Communicate Like a Leader

A good leader is someone that executes a vision, listens, coaches, is resilient and motivated. A good leader can literally make or break the success of his or her team. Why? Communication! As a leader, your job is to be able to communicate the vision of your company and inspire those around you to reach for greatness. If you can’t do that, what are you bringing to the table?

This expert sales interview explores:

• Communication
• Sticking to a Format
• Communicating Like a Leader: Connecting Strategically to coach, Inspiring, and Getting Things Done

Communication

A lot of people associate communication with a “likeability” factor – meaning if people like you, that means you are good at communicating. This is not always the case. You can be likeable, comfortable and confident, but that does not mean that you are able to close the deal by persuasively getting your message across. Are you able to engage and win the trust of your prospective customers? Are you able to think on your feet?

Format

As a salesperson, you should always expect a dialogue rather than a monologue. It can be easy to be thrown off your game, or lose your train of thought when you are being interrupted or asked unexpected questions, but in order to be a great leader, you need to be able to pick right back up where you left off. Having a format for how to put your thoughts together will help you think on your feet. Booher suggests starting with one sentence overview, then you will elaborate, followed by a short anecdote to get your point across, and summarize with a sentence.

Communicate Like a Leader

Too often people get promoted to leadership positions with no experience and poor communication skills that lack inspiration and vision. Instead, they focus on what they know: tactics rather than strategy. The result – they become stuck in micromanagement mode.

Booher wants to prevent micromanagement before it happens by providing leadership communication skills. Built on a foundation of extensive research, Communicate Like a Leader, offers practical guidelines to help professionals think, coach, converse, write, and negotiate strategically to deliver the best results possible.

To learn more about how to communicate like a leader, watch the entire expert sales interview. If you would like to read Dianna’s book, it is available on Amazon.

About 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 is CSMO at Pipeliner CRM. In his spare time, John is an avid Martial Artist.

Lead Through Change to Accomplish Greatness

If there is one thing in life that we can count on, it’s change. Whether it’s a change in career, family situations, moving to a new place, a change in technology, change is inevitable. While change can be scary and uncomfortable, change is actually a great opportunity because it helps develop us into stronger individuals. Change allows us to adapt to uncomfortable situations or circumstances and come out better than we were before.

This expert sales interview explores:

• The two Cs
• Managing your thinking
• See the choice to make the change
• Taking risks

The two Cs

Complacency and comfort are two things that can kill you. Especially in business, when technology changes and our customers need to change, and the world around us needs to change, it can be difficult to remove ourselves from our comfort zones. If things stay the same, we can predict them, and if we can predict things, we feel safe. If we cannot predict things, we become afraid and cannot manage ourselves efficiently.

Manage your thinking

Rather than worrying about all the things in life that you cannot control, focus on what you can control and be realistic. Consider the worst case scenario in business, for example – If you lose your job, what are you going to do? Probably get a new one, right? You have to learn how to manage yourself, how you think, and how you feel, especially if you want to lead other people.

See the choice to make the choice

In order to effectively manage your thinking, you need to be able to see that you are beginning to let your mind take over, and you have to see that your fears are beginning to drive you. The best way to do that is to listen to your body. Are you eating more or less? Are you having a hard time sleeping? If you are noticing differences, that is your body’s way of telling you that your mind is taking over and you need to be aware.

Taking risks

Very rarely are we going to be able to adapt to a change, or make change happen if we are not willing to take some kind of risk. Looking back on your life, has it been worthwhile, or have you just been doing everything by the book? Even if your risks don’t pan out, you have to get through your barrier of fear and live your life to the fullest.

To learn more about how to lead through change, watch the entire expert sales interview.

About 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 is CSMO at Pipeliner CRM. In his spare time, John is an avid Martial Artist.

How does personality type play into success in sales? Is there an “ideal” personality type that makes up a successful salesperson, or does it depend on the environment that you are in and who fits best in that environment?

This expert sales interview explores:

• Four Components
• Four Personality Colors
• Four People, You Should Know: How to Connect for Exceptional Sales, Customer Service, and Unified Teams

Four Components:

Using his sales background, Schlackman devised that it’s not about who sells – it’s about how the client buys. He came up with 4 components that he uses to characterize personality types:
What does the client value? How do they make decisions? What motivates them to action? How do they prefer to communicate?

Four Personality Colors

• Blue – The blue personality is the relationship person. The most important thing is relationships – family, friends, loved ones. Blues are the best at selling themselves to a client, and they do that by building trust through integrity and honesty. They believe in delivering great service and always put the customer or client first. These people are one of the two “right-brained personalities.”
• Gold – The gold personality is all about organization, process, planning, discipline, and structure. They live a very scheduled life and are not very flexible, but they get things done. They put together a time frame and they stick to it. Gold people like to look at the pros and cons of things and measure by comparison. They are very focused, aggressive, and very direct. These people are one of the “left-brained personalities.”
• Green – The green personality is your analytic – your IT person, engineer, doctor, or scientist. They are facts, details, and logic driven. Green people tend to be skeptical and ask more questions than any other personality, and like the blue, they are slow to make a decision because they need to have all of the information. These people are also “left-brained personality.”
• Orange – The orange personality sells excitement, the immediate benefits, and they love to beat the competition. They are good at thinking on their feet, and they are persuasive. Like the gold personality, they are direct and aggressive, but they are also relationship oriented like the blue personality. These people are also “right-brained personality.”

Four People, You Should Know

Questioning why one sale closes and another doesn’t, Schlackman came to understand that a large part of the answer lies in personality – the personality of the salesperson, the personality of the customer, and the way those personalities interact.

Using this book will help you address personality dimension that is often overlooked when we convey our message to customers, team members and leaders – understanding how personality styles impact people’s view of situations and events and how they interact with others.

To learn more about the 4 personality types, watch the entire expert sales interview. If you would like to purchase his book, it is available on Amazon.

About 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 is CSMO at Pipeliner CRM. In his spare time, John is an avid Martial Artist.

Everyone at some point in their life has been asked what their purpose is. If you haven’t been asked yet, you will be. Have you ever considered that there is more to life than waking up every morning and working an 8-5 job, feeling like you are stuck on the carousel of life? How do we eliminate that feeling? By finding our purpose.

This expert sales interview explores:

• Attracting and Maintaining Talent
• Finding Purpose
• Purpose’s Missing Piece: 7 Steps Process for Getting Your Top People Fill Your Talent Pool

Attracting and Maintaining Talent

A lot of people think that Millennials are people that are in their twenties, but actually, a Millennial is anyone that is between the age of eighteen and thirty-eight. When Baron entered the workforce, asking someone what they wanted to do was a forty year question. To a Millennial, it is a four-year question.

It has been said that Millennials are lazy because they don’t want to work an 8-5 job, but the reality is that a millennial is willing to work at 2 am if they have to. As organizations, we have to get used to higher levels of turnover. Why? Because the average millennial spends 1-2 years in a job (not a career) that they LIKE and ENJOY. Did you know that 47% of today’s workforce is already looking for another job? Organizations also need to do a better job of creating an environment of being fiercely loyal so that people want to stay longer than the average.

When you look at a list of what millennials want in a job, they want meaningful work. Money matters, but not as much as meaningful work. What does that mean? Working for a company that has a higher agenda than profit.

Purpose Driven Work

Baron discusses the misconception that his life is so glamorous because he gets to travel the world and work with high powered individuals, but in reality, he is sleeping in a different bed almost every night and having to deal with airport security and time zone changes on a regular basis. What makes all of the drudgery worth it is being able to live his purpose every day and doing what he loves.

Your mission statement is not a purpose – your purpose should be emotion based. Human beings have emotional logic, not just logic. When we apply that emotional logic to our lives, that’s what makes us make moves. As an organization, you want to have purpose-driven leadership with a purpose-driven culture that then facilitates your employees finding their own individual purpose.

Purpose’s Missing Piece: 7 Steps Process for Getting Your Top People Fill Your Talent Pool

For many people, the demands of work and life can be overwhelming. Studies have shown that fewer than thirty percent of people in the workforce are fully engaged. What do people that are able to spring out of bed know (or have) that so many others don’t? The answer is a purpose. The purpose is the key ingredient of a genuinely authentic leader who inspires loyalty. The purpose is also the highest value asset of a sustainable organizational culture.

Purpose, when realized, is woven into the fabric of an extraordinary leader and it becomes the unseen, yet the ever-present engine that drives an organization. For a new, emerging company or companies who recognize the need for a fresh start, Purpose can be a strategic starting point and an organic attractor of both top talent and customers. In what can appear to be a hyper-competitive environment, there is no greater differentiator than Purpose. For an individual and or a company to thrive in today’s global marketplace, we need to infuse Purpose in all that we do.

To learn more about how to provide leadership driven by purpose in the workforce, watch the entire expert sales interview. If you would like to purchase Dov’s book, it is available on Amazon.

About 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 is CSMO at Pipeliner CRM. In his spare time, John is an avid Martial Artist.

As the year comes to a close, having a good state of mind can be challenging. Maybe you’re struggling to meet your quota at work, or maybe you’ve just had one heck of a year and are ready for a fresh start. Regardless of your current frame of mind, having a positive attitude can really help you end your year with a bang.

This expert sales interview explores:

• Belief
• Standard of activity
• 4% Solution

Belief

A lot of people shut down the last few months of the year and assume that people don’t want to hear from you. It’s important to remember that even in the slow months, you can still set yourself up for success for the first quarter. Simple things like calling people early, or calling late, can really improve your chances of getting ahold of someone. Sales is a pipeline business, so it’s doing the little things everyday that can make a big difference. Success is about mindset – if you believe that no one wants to talk to you, that will be your reality. But if you believe that you have something unique to bring to the table, then success will come.

Standard of activity

What are you going to do each and everyday? It’s easy to be busy, but still not be doing anything to move your pipeline forward. What are you doing in terms of contacting past clients? A lot of people forget about their past clients all together which could mean losing out on business. Eichelberger says, “if you track something then it is much more likely to happen,” so it is important to start each day with a game plan.

Eichelberger also suggests that if you don’t exercise already, do so! Mix up your schedule. The quality of your life is dependent on the quality of yourself and how much oxygen you are getting. Aerobic exercise means exercise with oxygen, so get up a little bit earlier and start your day off with a sweet and maybe a smoothie.

4% Solution

4% of 24 hours is one hour a day. That is 168 hours a week. And of those hours, you need to be on your A game for 7 of them. In order to get yourself to be on your A game, what are you reading? What are you listening to on your commute to and from work? If you make the decision to listen to at least half an hour of positive material a day, or read something positive for 15 minutes a day, or even just visualize something positive that will help you achieve success, you will be a lot more energized.

To learn more about how to get energized, watch the entire expert sales interview.

About 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 is CSMO at Pipeliner CRM. In his spare time, John is an avid Martial Artist.

There are an estimated 18 million salespeople in the United States. So how do you stand out in today’s noisy and distracted world, and how can you strive to be remarkable? Now, I know what you’re thinking – How does being remarkable pertain to the business world? Well, if you are just another salesperson in a sea of other fish, why should someone choose to listen to what you have to say?

This expert sales interview explores:

• Distraction
• Intuitive vs. Intentional Perspective
• Taking Responsibility
• Be Remarkable
• Meetings Matter: 8 Powerful Strategies for Remarkable Conversations

Distraction:

It’s a fact that you are not able to give something your all when you are distracted. Aside from the technology that distracts us on a daily basis, there are also residual distractions caused by being interrupted, or checking your email. Even a simple action such as taking a brochure into a sales meeting causes a distraction because the moment you put that paper down, you have lost the buyers attention.

Perspective

Axtell references a book by Mindy Hall about the difference between intuitive and intentional leadership. Intuitive in this case, referring to something that we do naturally and intentional being something that we are choosing to do. Hall’s mantra is that she “wants it to matter that we met.” Walking into a meeting with the attitude of wanting to provide someone with more value than they had previously received will greatly improve how well you are able to communicate with them. You are a product of your perspective – either you are going to empower someone, or you won’t. The choice is yours to make.

Responsibility:

Knowing and understanding the differences between accountability and responsibility is crucial in understanding how to be successful. Accountability can be assigned – you are being held accountable for this sales territory, or you are being held accountable for this part of the project. Responsibility (or ownership), however, cannot be assigned – it is a choice and a perspective. Literally speaking, if you are being responsible, you are able to respond and have something to say about how a situation turns out. All you can do is focus on what you can control, rather than that in which you cannot control.

Being remarkable:

Why would anyone want to be remarkable when they can settle for being good enough? Being remarkable requires a lot of hard work, patience, persistence, and practice. Whether you are trying to be a remarkable golfer, or a remarkable salesperson, or a good presenter. Talent is no longer the deciding factor for success. If you work at something, you are going to succeed.

Meetings Matter:

Axtell discusses the topic of meetings in his book, Meetings Matter: 8 Powerful Strategies for Remarkable Conversations. At the heart of all effective organizations lies the meeting. Meetings provide opportunities to clarify issues, set direction, unify efforts, and sharpen our communication skills. Axtell provides eight powerful strategies, and real-life advice, to put into action so that everyone in the room can feel heard and appreciated.

To learn more about how you can be remarkable, watch the entire expert sales interview. If you would like to purchase Paul’s book, it is available on Amazon.

About 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 is CSMO at Pipeliner CRM. In his spare time, John is an avid Martial Artist.

MUST WATCH PANEL DISCUSSION [icon name=”binoculars” class=”” unprefixed_class=””]

It’s the end of the year, do you know where your quota is at? Maybe you’re on track to hit your quota, but want to keep up the momentum and go above and beyond. Or, maybe you’re not even close to hitting your quota, but want to get as close as possible to your end of the year goal.

Join us on November 29th at 10am PST to get actionable insight from Spencer Marona, Janice Mars, and Chip Eichelberger into how to accelerate your end of year sales.

Spencer Marona, CSC is the founder and owner of PERFORMANCE NORTH, a sales performance and leadership development consulting firm. Spencer helps his client’s rapidly elevate their revenue via a hybrid of solutions including using an objective, scientific, and measurable tool that measures how the thinking of an individual, team and/or organization is impacts performance.

Janice Mars, Principal and Founder of SalesLatitude, is a sales performance improvement consultant and is focused on growing top performers to impact bottom line growth. With more than 30 years of experience as a senior business and sales executive, she helps companies build successful sales teams.

Chip Eichelberger, for 5½ years as world-renowned business leader Tony Robbins’s international point man, he spoke over 1300 times throughout the US, UK, and Australia. This immersive experience
sharpened his skills and created a unique style. Chip promises to be THE energy source at your event.

One of the many challenges that organizations face today is that there are a lot of productive people, who are trying to push the organization to success, but the organization itself is not necessarily moving forward in the direction that they want it to. This is because there is an overall lack of communication as to the end goal. Having a lot of people that are “getting stuff done” in a productive manner is great, but unless there are specific goals and intentions set, and a long-term collaboration is maintained, some people may be unintentionally combating the work of others in a negative way. This is where leading with emotional courage plays an important role.

This expert sales interview explores:

• How the Big Arrow Process Came About
• Consulting vs. Coaching
• Leading with Emotional Courage: How to Have Hard Conversations, Create Accountability, and Inspire Action on Your Most Important Work

The Origin of the Big Arrow Process:

The Big Arrow process came out of a failure that Bregman himself faced. After coaching someone senior in an organization, the company decided to let the guy go. Not because he wasn’t doing a good job, but because he wasn’t taking initiative and was not pursuing a vision or taking initiative in the same direction that the rest of the company was going in. Bregman recalls that it made him realize that when you bring coaching into organizations because it’s confidential, it’s almost always separated from what is happening with the rest of the company.

Consulting vs. Coaching

Consulting almost always leaves people behind because the spreadsheet is prioritized over the people. Coaching, on the other hand, prioritizes the people over the organization. In order to meld the two together what has to be achieved? You need to have people working together in an organization, you need to have coached them to be successful, and most importantly, they need to be in alignment with each other, so that they are moving the organization’s most important work forward both individually and collectively.

Leading with Emotional Courage:

Bregman discusses his book, Leading with Emotional Courage: How to Have Hard Conversations, Create Accountability, and Inspire Action on Your Most Important Work. The book discusses the difficulties of being a leader and struggling to experience the discomfort, risk, and uncertainty of saying or doing what it takes to be a good leader. Leading with emotional courage covers four aspects of leadership: Confidence in yourself, being connected to others, being committed to a purpose, and emotional courage. If you are willing to feel everything, you can do anything.

To learn more about the Big Arrow Process, watch the entire expert sales interview. If you would like to purchase Peter’s book, it is available on Amazon.

About 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 is CSMO at Pipeliner CRM. In his spare time, John is an avid Martial Artist.