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To begin with, let’s take a look at this thing called continuous improvement.
Every salesperson who has ever sat through a management meeting where you find out that
you need to double your sales next year with half the territory, knows the stress and anxiety
that comes with the territory. Everyone who has been behind quota and had their sales
manager and spouse on their back 7 x 24 knows about the stress and anxiety that can be part
of a salesperson’s world. The reason why we focus first on continuous improvement is
because it provides a means of improving sales performance without a corresponding increase
in stress and anxiety. It can dramatically reduce perceived pressure and the anxiety
of not knowing what to do next. Every major league baseball player knows in
his heart that the difference between being in the major leagues and the minors is his
ability to make continuous small improvements in performance. Those left behind did not
continue to make the needed improvements. The simple fact is that at high levels of
performance, the only changes you can make to improve are small changes. The ability
to identify and continuously implement small changes is a core competency in every high
performer. By now, I hope that you at least have an open
mind about the benefits that can come from making continuous improvement – Kaizen – part
of your daily experience. Let’s start by looking at how to it works and how to make
it work for you. First, you must commit yourself to continuously
take small steps towards improvement. When you make and keep this commitment, you’ll
overcome the fears and other psychological responses that come with making big changes,
such as procrastination and resistance. Instead of attempting to achieve big steps, your challenge
should be just the opposite. In every step of your daily sales activates you must answer
the question: “How can I take a step so small that it’s
impossible to fail?” 1. When you make small steps you guarantee
that you will achieve small successes that you can build on and gain momentum.
2. By continuously answering that question, you start the process of adopting a new and
beneficial habit. This is the best way to implement the daily changes you need in a
way that feels effortless but will result in sustainable performance improvements.
OK. By now everyone should get the fact that you can and should make small improvements
in your daily sales activities. However, I want you to know something important to making
this work for you. Consistency is the glue that holds small steps together. Most achievement
failures are not the result of a lack of will-power or courage, but a lack of consistency. Consistency
of action doesn’t necessarily mean consistency of direction. As your goals grow, so must
your direction. The best way to consistently take steps you need is to build new behavior
which becomes new habits. Your behavior is one of the few things over which you have
100% control. So, where do you start? We’re going to start
the continuous improvement needs analysis by looking at your day. Do an an honest evaluation
of your target sales performance broken down into daily increments. Do the math. How many
prospect calls result in how many appointments? How many appointments equal how many sales?
Now, let’s look at your day. What time to you get up? What do you do before you start
work? What do you do for the first hour of your day? What is your goal for that hour?
What do you do before noon? What is your goal for that time? How often do you lunch with
a customer or prospect? I think you get point.