Principles to Live By

Listen Aggressively

The ability to listen, really to hear what someone is saying, has far greater business implications, of course, than simply gaining insight into people. In selling, for instance, there is probably no greater asset.

Almost any business situation will be handled differently, and with different results, by someone who is listening and someone who isn’t. Listen not only to what someone is saying but to how they are saying it. People tend to tell you a lot more than they mean to.

Watch your listen/talk ratio.

Observe Aggressively

Observation is an aggressive act. People are constantly revealing themselves in ways that will go unnoticed unless you are aggressively involved in noticing them.

The statements people make about themselves, the signals they give off, are both conscious and unconscious.

“Body language,” as these unconscious signals are commonly called, is certainly important, but it isn’t even half the story.

Most visual statements are quite conscious and intentional—the way someone dresses, the way he carries himself, and all the other ways people go about trying to create a particular impression.  But these signals are only as useful as your ability to pick them up.

Aggressive observation means going after the big picture, taking all these conscious and unconscious signals, weighing them, and converting them into usable perceptions. 

When you meet someone face to face, what you are trying to establish more than anything else is a comfort zone—the “picture frame,” so to speak—or the boundaries you need to observe, based on what you see and hear, which will best enable you to deal with that person. (Aggressive observation does not mean hasty observation—jumping too quickly to conclusions, overresponding to conventional interpretations, or reading meaning into things where none exists. Everything must be considered within the larger context of the situation and what else you are hearing and seeing.)

Of course, the most fertile, consistent, revealing arena for observation is the eyes. The eyes will tell you more than anything else what someone is really thinking, even when all the other signs are pointing elsewhere.

Talk Less

You will automatically learn more, hear more, see more—and make fewer blunders. Everyone can talk less and almost everyone should be talking less. Ask questions and then don’t begin to answer them yourself.

Discretion is the better part of reading people. The idea of using what you have learned properly is not to tell them how insecure you think they are or to point out all the things you have perceptively intuited that they may be doing wrong. If you let them know what you know, you will blow any chance of using your own insight effectively.

You don’t owe anyone an insight into yourself for every insight you have into them. Let people learn of your qualities and achievements from someone else.

Think On Your Feet

Learn to Wait

Over the years I learned - and am still learning - the importance of patience and how destructive the lack of it can be. 

What is the difference between people who shoots straight to the top while others seem to languish forever in the morass of mediocre ? I think the overall answer lies in understanding the difference between capabilities and effectiveness, which is using those capabilities to achieve certain ends and results. People who merely work up to their capabilities don’t become stars. 

Learn How to Say I Don’t Know

It’s amazing how many people are afraid of these words, who think that by using them they will somehow appear inadequate.

Just because you don’t know something doesn’t mean you’re incapable of learning or you’re incapable of finding someone who does know.

Today, I probably know more than I did 5 years ago, yet I find myself saying “I don’t know” more and more all the time. I’ll use it even when I really do know, sometimes to get more information or to compare versions of what is already “known,” but mostly because I believe the self-effacing approach is almost always more effective than the know-it-all approach.

Even when you have a definite opinion, it is often better to soften it by allowing for the possibility that you may not be omniscient: “I don’t know, but it appears to me that…”

The inability of people to say “I don’t know,” even in innocent social situations, can give you an insight into their business character. I really do enjoy watching these people squirm sometimes as they try to bluff their way through conversations.

What these people fail to realize is that not admitting what you don’t know can lead to suspicion about what you do know.

Admit When You Are Wrong

The people who are least secure about their abilities have the hardest time admitting their mistakes.

They fail to realize that making a mistake and admitting it, owning up to it, are two totally separate acts. It is not the mistake itself but how a mistake is handled that forms the lasting impression. These people would be so much better off, and would look so much better in the eyes of people, if they could admit their mistakes and get on with it rather than waste everyone’s time trying to rationalize them, cover them up, or lay the blame everywhere else.

Powers of Persuasion

The real problems of selling have little to do with aptitude and almost everything to do with how we perceive the process of selling itself. Some people find it beneath them; others find it intrusive. And almost all of us fear the rejection.

People hate to impose, to make waves. Have you ever found yourself nodding in agreement to something with which you totally disagree?

A feeling that selling is intrusive is not a problem. It is an asset.

The best salesmen all seem to have a sixth sense about this. They can tell by the tone in someone’s voice or the atmosphere in the room when the mood or timing is wrong. And either because they don’t want to impose, or because they know that it is not in their own best interests to do so, they will not antagonize their customer by attempting to make a sale.

Effective selling is directly tied to timing, patience, and persistence—and to sensitivity to the situation and the person with whom you are dealing. An awareness of when you are imposing can be the most important personal asset a salesman can have. It also helps to believe in your product. When I feel that what I am selling is really right for someone, that it simply makes sense for this particular customer, I never feel I am imposing. I feel that I am doing him a favor.

I can think of no aspect of timing that is more important than patience. Lack of patience alone is enough to blow a deal, while the application of it—letting someone ramble on philosophically while waiting out a particular situation—can singlehandedly turn a deal around.

Fear 

Fear is the single biggest problem people have with selling: fear of rejection, fear of failure. 

So much of selling a product, a service, anything, is selling yourself, putting your own ego on the line. And what are the odds?

If you’re pretty good, you’re probably going to fail half the time. Rejection, as they say, comes with the territory.

Rejection in selling is rarely personal, but simply knowing this doesn’t make it any easier to take. Realizing that it isn’t personal doesn’t mean you shouldn’t take it personally. If you don’t, in fact, it may mean that you haven’t put enough of yourself into the effort.

Fear of failure is another problem that people have with selling. Sales results are so tangible, so measurable in black and white, there is no place to run or hide.