In this Expert Insight Interview, Cyriel Kortleven discusses how to change your mindset to make coping with change a little easier. Cyriel Kortleven is a global speaker who has inspired organizations like IKEA and NASA to approach change with courage, confidence, and enthusiasm for more than 20 years. His pragmatic advice has earned him the nickname “The Simplifier.”
This Expert Insight Interview discusses:
- Why it is a good idea to simplify business processes
- How corporations slow their decision-making down as they grow
- The concept of “yes, and” in business meetings
Simplification
Sometimes we tend to make things unnecessarily complex. This is undoubtedly the case in the business world. If something goes wrong in our work environment, instead of having a simple chat, we go to HR to develop a procedure to ensure it never happens again.
Then, when an exception inevitably happens, we come up with another rule and another one, and after a while, we don’t even know why those rules and regulations are there. Although simple solutions cannot solve everything, they could potentially fix 75–80% of our problems — we just need to remember to keep it simple.
Decision-Making
If you sit people down to put a process in place, they will start building exceptions rather than the rules. This is because the world will change anyway; there will always be people going in a different direction from what you originally intended.
It is impossible to predict every possible decision someone will make in the future and put it all in a system. That is part of why startups often make progress much faster than big corporations. Startups can often just try things out and see if they stick, while in a big corporation, you need several people to sign off each decision, slowing things down significantly.
“Yes, And”
As human beings, we often approach change with a lot of resistance from the outset. We have a negative bias toward new ideas and changes. Cyriel advises everyone to suspend their judgment at the very start. Instead of saying “yes, but,” say “yes, and.”
This helps you create a more accepting atmosphere, where ideas are welcome, and enables you to build things you previously might not have thought possible. Not all of these ideas will be perfect, but you could create something special if you can pick a few pieces out of each one.
Our Host
John is the Amazon bestselling author of Winning the Battle for Sales: Lessons on Closing Every Deal from the World’s Greatest Military Victories and Social Upheaval: How to Win at Social Selling. A globally acknowledged Sales & Marketing thought leader, speaker, and strategist, he has conducted over 1500 video interviews of thought leaders for Sales POP! online sales magazine & YouTube Channel and for audio podcast channels where Sales POP! is rated in the top 2% of most popular shows out of 3,320,580 podcasts globally, ranked by Listen Score. He is CSMO at Pipeliner CRM. In his spare time, John is an avid Martial Artist.
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