Bob Schultek Managing the ever accelerating pace of change creates a challenge for leaders. In the race to stay ahead, what parts of your business do you preserve and what should you break? The competitive advantage of your exclusive product or service erodes quickly these days. Sustaining a program of continuous innovation and improvement is mandatory to stay ahead of the disruptive forces of unrelenting, rapid change. Implementing such a program drives you to acquire new skills …
When a customer has a problem, they search the web using whatever words they know about their challenge and possible solutions. But once they have identified potential solution providers, most customers want to connect directly with them to discuss their needs. Rather than forcing a potential customer to fill out a response form on your website, it’s more productive if you enable those customers to contact you in whatever way they are most comfortable. This …
In this dynamic marketplace, how can you move faster? How can you accelerate your time to market? How can you react faster to opportunities? How can moving faster help you grow, or save you time and money? Moving faster primarily involves your decision-making process. Here are 3 ways to move faster: Accelerate decision-making. First, you must choose to decide. Ask yourself if waiting to decide will generate any more useful information. If the answer is …
Leading a business, or driving a change initiative, or proposing solutions to a customer requires that you influence others. There are 6 factors that enable you to persuade those you need to convince. Much has been written about the art of influencing others to follow your lead. One of the best known works is called the “The Science of Persuasion” by Dr. Robert Cialdini and it describes six principles that are most productive for generating a …
When working with sales teams, three excuses are often cited as obstacles to earning new business. Ask yourself “why” you think it is an issue when you are tempted to mention one of these excuses and try a different approach 1. “If we don’t offer the lowest price, we don’t get the order.” If you make no effort to learn about your customers’ business, and offer nothing novel or compelling to help them achieve success, …
Every leader faces a business crisis during his or her career. It’s the defining moment of adversity that tests that person’s leadership competency. What decisions must be made now? What vital actions must urgently be taken? Proven leaders consider 3 key questions when confronting a crisis. 1. What is the current real situation? Leaders first seek to gain a comprehensive understanding about the actual scope of the crisis. This is the diagnostic assessment. What caused …
Prospects have stated and unstated needs. Discovering the unstated ones results in getting the order. Intimacy is the key that unlocks these hidden unstated needs and begins to build the emotional connection with a prospect that leads to an order. What is the best way to foster intimacy with new prospects? Your first three minutes with a new prospect is your chance to put the person at ease and gain insights into his or her …
Leaders are increasingly challenged to preserve balance between their corporate responsibilities and their personal core values. The inability to sustain this balance can cause conflicts for the leader and confusion for those who depend on her or him. A prolonged imbalance can breed distrust in a team. One way to help leaders preserve balance is for them to measure the energy and skill invested in their key activities versus the benefits they receive back from …
The vast amount of information available via the web has radically altered the selling process. Potential customers can reference websites, blogs, LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and other web-based tools to gather volumes of data before they ever reach out to a salesperson. If you are not careful, when that inquiry arrives, your response will convince them that your product or service is just like the other commodities they see all over the web and they …
Leadership is the practice of influence. Inspiring people to follow your lead requires a commitment to personal engagement – an investment of precious time to be prioritized versus other stakeholder demands for your attention. Where does personal engagement fit into your priorities? People choose to follow you because they believe in you and where you are leading them. When they stop trusting you, your ability to continue as leader is over. This is why engaging …