In sales management, as in all other personal and professional activities, there are blocks that prevent us from accessing the most desired results.
All of us have blockages that have arisen and taken root in us during our evolution, but if we continue with them, in addition to representing a heavy emotional burden, it will take us away from the most precious goals that we may wish to achieve with all the potential that we possess..
The main blocks
Analyzing the main ones with objectivity and depth will allow us to identify them, begin to minimize them and eliminate ourselves in order to achieve greater and better achievements in our lives.
Although it is not an easy task, this analysis may represent the beginning of a path towards a more successful and enjoyable activity, both personally and professionally.
• Fear of the unknown. Only the intrepid and the unconscious turn out to be the ones who risk improvising in their profession with a serious lack of knowledge and skills that will inexorably lead to malpractice and a state of repeated frustrations and consequent lows. The only effective solution here is to learn and train with the best sources and resources.
• The fear of making mistakes. Making mistakes is an inherent characteristic of all being. Given this, we tend to freeze and stop taking certain actions. Although it may be originated or associated with ignorance, we have already seen how to solve it. It is important to keep in mind that intelligent and perfectible human beings learn and enrich ourselves from our experiences, developing a learning process that will allow us to avoid the same mistakes in the future. Therefore, it should be pointed out that learning from our mistakes constitutes the most effective learning methodology, although it is the most arduous and prolonged in time, as well as it turns out to be the most expensive of all due to the consequences it may generate for third parties.
• Avoid being hurt. As sentient beings that we are, we do not like to receive rejections. However, in the exercise of the sales profession it is very important to accept that there is "no" as an answer and if it is elaborated that it is a rejection of what we can offer and not of ourselves, we will be minimizing its effects by giving us the opportunity to always advance, despite this.
• The "what will they say". This blockade inhibits us from doing what we may be considering as the best or most creative way to perform some action. In a purely social sphere, it may be related to the fear of making mistakes, but in any case it is an inhibitor of the best we have inside and the most desired to achieve. Just remember that there are two large groups of people: the makers and the opinionologists. The former can make mistakes and learn from their mistakes, but they also produce achievements. On the other hand, opinionologists turn out to be the critics of all actions of the doers, they are never wrong in their actions because ultimately they never know how to do or do anything other than express an opinion.
• Their own Paradigms. Paradigms are rules that each assumes to be true and even difficult to modify. For example: "We have made ourselves successful by doing the same as my grandfather, my father, etc., because this was always done this way." The consequences of this blockade is that it does not allow us to think or create new ways of doing it better because we deny any possibility of modifying what is already known as the only valid thing. Keep in mind that the successful ones in the world have broken very traditional paradigms, generating new paradigms that were previously unthinkable.
Conclusions
Selling is a vital profession of service to people (current and potential customers) based on advising them on their needs or problems that are satisfied or solved with our products or services, with the sole purpose of always making their best purchase decision.
The adjective "vital" is represented by the need to consistently obtain the best and greatest achievements in each period of the year, otherwise wages, fixed expenses and taxes, will not be paid to suppliers, etc., nor will it be possible to obtain nor distribute the profit that gave rise to the business or activity.
Due to professional experiences in management consulting and training, as well as the results of the latest research carried out, there is still extensive malpractice in the practice of the sales profession. This may be motivated by the existence of these blockages, both at the business, managerial level and in their representatives in said organizations.
One can begin to analyze their own blocks and even identify those that belong to each of the members of their sales team, but the key lies in discovering how to overcome them definitively, if you want them to be able to apply the maximum potential that they carry inside.
Regardless, when we see a successful sales professional, let's applaud him mentally and honestly for his achievements, because that person didn't get there by chance or fortune, but because:
• had the courage and determination to advance towards his goals, enriching himself by learning what he did not know, • assumed that he could be wrong but that it was at his own risk and learning from his mistakes, • accepted that he could be wounded in his crusade, but he strengthened himself with each obstacle and rejection,
• that he did not listen to those who said "that's not going to walk" or "I wouldn't get into it", and finally, • discovered a new state of affairs in his specialty after his achievements.
© Copyright 2006, by Martín E. Heller
