ATTENTION DECODED

In the professional world... "Us against them" situations rarely start out that way. Most of the situations we find ourselves in have a goal of mutual success. A win-win result is always better for the longevity of business than its arch enemy,the lopsided "lose-win" situation.  And mutual success is something we achieve through equal effort and cooperation. "Us" makes its division into "us against them" when two or more parties assume different or contradictory viewpoints about the same situation.  At this point, communication becomes a challenge and sometimes stops all together. "us against them" is a viewpoint issue. often occurring when we make assumptions about the cause of another persons actions. The division of teams, deals, corporations and any relationship rarely occur because of one isolated incident. More often, "us against them" as a perspective develops from a slow unwinding where a single loose thre...

It is not possible to zoom though life as a human with out encountering one or some of these habits. Moderately engaging in these habits is not likely to send your career spiraling... But it is important to recognize bad habits and minimize them as much as possible.   Habits that threaten success:  Not Listening:  Not listening to the concerns and direction of other people is career suicide. No one is "so good" that they don't need "anyone else" to be successful. Have you ever heard a person mid- rant say: "I don't need anyone I only depend on me"? What an unfortunate mindset... Unless you are you are the only consumer of your product you will always need other people.   Not Listening is where so many people drop the ball and it is a terrible habit. Proving you have listened is the easiest way to build trust and respect.  Confirm what a person tells you by repeating what they said in an effort to make su...

There are all kinds of things that make other people happy. Happy people are happy to tell you what makes them happy if you ask. But if you find yourself looking at the things that make other people happy in the hopes they will infect you with the same bliss… You may find that you are immune to their particular strain of happiness. Do you want to know why they say: “and just when I stopped looking for happiness I found it”.? They say that because adding and looking for something else almost never works. Happiness happens when we focus less on what we need to add to make us happy… Happiness is a side effect. A positive side effect that happens by eliminating what we know for sure does not make us happy. Spatially eliminating things and people who hurt us. Making values based decision that YOU are more important. Subtract negative things from your life ... Don’t add things to fix a lack of happiness. Psychologically it has been proven ...

If you find yourself at the top of your game or really hitting a good stride... You will need a way to be your own source of sustainability. The more success you achieve the less resources you will find on how to stay there. Resources are slim because few people have figured out how to get to the top, much less have be able to stay there. Reaching and staying at the top of your game requires some honesty about what staying power is. People at the top and those who want to be there all eventually wonder: How is it possible to keep up with this good pace without eventually losing momentum? In life it seems inevitable that if we find ourselves in a peak that a valley is sure to follow along and bring us back down. Why is that an almost universal premonition? Conditioning.   We are conditioned by every experience and observation that has left an impression on us. This behaviorally based motto of: "nothing lasts forever". A motto that gets us through difficult times by ...

It has been said that your attitude not your aptitude will determine your altitude. Though I fundamentally could not agree more... Try using that phrase as inspiring motivation for someone wreathing in pain and sorrow. The point is that knowing something is logical and true does not always mean you are able to embrace it and bring it to fruition on your own.  Not right then and there anyway. That is not a practice way to pick ourselves back up when we have been brought to our knees by life. No... Getting back up is much more difficult than that.  Thank goodness "difficult" is not impossible. Like many other emotions, hope feeds on itself in order to grow.  To truly take root and help us renew our outlook.  Through each effort filled movement we make... With every positive thought... Hope will grow. The hardest truth to accept when we are feeling a complete loss of hope is that hope starts as nothing more than a seed. And that by understanding that regardless of how y...

Urgency. After two conversations and permission to begin sending a prospect free information... Bring on the urgency! Why now and not in the first conversation? Because urgency in the first conversation sounds like a pitch. Even if it's not a pitch and you are being genuine it will still "feel" pitchy. Urgency is a pitch. Timing is of the essence when urgency should be used. The urgency we feel versus feeling pushed is a matter of taking the time to build trust. If urgency is conveyed before trust is established the message is "pushy " feeling. Pushy is NOT how you want to come across when you want a prospect to buy from you.   Here is an example: If someone we don't know tells us what we " need to do" we feel invaded and our guard goes up. However, if someone has been getting to know us and giving is "no strings attached " information that benefits us to know and THEN they tell us to do something it feels more like a nudge forward and...

Time to take a step back... One of the hardest things to do is to initiate a "pause" in our workflow for the sake of our workflow. It feels counterintuitive to STOP working for the sake of your work. But when the work and energy you are putting in is not reaping the desired outcome you had envisioned for yourself... As Jeff Foxyworthy would say: "here's yer sign." This methodology applies to anyone who is spinning his or her wheels or experiencing a dip in business or happiness. The Human Condition 101: We are a product of the situations we go through. Our individual experiences make up for what gets imprinted on our psyche and our happiness will be directly impacted. If we do not acknowledge and deal with disappointments and frustrations as they come. Your job… Your service to others… Your income… Your happiness and health... They are all at the mercy of how you internalize stress , fe...

Mark Cuban attributes having a leg up on his competitors to the fact he reads everything he can get his hands on. Today, knowing how the market is trending is easier than ever before. The guru factor: Arm yourself with knowledge. Acquire information from reputable sources and then use that knowledge to start the second and subsequent (4-5) conversations you will need to sign your prospects on as paying clients. A scenario to think from a different perspective : If you know a person who obsesses about what car breaks down the least over time, who would you ask about cars that run the longest when looking for a car? A random car dealer or the person you know who is always giving you free information and talking about what car is the best currently? You would pick the person who is always talking about how you can save money by picking the right car. The same tactic will work for prospecting your future clients. Yes they ca...

80% of clients who sign on with a service provider do so on the 5th sales attempt. About 50% of salespeople mentally stop considering a prospect a potential client after they are told no the first time. Call it lazy... Tired of being rejected... Whatever you think the reason why most people attempt to make a sale only once, you are probably right. You should be happy about that drop out rate. It means more business for you if you are committed to ensuring a few "no's" will not stop you. Keeping in constant contact without being invasive is a skill. It requires a strategically diverse arsenal of conversation starters and for you to be willing to have conversations with people. Let’s put aside what good conversation starters sound like for a moment. First we need to focus on the importance of preparing ourselves to hear a series of "no's" from clients. “There is no fear in the bang, only in the anticipation of...