featured – Robin P. Zander

Everything in life is sales. From inviting your child to do her homework, to deciding where to go for dinner, to encouraging a colleague at work, the situations we encounter daily are filled with the dynamic of sales and persuasion. And, unfortunately, most of what you know about sales is wrong.

What is Sales?

My favorite example of sales comes from a scene from the classic Christmas movie Miracle on 34th Street.

In Miracle, the Macy’s department store Santa asks each child who sits on his lap what they want for Christmas. Santa then tells the family where they can purchase that toy at the best price, even if it means at a competing department store. At first, the store manager is outraged that Santa is supporting his competitors – until he sees enthusiastic customers returning to Macy’s because of the excellent customer service. The value to Macy’s of Santa’s recommendations is greater than the sale of a single children’s toy; it’s customer loyalty.

Sales is having a clear solution – a service, opportunity or opinion – that can help to solve somebody’s problem. Like Santa, good sales means aligning yourself with the interests of the person you are talking to, to discover if your solution is a good fit for them. If it is, invite them toward your solution, and if not, move on.

How to Do It Wrong

Sales and persuasion are most often practiced with pressure and urgency.

Think of the reputation of a car salesman – pushy, fast-talking, deceptive. They aren’t considering what is best for the customer. They only want to sell a specific car at the best possible price. The result: nobody enjoys the experience and the customer won’t recommend that product or service in the future.

Pressure and urgency can work, but only in the short-term. They don’t increase trust or loyalty.

How to Do It Right

A Process of Discovery

Done well, sales and persuasion should be a process of discovery. Instead of using force, inquire about what your friend wants to eat for dinner. Get curious about why your colleague doesn’t want to do the work assigned to them.

When you start by asking questions about what someone is looking to solve – for themselves, their business, or their family – you’ll discover if what you are selling is a good fit for the other person.

People relate through the stories that you tell them, so share your experience, too. As I discussed in “Everything is Storytelling,” your story should be brief, personal and relatable.

Useful Beliefs About Sales

Abundance – If the person you are talking to doesn’t want the solution you are offering, somebody else will. There are between 7 and 8 billion people in the world today. If the person you are talking to is not a good fit, move on.

Believe it – Believe in what you are selling. That doesn’t mean that it is valuable to every single prospective buyer, only they can tell you that. But believing that it is valuable in the world makes closing easier, genuine, and fun.

Decrease the stakes – There are very few game changing moments in life, and this specific sale isn’t likely to be one of them. Whether or not you make this sale today isn’t likely to matter over the course of your or your customer’s life.

Autonomy – Foster the belief that everybody knows what’s best for themselves. You aren’t trying to convince anyone, but rather inviting them to entertain if what you’re offering is a good fit for them.

Look for “What I’ve learned” – It is useful to hold that even if you don’t close a sale, you will have learned a lot along the way. This practice of iteration and repeated repetitions will make you better at closing future sales.

Put in the Reps

Improving at sales is a matter of practice and incremental improvement. Many of the most successful salespeople and deal makers in the world have practiced tens of thousands of times. Sales is as much a performance as trying out for a sport or auditioning for a play, and practice makes for consistency.

Your Attitude Closes Deals

Who you are and how you show up with a prospective customer is what will determine whether they buy. Who you are closes deals.

Maintain an attitude of enthusiasm and want what is best for the other person. You’ll have a better chance of having things go your way.

Next time you are debating with your spouse about the dishes, trying to get your child to do their homework, or asking an employee to fill out their hours, think of Santa, sitting in Macy’s department store, referring customers to the competition.

Until next time, Robin

I originally heard this quote applied to dog training in reference to using high quality treats. In a world where there are a million interesting smells, but you want to control a dog’s attention, it pays to use high quality rewards. But that same advice can be applied well beyond the context of dog training!

I have always enjoyed training dogs. Dog training is about reinforcing good habits, both for the dogs and ourselves. And I’ve found that we have a lot to learn about habits, and ourselves, from the process.

I was working with a dog recently; he is 100 pounds, and a complete love. Unfortunately, he had some traumatic experiences as a puppy and can be reactive. But this was the first time he was reactive with me: teeth bared, snapping. He alternately wanted my attention and was scared that I might hurt him.

In all fairness, he had just been to the vet and had to be sedated. The next day – still recovering – he snapped at me and wouldn’t let me pet him, as usual. I had a moment of despair: I sure as hell don’t want to interact with a reactive dog! But also, up until this incident, I’d thought of this dog as a friend. And I began thinking about how likely it is that a dog can ever be completely trained out of unwanted behaviors.

How completely, how thoroughly, can behavior really change? As I was considering this dog, I realized that changing behavior is like riding a bicycle.

When I first learned to ride a bike, I fell off hundreds of times. But in the thousands of hours I’ve logged since, I can count the number of tumbles I’ve taken, including barreling down city streets at 45 miles an hour.

And accidents do happen. We do sometimes make mistakes or revert to unwanted behaviors. It can be tempting to avoid making mistakes by removing the conditions that led to them or ceasing the activity altogether. A way to ensure I never fall off my bike again would be to never get on it in the first place. I could take the same approach with this dog. He and I could never interact, or he could stay locked in his house alone. But these aren’t viable solutions. All are based on fear, perfectionism, and a fixed mindset.

We all have unwanted behaviors and habits we want to change. But, that’s not really how learning works. Put anyone in a stressful enough situation and they can revert back to earlier patterns. I eat a lot of mint ice cream, and would like to change this behavior. Offer me mint ice cream when I’m hungry and I’ll probably eat it. Put me on my bike, on a bad road, amidst distracted drivers, and I might get into an accident.

Even if we never, for the rest of our lives, repeat a habit we’re trying to extinguish, we always have the capacity to do so.

What this means is that, instead of looking for perfection, the solution is to look for learning. When I repeat a habit I want to avoid – when this dog snaps at me when he’s scared, when I eat too much ice cream, or when I fall off my bicycle – there’s only one option: get back up and try again.

Build from where you are

Building from where you are is usually the best option, since it adds on to what we already do and increases the range of what’s possible. With this dog, that means first acknowledging that he’s reactive today, and not letting my ego get in the way. Staying frustrated, or even feeling betrayed (“We were friends yesterday!”) clouds judgment. Working with where he is today means not denying the reactive state he’s in, which in turn allows me to avoid repeating interactions that will reinforce the undesirable behaviors.

Don’t try to remove unwanted behaviors.

I have some counterintuitive advice: don’t try to remove unwanted behaviors. You may want to remove unwanted behaviors, but it is rarely that simple. Habits and behaviors can’t simply be turned off; that’s not how neuroplasticity works. Change comes by rewiring the brain and building upon what is currently possible. We crowd out undesirable behaviors by positively reinforcing desirable ones. Focus on the behaviors you want to encourage and the habits you want to cultivate.

Reinforce what you want

In interacting with a reactive dog, I want calm and gentle behavior towards me, other people, and other animals. My goal, then, is to positively reinforce the dog every time he offers me, or anyone else, the slightest bit of gentleness. Getting him to focus on treats and positive interactions is a much stronger incentive than yelling at him (and thus scaring him further).

Work around the edges

Instead of trying to repress unwanted behaviors, work around the edges of what is currently available. Take what is currently easy and try small variations. With the dog, that might mean that petting is off the table at first, and I have to begin training with a bit more distance than I’m used to. With my current addiction to mint ice cream that might be:

Trying a different flavor of ice cream (to get me out of my habitual rut)
Eating out of a bowl (because then I’ll demolish the whole pint)
Drinking water before I have ice cream (I’ve learned that I sometimes reach for ice cream when I’m thirsty)
Making a fruit smoothie instead of ice cream (it comes close to the temperature and texture that I’m seeking)

Failure isn’t failure

Progress isn’t linear. One moment of reactivity isn’t indicative of how an interaction is going to go tomorrow. When I eat too much ice cream, it often feels like I’m repeating a “bad” habit and failing to practice a “good” one. But a moment of failure is just that: one moment.

The real mistake is to consider one misstep a mark of complete failure. In times of stress we revert back to more primitive versions of ourselves. For me, that might be stress eating ice cream as a form of self-soothing. For a dog, that can mean protecting himself the best way he knows how.

Learning happens like a ball repeatedly rolling down a hill of sand. With every iteration, the grooves of the ball’s path become deeper and deeper and increase the ball’s tendency to follow a similar pattern. That doesn’t mean that the ball will sometimes roll along a different route, but the more a pattern is reinforced, the more consistent that habit will be.

My consumption of mint ice cream is something I’m working on. I eat more ice cream when I’m stressed, hungry, and it is readily available. But I’ve begun iterating on habits to change my relationship and these habits.

I’ve never trained a reactive dog before and I’m nervous! But I know that change is not only possible, but – given the right prompts, patterning, and reinforcement – it is almost inevitable.

Behavior change, however minor or significant, is the culmination of millions of small influences, moments, and habits. Regression isn’t necessarily going backwards. I’ve got nothing but excitement for all of the behavior change ahead.

Until next time,
Robin

Last month, I went for a hike to celebrate my father’s 74th birthday. My father is a botanist, and it was with profound joy that I watched him meticulously bend over to identify flowers amidst the California bloom. Aside from being happy to see my father doing something he loved, I was moved because this simple habit, walking and bending down, was almost impossible for him 5 short years ago.

For most of the last two decades, my father suffered chronic back pain – the result of years of pounding concrete as a runner. It pained me to see him suffer and I desperately wanted to help him. I tried everything I could think of to get him to change his habits and improve his back pain.

Nothing I did had a lasting impact. Hard as I might try, I couldn’t “fix” him and my father would inevitably return to the habits that caused pain in the first place. Moreover, my judgments and pressure created a wedge between us.

Then, after decades of worsening pain, my father underwent back surgery, which resolved the back pain.

Early in his recovery, I lent him my Concept 2 Rower and a few free weights. I’d recently taken up rowing, and built out a home gym. While I had no expectation that he’d adopt a new physical routine, I enthusiastically shared what I’d been learning. I taught him a few simple exercises: how to row with good form, how to lift some basic weights, and how to hang from a bar.

When I came back to reclaim my Concept 2 Rower a month later, he was rowing and practicing the exercises I taught him every day. In the two years since, I’ve helped him continue to build on his exercise habits until he’s exercising for two hours most days!

My father’s transformation has been profound. He is out of pain, working in his garden, and exercising several hours a day. I am immensely proud, but ultimately can’t take much credit for his recovery.

They have to want it

I have some tough news: you can’t change people. People have to want change in order to make progress.

If they don’t want to change their behavior, that’s where to begin. You can start with data, with a personal appeal, or any other approach that you think will work to help them want to change. But without the core desire – their “why” – change is impossible.

Let go of the outcome

My biggest learning, and one that I’ve had to confront again and again, is that in order to help someone we love, we have to let go of the need for them to change. You have to let go of the outcome.

You don’t have to care less, but we all know when we’re being pressured, even if it isn’t explicit. And – I don’t know about you – but when I’m pressured, I dig in my heels and resist change all the more!

To encourage someone you love to change their behavior, you have to first get comfortable with the fact that they may not ever change.

Attitude is everything

I spent many years helping kids with autism build better habits and learned an invaluable lesson: attitude trumps everything.

Many of the kids I worked with were non-verbal, and they, and their families, would often be bossed around by therapists and specialists who believed things should only be done a certain way.

These kids learned to respond, primarily, to a caregiver’s attitude. And I learned that when I showed up with a loving presence, we’d be able to connect much more easily.

This same approach holds true for everyone. To help someone you love change, showing up with a kind and gentle attitude is more than half the battle.

Be like gravity

The best invitations feel like gravity; impossible to resist

We’ve all been sold to by pushy salespeople. Gravity is the opposite.

Instead of pushing and pressuring, be so engaging, so inviting, that people want to gravitate towards you, and towards the changes you’re asking for.

Start where they are

For someone to change, you have to begin with where they are right now.

That’s true for any of us in pursuing any kind of behavior change. And it is particularly true when you’re wanting someone else to make progress.

We can’t run a marathon tomorrow if today we’re healing a sprained ankle. We can only build small habits from where we are right now.

Change takes the time that it takes

This comes back, full circle, to “we can’t control people.”

Change takes time, usually more than we want to give it. This is as true of change in others as it is for change within ourselves!

Helping someone we love takes the time that it takes. We can’t dictate how long a transformation will take. Impatience can not only create a negative atmosphere of pressure that slows down progress, but it also can mean that we miss important markers of progress along the way or lose the opportunity to be part of someone’s journey as they come back from a setback.

–

During a conversation with author and conflict resolution specialist Dana Caspersen, she said to me, “Not only can you not change people, but it is none of your damned business.”

My judgment of the habits that led to my father’s injury and pressure for him to change did not help him recover, but actually got in the way of us having a healthy relationship.

Trying to get anyone to do something that they don’t already want to do is wasted effort. All that we can do is support and celebrate where someone is, and encourage them to take incrementally small steps in the direction we’ll hope they’ll go.

Until next time,
Robin

Tag: featured

Everything Is Sales & You’re Doing It Wrong