Whose Fault Is It Anyway ?

Not getting all the business referrals you want? Then it’s all your fault!

I joined a close contact networking group many years ago, a group where we met regularly to pass business referrals to each other. I was the President of the group at the time and remember inducting a new member, we’ll call him Phillip. He attended the meetings regularly and when it came to the part of the meetings where we passed referrals to each other he would stand each week and say “Nought to report”.

After six months Phillip came to me and said “I’m not going to renew my membership as I’m not getting anything out of these meetings. I’ve got hardly any business from belonging to this group. This just doesn’t work!” In fact I’ve heard similar stories or variations on the same theme over and over. Phillip went on to say:

• This group is fickle, they used me once and never again
• I’ve bought something from every single person in this room, but they’ve never bought anything from me
• The members just don’t understand my business

What Phillip had missed in his membership of our group was that in order to get a referral sometimes you have to give a referral. It’s called the law of reciprocity, In order to receive, you must first give, or you get back what you give out.

Phillip was quick to blame anyone and everyone else in the room, except himself. If you belong to a networking group and aren’t getting referrals or if you pass referrals to other business people and aren’t getting any in return…whose fault is it?

I would suggest all you need to do is look in a mirror and you’ll see the culprit staring straight back at you.

If you are thinking along the same lines as Phillip, then you may want to consider the following:

This group is fickle, they used me once and never again
If you did business with a member of perhaps a new client, did you follow up to make sure they were happy with the goods or services you supplied? Did you go the extra mile to turn a customer into a regular client? Did you give them a reason to come back again and again to buy from you? Did you make sure the customer saw your best work first time?

I’ve bought something from every single person in this room, but they’ve never bought anything from me
Often people join networking groups thinking that it’s only the people in the immediate group that they are going to do business with. Raise your aim! Research by social scientists confirms that every business person knows at least 250 other business people. Why limit yourself to just doing business with the person in the room?

An astute networker will give outstanding service on the first engagement with a view to cementing a longer term relationship. Once trust is established, then you can begin to tap into those other 250 people that each person in your network knows. If you know ten other business people and they trust you, suddenly you can access 2,500 people. All that needs to happen next is for you to ask for a targeted referral to that network.

The members just don’t understand my business
Finally if the members don’t understand your business you will never get access to those potential 2,500 contacts. You must make the effort to educate your network. Take time to meet with people in your network. Organise to meet one on one with the people in your network and take the time to learn about their business. Then and only then, you can teach them about your business.

Here’s the Top Ten things to teach them:
1. Your products and services
2. The hours you are open for business
3. Where you are located and whether you are mobile or not
4. How can you be contacted, phone, email, website
5. Your target market
6. Your ideal referral
7. The kind of business you are looking for
8. What kind of business you aren’t looking for
9. How will other people know when to speak up and recommend you, give them words or phrases to listen for in everyday conversation
10. How to set up an appointment with their client to introduce you as a recommended and preferred supplier

The list goes on and on. The key here is to take time to educate the other people you want to bring you business referrals. If you aren’t getting all the referrals you need it’s probably your fault !

Article Contributed by Lindsay Adams, International Speaker with Training Edge International and President of Global Speakers Federation
Website : www.trainingedgeasia.com
Email : Lindsay.adams@trainingedgeasia.com

Nourish Your Relationship With Trust

TRUST is an integral part of the sales process.

Once your customers trust you, they will remember you and refer you to friends, family and colleagues.

“Go to this person, you can trust him”, is one of the most valuable endorsements someone can give you.

As trust becomes harder to earn, it becomes more important. And salesmen who can build trust are the business saviours in this new financial environment.

The best way to build trust is to demonstrate it — and in the current economic climate, it has become harder to do that.

You feel the right thing to do by your business is to be wary. Your default becomes “don’t trust”. And it’s this attitude that starves the sales relationship — depriving it of the nourishment of trust that it needs to grow.

Demonstrating trust — or the lack of it — sometimes takes just the tiniest thing, and sometimes involves very little actual risk. Here are two examples from my own experience.

In a café after a very satisfactory lunch, I went to the counter to pay and noticed an open bowl of mints. Now, this would normally be seen as a friendly gesture by the management. The difference this time was that in the bowl of mints was a piece of cardboard with a handwritten message: Free Mints — Take ONE only.

Now, I’m no handwriting expert, but the word “one” seemed to be written in a very aggressive way. Needless to say, I didn’t take one. I wondered what might happen if I dared to take two. Would I be accosted as I left the premises with a demand that I hand it over?

The clear message patrons took away was that the owners didn’t trust us. And if they didn’t trust me with their mints, I wasn’t inclined to want to continue the business relationship with them, and I made a mental note never to go back.

Just a few weeks ago, I wanted to purchase a piece of specialised computer equipment. I discovered one supplier who explained that he didn’t usually stock the model I wanted, but could show me another one.

When I visited and explained the usage, he agreed that the model I’d asked for was the right one for me.

It would have to be ordered in and would take three to four days. I asked how much deposit he required to confirm the order and he said, “Nothing. I trust you. Just pay for it when you pick it up.”

I was with a business colleague and we were both shocked at this. Neither of us could remember a recent occasion when someone whom we had met 10 minutes earlier would take such a risk.

We spoke about him to many people over the next few days. Four days later he called to say it had arrived and when I picked it up I also purchased a whole lot of consumables without even comparing prices — because I trusted him! I will now support and recommend him whenever possible.

Now, when you think about it, what was his real risk? He may have been left holding this item he didn’t usually stock — which he would have to sell to someone else or trade back to the distributor for credit or alternative stock.

Either way, his chances of an actual loss were minimal. So, a small risk he took left a lasting impression and created a loyal advocate of his products. This equals a great outcome!

I am not suggesting that you take unnecessary risks, but the alternative is to lose the ability to trust.

As Samuel Johnson said in the 18th century: “It is better to suffer wrong than to do it, and happier to be sometimes cheated than not to trust.”

While it didn’t take much risk to build trust, it took something as tiny as a mint to destroy it.

Take the effort to build trust, take the initiative to demonstrate it, and you will take the lead in customer loyalty and sales performance.

Article Contributed by Kevin Ryan, an international speaker , workshop leader and author with Training Edge International. He is a business communication expert specialising in the areas of employee and client engagement, sales, humour intelligence and presentation skills.
Email : kevin.ryan@trainingedgeasia.com
Website : www.trainingedgeasia.com

Stand Out For The Right Reasons

If you’ve ever wanted to stand out from the crowd and create a competitive edge no doubt a well-meaning friend or advisor may have said ‘be different!’ Whilst being different may be useful advice for some, in terms of reputation branding, it’s not necessarily a smart strategy to follow.

Novelty and innovation can set you apart, attract attention and make you memorable – for a time. The downside of this is that being different, and straying too far from accepted norms, can raise doubts in the minds of those you most want to influence.

Being different can be risky. Questions will be raised about your ability to deliver, whether you might be a good ‘fit’ and even the fleeting thought that by taking a punt on you, the person recommending you will be putting their reputation on the line and they’ll probably want to be sure their own reputation isn’t put at risk.

Being distinctive, on the other hand, can make you memorable for all the right reasons. Being distinctive can help differentiate yourself from your competitors and others around you, and give you a compelling ‘edge’ if whatever it is that makes you distinctive is viewed positively. If the distinction is not viewed positively, it can leave you being perceived as odd, strange or risky. Inappropriate differentiation can raise doubts in the minds of others that can be hard to counter or overcome.

So how can you create a positively distinctive edge without being riskily different?

Highlight subtle, but significant, differences. Draw attention to a subtle point of difference that others in a similar situation to you don’t necessarily highlight or focus on. For example, when applying for a job or promotion, or pitching for a new account or business, providing written testimonials from happy clients and colleagues could add huge value to the information you provide directly. What other people say about us is eight times more powerful than what we say about ourselves, and yet few of us offer references or testimonials up-front – most of us wait to be asked to provide them.

DO sweat the small stuff! Author Richard Carlson’s book urged readers to ‘Don’t Sweat The Small Stuff’. However, sweating the small stuff is hugely important from a reputation branding perspective. Do take time to think about details that could either help or harm your reputation from someone else’s perspective. Aim to ensure you leave people feeling valued and respected when they deal with you by caring about the details. Ensure, too, that whatever promises you make explicitly, or imply, live up to expectations and are consistent with what people expect when dealing with you.

Create meaning from the difference. It’s all very well being distinctive or different, but what does it mean to the person you’re dealing with? Being able to spell-out the benefits to them is essential in terms of them viewing you favourably. You’re probably not the only person who may have spent a year in Outer Mongolia doing your ‘OE’, but you may be one of relatively few able to articulate that doing so has given you a greater awareness and understanding of working with people with a different view of life in practical ways and how this has made you a better ‘people-person’ as a result. The very fact that you can demonstrate how and why whatever makes you distinctive is a plus will be viewed positively.

Adopt a philosophy of ‘Best-Plus’. Be committed, not only to being the best at what you do, but also to identifying and delivering extras, or ‘pluses’ over and above what’s expected of you that will help you be perceived as innovative, and people and client-focused. These are often right under our noses if we open ourselves up to noticing them. Sending a handwritten ‘thank you’ card to a prospective employer or client following a meeting, for example, or sending them a website link simply because you noticed something they may be interested in. Small, but subtle, actions and words can really set you apart and create a memorable impression that will stand you in good stead years down the line.

Of course, being distinctive attracts attention so be prepared for others to copy you. Imitation may be the sincerest form of flattery, but ongoing effort is required to remain positively distinctive, as is a willingness to push the boundaries within acceptable levels.

Sun Tzu’s famous treatise ‘The Art of War’ notes how opportunities come from the openings caused by the relative weaknesses of others in any given area. “If you know both yourself and your enemy, you can win a hundred battles without a single loss.” Articulate what makes you distinctive and you’ll have more ammunition in your reputational armoury.

Article Contributed by Hannah Samuel, International Speaker with Training Edge International She is a specialist reputation advisor, author and speaker.
Email : Hannah@trainingedgeasia.com Website : www.trainingedgeasia.com

Are Your Customers Willing To Put Their Reputation On The Line For You?

For many businesses, particularly those providing services, more than 85 percent of business comes from personal referrals and recommendations, and yet many businesses spend thousands of hours, and dollars, trying to acquire new customers, and relatively little time and effort nurturing and retaining their existing ones.

Valuing and retaining your current clients and customers is essential. Not only will you benefit from their continued custom directly, you are also more likely to benefit from any new clients or customers they recommend. And given that it’s it's 6-7 times more expensive to gain one new client or customer than it is to retain one, retaining your existing clients and customers, and being highly recommendable, can have a huge positive impact on your bottom-line.

Clients and customers who already trust and respect you:

• are more likely to acknowledge, and value, what you provide and the benefits they gain from dealing with you
• may be more willing to accept your prices, terms and conditions without question or negotiation
• are often more loyal
• require less 'selling to' and
• are more likely to continue doing business with you, and even increase the amount they spend, as their trust in you increases.

They are also significantly more likely to recommend you to people they know and trust giving you an opportunity to gain new clients whilst reducing your acquisition costs and improving your profitability.

Some people may be willing to provide a recommendation or testimonial without giving it much thought. But, and it's a big but ... most people will only recommend you when they are confident you will be able to deliver on your promises as it's not your reputation they're putting on the line when recommending you. It's theirs.

So how can you improve your chances of being recommended more often and acquire low-cost / high-value clients who are positively pre-disposed to dealing with you? Adding value to your existing clients and customers on an ongoing basis is essential.

• Deliver on your promises, on time, every time. Over-promising and under-delivering is one of the biggest reputation damagers there is. It may be tempting to over-state your experience, capabilities and past achievements, but make sure you take the time to clarify understanding and expectations before agreeing to something you may not be able to deliver on.

• Be respectful. Avoid assuming people want to be treated in the same way. Many don't. If you're unsure about what may work for them - ask! The very act of asking demonstrates respect, so long as you act on any information they give you.

• Genuinely care. We can only add value and serve effectively when we fully understand what a client or customer truly needs and wants. Discover their motivations before trying to sell yourself or your products or services, and if you feel you're not the best person to serve them, recommend someone who is! Random acts of kindness can have long-lasting, positive, effects.

• Make the person you’re dealing with feel both valued and valuable. Adding genuine, spontaneous, 'no strings attached' value such as forwarding a relevant article, website, or passing on a hint or tip you've come across, for no other reason than you feel it may be helpful or useful for them, nurtures the connection you have and shows you genuinely care about them. Good manners carry a huge amount of weight. Be friendly without being overly familiar and be mindful of the fact that people will remember how they ‘feel’ about you more than what they read about you.

• Act with integrity and live your values. Be clear about what's important to you in terms of what's negotiable and what's non-negotiable and act accordingly. When you and your team live your values, and demonstrate them in tangible ways on a day-to-day basis, you build trust, and trust engenders confidence which helps improve your chances of being recommended or referred to others.

One of the greatest compliments, and reputation-enhancers there is, is to be highly recommendable.

People who are willing to recommend you, without incentive or reward, are putting their reputation on the line for you. Protect not only your own reputation, but that of the person recommending you, by delivering what's expected with integrity and you’ll find yourself more in demand than ever.

Article Contributed by Hannah Samuel, International Speaker with Training Edge International . She is a specialist reputation advisor, author and speaker.
Email : Hannah@trainingedgeasia.com;
Website : Website : www.trainingedgeasia.com

Wanted : Happy Employees

A recent poll of employee attitudes in 14 countries, as reported in the Straits Times recently, ranked Singapore last in workplace happiness. Talent management company Lumesse polled about 4,000 employees from a wide variety of industries. People were asked about how happy they were at work, whether they felt their skills were properly utilized, the career paths open to them and the training and career opportunities they had. The result put Singapore last in three major areas.

We least enjoy going to work, are the least loyal and have the least supportive workplace. As a small nation that prides itself on the plaudits of being placed near the top of the rankings in so many fields, coming last in this crucial aspect of our economic life should cause us great concern and anxiety.

I have believed for many years that organizations get the workforce they deserve. If this is so, then the survey is a damning indictment on Singapore companies and more specifically on our management style.

Traditionally management has been concerned with the key tasks of planning, organizing controlling and directing the organization’s resources to achieve maximum utilization. Singapore managers have excelled at this and have achieved remarkable success over the past fifty years.

On reflection however these very same principles of management are the principles of management laid down at the turn of the last century by writers and practitioners like Frederick Winslow Taylor and Henri Fayol. Working conditions and organizational culture were very different then and as we progress into the twenty first century one could argue that we need a major rethink of our management attitudes, values and style.

A series of studies carried out in America in the early 1950’s gave us hard evidence for the first time that good management consisted of high concern for “task” and high concern for “people.” My suspicion is that we still have a high concern for task but that sometimes it is at the expense of people – and that is where the problem lies. Do we want our organizations to remain “prisons” based ultimately on a system of rewards and punishment or to become a very different place where individuals can develop, grow and flourish?

If we were to mentally create two lists with the headings of Management and Leadership and then bullet points all the characteristics we associate with both titles, we would find all the task functions in the management column and probably find that most of the people functions had been placed in the leadership column. Though simplistic and polarized it gives us a pointer as to where modern management best practice should be driving

My experience and intuition tell me that the old traditional principles of management need to adopt some of the newer concepts of leadership and that the way ahead is to transform managers into leaders who can embrace the new model of “Managerial Leadership” and by so doing move us up the rankings in terms of utilizing people’s skills, nurturing talent and creating opportunities for growth and development for all.

In order to simplify and understand managerial leadership I have adapted the acronym M.A.N.A.G.E.R. as a framework to explore the new roles that are demanded from modern managers and supervisors in addition to their more traditional duties which of course are still vital to the success of the organization. Vital but no longer enough!

Managers must: Motivate, Appreciate, Nurture, Align, Grow, Empower, Reflect

Motivate, Inspire and Energise members of their staff
Appreciate, Recognise, Give Poitive Feedback and Build Trust
Nurture a Climate of Creativity and Innovation. Let People take Risks
Align People to the Vision. Obtain Active “Buy In” Make the Job Fun
Grow, Coach and Never Stop Developing People
Empower Others, Delegate Responsibility and Encourage the Heart
Reflect on what they Hear. Listen and Communicate Endlessly

I know this is easy to write but far more difficult to apply in the fast paced demanding environment we work in. Yet consider the consequences if we do not. For Singapore to grow we need talented, motivated members of staff committed to the organizations they work for and willing to invest their own energy and potential into their own development and that of their companies. We are in danger instead of switching people off with the long term disastrous impact this will have on our prosperity

Article Contributed by Chris Fenney, Co-founder and Director of Training Edge International
Email : chris.fenney@trainingedgeasia.com
Website : www.trainingedgeasia.com

Singapore - The World’s Unhappiest Workers

A recent poll of employee attitudes in 14 countries, as reported in the Straits Times recently, ranked Singapore last in workplace happiness. Talent management company Lumesse polled about 4,000 employees from a wide variety of industries. People were asked about how happy they were at work, whether they felt their skills were properly utilized, the career paths open to them and the training and career opportunities they had. The result put Singapore last in three major areas.

We least enjoy going to work, are the least loyal and have the least supportive workplace. As a small nation that prides itself on the plaudits of being placed near the top of the rankings in so many fields, coming last in this crucial aspect of our economic life should cause us great concern and anxiety.

I have believed for many years that organizations get the workforce they deserve. If this is so, then the survey is a damning indictment on Singapore companies and more specifically on our management style.

Traditionally management has been concerned with the key tasks of planning, organizing controlling and directing the organization’s resources to achieve maximum utilization. Singapore managers have excelled at this and have achieved remarkable success over the past fifty years.

On reflection however these very same principles of management are the principles of management laid down at the turn of the last century by writers and practitioners like Frederick Winslow Taylor and Henri Fayol. Working conditions and organizational culture were very different then and as we progress into the twenty first century one could argue that we need a major rethink of our management attitudes, values and style.

A series of studies carried out in America in the early 1950’s gave us hard evidence for the first time that good management consisted of high concern for “task” and high concern for “people.” My suspicion is that we still have a high concern for task but that sometimes it is at the expense of people – and that is where the problem lies. Do we want our organizations to remain “prisons” based ultimately on a system of rewards and punishment or to become a very different place where individuals can develop, grow and flourish?

If we were to mentally create two lists with the headings of Management and Leadership and then bullet points all the characteristics we associate with both titles, we would find all the task functions in the management column and probably find that most of the people functions had been placed in the leadership column. Though simplistic and polarized it gives us a pointer as to where modern management best practice should be driving

My experience and intuition tell me that the old traditional principles of management need to adopt some of the newer concepts of leadership and that the way ahead is to transform managers into leaders who can embrace the new model of “Managerial Leadership” and by so doing move us up the rankings in terms of utilizing people’s skills, nurturing talent and creating opportunities for growth and development for all.

In order to simplify and understand managerial leadership I have adapted the acronym M.A.N.A.G.E.R. as a framework to explore the new roles that are demanded from modern managers and supervisors in addition to their more traditional duties which of course are still vital to the success of the organization. Vital but no longer enough!

Managers must: Motivate, Appreciate, Nurture, Align, Grow, Empower, Reflect

Motivate, Inspire and Energise members of their staff

Appreciate, Recognise, Give Poitive Feedback and Build Trust

Nurture a Climate of Creativity and Innovation. Let People take Risks

Align People to the Vision. Obtain Active “Buy In” Make the Job Fun

Grow, Coach and Never Stop Developing People

Empower Others, Delegate Responsibility and Encourage the Heart

Reflect on what they Hear. Listen and Communicate Endlessly

I know this is easy to write but far more difficult to apply in the fast paced demanding environment we work in. Yet consider the consequences if we do not. For Singapore to grow we need talented, motivated members of staff committed to the organizations they work for and willing to invest their own energy and potential into their own development and that of their companies.

Article Contributed by Chris Fenney, Co-founder and Director of Training Edge International 



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The Secret of Successful Entrepreneurship – LUCK!

Look around you and you will find motivated, hardworking and dedicated people in the pursuit of success. However, more than 90% of all startups fail in the first 5 years. Talk to any successful entrepreneur and you will discover that they just happened to be at the right place at the right time. What a stroke of luck! Is this what differentiates the successful entrepreneurs?

Jean-Baptiste Say, a French economist, is believed to have coined the word “entrepreneur” from the French word, entreprendre, which means “to undertake.” in the 19th century – a person who is willing to launch a new venture or enterprise and accept full responsibility for the outcome. When a person becomes an entrepreneur by deciding to start a business they are acting on an opportunity that they believe will satisfy a need both for consumers (a product or service) and themselves (independence, wealth, fame).

Successful entrepreneurs are successful because they made a lot of careful and calculated decisions, and had enough motivation to take action at a point in time. They saw opportunity, the chance to be “lucky” and decided to go for it given they had the skills to make it happen. There is a growing brand of entrepreneurs, academics and thinkers dedicated to the idea that business owners can actually create and manage luck.

Wiseman, a psychologist studied what makes some people lucky and others not and claims that he’s cracked the code. Luck isn’t due to kismet, karma, or coincidence, he says. Instead, lucky folks — without even knowing it — think and behave in ways that create good fortune in their lives. In his new book, The Luck Factor: Changing
Your Luck, Changing Your Life: The Four Essential Principles , Wiseman reveals four approaches to life that turn certain people into luck magnets.

The best explanation on luck and the mechanics of being lucky was at an entrepreneurship seminar a couple of years ago. The speaker defined luck as:

L – location: Who chooses where you place yourself every day? Are you so busy doing work that there is no time to see the opportunity? It is similar to being at a football field where good players always seem to be at the right spots to pass or score goals. Rather than waiting for the ball without even noticing that the game has moved to another location.

U- understanding: At the critical moment when we are at the right place and right time it is the understanding that differentiates success from failure. When the ball is in front of the goal, we might find ourselves at the right place, right time, but must also have the understanding of the reason we are there: to kick the ball into the goal.

C – connections: It is the network of the people we know and work with that is our greatest strength. Invest in your network and team– the players who should be kicking us the ball. A network is not a pile of cards but a growing relationship with business players to receive and give opportunities.

K – knowledge: There’s no point having opportunities come our way if we do not know what to do with them. Knowing how to kick the ball, and the rules of the game come with playing the game. On the football field, it seems that the successful players seem to know where the ball will go.

Creating luck is about noticing and taking opportunities. As an entrepreneur, your mind is trained to look for things and observing opportunities. With the right connections and being visible, you get approached by people who have ideas who want to work with you. That often means taking risks, and some opportunities don’t work out. As Louis Pasteur said “Chance favors the prepared mind.”


Article Contributed by Ms Poonam Sagar is an International Consultant with Training Edge International
Email : poonam.sagar@trainingedgeasia.com,
Website : www.trainingedgeasia.com