Dear Reader,
Become strong in the hard moments of life! In
every day that we're at work, or at home, we find a
few hard moments, which if we can deal with and are
strong in, make everything else easy.
But if we are weak in those moments - we
cave in to the temptation of taking an easier pathway,
for example to criticise or to complain or to condemn -
then we will find ourselves caving in on many things.
As Shakespeare said:
"There is a tide in the affairs of men,
Which taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life
Is bound in shallows and in miseries.
On such a full sea are we now afloat,
And we must take the current when it serves,
Or lose our ventures."
Isn't that just so powerful?
One of my favourite truths quoted by Stephen
Covey, author of The 7 Habits of Highly Effective
People is:
"Between stimulus and response is a space. In
this space lies our freedom to choose our response. In
these choices lie our growth and our happiness."
Just think about this for a moment.
When your team member says something that you
don't like, do you take a moment to think about your
response before lashing out?
When at home, your spouse or teenage child
makes a cutting remark, do you respond with
hardly a
moment in-between and cut them down to size?
When
a customer asks you to do something out of the
ordinary, do you instantly show your disfavour by
saying, "that's not our policy!"?
Essentially, what I'm talking about is
character. Character must equal competence. I
simply don't think that one can be competent without
having positive character - or the characteristics of
being a good human being. When we are competitive
with each
other, we begin to take sides; that in order for me to
win, you must lose.
I don't believe that we must compete in a "I
win/you
lose concept." I believe in 'setting you up for
success.' And when I spend most of my time in doing
this, my entire team will be successful. Then I will be
successful.
It also goes that as a manager or parent or spouse,
that I shall coach, guide, mentor and also take
disciplinary action when appropriate to ensure we get
our goals.
What are your thoughts on this?
Perfect Practice Makes Perfect! In the field of selling,
I find few people ever do any practice at their profession.
We practice to be good at golf, or badminton, or sailing,
or athletics, or swimming, or any contact sport. But we seldom
practice nor deeply think about our profession of selling.
I say again that selling is not rocket science, but it's
still a complex process, and unless you think about and
practice the entire process, you will find that you will only
ever be mediocore at your profession.
Cheers! Make May a fabulous month!
It's going to be another busy month for me and I do
hope it's also going to be another busy and fruitful
month for all of you!