Categories
Archives
Search
Subscribe to Our Monthly Digest
Category: Self-Improvement
The silver lining of 2020
“Fun is how you feel during…happiness is how you feel afterwards”
– Bits and Pieces
It is December 31, 2020, and I just finished a phone call with an old friend and business owner who completed his most profitable year ever. As you can imagine, he is in good spirits. For Robert and his family it has been a good year. Of course, there were parts of 2020 that Robert didn’t like. His mom passed away in a care facility and he wasn’t able to be with her during her last final moments. He loves to dine out and go to movies, and he missed these activities. His daughter is a school teacher and he has 6 grandchildren. Their school schedule has undergone a complete upheaval. The list could go on, but you get the picture. Like all of us, Robert’s life was severely disrupted.
In reading my Christmas cards and talking to my friends this past couple weeks, I frequently hear 2020 referred to as a bad year. If you lost a relative or close friend to Covid, you will probably not reflect on this year as your favorite. Let’s face it…2020 has not been a fun year. Robert didn’t have a fun year, but he had a happy one. He looked for opportunity, made a plan, and followed through with his plan diligently. He didn’t complain, he didn’t blame and he was always on offense. Ironically, others in his same profession did poorly, but not Robert. He developed a winning mindset and he won. How about you? What are your expectations for 2021? I hope they are great. Happy New Year!
How to make it a good holiday season
Respected leaders admit when they are wrong
I have two sons who are now married and in their mid-30’s. Growing up, they loved to play baseball in the back yard. One day I was coaching my son, Kevin as he was working on his batting skills. I was frustrated that he wasn’t doing something right, and I made a comment that was not supportive. As soon as I did, Kevin had a puzzled look on his face and asked, “Dad, was that a put-down?” My first instinct was to respond, “Oh no, I just…(blah, blah, blah)”. Instead, I paused, reflected on what I had just said, and replied, “Yes, Kevin. That was a put-down and I was wrong to do that. I am sorry”. When I said that, I could feel the tension leave my body, and Kevin and I were back on track.
To be clear, when I say “put-down”, I do not mean we don’t ever re-direct someone. A strong team strives for excellence, and each team member knows how to keep one another accountable. For example, let’s say I am playing baseball in the outfield and not paying attention. As a result, I mess up a play. My team members have every right to say, “Hey Brainerd, wake-up!”
Throughout the holidays you may be with many friends and relatives. You will also be with your team members at work. Whatever your situation, when you are tempted to find fault, take a step back and pause. If something needs to be said, say it in a way that builds trust and respect, not resentment.
Happy holidays and thinking right
It’s the first week in December, and that means it is time to get our best mindset for the holiday season. Even with Covid restrictions, it is likely that many of us will be attending social events and family gatherings.
For nearly 20 years, I facilitated leadership classes year round. During that time I noticed that each holiday season, many would dread getting together with some relatives – particularly the ones they seemed to get their “fill of” quickly! When we don’t look forward to an event, we usually don’t have a very good time. That is unfortunate. Is there anything we can do? Maybe.
For the first several years we were married, my wife and I kept a weekend scrapbook. In this book, we summarized the events of each weekend of the year, and illustrated the pages with pictures and mementos. One year we decided to spend New Year’s Eve reading through the years events and evaluate them. We reviewed all the weekends and various activities, and rated them on a scale of 1-10. The ratings we gave referred to how much we like the event or activity. Joyce’s ratings and my ratings matched up pretty closely. There was one thing we noticed that was peculiar: One event occurred twice during the year. It was with the same friends, and we did the same activities. One of these events we rated high. The other got a poor rating. We wondered why, so we did some thinking. We realized that our thinking going into the low-rated event was negative. We were upset about something. We went into the event with low expectations. Here is what we learned: When we are going to an event or function, we need to do an attitude check beforehand. What is our enthusiasm on scale of 1-10? Is is an five? Why? What do we need to do to take it up a couple notches? Then we give ourselves a pep talk, and keep talking to ourselves until our attitude is up to speed. This works for us, and it has resulted in us enjoying many events that we normally we would have just “got it over with”. The most important words we say each day are the ones we say to ourselves. Happy Holidays!
One way to get the new year off to a running start…
Several years ago I received a follow-up call in mid-December from a company that sells and installs carpets. They had given me a quote earlier in the year, and due to some unexpected expenses I had set the quote aside. It is important to note that the person calling was professional, likeable, and easy to talk to. She made reference to the quote and wanted to know if I was still interested. The timing of the call was perfect, and resulted in a $10,000 order. I can’t say this for sure, but my hunch is that the woman calling was given a list of outstanding quotes, and they were doing an end-of-year cleanup.
Many sales professionals regard December as a poor month to sell. People are distracted by the holidays and less likely to commit to any purchase that is not a Christmas gift. While this may be so, I have found that consistently top-performing sales people do well in December. They want to set the table to “hit the pavement running” when the new year rolls around. If you would like to increase your sales in December, here is an idea:
Write down all the accounts and contact people for those in these categories:
- Clients you are currently doing business with
- Clients you have worked with – but not for a while
- Outstanding quotes that have not been followed up on recently
After you have put together this list, commit to a block of time, and start dialing. You will probably get one of three responses:
- No longer interested
- Interested, but not until after the first of the year.
- Yes, I am interested now
- Let’s just say that the woman that called me had a list of 100 names. If my sale was the only one she made, that means she would have made $100 per dial. That is s pretty good hourly wage! Dig in to December!