If you are working with customers, hiring (and retaining) people, leading people, selling products or services, applying for a new job or promotion, enrolling people in an idea, or essentially wanting to influence anyone about anything — you are in "sales." (I don't think of it as "sales" — see video below — AND this is the quickest way to speak to this.)
The thing about "sales" and "sales processes"— even the most excellent ones behind the most phenomenal services and products — is that our Intentions, Energy, and Presence (our "IEP") and how we show up in that conversation or process, will make or break our success in the "sale."
Consider the last time you went to buy something, hire someone, or be led by someone— maybe the product you were considering was awesome, the potential hire looked great on paper, or the leader was masterful in their craft and even held a high-level role — but for some reason, it just didn't feel right. You didn't feel good with them. Something was off.
It was likely their IEP — their Intentional Energetic Presence® and their Intentions, Energy, and Presence. Our IEP is like food coloring in water, it influences and "colors" everything we do, and it is present in every moment. It is the intangible quality that makes us want to follow people or run from them, trust them or feel super careful with them, buy from them or choose their competitor (who may not even have a better product).
Why you maybe missing your mark in sales and leadership. (And why they won't tell you.)
Is the way you (or your people) are showing up ruining your sales/influence/leadership abilities?
I had a meeting today with a team who'd asked me for some feedback. Our meeting was to discuss some of the core challenges they were having and how we might address. This is an awesome company, great group of people, doing good and important work, and all totally wiped out. Exhausted.
Becoming in 2021
Almost every year I write a big broadcast for our subscribers with special queries and exercises to close out the year and bring on the next. (You can also search this blog for end of year posts and questions to support you as well.) Since 2020 has proven to be so... deliciously demandingly different... I'm shifting gears. Here's the invite. Get subscribed (if you're not already), read my stuff and do the work and exercises I offer in my broadcasts and in my blogs (at no charge), ask yourself these SEVEN questions (below) as you leave 2020 and lean into the 11 "Anese-isms" as you enter 2021, take an assessment (or four) on our new assessments page*, and enroll in any of my self-paced programs as they resonate for you, and/or in my live virtual programs coming in 2021 (there are TWO: Learning Labs and Impact Cohorts). [A special note about this site, any page with the "wave" as shown above, is a new page with new resources or offerings for 2021. Have fun and please join!!]
Resources I'm finding useful right now
Navigating this year has been tricky -- I know I'm not alone. The range of emotion I experience, almost daily, is like nothing I've ever felt before -- a mix of personal feelings, empathy for what's going on, feeling the collective energy and emotions on our planet right now, and ambiguity galore -- combined with a lack of control of so many big things -- creating an incredible amount of global anxiety. It's a lot.
Optimizing your virtual presence now
As we become more and more virtually-based (V), leading team meetings, having 1:1's, teaching, speaking, dating, relating, and all things human connection over pixels, our Intentional Energetic Presence® (IEP) + (V) is more important than ever. After all, we now have to create safety and connection ON a screen in little boxes, hundreds and thousands of miles away from each other, and sometimes just next door. This is no small feat. However, it can be done beautifully.