Why Purposeful Optimism is great for business

By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Communication, Innovation, Life Skills, Opportunity, Optimism, Resilience

I want you to imagine that you are a 24 year old graduate going for job interviews. In this instance, you are being interviewed by a multinational who takes you to the next stage- completing a range of psychometric assessments followed by an interview with a psychologist. Imagine if you will, that this psychologist starts his interview with you by saying you are ‘too optimistic’, that you are a ‘Pollyanna’, that ‘you are unrealistic in seeing the world in such as positive light’, claiming there is something really wrong with you.

How would you feel? Well, this scenario happened to me …

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What are YOU doing to create space for opportunities?

By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Life Skills, Opportunity, Optimism

In recent months, I have deliberately chosen to start each week by writing down this statement:

‘Be open to great opportunities’

This statement appears at the top of my To Do list book that I take with me everywhere.

It is handwritten and highlighted with yellow highlighter.

I have chosen to do this for several reasons:

  • It keeps me focused on moving forward and being open to new ideas, new ways of doing things, new people and markets, new opportunities with new and existing clients, and so on
  • It stops me from falling into ‘group think’ and being drawn into unproductive spaces, and negative and ‘fake …

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    Are your salespeople stumbling at hello?

    By / / Assessments, Attitudes & Behaviours, Sales performance

    We all want better sales performance and, as I mentioned last week, there are different ways to get there. A good starting point to understand what your team needs to sell better and improve their performance is assessing where they need help.

    For example, through an attitude and activity based questionnaire you can measure if people avoid making phone calls to prospect, if they hesitate to prospect, and self-promote for new business. You can also identify how much initiative, energy and drive an individual devotes to proactive sales prospecting and the amount of energy spent …

    Are your salespeople stumbling at hello? Read Post »

    We all want better sales performance, but what works best?

    By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Coaching, Sales Coaching, Sales Leadership, Sales Management, Sales performance, Sales Results, Success

    Most of us will agree that as sales leaders we want better and more consistent sales performance. The approaches on how to get there, however, vary greatly.

    Some tactics offer a temporary lift in sales while other strategies deliver more sustainable changes and lifts in performance over the long term.

    We’ve outlined three different approaches organisations take to improve sales performance and their impact.

    Annual sales training session/conference – 1 or 2 day workshop

    Effect
    Result score out of 10

    Popularity
    9

    Long term effectiveness
    2

    Team building
    7

    Risk
    5

    Return on investment
    3

    This is by far the most popular choice amongst sales managers and business leaders. However, the question that needs to be asked …

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    Trust is the heartbeat of business, sales and society

    By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Brand & Reputation, Communication, Competition, Ethics & Values, Sales Culture, Sales Relationships

    I have been writing about Trust in sales and business for many years; however, this year has seen a rise in my output on this topic, especially with the fallout from the Banking Royal Commission with posts such as:

    The Flight to Ethical Selling – how the banks can avoid a royal commission

    What does Selling Better mean for customers and shareholder return?

    What are the biggest issues facing CEOs and sales leaders today?

    Yet, trust is the heartbeat of business, sales and society.

    Without this life force pumping vitality through our collective systems every day …

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    How Sales and Marketing can excel in a world in flux

    By / / 12 Sales Trends Pages Category, Attitudes & Behaviours, Collaboration, Marketing, Sales Driven Organisations, Sales Results, Sales Trends

    In this sales trend from the Barrett’s 12 Sales Trends Report for 2018, David Hubbard explains what sales and marketing can do working together to excel at generating revenue.

    Who’s in flux? The Buyer. They have dramatically changed how they identify, evaluate and purchase solutions over the past 10 years, and they continue to evolve. Every member of the buyer team for B2B and considered B2C purchases has instant mobile access to the information they need throughout each stage of their purchasing process.  Even when they are fully engaged with us, they are constantly interacting with our competitor’s information.

    As a …

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    Selling isn’t only for salespeople

    By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Education in Sales, Ethics & Values, Life Skills, Self Promotion, Selling Better, Success

    Have you ever tried to persuade someone about the merits of a new idea, service or initiative?

    Most surely you have. Countless times.

    People do this all the time, since we were born; in our personal, professional and community lives. It is part of being human.

    So how did your efforts go?

    Did you get their attention?

    Did you manage to convince them to adopt your idea?

    Did you both get what you wanted out of the exchange?

    Did you feel satisfied that you made a positive impact?

    Maybe. Maybe not.

    It all depends on how well you were able to enlist all the skills and qualities of good …

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    The alarming findings about the Peter Principle & Sales Managers

    By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Business Acumen, Coaching, Collaboration, Sales Leadership, Sales Management, Sales Talent

    Have you ever worked with someone who was really effective in one role but then promoted to other roles, usually management, and ended having no idea and no real capacity to fulfil that role in a competent manner?

    Chances are your answer is ‘yes’.

    This is a common occurrence in many organisations where people are continually promoted until they are no longer effective in their roles – basically they rise to their level of incompetence. This is referred to as the Peter Principle which was highlighted by Dr. Laurence J. Peter in 1969.

    Basically, the problem arises when the skills that makes someone …

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    What are the biggest sales issues & opportunities for CEOs & Sales Leaders today?

    By / / Attitudes & Behaviours, Business Acumen, Sales Benchmarking, Sales Consulting, Sales Driven Organisations, Sales Strategy, Strategy

    Since late 2014, we have been rolling out the Sales Strategy & Operations Audit working with a wide range of businesses across industries in the public, private, and N4P sectors to help them sell better.

    In 2017, we compiled the Barrett Sales Strategy & Operations Benchmark Report for 2015-2017 based on over 20 companies and found several trends emerging that are relevant across businesses and industries. We are also seeing this across many other businesses with or without the audit.

    Here is what we found:

    The biggest sales issues facing CEOs & Sales Leaders today:

  • Average or below average: Every business …

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    Sales Trend 4: Buyer Behaviours, AI & the Future of Sales Roles

    By / / 12 Sales Trends Pages Category, Attitudes & Behaviours, Complex Selling & Transactional Selling, Customer Service, Sales Driven Organisations, Sales Trends

    Sales Trend 4 from the Barrett 12 Sales Trends Report for 2018 is about buyer behaviours and the future of sales roles.

    According to Gartner Research, by 2020 85% of interactions between businesses will be executed without human interaction. [i]

    Automation has already diminished the number of people required for blue collar manufacturing roles; however, with the advent of AI (artificial intelligence), big data and algorithms, we are beginning to see sweeping changes happening across the once untouchable white collar sector, including the very people-oriented roles of sales, as many buyers shift part or all of their buying journey …

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