Episode 170: Focus on the Client, Not the Reward: Stories of Service and Gratitude
Your goal in any situation cannot be about you, about making money, about getting the job, about closing the deal. The goal has to be service to others. It must reflect your humanity and align with your values, your goal is most valuable to you when it is about helping the person in front of you reach their goals or solve a problem.
The money, the contract, the job offer - those are the results of meeting the goal, not the goal itself.
Bob Burg Reminds Us That We Cannot Inhale without Exhaling - We Cannot Give without Receiving
This conversation with Bob was full of inspiration and what I call *zingers*, those one sentence quotes that packs a huge motivational punch. The piece that seems to be most sticky to me is this idea:
Your goal in any situation cannot be about you, about making money, about getting the job, about closing the deal. The goal has to be service to others. It must reflect your humanity and align with your values, your goal is most valuable to you when it is about helping the person in front of you reach their goals or solve a problem.
The money, the contract, the job offer, those are the results - the reward - for meeting the goal, not the goal itself.
Read those last two paragraphs again, friends, and then give yourself some time to process them. And then try to apply this guidance in your next conversation. That's what I've been doing since we recorded this episode.
The final lesson in the book The Go Giver is one that I have to continually remind myself: The Law of Receptivity.
It's the final lesson in the book because the first four lessons involve learning to shift your mindset toward giving, toward understanding how to give in a way that is practical and truly helpful to others. You must learn those lessons before you can learn to open yourself up to receiving.
If you're ready to receive, dive into this conversation and enjoy!
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The Go Giver series is a collection of books full of inspiration. If you're curious about Bob and his work, be sure to follow him on LinkedIn, visit his website, join his Facebook community, and interact with him on Twitter.
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ABOUT SARAH:
"Uncovering the right stories for the right audiences so executives, leaders, public speakers, and job seekers can clearly and actively demonstrate their character, values, and vision."
Elkins Consulting logo with image of Sarah with her dog, Toblerone
In my work with coaching clients, I guide people to improve their communication using storytelling as the foundation of our work together. What I’ve realized over years of coaching and podcasting is that the majority of people don’t realize the impact of the stories they share - on their internal messages, and on the people they’re sharing them with.
My work with leaders and people who aspire to be leaders follows a similar path to the interviews on my podcast, uncovering pivotal moments in their lives and learning how to share them to connect more authentically with others, to make their presentations and speaking more engaging, to reveal patterns that have kept them stuck or moved them forward, and to improve their relationships at work and at home.
The audiobook, Your Stories Don’t Define You, How You Tell Them Will is now available!
Included with your purchase are two bonus tracks, songs recorded by Sarah's band, Spare Change, in her living room in Montana.
Episode 117: Uncovering a Life Pivot Point, And Why It Matters
When she was 17, her public speaking course final was to perform at a local comedy club's open mic night. She wasn't nervous, though she thought she would be. Brynne stepped into the spotlight that night and never wanted to leave it. Even now, after decades of training and performance, she steps onto the stage and simply owns it.
We Can't Know at the Time, Our Stories That Will Inspire Others
Brynne Tillman and I met on #LinkedIn many years ago, just before she received the LinkedIn #Influencer title in 2016. I loved her content because it always included #humor, I could tell that Brynne took her work seriously - but never took herself too seriously.
During our conversation, we uncovered a life pivot point that she didn't realize was a big part of what shaped her future until she began to share it with me.
When she was 17, her public speaking course final was to perform at a local comedy club's open mic night. She wasn't nervous, though she thought she would be. Brynne stepped into the spotlight that night and never wanted to leave it. Even now, after decades of training and performance, she steps onto the stage and simply owns it.
That first evening at the comedy club, the manager pulled her and another student aside and invited them back the following week. After a few weeks working through her bit and performing at the open mic, she was invited to have her own time on stage - paid. She was officially a professional comic.
Similar to my conversation a few weeks ago with Ash Rao, Brynne and I touched on the topic of work ethic and being a good ambassador for yourself, no matter where you're working. In Brynne's case, being aware of her surroundings, and being driven to be good at whatever she does, was the key to her first opportunity to truly shine in a professional environment.
She remembers the day the big boss came down from his office to the call center she was working at in a Dun & Bradstreet office. He looked straight at her, then walked into her boss's office. She was sure that was the end of her career, sure she had said something her internal filter didn't catch, which happened a lot, and that she was being fired.
Instead, her boss and his boss called her into the office to ask her to create and facilitate training. They were so impressed with her skills of connecting with people and adding value, that they wanted her to find a way to basically clone herself through creating training for others.
Listen in on our conversation to hear more about Brynne and her entertaining, inspiring stories.
Connect with Brynne on LinkedIn, visit her website, and pick up her book, The LinkedIn Sales Playbook: A Tactical Guide to Social Selling.
Episode 59: Old Stories Create New Pathways
What Stories From Your Past Still Color Your Present?
His mother went to answer the door while his family sat at the supper table. Chris heard a man's voice, and watched as his father went into the living room. A demonstration and 40 minutes of answers to every objection later, that Electrolux vacuum salesman in the brown polyester suit with bad breath left with an order for a $3,000 machine.
Chris was 10 years old, and his image of a salesman was set for decades. Not only did his family have a vacuum cleaner they didn't need and couldn't afford, his parents bickered over it for months afterward.
Fast forward to Chris as a young adult with entrepreneurial aspirations and the realization that he'd have to get more comfortable with sales if he was going to be successful. He hired a coach who was able to peel back the layers of Chris's experience to find that vacuum salesman and his impact on how Chris saw the word "salesman."
80s Style: Friendship Pins
In the beginning of our conversation, Chris mentioned his love for heavy metal music, particularly in the late 80s and early 90s. He spoke about wearing his Metallica jean jacket to church, and about having the opportunity to play guitar with a band on Sunday evenings in the same church, and blowing away the senior women with the sound. We made a few references during that part of our conversation, one to a scene in Back to the Future with Michael J. Fox, and another about my friend Ranjith Abraham, and his musical projects, Miles Apart.
Connect with Chris on LinkedIn, and check out his book, It’s Time to Sell. Learn more about Chris and his gifted approach to sales and leadership by visiting his website.
Can You Bring Your Whole Self to Work?
Stories About Finding Your Fit
An introvert. That's how Jeff sees himself, despite being a successful salesman, and that's part of the reason his first career path led him to a biology degree and a research position.
He realized at some point that spending all day every day in a lab, mostly by himself, didn't bring him as much satisfaction and stimulation as he thought it would. His colleague found her outlet as a bartender on weekends, and he realized he wanted to do something similar to bring some social activity into his life. Thanks to a few introductions from friends, he found himself training and then working as a DJ on weekends.
Not only did he enjoy the opportunity to get out on weekends, he liked the extra cash he earned. On top of that, he realized that despite his introverted tendencies, he was really good at engaging an audience and getting people to step out of their comfort zones.
After a few years of his Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde life of research scientist by day, wild DJ at night, he started to feel that sense of dissatisfaction again. He realized he felt split, like he was living two completely different, separate lives, and he wanted to be able to bring his whole self to his whole life. That's when he started to explore other options in his field, and found a great fit as a salesman.
How many of us have started down a career path with interest and passion, only to realize the choices we made might not really satisfy all aspects of our character?
The question, then, is how to transition into something that's a good fit?
Jeff Bissen shares his story here, in the hopes that others will see themselves in his story, and make the necessary changes so they, too, can find satisfaction by finding a fit that allows them to bring their whole selves to work.
Are you enjoying listening to episodes of this podcast? Are you wondering how you can help me sustain this project, to support and encourage the sharing of important stories?
Here are a few ideas!
1) Leave a rating and comment on your favorite podcast service like iTunes or Stitcher
2) Share a link to the show and tell people why you like it
3) Become a sponsor (for as little as $2/month) by going to Patreon
After Conference Hangover
In less than ten seconds, my boss had me nearly deflated. Within two weeks, I may as well have not gone to that conference at all.
So excited to begin implementing ideas, I actually arrived early to work the morning I returned from the conference. That's a big deal for me; I love to sleep and rarely choose to get up an earlier than I have to. But that morning was different. That week would be different. My JOB would be different. I was on fire.
The conference had been full of great topics, from sales to leadership, from marketing to financial analysis. My favorite sessions were the keynote and breakout session on marketing in our industry, hosted by the keynote speaker. He reminded me why I loved that class when I was going through my undergraduate business program. His excitement for the planning process, implementation, and follow up analysis was contagious; I couldn't wait to get back to work and start my own project!
That Monday, I sat down at my desk and penciled in time on my busy calendar to work on a formal marketing plan. Allowing myself 30 minutes to get started by looking at available online templates, I found myself selecting a simple but solid format and downloading it to my desktop. My boss walked in as I was saving it; he was surprised to see me already settled into my day, a bit earlier than usual. In an uneasy, suspicious, fake-happy tone:
What are you so happily working on first thing this morning?
"You know that break-out session I went to at the conference last week? The one on marketing plans and implementation? I'm working on a marketing plan for us, to formalize some of what I've been doing, and to make it easier to budget and analyze the success of what we're doing here. I've been so busy since I started, trying to build business, I completely forgot how important this tool can be!"
Why do we need a marketing plan? You should be pounding the pavement. Didn't we have this conversation, that you need to spend less time onsite and more time selling?
In less than ten seconds, my boss had me nearly deflated. I didn't give up, though, I just knew I was on the right track. Every time I had 15 minutes alone in the office, I worked on that marketing plan. I knew I needed the document to help me stay on track and see results in my efforts at that job. In my optimistic mind, when I presented the finished product to my boss, he'd appreciate it -- he'd realized why we needed it. I'll save the results of that work for another blog post; let's just say it wasn't pretty.
I tried to keep my enthusiasm that week and the next. Interactions with staff included some discussion of things I learned and ideas I wanted to share; some were motivated to work on them. Most just nodded and smiled, assuming the ideas would go away and they could get back to their routines without having to work too hard.
Within two weeks, I may as well have not gone to that conference at all.
Have you been to conferences that got you all excited, only to return to your routine and lose momentum within days or weeks? Why is that? Is it the conference itself, setting up unreasonable expectations? Is it your colleagues who didn't attend, who aren't motivated to step things up and improve?
How do we fix this?
I have an idea about that and I'm implementing it at the No Longer Virtual conference in February. Because the participation is limited to 50 people, every person will have the opportunity to meet the facilitators and other participants and truly connect. Think about the value of that roomful of advocates for you, your career, and your business. Participants will keep in contact via the No Longer Virtual Facebook group and via LinkedIn, solidifying not only the learning and motivation from the event itself, but the relationships that were built in those 48 hours.
Think about the opportunity. Think about the value. Can you afford to miss this?
Watch my enthusiastic interview about NLV with Chris Spurvey here:
Do You Value Yourself? How Much?
What is your budget for inspiration, encouragement, and solid strategy for improvement? I want to know, because I want to help.
Do you value yourself? Do you value your professional and personal development? How much?
What is your budget for inspiration, encouragement, and solid strategy for improvement? I want to know, because I want to help.
"Hope is not a strategy."
Wiser words have rarely been spoken, and thanks to Trent Selbrede, those words are burned into my mind and have dramatically changed the way I write and think. Instead of writing hope, hopeful, or hopefully, I write intend, plan, and will.
"Fear is a liar."
This sentence is next in line in my current thought process, thanks to Trish Goff. When I find myself falling into my gerbil-like mind with circular thinking about what could go wrong, that is the sentence that I will into my consciousness.
If someone else had planned something like the No Longer Virtual conference, I would invest quite a lot to attend. As a matter of fact, I AM investing quite a lot to attend, and here's why:
The people facilitating these interactive sessions are some of the most competent, motivated, inspiring and inspired people I've had the pleasure to meet; I've only met one of them face-to-face. The people already registered are some of the smartest, most self-aware, kind, ambitious and motivated people I've met, and I've only met one of them face-to-face.
I know that to maximize my learning from these incredible people I must meet them face-to-face. It is worth the investment I'm making to have this experience because I know that -
what I put into it is exactly what I'll get out of it.
And I intend (not hope) to make this a life-changing experience.
I know that I need to continue to learn strategies to leverage my online network in my offline life. This agenda is full of topics I know will help me move my business and my life forward, and I know it will be worth the investment.
The question is, how much can you - should you - invest to avoid missing this opportunity?
It's the Shoes. Trust Me.
I was in high school when I stopped wearing shoes. There was probably a reason, as far as reason goes when you're in high school, but I can't imagine any reason beyond pushing my mother's buttons.
~ Picture courtesy of Eliza Wiley
I was in high school when I stopped wearing shoes. There was probably a reason, as far as reason goes when you're in high school, but I can't imagine any reason beyond pushing my mother's buttons.
My feet were tough and thick with calluses from the moment the snow melted in Colorado until the first frost hit. I would carry my shoes, just in case I needed them to be allowed into a store or restaurant. From my sophomore year of high school until I graduated from Colorado State University in Fort Collins, I was known for my bare feet. As an exchange student my sophomore year, I even hitchhiked by myself through New Zealand with bare feet. I'm pretty sure I was the only business major with bare feet and cut-off jeans. When I was walking through Moby Gym with my father, getting ready to graduate, we ran into a few of my professors and I was happy to introduce them to my dad.
Oh my! We were just placing bets on whether Sarah would wear shoes to cross the graduation stage.
When I think back on that interchange, I like to remember my dad smiling good naturedly, and not totally embarrassed, but I really don't recall his reaction. I smiled and lifted my graduation robe enough to show some pretty pumps. It was December, I was definitely wearing shoes.
I moved to Washington DC for a paid internship immediately following graduation. My father drove with me across the country in my little Chevette with my cat on the floor under the passenger seat. Of course I wore shoes every day to my job with the US International Trade Commission; as soon as the weather warmed a bit, you could find me wandering on weekends through the District, shoes in hand. I think back on that time and I'm totally disgusted. Really, Sarah? Barefoot in Washington DC? It didn't take long for me to change my ways. Not only is it gross to walk barefoot on the streets and sidewalks in a big city, it gets very, very hot.
Shoes were simply a function of getting dressed back then. I had my basic pumps in black and navy for work, and my casual sandals and tennis shoes for weekends, and that was about it. I absentmindedly put on two different colored shoes on my first day of work at a new job... but that story is all it's own.
Shoes didn't become anything important -- or even more than a passing thought - until I took my first job in sales.
As the director of sales at a downtown boutique hotel, I had the opportunity to dress up and be a little creative in my style. In my time working with clients and staff at the hotel, I noticed a distinct difference in how I was being perceived and treated when I wore shoes with a heel height of two inches or more. Observation has always been a strength of mine, and I took notes about the phenomena for a few weeks; it wasn't a serious scientific study, but the conclusions were obvious to me.
Shoes come with attitude for some of us. When I was struggling with a difficult boss, my dear friend sent me a package with this note in it:
Wear these bright yellow sandals and bring your own sunshine to work this week! - Let the haters hate!
They were three inch platform strappy yellow sandals and yes, I did wear them to work. My attitude was decidedly improved that day. Sometimes a little cue to catch my eye can work wonders on my internal dialogue. It's like a little spark of distraction; a reminder of who I am, and that while I cannot control someone else's behavior, I won't let it define me and my behavior.
Someone recently shared an article describing financial advantages of being tall; there are other studies to show that tall women are generally more successful in business. (I like to point out that I am one of the most comfortable people on any airplane, a distinct advantage when traveling.)
Though my titles haven't included the word "sales" since then, I've continued my observations about the differences when I'm a little bit taller, in how I believe I am perceived based on the treatment I receive by others.
I've come to some conclusions that have helped me over the past few years and I'm hopeful that those observations and strategies will help others. Here's one that I've shared a lot recently and have heard some great reviews following experiences by those who've tried it:
When you are planning your wardrobe for an event, meeting, or other important date, start with your shoes. Your shoes are the foundation of your wardrobe. Find shoes that make you feel good about the way you walk, the way you stand, the way you carry yourself. Invest in shoes that are comfortable AND that offer an indication of your style. Build your outfit around your shoes.
Try this strategy soon, and please comment and let me know your thoughts after you do your own experiment!
I know it sounds like a small detail, and it IS a small detail in the scheme of things. Like many other small details, like the grip of your handshake, the wrinkles around your eyes when you smile, and holding a door open for someone behind you, this one matters.
Sharing stories is a great way to communicate. Listen to my recent podcast to learn more about me and the work I do to help people communicate through storytelling.
Comments on this post:
Thank you for the belly laugh as I visualized you traipsing around Colorado sans shoes. Probably made you a more grounded person, though! Putting one's best foot forward is always a confidence booster. As women, we have many ways to add flair and customize our own sense of style and personality to others. For me, it is probably my passion to wear an heirloom or uncommon-type necklace to put my best self out in the world each and every day.
Sarah- Fantastic article thank you for sharing. I agree 100'% it's the shoes, I can not leave my house without a fierce pair of stilettos that make me feel like I could take over the world and people always remember me by the shoes