Human Nature
WMMM #043 - This week, I share tips from a coach to help you compete and win in sales and life.
Jeff Keplar Newsletter November 25, 2023 4 min read
In a rut?
It happens.
It happens to all of us, all the time.
Is it attitude? Technique? Lack of practice? External forces?
What’s holding us back?
It’s not about blame.
It’s knowing what traps to avoid.
Successful Coaches Know Where to Look
1. Embrace Change
It’s human nature to resist change.
We prefer the familiar versus the unfamiliar.
We see risk and uncertainty with change.
Early in my career, I experienced some success selling office automation to large oil companies.
Then, I moved “up” to selling system software to enterprise accounts: database management systems and fourth-generation programming languages.
I did even better.
I had a great sales coach named Gary.
My confidence was high.
I thought I was ready for the startup world.
I dove in head first.
I did not know how deep the water was.
I was fearless.
I may also have been naive.
Over the next seven years, I worked for six different startups.
During this period, the Internet was “born.”
It was “easy” for people with ideas to get funding from venture capital.
It was common for startups to experience unimaginable success and fast failure immediately.
Two of my employers experienced modest success, and the other four failed.
From a financial perspective, these seven years set me back.
In my mind, I had damaged my resume.
From a personal growth perspective, I learned to embrace change.
I now saw change as an opportunity to grow versus a threat to my comfort zone.
We had a young and growing family requiring more resources.
I got an audience with the new Area Vice President for Oracle.
I took myself and my resume to meet with him and told my story.
His name was Steve, and he thought Oracle could use someone like me.
Steve went to Mike, a director in the sales org, and Mike hired me to run a small sales team in his group.
That was December 1, 1996.
Oracle had a reputation for being a difficult place to work.
One thing they did that unnerved many was to reorganize the sales force every June (at a minimum.)
But given my experience in the prior seven years, I was ideally suited for a place like that.
I thrived when others became anxious.
I embraced change while at Oracle.
It had become a habit for me.
For the next 19 years, I learned, grew, and had success.
We delivered.
We were consistent.
We embraced change.
It’s easy to fall back into our natural comfort zone.
Coaches look for resistance to change and remind us to embrace it.
Get comfortable being uncomfortable.
2. Complete Tasks, Make Decisions
Look for procrastination.
It’s a natural defense mechanism.
It protects us from fear of failure or the anxiety of not doing a task perfectly.
Quick fixes:
Focus on Doing, not on Perfection
Inbox Zero approach with our email - ever hear of Superhuman?
Don’t put off tomorrow what we can do today.
3. Have a Roadmap
“If you don’t know where you want to go, any road will get you there.”
Lewis Carroll
When faced with a challenge, it is easy to lose interest and give up without a vision or a roadmap.
Look for jumping from one idea to another without progressing in any area.
It’s easy to fall into this behavior.
No Pattern. No Plan.
Create a vision of who and what we want to be.
Develop a plan to get there.
Set goals for ourselves.
Stay motivated by holding ourselves accountable to those goals.
4. Compete Every Day
Competing every day means having a growth mindset.
Seek to grow with self-improvement.
If we are going to score above our weight class, we have to be willing to subject ourselves to and endure rejection.
Michael Jordan missed 27 game-winning shots.
We will miss 100% of the shots we don’t take.
Business is a numbers game, and so is selling.
But, low self-esteem holds people back far more than talent.
It’s easy to get discouraged when comparing ourselves with the best.
Find a room where we are the smartest or a gym where we’re the fittest.
Build our confidence.
Get better.
Win a few matches.
Winning is more fun.
Success is more fun.
Then, move up to the next weight class.
Push ourselves.
Be comfortable being uncomfortable.
Acquire new skills.
Keep growing.
Our Environment Can Make a Difference
We thrive in a culture that embraces us, is unifying, and celebratory.
A culture that dictates compliance to a particular approach is frustrating for any team to be a part of.
When a coach believes in us, our self-confidence remains high.
We have a healthy culture when every team member feels like they are in it and valued.
Enterprise technology sales is really hard.
We have to have the discipline to do those things we need to do when we don’t want to and not to do those we aren’t supposed to do even when we want to.
A healthy room where we all pull for one another makes it easier and doable.
Thank you for reading,
Jeff
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I possess the skills identified in this article and share them as part of my service.
I offer my help to sales leaders and their teams.
In my weekly newsletter, Win More, Make More, I provide tips, techniques, best practices, and real-life stories to help you improve your craft.
