Changing Employee Behaviour

Ever tried to change anyone’s behavior at work? It can be extremely frustrating. So often the effort produces an opposite result: rupturing the relationship, diminishing job performance, or causing the person to dig in their heels. Still, some approaches clearly work better than others.

In a study conducted by Zenger/Folkman a leadership development consultancy a study was done using a 2,852 reports submitted by 599 business leaders. These reports rated their managers on 49 behaviors and also assessed the leaders on their effectiveness at leading change – specifically, the managers’ ability to influence others to move in the direction the organization wanted to go. The results were analysed to determine which of the leaders had the greatest ability to facilitate behavioral changes in the workplace.

It was discovered that some leadership styles were less helpful in facilitating this change. It was further discovered that two had little or no impact thereby providing useful guidance on what not to do:

• Being nice. Sorry, but nice guys finish last in the change game. It might be easier if all it took to bring about change was to have a warm, positive relationship with others. But that isn’t the case.
• Giving others incessant requests, suggestions, and advice. This is commonly called nagging. For most recipients this is highly annoying and only serves to irritate them rather than change them. (This is the approach many tend to adopt first, despite its lack of success.)

Leadership behaviors that did correlate with an exceptional ability to drive change were then identified. Below are are the seven in order from most to least important:

1. Inspiring others. There are two common approaches that most of us default to when trying to motivate others to change. Broadly, we could label them “Push” and “Pull.” Some people intuitively push others, forcefully telling them they need to change, providing frequent reminders and sometimes following these steps with a warning about consequences if they don’t change. This is the classic “hand in your back” approach to motivating change. (We noted earlier that classic “Push” doesn’t work well.)

The alternative approach is “Pull,” which we can employ in a variety of ways. These include working with the individual to set an aspirational goal, exploring alternative avenues to reach an objective, and seeking other’s ideas for the best methods to use going forward. This approach works best when you begin by identifying what the other person wants to achieve and making the link between that goal and the change you’re proposing. Inspiring leaders understand the need for making an emotional connection with colleagues. They want to provoke a sense of desire rather than fear. Another approach in many work situations is to make a compelling, rational connection with the individual in which we explain the logic for the change we want them to make.

2. Noticing problems. Lots of management advice focuses on the need for individuals to become better problem solvers; but there is an important step that comes even earlier. It is the ability to recognize problems (to see situations where change is needed and to anticipate potential snares in advance).

For example, in one company for example, it was common to hear people being praised for their heroic crisis management skills – rescuing projects on the brink of failure, or getting a delayed product to a client just in time. A new manager recognized this pattern as a serious problem. She correctly saw it not as a sign of hard work, but as a symptom of a broken process.

3. Providing a clear goal. The farmer attempting to plow straight furrows selects a point in the distance and then constantly aims in that direction. Change initiatives work best when everyone’s sight is fixed on the same goal. Therefore, the most productive discussions about any change being proposed are those that start with the strategy that it serves.

4. Challenging standard approaches. Successful change efforts often require leaders to challenge standard approaches and find ways to maneuver around old practices and policies – even sacred cows. Leaders who excel at driving change will challenge even the rules that seem carved in stone.   

5. Building trust in your judgment. This is both about actually improving your judgment, and improving others’ perceptions of it. Good leaders make decisions carefully after collecting data from multiple sources and seeking opinions from those whom they know will have differing views. They recognize that asking others for advice is evidence of their confidence and strength, not a sign of weakness. Because of their ability to build trust in the decisions they make, their ability to change the organization skyrockets. If others do not trust your judgment it will be difficult to get them to make the changes you want them to make.

6. Having courage. Aristotle said, “You will never do anything in this world without courage. It is the greatest quality of the mind next to honor.” Indeed, every initiative you begin as a leader, every new hire you make, every change in process you implement, every new product idea you pursue, every reorganization you implement, every speech you deliver, every conversation in which you give difficult feedback to a colleague, and every investment in a new piece of equipment requires courage. The need for courage covers many realms.

Sometimes you hear people say, “Oh, I’m not comfortable doing that.” The observation is that a great deal of what leaders do, and especially their change efforts, demands willingness to live in discomfort.

7. Making change a top priority. One of Newton’s Laws of Thermodynamics was that a body at rest tends to stay at rest. Slowing down, stopping, and staying at rest does not require effort. It happens very naturally. Many change efforts are not successful because they become one of a hundred priorities. To make a change effort successful you need to clear away the competing priorities and shine a spotlight on this one change effort. Leaders who do this well have a daily focus on the change effort, track its progress carefully and encourage others.

Becoming a change enabler will benefit every aspect of your life, both at home and in business. It will even help you to change yourself.

What Makes Good People Quit?

By – Dr. Travis Bradberry TalentSmart, President and ‘Emotional Intelligence 2.0,’ Coauthor

If you want your best people to stay, you need to think carefully about how you treat them.

It’s pretty incredible how often you hear managers complaining about their best employees leaving, and they really do have something to complain about—few things are as costly and disruptive as good people walking out the door.

Managers tend to blame their turnover problems on everything under the sun, while ignoring the crux of the matter: people don’t leave jobs; they leave managers.

The sad thing is that this can easily be avoided. All that’s required is a new perspective and some extra effort on the manager’s part.

Organizations know how important it is to have motivated, engaged employees, but most fail to hold managers accountable for making it happen.

When they don’t, the bottom line suffers.

Research from the University of California found that motivated employees were 31% more productive, had 37% higher sales, and were three times more creative than demotivated employees. They were also 87% less likely to quit, according to a Corporate Leadership Council study on over 50,000 people.

Gallup research shows that a mind-boggling 70% of an employee’s motivation is influenced by his or her manager. So, let’s take a look at some of the worst things that managers do that send good people packing.

1. They overwork people. Nothing burns good employees out quite like overworking them. It’s so tempting to work your best people hard that managers frequently fall into this trap. Overworking good employees is perplexing; it makes them feel as if they’re being punished for great performance. Overworking employees is also counterproductive. New research from Stanford shows that productivity per hour declines sharply when the workweek exceeds 50 hours, and productivity drops off so much after 55 hours that you don’t get anything out of working more.

If you must increase how much work your talented employees are doing, you’d better increase their status as well. Talented employees will take on a bigger workload, but they won’t stay if their job suffocates them in the process. Raises, promotions, and title-changes are all acceptable ways to increase workload. If you simply increase workload because people are talented, without changing a thing, they will seek another job that gives them what they deserve.

 

2. They don’t recognize contributions and reward good work. It’s easy to underestimate the power of a pat on the back, especially with top performers who are intrinsically motivated. Everyone likes kudos, none more so than those who work hard and give their all. Managers need to communicate with their people to find out what makes them feel good (for some, it’s a raise; for others, it’s public recognition) and then to reward them for a job well done. With top performers, this will happen often if you’re doing it right.

 

3. They fail to develop people’s skills. When managers are asked about their inattention to employees, they try to excuse themselves, using words such as “trust,” “autonomy,” and “empowerment.” This is complete nonsense. Good managers manage, no matter how talented the employee. They pay attention and are constantly listening and giving feedback.

Management may have a beginning, but it certainly has no end. When you have a talented employee, it’s up to you to keep finding areas in which they can improve to expand their skill set. The most talented employees want feedback—more so than the less talented ones—and it’s your job to keep it coming. If you don’t, your best people will grow bored and complacent.

4. They don’t care about their employees. More than half of people who leave their jobs do so because of their relationship with their boss. Smart companies make certain their managers know how to balance being professional with being human. These are the bosses who celebrate an employee’s success, empathize with those going through hard times, and challenge people, even when it hurts. Bosses who fail to really care will always have high turnover rates. It’s impossible to work for someone eight-plus hours a day when they aren’t personally involved and don’t care about anything other than your production yield.

 

5. They don’t honor their commitments. Making promises to people places you on the fine line that lies between making them very happy and watching them walk out the door. When you uphold a commitment, you grow in the eyes of your employees because you prove yourself to be trustworthy and honorable (two very important qualities in a boss). But when you disregard your commitment, you come across as slimy, uncaring, and disrespectful. After all, if the boss doesn’t honor his or her commitments, why should everyone else?

 

6. They hire and promote the wrong people. Good, hard-working employees want to work with like-minded professionals. When managers don’t do the hard work of hiring good people, it’s a major demotivator for those stuck working alongside them. Promoting the wrong people is even worse. When you work your tail off only to get passed over for a promotion that’s given to someone who glad-handed their way to the top­­­­­­­, it’s a massive insult. No wonder it makes good people leave.

 

7. They don’t let people pursue their passions. Talented employees are passionate. Providing opportunities for them to pursue their passions improves their productivity and job satisfaction. But many managers want people to work within a little box. These managers fear that productivity will decline if they let people expand their focus and pursue their passions. This fear is unfounded. Studies show that people who are able to pursue their passions at work experience flow, a euphoric state of mind that is five times more productive than the norm.

 

8. They fail to engage creativity. The most talented employees seek to improve everything they touch. If you take away their ability to change and improve things because you’re only comfortable with the status quo, this makes them hate their jobs. Caging up this innate desire to create not only limits them, it limits you.

 

9. They don’t challenge people intellectually. Great bosses challenge their employees to accomplish things that seem inconceivable at first. Instead of setting mundane, incremental goals, they set lofty goals that push people out of their comfort zones. Then, good managers do everything in their power to help them succeed. When talented and intelligent people find themselves doing things that are too easy or boring, they seek other jobs that will challenge their intellects.

 

Bringing It All Together

If you want your best people to stay, you need to think carefully about how you treat them. While good employees are as tough as nails, their talent gives them an abundance of options. You need to make them want to work for you.

Long Term Sales Success

It’s been about 3 years since I was specifically employed as a business coach and mentor where my role was to guide and coach entrepreneurs. During this period of my career my job was to critically look at other people’s businesses and business practices and measure those against what my understanding of global best practice was.

It’s the reason I started writing this blog. I have always been of the opinion that there is a gap between the theory of business (what we learn at school) and the execution of daily business operations and those business people who are most able to close the gap between the theory and execution are the ones that most successful.

After my role as a consultant I moved back into managing a team in a regular business operation. It’s in moving back to a ‘day-to-day’ business function where the execution is far more real and relevant than the theory that you will really test your skills as a consultant. Here the financial results and team performance are the real and I would say only true measure of how good you really are.

So how have I performed over the last three years? Well I have mixed feelings about the results. Financial results for the business unit are good. Operationally we’re doing well and the owners are happy. There is however a question mark that I have on my own performance and it has to do with people. Specifically managing them day to day. As a consultant my interactions with individuals was far less than actual staff. As a consultant I would guide, suggest and encourage and then move onto the next client. This process would repeat itself weekly. Ultimately the person I was coaching was only accountable to himself and his business. In the environment I’m in now I’m accountable. If someone doesn’t perform well or has discipline issues I need to take remedial actions. If the team misses target I have to provide answers. It’s in this process that I have learnt that there is one thing that cannot be taught, it cannot be taught because it’s a personal value that will have been cultivated (or not) during your upbringing and fine tuned with your experiences and the results that those experiences have created. It’s a work ethic. A desire to go the extra mile to make sure you achieve the result you want. A work ethic is a value that binds most entrepreneurs – as a coach I don’t think I ever had to address the issue of working hard. As for employed staff, well now that’s a different issue altogether.

It’s with this issue of a work ethic that I’m now wrestling.  My opinion is that I signed a contract with a business owner. He agreed to pay me for my services and I agreed to deliver certain results. The result is what drives me. Not the security of the job or the pay cheque but the result. Many of our staff don’t have the same drive or value. They do the bare minimum, require constant ‘talks’ and are generally just apathetic.

So how do you effectively get the best out of a team, day after day and week after week if they don’t necessarily have the same value system as you do?

For me it’s been a constant struggle with various motivation theories, micro-management models and tough love. I’ve realised that getting the best from the team takes a highly dynamic management approach. I keep having to make adjustments and allowances.  It’s hard work and it’s not for the faint hearted. These are however 4 guiding principles that I continuously use:

1. Set Appropriate Goals

Goal setting is essential. It helps the team prioritize their activities and focus their efforts. When setting goals with employees, it is critical that they be SMART goals (Specific, Measurable, Action-oriented, Realistically high, Time bound). The goals must also be meaningful to the employee. There should be sufficient rewards for goal achievement and consequences for failure. This will ensure that achieving the goal will rise to the top of the employees “to-do” list.

2. Develop a plan to achieve the goals.

After setting goals with the team, put together a plan to achieve them. To accomplish a goal, the employee will need to commit to a set of actions. A goal without an action plan is just a dream. It’s not real and it’s not likely to happen. It’s equally important to agree on a date, and possibly a time, by when the employee will complete each action step. This will create the urgency necessary to get the work done in a timely manner.

3. Empower the employee.

To maximize the probability that your team will achieve their goals, you must empower them. Empowering employees means three things. First, you must properly train your workers to do the tasks necessary to achieve their goals. Then you will need to motivate your people. There should be rewards for success and consequences for failure. Finally, you should remove roadblocks that are within the company’s control. Following these steps will result in your employees more consistently achieving their goals.

4. Assess performance and make adjustments.

Once the three steps above are complete, you have to assess performance and make any necessary changes. We’re not talking about annual performance evaluations. A formal write up may only happen once a year, but effective management requires assessing performance much more frequently. For employees that are new to the organization or learning a new task, you may need to assess performance daily or perhaps even more frequently. Employees who have demonstrated competence may only require weekly, bi-weekly or even monthly meetings to discuss performance.

Managing people is difficult. It’s not an exact science and there is no magic wand that will ensure you always get it right. In fact, you won’t always get it right. Even outstanding managers make mistakes. The good news is that managing people well is a learned skill. With work, you can improve your capability in this area. Doing so will take a concerted effort on your part, but if your company is going to thrive, your skills as a manager will be of paramount importance.

Can You Be a Tough Boss Without Being a Jerk? – Gwen Moran

 

You want your employees to perform at their best, but there’s a fine line between being a tough boss with high expectations and being an unreasonable jerk. Business coach Mike Staver, founder of the The Staver Group, a Fernandina Beach, Fla., business performance consulting firm, advises using these four rules to avoid crossing the line.

1. Appreciate different work styles. Be clear about the outcomes you expect, but don’t create conflict just because your employee has a different style of getting something done, warns Staver. “If they’re effective, give them latitude to develop their own solutions and add value,” he says. “When the leader is saying, ‘I don’t want you to do it any other way than the way I want you do to it.’ I think that’s where the ‘demanding jerk’ side comes in,” he says.

2. Give your employees a sense of purpose. In his book, Leadership Isn’t for Cowards (Wiley, 2012), Staver says business leaders need to give their employees a reason to care. It can be tough if you’re providing a basic product or service versus curing cancer, but everyone is in business to serve a need–so make sure employees understand that. For example, if you sell machine parts, it’s because someone needs them to keep their equipment running. The receptionist at an insurance company helps protect people from financial catastrophe. Clarifying the big-picture importance of what your people do helps employees stay focused and committed, even when the demands are great.

3. Recognize good work. If you’ve set rigorous performance goals or expectations employees must meet, don’t change the rules after the fact or fail to recognize success. Include your expectations in resources such as employee manuals, training materials or job descriptions. Conduct regular performance reviews and be sure to acknowledge when expectations have been met or exceeded. Whether it’s a simple “good job,” in front of the team for hitting a tough deadline, or a small perk for landing a big new client, recognizing a job well done enhances motivation.

4. Be respectful. Regardless of how demanding you are, treat your employees with respect and dignity. While it takes courage to tell the truth, it should be done in a way that doesn’t devastate your employees. That means no “sucker punches”–blindsiding them with expectations they couldn’t have anticipated–and avoiding destructive communication styles like screaming and insults. Explosive or reckless behavior hurts productivity and will likely cause you trouble retaining your best employees, Staver says.

Sales Motivation!

Most of the time when I sit down to write something it’s because I’m wrestling with challenges in my own business environment. My team currently operates in a high paced, aggressive sales environment. There is constant pressure for them to perform and conditions on the ground are not always ideal to get the performance that is expected.

Sales is one of the more stressful jobs within any business. This particular job category is more likely to make you money but it’s also most likely to make you stressed.

Managing a sales team is an art that requires a delicate touch. Sales people need to be given just the right measure of control on one hand and freedom on the other to make sure that they consistently perform.

All of these factors can affect your sales operations as a whole – especially business-to-business sales – demoralizing employees, making them less efficient and at worst prompting them to jump ship. So how do you keep the team motivated? How do you keep them selling when conditions are not always conducive to keeping them knocking on doors or making the calls?

 

1. Send fewer emails. Make fewer calls. Strive for quality, not quantity.

When sales teams are hitting a slump, some reach a point of desperation where they begin smiling, dialing and spamming. This may seem like a good idea, if you don’t think about it; hopefully, one of those hundreds of emails may hit home, but you won’t create great clients out of them. Halve the number of sales emails or calls you’re making and get the team focused on researching targets to a minute level. It’s the sales equivalent of “less haste, more speed.”

2.  Keep them motivated – beyond money.

Money’s a great way to encourage people to work harder, especially in a commission-based job. It’s critical however that you have to appeal to the emotional part of a person. I’ve always tried really hard to understand what drives and motivates my team beyond money. Find that one thing that makes the person tick. Is it public recognition, or more regular formal evaluations?

3. Be the field general when the going gets tough.

 

Leading from the front. This has been a great tool for me to use when there’s a slump in sales. I can remember a day when I walked into a branch and there was very little sales activity going on – I grabbed a white-board and set it up in front of the sales desk. I challenged the team to see who could make the most appointments in an hour – I sat down and started working the phones with them. The team seeing a C -Position Exec rolling up his sleeves and getting stuck in had an amazing knock on effect and rippled across the entire organisation.

Employees need to know that the people making the decisions, setting the targets and calling the shots have had the experience and know how when it comes to executing the work.

Why Do Great Employees Quit?

One of the greatest challenges facing any business is staff retention. Finding and more importantly keeping good employees is paramount to financial success.

Sometimes people leave for a solid reason, they’re a bad fir for the team or moved away for personal reasons, or was offered an opportunity too great to pass up. In those cases, even if it’s a difficult transition, it feels fundamentally right.

But what about the rest?

Keeping your best employees starts with understanding why people leave. Here are six of the top reasons:

1. Stagnation

People don’t want to feel like they’re going to be doing the same thing for the next 20 years!  People want to feel that they’re still moving forward and growing in their professional life. They want to have something to aspire to. If there is no formal structure for advancement, they know they’ll need to seek it somewhere else. In the meantime, they’re far more likely to be bored, unhappy, and resentful–things that affect performance and the entire team’s morale.

2. Excessive Workload

Some periods of stress and feeling overwhelmed come with most jobs, but nothing burns out great employees faster than overwork. And often it’s the best employees-the most capable and committed, your most trusted you overload the most. If they find themselves constantly taking on more and more, especially in the absence of recognition such as promotions and raises, they come to feel they’re being taken advantage of. And who could blame them? You’d feel the same.

3. Vague Visions

There’s nothing more frustrating than a workplace filled with visions and big dreams, but no translation of those aspirations into the strategic goals that make them achievable. Without that connection, it’s all just talk. What talented person wants to spend his or her time and energy in support of something undefined? People like to know that they’re working to create something, not just spinning their wheels.

4. Profits over people

When an organisation values its bottom line more than its people, the best people go elsewhere, leaving behind those who are too mediocre or apathetic to find a better position. The result is a culture of underperformance, low morale, and even disciplinary issues. Of course, things like profit, output, pleasing stakeholders, and productivity are important–but success ultimately depends on the people who do the work.

5. Lack of recognition

Even the most selfless people want to be recognized and rewarded for a job well done. It is part of who we are as human beings. When you fail to recognize employees, you’re not only failing to motivate them but also missing out on the most effective way to reinforce great performance. Even if you don’t have the budget for raises or bonuses, there are lots of low-cost ways to provide recognition–and a word of appreciation is free. People won’t care if they don’t feel noticed.

6. Excessive hierarchy

Every workplace needs structure and leadership, but a rigidly top-down organization makes for unhappy employees. If your best performers know they’re expected to produce without contributing their ideas, if they’re not empowered to make decisions, if they’re constantly having to defer to others on the basis of their title rather than their expertise, they don’t have much to be happy about.

Ultimately, many people who leave their job do so because of the boss, not the work or the organization. Ask yourself what you may be doing to drive your best people away, and start making the changes needed to keep them.

The Real Cost Of Unhealthy Staff – Duncan D’Ewes

So for the last 6 months I’ve been writing articles for the Business Day in the Gulg Region and last month I wrote about Corporate Wellness. The calls that the article generated have been higher than on any other subject that I’ve touched on.
The motivation for the article was grounded in our own business migration from pure vendor to wellness partner.

The response to my previous article has prompted me to take an even closer look at the actual costs associated to unhealthy employees. This is particularly relevant to the current economic situation in the Sultanate as many companies are looking to cut costs as profits have decreased. I have heard of a number of instances where companies have reduced or removed benefits as part of their austerity measures.

Business owners and Employers that I have spoken to say that they are concerned with the rising costs of healthcare and I must tell you that their concerns over health costs are not without cause. According to a recent Employee Health Benefits Survey, average annual premiums for employer-sponsored coverage has increased by 80% since 2003. This equals a compounded annual growth rate of approximately 6% which means that in most cases the increase in health care costs will outpace income growth. Increased cost-sharing with employees or reduction of benefits has provided short-term reprieve for employers who are concerned about protecting their bottom line.

There are very limited research figures available in the GCC for the actual costs but the research that I have done suggests that the figures are similar to the USA on a per capita basis.
The figures make for some interesting reading:

The Center for Disease Control (CDC) estimates that $3 of every $4 dollars employers spend on health costs are used to treat chronic conditions such as obesity, hypertension and diabetes. The study suggests that these same conditions create workforce absenteeism costs amounting to $153 billion of lost productivity for U.S. businesses each year – a truly staggering number.

The thing about these chronic conditions is that they are almost all lifestyle diseases and in many cases can be effectively managed by small behavioral changes.

These are some of the underlying lifestyle factors that influence the conditons:
• Poor nutrition – Coronary heart disease, hypertension, diabetes, and obesity are conditions most commonly attributed to poor dietary patterns. It’s estimated that 76% of. workers consume insufficient levels of fruits and vegetables, 63% are overweight or obese, and 38% have high cholesterol levels. The study also approximates that these behaviors cost 250/-OMR – 600/-OMR in excess annual medical costs for high-risk adults.
• Physical inactivity – My estimation based on the data I have from the fitness industry in Oman is that 80-90% of the Omani population are physically inactive, or achieve less than 30 minutes of moderate daily exercise. Furthermore, 15% of health claims are attributed to sedentary lifestyles. This equates to approximately 350/-OMR in excess annual medical costs for physically inactive adults.
• Smoking – It’s estimated that 1 in 4 Omani’s smoke despite the fact that smoking is the most preventable cause of death globally. The Wellness Councils of America (WELCOA) assigns 15/-OMR of additional health costs to every pack of cigarettes tobacco users smoke.
Together these risk factors make up 75% of the health costs.

So what’s the solution? How do employers and business owners start the process of creating an awareness of healthy living?

1. Communication: This may seem obvious but it amazes me at how few companies aren’t using their inter-office communication channels to inform and educate staff about the benefits of healthy lifestyle choices
2. Corporate Fitness Days: Corporate Fitness Days serve as formal business endorsed events that aim to inform individual staff members about their health status. They are also great for team building
3. Office Challenges: Challenges among staff to lose weight or give-up unhealthy foods are great ways to encourage healthy living. They also have the added benefit of created camaraderie amongst the staff
My final suggestion is this – Don’t be too concerned about creating a perfect wellness initiative or program. Just start one!
Remember:
“The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step.” – Lao Tzu

4 Clever Persuasion Techniques You’ve Never Heard of Before – Aja Frost

Some people call George C. Parker the most persuasive American who ever lived. Once or twice a week for several years, Parker convinced people he owned the Brooklyn Bridge. After they were convinced, he’d sell it to them. His buyers would usually discover the swindle when police arrested them for putting on toll barriers on “their” bridge.

Here’s the thing: Parker may have been a talented con man, but he wasn’t persuasive.As Forbes writer Jason Nazar explains, persuasion involves getting people to do things that benefit both you and them. Manipulation, on the other hand, “is coercion to get someone to do something that’s not in their own interests.”

Master the art of persuasion — as opposed to the art of manipulation — and your numbers are guaranteed to go up. And good news: with these four principles, you can become more persuasive right away.

1) Match Their Reasoning

Turns out, “fight fire with fire” is a smart persuasion technique. Research proves that using the same type of reasoning as the person you’re trying to persuade is much more effective than using a different one.

So if the prospect is being logical, use logic too. If, on the other hand, they’re making decisions based on their emotions, sway them with an emotional argument.

Let’s say you’re talking to a prospect who’s unsure about changing suppliers. They’ve worked with their current one for 10 years and really like them.

Because they’re using emotional reasoning, don’t lead with a logical argument like, “Switching to our product will cut your manufacturing time by 10%.” It’s probably not going to resonate.

Instead say, “I completely understand. We really try to provide that same level of support and trust to all of our customers. In fact, during your first year, we provide a second account manager at no extra cost to make sure your transition is as smooth as possible and you feel secure.”

2) Compliment Their Thought Process

Next time a prospect says something you agree with, reply, “It sounds like you’ve put some thought into this.”

According to a study published in The Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, “Individuals who were led to believe that they had thought a lot about a two-sided message felt more certain about the resulting attitude than people who were led to believe that they had thought only a little about the same message.” In other words, if you make prospects think they’ve spent some time coming to a belief, they’re far likelier to hold on to it.

What would that look like in practice? Imagine the prospect says, “Since we’re expected to grow 150% in the next year, the flexibility of your software is really appealing.”

With this trick up your sleeve, you’d respond, “It seems like you’ve really thought about what you’ll need as you scale.”

Now, validated in their thinking, they’ll be even more convinced your product is a good fit.

3) Present the Counter-Argument

Not only should you be prepared for any counter-arguments the prospect brings up, you might even consider bringing up the counter-arguments for them.

It may sound crazy. However, a meta-analysis of 107 studies with a total of 20,111 participants showed that, across the board, two-sided arguments are more persuasive than one-sided ones.

The key is to refute the counter-argument after you’ve raised it — otherwise this approach doesn’t work.

For example, you could tell the prospect, “Our accounting software doesn’t enable users to give clients their own accounts. I know that’s a feature you’re interested in.”

Laying your cards on the table immediately makes you more credible. But you don’t want to leave any potential issues unaddressed, so follow up with: “We chose to offer automatic, recurring billing instead — once you’ve set it up, you never have to worry about payments again. Plus, clients can view their invoices in their email without the hassle of logging into a whole new platform.”

Because you’ve gained the prospect’s trust, this explanation will be more impactful than if you’d waited for them to bring up the issue. Ultimately, setting up arguments before knocking them down will make you far more persuasive.

4) Be Clear and Direct

My brother — who’s a philosopher — once handed me an extremely dense text on the Münchhausen trilemma, telling me it would change my life.

A month later, he asked what I’d thought. I said, “Honestly, I couldn’t understand more than 10 words in a row.”

The takeaway: The strength of your argument doesn’t matter if your audience can’t understand it.

And this holds true whether you’re talking about a complex psychological theory or how your product works. It might be tempting to fill your explanations with five-dollar words, jargon, and industry buzzwords, but you’ll only confuse your prospects — and ultimately lose the deal.

With that in mind, speak as plainly you can. For example:

Wrong: “We’ve developed a real-time pipeline that ingests the full Twitter stream, then cleanses, transforms, and performs sentiment and multi-dimensional analysis of the Tweets that were related to campaign and finally delivers a valuable real-time decision making platform.”

Right: “Our tool grabs the data from Twitter accounts, analyzes it, and puts the relevant information in an easy-to-use dashboard. It updates in real time, so you’ll always be making the most informed decision possible.”

It’s clear which statement is more persuasive: the simple one.

Now that you know these science-backed persuasion secrets, moving your prospect’s hearts and minds should be a little easier. But make sure to use your powers for good, not evil — in other words, don’t sell any bridges

6 Ways to Sabotage a SALE – Duncan D’Ewes

I currently work in a very young market that has been largely supported by oil revenue. The near-collapse of the energy sector in the Middle East has put huge strain on the resources of Governments…

Source: 6 Ways to Sabotage a SALE – Duncan D’Ewes

6 Ways to Sabotage a SALE – Duncan D’Ewes

I currently work in a very young market that has been largely supported by oil revenue. The near-collapse of the energy sector in the Middle East has put huge strain on the resources of Governments as well as the private-sector who have traditionally been highly dependent on this revenue. In the last 6 months I’ve seen companies scrabbling to become more efficient in their business processes. Especially sales.

Our company has had aggressive expansion plans over the last 5 years which puts us on the radars of multiple vendors looking to do business. I get calls and emails daily from Sales People looking to do business.

Now I should mention that I like to be sold to – I enjoy the process of having a great sales person make their pitch, lead me with the right questions, understand my needs, handle my objections, negotiate a deal and close. Suffice to say that I very often find myself on the phone with a sales person who wants an appointment  but I find myself irritated, annoyed and effectively shut down to anything that they say.

So why does this happen? Why are there times when even if a needed the product or service and had the budget for it I wouldn’t buy from the guy trying to get an appointment with me.

Well for me in comes down to first impressions. First impressions really matter. As research shows, conclusions about someone only take about 30 seconds to make – worst still they usually last forever;

Clearly, this matters in sales.Here are a few issues that I think cause prospects to form a negative opinion in those opening moments:

1) Speaking too quickly

This often happens unintentionally – after all, you’ve got a lot of information to communicate in a very short time. But adopting an auctioneer’s rapid-fire style isn’t the right solution. Not only can speaking too quickly make your prospects anxious if they can’t follow along, it also decreases the chance they’ll absorb everything you say, let alone evaluate it. And if they can’t think critically about your statements, good luck winning their business.

With that in mind, concentrate on speaking at a normal rate. You can get better at identifying what “normal” sounds like by practicing with your colleagues.

2) Being inflexible

Ideally, you’ve got an agenda for the phone call. Yet you shouldn’t be so married to your agenda that you ignore what your prospect wants to talk about -for example, maybe you’re focused on identifying the person with purchasing authority, while the prospect wants to talk product features.

If you ignore or evade their questions so you can “stay on-topic” (that is, your topic), you’ll come across as pushy and self-interested. The solution? During the beginning of the call, explain what you’d like to cover – then ask, “Is there anything you’d like to discuss today?” Not only will they feel like an equal member of the discussion, but you’ll learn their biggest priorities and objections.

3) Using the wrong tone

According to a study from researchers at the University of Glasgow, strangers decide how trustworthy or dominant you are after hearing just 300 to 500 milliseconds of your voice. Not only that, but most strangers come to the same conclusions – meaning there’s such a thing as a universally trustworthy “hello.” The opposite is true as well: If your voice sounds untrustworthy to one person, there’s a strong chance it sounds untrustworthy to most people.

However, how you apply this study’s findings may depend on your gender. The study’s authors found that men who raise the tone of their voice are seen as more trustworthy, while women must vary their pitch to achieve the same effect.

4) Sounding unenthusiastic

On the first call, projecting enthusiasm was probably easy. But as the day goes on, you might find yourself losing some of that positive energy.

Unfortunately, if you sound apathetic, your prospect will assume you’re not truly invested in helping them -and recovering from this negative impression will be almost impossible.

When possible, set up the majority of your phone calls to coincide with your peak energy levels. And if you feel your energy flagging, take a short break: Get up, walk around, watch an inspiring TED talk, switch to a different task for a couple minutes, or even reflect on your latest achievement to get your adrenaline pumping.

5) Appearing uninterested

People can tell when you’re genuinely interested in them, and unsurprisingly, they love it. But communicating that interest can be challenging.

Here’s where doing some research before the call is incredibly handy. Citing details from their LinkedIn profile, website, blog, or social media account tells the prospect you see them as a person, not a sales opportunity.

These details can be related to their work, their personal life, or both. For example, if you see that your prospect retweeted an article about the benefits of having pets, you could say, “I enjoyed that Atlantic article you shared on Twitter. How many pets do you have?”

You’ve also probably heard that our brains light up whenever we hear our own names. Use this to your advantage by saying your prospect’s name – selectively, of course.

6) Interrupting

We usually interject while someone else is talking for two reasons: Either we’re excitedly announcing we share the same opinion, or we’re too impatient to wait our turn.

The first type of interruption is forgivable among friends and family — but not with prospects. Not only can it be seen as rude, but you don’t know if you’re actually in agreement until they finish talking.

And the second type of interruption? It’s never forgivable.

If you’re a chronic interrupter, remind yourself before each call to let the other person finish their thought before you start yours. And don’t just start talking when they’re done – make sure you’re processing what your buyer is telling you, then respond to them instead of rattling off the thoughts you had while you were waiting for them to finish talking.

Try waiting a beat after you think they’re done to make sure they’re not simply taking a breath. While this might feel awkward, remember that the silence feels much longer to you know than the prospect – and you’ll be surprised at what many people will reveal when they feel you’re really paying attention.

It can be a little intimidating to realize that a prospect’s opinion of you hinges on the first three minutes or so you spend with them. If you come across the wrong way, you’ll be trying to overcome that mistake for the rest of the relationship. But the opposite is true as well – if you make a great impression, your prospect will think you can do no wrong.