Yesterday I wrote about how mastery begins with finding a master. Today I wanted to talk about the next step in the process and that is actually applying what the master teaches. This is how you learn to master anything. Find a teacher, do exactly what the master says and have success. With all the knowledge out there and all of the successful people who have been willing to share their knowledge with us, why then aren’t more people successful?
That certainly seems like a reasonable question. So really then, why aren’t more people successful at a lot of stuff?
The biggest mistake that I have observed people make is that they don’t trust what the master teaches and therefore don’t act on their instructions and follow them exactly as taught. I have heard on many occasions that people make excuses like, “well that might work for them, but in my situation that won’t work because” and other excuses similar to that.
You can probably even think of situations you have been in where you have been involved in teaching someone something and have heard exactly that.
I certainly have been guilty of this kind of thinking from time to time. It’s easy to come up with reasons why certain things won’t work.
Why is it then that we find people who are good at things and then refuse to do exactly what they say?
I guess there are a few reasons this is the case. First of all, anything that we do requires effort. Effort is hard work. Anything that takes effort is easy to talk yourself out of. And it’s also easier to find other people who say they are masters that promise you that you can do it with guess what – less effort. That then, moves your focus to the next master and so on.
If you are like me, you’ll do just about anything to avoid doing anything you don’t want to do. It’s human nature.
But this lazy trait we all have dilutes the masters message. It causes us to not follow instructions step by step. And what happens is that we don’t achieve the same result. After that we criticize that masters instructions because obviously, it was the masters instructions that were the problem and not our application of them.
The other reason we don’t follow instructions exactly as taught is that for some reason psychologically we think we know more than the master. We think this even though there is no evidence that we are. It’s just our belief system.
Only success better than the master proves you are better than the master. Knowledge of mastery doesn’t prove you have mastered anything. Only application of that knowledge in a manner better than the master does.
The moral of the story today: When learning from the master, do exactly as they say until you have duplicated their success. Only then modify it to suit your own tastes – once you are the master.
Michael,
You really hit the nail on the head. I recently have been guilty of all of these sins, much to my surprise.
I was wondering if you would be kind enough to give me some advice:
Regarding sales specifically. I read that you organize each “potential” and client as their own project. Do you also have a project folder just for prospecting? If so how do you organize your prospecting “project”?
More importantly, do you have a checklist for prospecting, like you do for other tasks? I’m struggling with this myself as I think having a checklist would really help me. For example I think I need to set aside time to practice what I say everyday since I’m new, time to organize my leads and CRM ect.? Right now I swing wildly from busy on the phone, to procrastinating by dealing with a completely unorganized mess.
Thank you!
Hey Luke,
Here is how I organize my sales. The first step is realizing that sales is an “area of focus”. So I put “Sales” on my area of focus list. The next thing I did was create a specific project list for certain sales prospects. For me I organize them geographically. I then list each of those prospects on it’s own list. Here is what we have so far:
Areas of focus
Sales
Projects
Prospects – Type 1
Prospects – Type 2
I then have a list for each type of all the prospects in that region. My assistant set up my prospects in ACT (which we are now discussing moving to a spreadsheet in Google docs) and created reports that have the name of the prospect, address, phone and status of the prospect.
I have several regions and put these lists in a binder by type so that I can call all “like” kinds of prospects at the same time. We further divided them by region geographically and scheduled these prospects a specific week on the calendar.
Then, I call those prospects and update my report.
Some other tips.
1. Have a script and know exactly what you want to say
2. Make a strong offer when you call, something FREE works best.
3. Consider having a fall back offer
4. If the prospects says no, let them go
5. Don’t ask if you can call back ( I already plan to )
6. Don’t write down negative stuff on your lists only results that move the prospecting forward
7. Set a specific time of day to prospect and stick to it.
8. Get all other distractions out of the way
9. Record your results. How many calls, how many contacts, how many appts (or whatever the goal of the call is)
10. A two call approach works best if you are cold calling.
Prospecting by phone is hard if you don’t have any connections. I have done it on numerous occasions but it is hard work especially in today’s environment of do not call lists and voice mail. Anytime that you are able, enlist the help of people they know. You do this by prospecting in a particular niche where the other prospects know each other. This is by far the best way to prospect. Cold calling is extremely challenging as I am sure you are aware if you have done any.
Oh, and prospects don’t get their own file for me until they are a client. I also recommend the following book as it was the best book I ever read on prospecting if it is the one I remember.
Prospecting Your Way to Sales Success
I hope that helps!