and expand. These organizations are led by people who
possess the emotional maturity to assume responsibility,
rise to the level of authority given to them and then
hold themselves accountable for whatever level of success
or failure they experience.
But how does this relate to your sales
career? It should be clear that emotional maturity and
accountability are essential to success in any career.
This is especially true for sales. How emotionally mature
are you? Take a look at this short survey:
When a sale is lost do you blame the customer, your
own organization or other external forces?
When a prospect fails to appear for an appointment who
do you blame?
Do you blame your lack of success on unreasonable pricing
of your product?
How often do you blame market conditions, seasonability
or the economy for your lack of success?
How often do you find yourself doing "busy work"
instead of proactive, positive activity?
How often do you avoid looking at hard, objective sales
numbers to gauge your sales success (or lack of it)?
How well do you work with other members of your sales
and support team?
It should be obvious that Pogo, the classic cartoon character,
was absolutely right when he muttered the infamous line,
"We has met the enemy and they is us!"
In sales, it is easy to find scapegoats for our lack
of success. They abound around us everywhere. Here are
just a few:
Delivery people and systems
Customer service staff
Poor quality
Estimators and pricing specialists
Unreasonable customers
The economy
Interest rates
Unreasonable quotas
Poor pay plans
The list goes on and on. But here is the proverbial bottom-line.
Capable, professional salespeople assume full accountability
for their own successes and failures. They don't
blame others, circumstances or conditions. It is ironic
that we often take full responsibility for our successes
– yet blame every conceivable external source for
the failures.
Here are six specific powerful affirmations that could
help you as you work toward the full accountability necessary
for accelerating your sales career.
I will assume full responsibility for all of my own
actions with every prospect or customer.
I will assume full accountability for my own sales results
– both good and bad.
I will not blame others, conditions or circumstances
for any lack of success I may have.
I will learn to compartmentalize my failures, move past
them and concentrate on positive, productive activities.
I will never allow any failure to become a part of my
permanent record of feelings, actions or sense of self-worth.
I will work with other team members to deliver positive
results and totally enthusiastic customers.
It should be obvious that any salesperson will experience
some degree of failure at some time in his or her sales
career. A baseball player is considered a superstar if
he maintains a batting average of 300! The problem? There
is no purchase order issued 70% of the time when a salesperson
fails 7 out of 10 times. It's a different game with
a different set of rules.
It also means being able to do what is right, 100% of
the time. Not only when superiors, customers or co-workers
will notice it. It is treating priorities, company property,
rules and expectations professionally. It means following
whatever sales system is expected, complying with expectations
and performance standards. What it really means is living
up to the things you agreed upon when you "signed
on" to your job. Expense reports, marketing requests,
paperwork and the rest are all part of the sales function.
Simply refusing to comply with requirements or expectations,
saying "I'll do it when I get around to it!"
or doing what you want to do when you want to do it are
merely symptoms of this syndrome of emotional immaturity.
And sales is one profession where there is no room for
it.
Emotional maturity is also the ability to objectively
analyze situations, clearly determine the cause of the
failure, course correct if necessary, move on and learn
from the error so it doesn't happen again and then
face the next prospect or customer with a sense of positive
expectation. That's what the winners do, and how
they do it. How about you? Are you ready to join the winners?
Bill Brooks is CEO of The Brooks
Group, an international sales training and business growth
firm based in Greensboro NC. For more information visit www.thebrooksgroup.com.
If you would like to receive The Brooks Group's free e-mail
monthly sales or sales management newsletter e-mail:
Barbara@thebrooksgroup.com
or call The Brooks Group at 800-633-7762
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