Anyone who’s read my book, Endless Referrals or attended my live program knows my basic premise of sales success and that is, “All things being equal, people will do business with, and refer business to, those people they know, like and trust.” This is also true when in the Winning Without Intimidation process of trying to persuade a difficult person to your point of view.
Let’s focus our discussion today, not on “know” or “like” but on trust.
One of the primary tenets of any successful presentation (a presentation is defined as any time you talk to one or more people) design is the establishment of “tone.”
When it comes to presentations, the term tone refers to much more than merely an individual’s “tone of voice.” The tone of a presentation is really about audience perception.
The simple truth is that your success or failure at anything — whether ordering a hamburger in a restaurant or speaking to a 5,000 person assembly — is largely contingent upon how you are received by the person or persons you are speaking to.
Just because the economy is in a nose dive and life may feel out of control, that’s no reason to feel helpless.
You can make a huge contribution today by making someone else’s dream come true.
Who should be the lucky recipient of your gift? Choose someone who you are grateful for, or the one who needs it the most, or even the person you can most easily help.
I chose my dad. At 80 years old, it’s been painful to watch my young hearted father fight a battle with his aging body. He had been an avid golfer (“5†handicap) and fisherman but a few years ago his back began to hurt and he abandoned both of his favorite activities.
As someone once advised, “Grow antennae, not horns.” If you prejudge someone as shallow or crazy or ill-informed, you automatically cease paying attention to what they say.
So a basic rule of listening is to judge only after you’ve heard and evaluated what they say. Don’t jump to conclusions based on how they look, or what you’ve heard about them, or whether they’re nervous.
In fact, maybe a good exercise would be to go out of your way to listen to a difficult speaker. Maybe he talks with a thick accent. Or talks much more rapidly, or more slowly, than you, or uses a lot of big words.
“The person of good and lawful purpose cannot fail. It only needs that he daily renew the fire and energy of his fixed resolve, to consummate his object.” – The Mastery of Destiny
It is the great equalizer for all of those reaching for success. It overcomes lack of education, money, talent, intelligence, looks and all other seeming advantages. President Calvin Coolidge said nothing could take its place: “Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.”
To play big in life and work you have to act big. I don’t mean that you have to act superior to anyone or believe that you are better than someone else.
When you act that way you are really acting very small and insecure. When you behave in a way of superiority you are letting your ego take over and eventually you will pay the price.
Competing with someone else gives you a false sense of superiority or bigness.
The people who act big believe that within themselves they are gifted with the talent, determination, faith and persistence to be the best they can be.
I believe among the most valuable traits of any human being is the ability to honestly, objectively, and realistically assess themselves.
It is easy to look at friends, neighbors, and colleagues and judge their success in their personal or professional lives.
This ease in judging others comes from our tendency to look at everyone else’s actions and results while only viewing our own intentions.
We all start out with great intentions that can often become an excuse when we fail to perform.
Verb always inspires, for a verb is an action word. It is action that propels us to move mountains and tear seas apart.
It is action that motivates us to look forward to the next day with an eye of enthusiasm, passion and purpose. It is action that shifts our focus from “arm chair dude” to “get your hands dirty” dude.
If you just reflect on all the accomplishments that you have had in your life, 99% of them have been action oriented. Be it winning the hundred meters dash during your growing years, or the big corporate deal for your company wherein you spent days and nights preparing for the final presentation. It is action that gives each one of us the highest spirit of performance.
Get three strikes in baseball and you’re out. But what if that weren’t the case? What if you could swing and swing and swing without ever striking out?
I have a metal paperweight on my desk with the inscription, “What would you do if you could not fail?” It’s a nice ornament with a positive message, but over the past several years I’ve realized that it’s the wrong message. Anybody can fail at anything. It’s important to know that going in. A much better and more useful message would be, “What would you do if it didn’t matter if you failed?†To me, that’s much more realistic and powerful.
Our studies of high achievers have shown that no matter how different their personalities, work habits, occupations or gender, the people who accomplish great things in life have visualized and expected success all along.
They’ve had the ability to vividly picture their achievements and to reassure themselves in the face of long odds that they would come through.
To visualize the person you want most to become, set aside some time this week in which you can create an atmosphere conducive to re-affirming your life dreams.