Every month I receive a variety of questions from salespeople and their managers. These come from a variety of sources - my live seminars, the monthly phone seminars, questions that are sent into my newsletter, and issues that arise in the course of my consulting work. Out of all of these, I select those that I think have the most universal application, and respond to them here.
I'm one of those salespeople who haven't spent $20.00 this year on a book or seminar to improve myself. I just don't want to go to the trouble. I believe that I can learn sufficiently on the job, and I'm tired of going to school. Should I feel bad?
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Now that's an honest question. Should you feel bad? My knee jerk reacting is to say, "Of course." But, on further reflection, it depends on your approach to your job, and on your aspirations for yourself. First, a definition -- "mastery." You achieve "mastery" of any profession when you are in the top 5% of performers in that profession. Pursuit of mastery is the continuous striving to achieve and then to remain in the top 5% of your profession.
I believe that every serious professional salesperson ought to strive for mastery. If that applies to you, then you want to become as good as you can become. If you want the greater sense of fulfillment, the greater degree of respect, and the increase in economic status that mastery brings, then, yes, you should feel bad because you are not acting consistently with your aspirations.
So, from one perspective, I have to say, Yes, you should feel bad. But it is not an ideal world. And, realistically, only about 20% of salespeople have such aspirations. Most are content with the status quo. Most just want to do their job, go home at the end of the day, and be done with it. If that's you, then I guess you are living a life consistent with your values, and that's OK.
The difference is what you want for yourself and your family. If you are perfectly content with your situation and your results, if you do not want anything that can be achieved by higher performance, if you don't want to become something better than you are, than you are perfectly content, and contentment is the enemy of growth. If you want to be or achieve something that you are not now, that discontentment should lead you to the realization that you must change if you are going to achieve something more. And that realization should stimulate you to invest in more heavily in your own development.
So, which are you? Content with your situation, or discontent? The answer to "should you feel bad" depends on your position.
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If you have any comments or questions, email them to me. I do, of course, reserve the right to edit.
Here are a few articles by Dave
that you might be interested in reading:
- The Ultimate Survival Skill for the Information Age... We're living in incredibly turbulent times. The well spring of this uncertainty lies in one of the characteristics of the newly-arrived information age. Business people are being buffeted by an increasingly rapid rate of change. Consider this. In 1900, the total amount of knowledge available to mankind was doubling about every 500 years. In 1990, it was doubling about every two years.... {Read More}
- For CEO's: How to Model Self-Directed Learning for Your Organization... The challenge for every CEO is to transform his/her organization into a learning organization. Self-directed learning is the fundamental skill necessary for individuals and organizations to survive and prosper in our turbulent times. Those organizations who successfully transform themselves into learning organizations -- organizations which continually process new information and change their behavior on that basis of that information -- will be tomorrow's winners....[ {Read More}
There are also many other action-packed articles for sales professionals that offer how-to solutions to every day sales problems that you can read online at www.davekahle.com/article.htm.
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