Guest Post: Todd’s #1 Time Saving Tip for 2010

If you’re not going to put 100% effort into doing a great job then don’t do your job. Just stay home. Catch up on some sleep. Take the day and vege. Heck, take the rest of your career off.

While that’s a pretty rough statement, in this “value-driven world” it’s very appropriate. Luckily there’s a positive side to it as well.

Very early on my grandfather drilled the need to “do your job well” into my head. His favorite one-liner was, “If you don’t have the time to do it right the first time how are you ever going to have the time to do it over?” (And believe me, if he thought it wasn’t right you DID do it over.) Lucky Strikes and Jim Beam aside, my grand-dad was a wise man.

He also taught me to shake hands the proper way, to remember names, and always say “thank you”. He never read an email and probably wouldn’t have made it as long as he did if somebody had sent him a TXT message. If he were alive today I’m sure he’d be labeled a renaissance man.

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What Happens When Your Personal Life Invades Your Work Life?

I had big plans for tonight’s blog post.  It was going to be amazing and life-changing for all of my readers.  It was going to be the best blog post ever written.  And then it happened: life.

I went straight from the office to a Master Mind meeting; when I got home, I realized it was my night to cook.  After we ate, I sat down to blog, then got into a long conversation with my wife about her hectic day.  When I got back, I realized two things: it was really late, and I still had a podcast episode to edit and post.  Gah.  So much for the world’s first perfect blog post.

As I was editing the podcast, though, I remembered one of the core concepts we’d discussed in this episode: what to do when your real life interrupts your work life.  It’s an interesting question, and one that gets a lot of consideration.  A lot of experts urge you to find this mythical place called “work-life balance” (if you ever find it, please send me the map).  What I remembered was one of the things our guest, Dan Waldschmidt, had said: work-life balance is a pipe dream.

Face it folks: if you’re working hard on your business, chances are pretty good that other areas of your life (your relationships, your health, etc.) are going to suffer a little.  That’s not a bad thing; it’s just the way it is when you only have 24 hours to get done what needs doing.  We’re only human after all.

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Chasing The M-Myth

I had a really compelling dinner conversation tonight with Jim Pelley, Karl Palachuk and Jeff Marmins (each a genius in his own right, in my humble opinion).  One of the things we all agreed on, and the inspiration for this post, was what I’m going to start calling the M-Myth (if Michael Gerber is reading this, I hope he’ll remember that imitation is the sincerest kind of flattery).

The M-Myth was born in the Information Age, and it’s been plaguing business professionals and entrepreneurs for decades.  It’s destroyed careers and businesses, occasionally even lives.  What is the M-Myth?  It’s the myth of multi-tasking.

Some people claim to have this ability, even wearing it as a badge of honor.  They strut around with a misguided superiority complex, thinking that their ability to multi-task somehow puts them in the intellectual elite, with a brain so powerful, one task just isn’t enough!  Well, here’s the bad news: multi-tasking is impossible! At least, that is, for humans.  Computers can almost pull it off, but even they (as Karl points out in his book Relax, Focus, Succeed) have to chunk the separate tasks down into steps that get done one at a time; it just looks like multi-tasking because they do it really, really fast.

Jeff highlighted the impossibility of multi-tasking by using the simplest example: having a cup of coffee while doing some kind of work, let’s say writing a blog post.  Some would consider this multi-tasking in its most basic form, but think about it for a minute.  What’s really going on?  Am I really doing two things simultaneously?  No.  In order to take a sip of my coffee, what do I have to do?  That’s right: I have to stop writing my blog.  Makes it pretty clear, doesn’t it?  We really can only do one thing at a time.  Multi-tasking is a myth, and a dangerous one at that.  How so?

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You Can Accomplish Whatever You Believe You Can

Over the course of 2009, my friend and business partner Joel D. Canfield and I had some fun creating a series of videos for YouTube.   We were the Business Heretics, and we called the series our Burning Business Tips.  I was going through the videos tonight, and I came across one that I think has some relevance as we head into the new year.  The video below was recorded in honor of the 40th anniversary of the Apollo lunar landing:

I think it’s important that we all give this some thought as we look ahead to what we’re planning to accomplish in 2010.  I know that, for many of us, 2009 was a year we’d rather forget.  I also know that many of us are still carrying around some of the bruises and scars that we received during the past year, and that those scars are affecting the way we’re thinking about the future.  They’re even having an impact on the goals we’re setting for the new year.

As the video states, though, we can truly accomplish anything, as individuals or businesses, if we start with the firm belief that we can.  I know this to be true, and so do you, though you may have forgotten it. And it’s time to take our power back now.  No more wallowing in the misery of 2009.  It’s time to plan for a much better 2010, a task which can only be accomplished if you believe that you can do it.  After all, who sets a goal that he doesn’t truly believe he can achieve?

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Change Your Thinking, Change Your Results

I make no secret of the fact that this blog is only indirectly about business and sales.  While you’ll see the occasional post about a particular sales skill or business task, what you’ll usually find is something about how to think differently: about yourself, about your life, about your business.  My primary purpose is to get you thinking about your thinking.

Lately, I’ve been giving a lot of thought to the challenges that so many are facing in their lives and in their businesses, and wondering if there isn’t something more we can all do about improving the situation.  Of course, being an optimist, I always believed that there is, and I got what I was looking for: gratitude.

For so many of us, gratitude is the missing link in our happiness, and a lack of gratitude for the good in our lives makes a bad situation seem even worse.  And while I know and understand completely that many people are facing challenging, sometimes overwhelming, circumstances in their lives, there are still things, a lot of things, to be grateful for.  Like what, you ask?  Well, it’s going to be different for each of us.  I know what I’m grateful for, but it’s up to you to decide what you’re grateful for.

And yes, you read that right: I said you have to decide what to be grateful for.  Gratitude, like any other feeling, is something we have to choose.  Especially if you’re experiencing difficulty in your life, it can be a difficult choice to make; after all, it’s so much easier just to see the bad and to wallow in it.  Finding something to be grateful for in a bad situation takes a lot of effort, but it gets easier with practice.  Here’s a shortcut: write down five things you’re grateful for on a 3 x 5 card and carry it around in your pocket.  That way, when a challenge comes up, you can pull out your card, read it, and get right back on track.

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It’s Time For a Little Chat…With Yourself!

In case you haven’t noticed, I’m a big believer in the power of positive thinking.  I know there’s no better way to get what you want than to believe that you can; I also know that optimism is essential to success.  The big question everyone always asks, though, is “How do I do it? How do I become a positive thinker when my life/business/career is so crappy?”

That’s a great question with a really simple answer: you need to have a little chat with yourself.  I’m serious!  One of the biggest saboteurs to success is that nagging little voice in your head that says things like “Yeah, but…”, “I can’t do that!”, “That’ll never really happen!” and all the countless other negative phrases we say to ourselves when we have a great idea or try to take some kind positive action.  The voice might be that of a parent, a teacher, a sibling, an old boss…all those folks who, whether they meant to or not, planted seeds of negativity in our brains that we’ve never quite been able to shake.

Well, it’s time to strangle that little voice and replace it with a new, more supportive one, and it’s going to be easier than you think.  I’m going to encourage you to do something that’s going to feel a little weird, possibly even a little uncomfortable (imagine that!), but that will pay huge dividends in your personal development.  I’m going to encourage you to start doing…*gulp*…affirmations.

Now before you write me off as a new-age wacko in salesperson’s clothes, let me remind you that the Great Ones (Zig Ziglar, Jim Rohn, Brian Tracy, etc.) all encourage affirmations in one form or another.  And I agree with them all: positive self-talk is good for the soul.  More importantly, though, positive self-talk is GREAT for activity, which leads to results, which reinforces beliefs, which opens your eyes to greater potential, which spurs even greater activity…and so on.

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What Does the Motivator Do On the Days He's Not Motivated?

Well, I admit it.  In spite of all my rants about taking responsibility for your own motivation and doing the activity that leads to success, I still have days when I’d rather just give up and curl up on the couch.  Even though I tell everyone how important it is to control your own thoughts and choose an optimistic outlook,  I sometimes allow the negativity to creep in and seize my brain.  And there are days when all I want to do is whine about how I wish things were different.  Days like today.

So what does the guy whose constant theme  is motivation and optimism do on a day like this?  Well, here’s the plan.  First, I’m going to take some of my own advice and spend some time in quiet contemplation, visualizing a successful outcome for the day.  Then, when my head is a little straighter, I’m going to leave the office and go make a call on a local real estate agency to share the message of “Motivation 101” with them.  I’m also going to make a couple of phone calls to follow up on some great contacts I’ve made over the past several days. 

Then, I’m going to come back and let you know how it turned out.  I’m going to do all this bcause I know one thing: the only antidote to having a crappy day is to get up and do something about it.  Change your thoughts, and you change your life.

I’m curious: what do you do to break the momentum of a bad day?  What do you do to help you keep going when you really feel like giving up?  Please share your suggestions and advice in the comments section and, until next time, make it a better day!

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Why You Don't Like Salespeople

Whenever I have the chance to speak to groups, I always start by asking the following question: “Who loves salespeople?” You might be surprised to find (or maybe you won’t be) that I’m often the only person in the room with my hand raised. This has even happened when I’m speaking to groups composed entirely of salespeople! Why is that the case?

For the most part, people really, really hate to be sold to. Think of the last time someone tried to sell something to you; did you enjoy the experience? Even if you were there specifically to buy something, the answer is probably “No”. There is just something about being sold to that sets off a defensive reaction. We feel that if we’re not careful, we’re going to be taken advantage of. Salespeople, on the whole, have a nasty reputation. That said, you might find what I’m about to say a little offensive: no matter what you do, you are in sales, or at the very least, sales adjacent!

That’s right: no matter what line of work you are in, if you provide a product or a service that other people pay you for, you are either in sales or a sales support role. Bottom line. No arguments to the contrary will be accepted. Selling is the primary function of business. Think about it: if you don’t sell anything, can you really say you’re in business?

So we’ve got a bit of a dilemma: no one, including you, likes to be sold to; at the same time, without sales you have no business. How can you reconcile this quandary? That’s where HERO Selling comes in. You see, the reason no one likes to be sold to and that everyone hates salespeople is simple: many “traditional” selling methods (and the salespeople who still use them) are offensive, brutish and outdated. You know the routine:

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Information Overload and the End of the Recession

With the beginning of a new month on the horizon, I want to chat for a bit about information overload and its effect on the unwary salesperson. I’m sure you would agree that it’s very easy to get bogged down with too much information: from the daily news to talk radio to the endless stream of e-mail alerts, RSS feeds and Tweets, we receive far more information in a day than we can hope to process. This often leads to that old disease, the paralysis of analysis.

When we ask our minds to process too much information, we have a tendency to lose sight of the fact that information alone is useless. We have to put that information to use, and in a positive direction, before we receive any value from it. For example, consider all the data you’ve seen recently with regard to the economy. From the sub-prime mortgage crisis and the related plummet in real estate prices, to the oft-repeated declaration of “the worst depression since the Depression”, we are bombarded by data that has worked many people into a state of panic. This panic has caused many salespeople to fall into negative thinking patterns (“No one is buying in this economy!”) which prevents them from engaging in the very activities that could bring a swift end to all the bad news. Enough is enough, already!

Consider a different way to look at, process and do something with all that information that comes in the form of “bad news” about the economy. What if, instead of buying into the panic, the salespeople of the world looked at the situation as their cue to step up their efforts and invigorate the economy? What would happen then?

I’ll tell you what would happen: we would get the blood (in other words, the money) flowing again. That is the power that you, the world’s sales force, holds in your mortal hands. We all know that salespeople (and small business owners, entrepreneurs, solo-professionals, etc.) are the backbone to any thriving economy; at the same time, we can also exacerbate a stagnant economy. The only difference is in our attitudes. If we buy into the dismal outlook regarding the future, are we really going to feel motivated to get out and make our daily number of connections with prospects? If, on the other hand, we choose to let all that information motivate us to take responsibility for getting things moving again, we really can make a difference.

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ONO: Options, Not Obligations by Marc Warnke

I just finished reading “ONO: Options, Not Obligations” by Marc Warnke and I have to say: if you have any desire to be in business for yourself and to use that business to create a lifestyle filled with the things you want to do instead of the things you have to do, you really need to read this book.

Marc is an expert in ONO, having created a life in which he is free to spend time with his wife and kids as he chooses and to pursue his passions.  This life didn’t happen by accident or some random stroke of luck, though: Marc applied the principles he writes about in “ONO” to seize the opportunities that were presented to him and leverage them into the life of his dreams.

Instead of presenting a step-by-step “how to do” approach to creating ONO, Marc focuses on “how to think”.  He helps you create a mindset of entrepreneurialism while working at your current job so that you can make the transition when the time is right.  Rather than encouraging new entrepreneurs to plunge in and “follow their passion”, Marc recommends developing a calculated, well thought out path to creating ONO.

What I appreciated most, though, is Marc’s voice.  He speaks with the compassion of someone who has been there and at the same time doesn’t allow us to wallow in our self-pity.  His inspiring words will help you find the desire to do something different, to start looking at your life and the decisions you make through new eyes: the eyes of a Family First Entrepreneur.  

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