Chapter 3 Thinking vs. Doing.
Did you ever ask yourself why some people fail and others, when handed almost identical circumstances, succeed? For me success depends upon two factors. What you think and what you do, your thoughts and your actions. I like to classify what I think into the psychological realm and what I do into what I call the mechanical realm.
I see our actions as mechanical because our actions automatically follow our thoughts. We do not engage in an activity and then think about engaging in that activity. First we think and then we act. If you think I’m saying you can just make things happen by thinking them into existence, not so fast my friend. That's absurd.
What I’m saying is, if we don't believe a particular activity will bring a desired result we won't engage in that activity. We need faith that what we do will bring a certain outcome, before we willingly engage in the activity. Where does that faith come from? Faith is a thought, a belief that we, out of our own free will, voluntarily accept.
Now, if what we do has a profound impact on our success and if what we think has a profound impact on what we do, then it should be obvious we need to take great care in what we think. I have trained countless sales professionals and have concluded the reason it is often easier for someone with zero sales experience to take what I teach and turn it into success then it is for an experienced sales person, is because the novice does not have any preconceived thoughts about whether or not the activities I am suggesting will succeed or fail. So the novice is willing to follow more closely the activities outlined. The experienced sales person's mind is telling him his way is better then my way so he will not follow the activities I suggest as religiously as someone who doesn't think he knows better.
Since success is based in large measure upon what we do, i.e. the mechanics, the activities we engage in, the person who follows the prescribed activities succeeds while the one who thinks he has a better way fails. His thinking is preventing him from doing the very activities that would assure his success.
Who is preventing him from being successful? Who is in charge of what he thinks? Well he is. If what you do is entirely under the control of what you think and if what you think is under your control then you are responsible for what you do. And if what you do has a greater impact then anything else on your success, then success is up to you. I guess it becomes paramount that we be aware of what we think - if we want to be successful.
Everyday in our lives a thousand things happen that require some action on our part. Our action can be either a response or a reaction. A reaction requires almost no thinking. Responding requires you consider the consequences of your actions before you carry them out.
Why do we react instead of respond? Fear - we react when we are fearful. The cause of fear is the belief that you are under attack and against this attack you are defenseless. If you felt safe you would not react, you would take time to think and that would lead to a response instead of a reaction.
Fear is the basis of the thinking that prevents you from doing those activities that will lead to success. Fear manifests itself in sales generally in the form of rejection. Because the otherwise promising sales trainee is fearful of being rejected, he will not make the calls, or make the presentations. He is allowing his fear of rejection, even if on a subconscious level, to prevent him from doing the activities that will assure success.
The experienced sales professional has the advantage here. He understands that it is silly to personalize this rejection. He knows that the customer is not rejecting him. He thinks to himself: to know me is to love me. This guy can't be rejecting me, he doesn't even know me. And if he knew how much good my product would be for him, he wouldn't reject the product either. This is the realistic way to think about rejection that all sales people come to once they've been in sales for a while.
If you are relatively new to sales and still struggling with rejection, be patient with yourself, give yourself time. Believe me; if you just keep doing the activities I describe in Selling Simplified, before you know it you won't give rejection a second thought.