Posts

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Coaches Corner v.02.23.2023

Coaches Corner v.02.23.2023

Guest writer and Coach Floyd Jerkins addresses behavioral sales metrics for coaching equipment industry sales teams for Coaches Corner v.02.23.2023.

Every dealership organization is at a different place in time with the diagnosis of their sales teams and processes. The size of complex and level of operational sophistication are factors. Many times, it’s a location issue more than overall company-wide so that requires custom solutions. So, maybe this article is timely and you’re ready to look deeper into how to make real progress in the sales department. 

Professional Sales Management and Salespeople

Great salespeople are great salespeople, and in the equipment industry it’s no different than other industries. There are particular aspects unique to every industry due to a product’s life cycle, style of customers and personalities, buying patterns, and market conditions. And the best salespeople know they have to understand these industry specific characteristics to succeed, but there is more. When you learn to sell, you can sell anything. Yea, I know, I know, but it’s true.

Being a professional sales manager or salesperson in the equipment industry isn’t for everyone. There are real superstars doing this work every day and many of them make it look easy. They have a natural and personal approach that gets the job done. Others have tried and failed. Many linger on with average performance. Yet, owners who sell often do not follow the system they expect their salespeople to follow or they have a perceived top producer that no one can touch. 

There are typically high and low performers when you have a large sales team. Improving the performance metrics of sales managers and salespeople can be challenging to establish what particular actions need to be taken.

Building a sales team of all superstars is a great plan, but not always realistic or practical. In my experience, sales management and sales teams usually have a mixture of age and talent with varying skill sets and competency levels.

A Sales Managers Rally Cry – To Sell More, Talk to More People

To sell more, talking to more people always seems to be at the top of the list of things to do. Still, if a salesperson talks to a lot of people and prices a lot of people but doesn’t have a good measured closing ratio, it makes me wonder how effective they are and whether they should be allowed to keep talking to your customers. When a sales manager influences the sales team with a whip and chain or talks more about the problems than the solutions, is that the most effective leadership style to use in today’s business climate? I don’t think so.

The traditional metrics for sales success include new and used margins, sales volume, new and used turns, and a mixture of others. To be an excellent asset manager, you must know these metrics and how to positively influence their outcomes.

Performance Metrics Created Before & After the Sale

Like many traditional metrics, margins, turns, and other sales department indicators are created after a unit is sold. The efficiency of your booking and accounting practices determines when the sale appears in a statement. That could be anywhere from one week to sixty days past when the actual sale was made. Once the numbers are current, you can assess what’s going on. If you’ve followed my articles about this, you know where I am headed.

Let me ask a few questions:

  1. Who do you make more money on, a repeat customer or a customer who has never done business with you or your company before?
  2. Who do you have the most fun working with, a repeat customer or someone who has never done business with you before?
  3. Who do you sell in less time, someone you don’t know or a customer who’s bought from you before?

Perhaps you took a few seconds and thought about your answers. I appreciate the effort. Now, consider your answers and what you know and don’t know.

“The goal is to coach performance in the areas that help salespeople become more effective with real-time data. Becoming more effective in sales and marketing your business requires a deep understanding of your customer base so you can focus the sales and marketing team on what matters the most.”

Behavioral Customer Segmentation

The old saying is you can’t improve something unless you measure it. One of the first principles of process improvement is as a process evolves make sure you are measuring the right things. 

You probably already know the customer by machine or product sold, sales volume, and parts and service sales, so tracking this kind of customer segmentation can reveal even more real time data. Even a basic CRM system can track these customer categories.

Total Customers

Customer Categories

New Customer– This customer has never been to, called, or emailed your business before.

Repeat Customer– This is a customer who has bought from you before. Many companies have “orphan owners.”

Referral Customer– This is a customer who another customer referred to your business or the salesperson.

New Business– This customer is someone you meet at the gas station or a social event. A brief conversation in almost any social situation generates new leads.

The sale is the end result of all the activities performed by a salesperson. By coaching performance on these sales activities that happen before and during the sales process, we can naturally increase a salespersons effectiveness. 

When you measure these you learn a lot about how your sales mix is made up, how effective sales and front-line people are in each category, and even how well your marketing is doing. It also speeds up the learning curves. If you don’t know these, you are at the end of the sales cycle making decisions. When you are looking at unit sales, you are best guessing how effective your sales and marketing efforts are. 

A Behavioral Sales Mix- BSM

Each salesperson should log every Customer Contact interaction each day. To get buy-in, a sales manager communicates with the sales team to create the “rules of logging” they’ll follow. For example, if the salesperson is at the parts counter talking with Joe Customer and he asks how much that used machine is, that should be logged. Each person inputting into the system should understand what the code means when they log it. GIGO- garbage in, garbage out. 

Salespeople shouldn’t be allowed to post at their discretion, and that’s part of the rules created in the early stages of implementation. You don’t allow your accounting staff to post credits however they like, nor do you allow technicians not to record their time. Salespeople should be required to a certain standard of recording their day-to-day activities. Its good business. 

It’s essential to know how many Closes to Face-to-Face Contacts there are in the same time period. This establishes one of the fundamental Closing Ratios for performance improvement. 

By tracking these customer categories and how many face-to-face contacts by salesperson and how many closes by salesperson, you are ready to create a new view of your sales mix. Stay tuned, next month’s article will be on the analysis of these metrics. 

Did you enjoy this blog? Read more great blog posts here.
For our course lists, please click here.
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The New Style of Leadership is a Developmental Process

The New Style of Leadership is a Developmental Process

After a brief hiatus, guest writer and coach Floyd Jerkins is back with a new blog for our Coaches Corner: The New Style of Leadership is a Developmental Process.

What’s the most important asset in your business? If your reply is about the facility or the brand of products you sell, hang on for a second. The reality is your people represent business’s greatest asset.

Leaders have much better success motivating their employees’ creativity and challenging work when they take the employees’ perspective and invite them to generate their own self-endorsed work goals.

The new style of leadership is a developmental process. When you replace giving directives and commands with working patiently and diligently to see the situation from the other person’s point of view, you have better success motivating others. Gathering input and suggestions to pull all that information together to offer some constructive goals and strategies creates sustainable changes. Although these approaches to motivating and engaging others are somewhat difficult, they are well worth the effort.

Leaders use certain behaviors to engage and motivate employees. They know they cannot control employee motivation.

Optimizing internal human resources is one of the quickest methods to add profit to the bottom line. To scale and leverage a business requires a strategy that makes sense. Learning how to maximize effective working relationships tends to improve with training and a company-wide developmental program.

Creating intentional strategies to maximize the return on your investment in your people just makes good common sense and is a good business decision. We get into business to make money. When you follow my dynamic living articles, you know having fun and enjoying life can be accomplished while you own or work in a thriving business. To think you work 100 hours a week but don’t have time to enjoy life is not a fulfilling lifestyle.

 Leaders who recognize there is more potential to develop people than there are technical improvements or cost-cutting measures outperform those who don’t. 

Numerous studies reveal every year that, without a doubt, the top 1 or 2 reasons talented people leave their place of employment are because of the culture and the way their supervisor treats them.

A leader always knows their own strengths and weaknesses. They want to maximize employees’ strengths and ensure their weaknesses do not weaken their strengths. They are self-learners and seek to learn new attitudes and skills to maximize their effectiveness. The goal is to be the leader that followers like to follow.

Don’t think you can apply a one-size solution to improve your leadership capacity in your business. Improving one’s leadership abilities requires more than the five-step approach that many suggest. Each person is different, so their strengths and weaknesses are different. The learning path they need is unique to them.

Reading my articles, you know then that being effective and efficient can easily make more money in less time. A business with culture and leadership issues doesn’t mean the company isn’t profitable. It’s just not as profitable or satisfying to operate as it could be. It could be subject to chronic issues that could cause a business to fail quickly. Measuring the cost of turnover can lead to a loss of sleep at night. The numbers are staggering to realize, but there is an even more significant issue with many relatively easy solutions when leaders use the appropriate leadership style.

People issues cost your business about 25% of its efficiency. 

Your business improves when your people improve, and leaders and management lead that process to affect the culture positively. An employee who needs consistent attention and coaching can easily cost you more time than they’re worth. You want to see them growing into a role vs. being shoved because they don’t have the right skills or attitude. Moving people into different positions to find what they are best suited is easily an intentional strategy to improve overall performance. You just have to do this for the right reasons.

Middle management people are often overlooked and don’t get the respect they deserve. Their ability to get the job done is a duplicatable trait, and many I know enjoy coaching others. They typically have wonderful insight into what works and what doesn’t. When one quits or dies, you know first-hand how painful and costly they can be to replace.  

Unleashing the creativity of your management staff unlocks the controls to your business’s growth. There is more power to solve business problems and grow the opportunities when you unleash this natural creative energy you already have at your fingertips.

Motivation is a complex process to explain and equally difficult to realize fully. Science tells us that motives are internal experiences that can be categorized into needs, cognitions, and emotions that are influenced by a business’s culture.

These internal and external forces highlight how we can intervene to increase motivation. Depending on the motivational situation we are dealing with, we can design interventions that target physiological or psychological needs and make adjustments to the environment to create the opportunity for increased motivation.

“Among all the prospects that man can have, the most comforting is, on the basis of his present moral condition, to look forward to something permanent and to further progress toward a still better prospect.” Immanuel Kant

Finding what is easy to do is rarely what is effective. You often have to go back to the drawing board to do the challenging work of designing effective interventions and motivational support.

Unleash Creativity in Your Most Valuable Asset — Your People

Creating a learning and teaching environment creates a progressive culture that employees like. Key leaders with specific knowledge of performing a particular task or set of functions can quickly become teachers. Documenting these processes is a wonderful best practice to implement while creating a clearer pathway to scaling the business.

Many times, a one-on-one is needed to foster an individual’s talents. Based on the assessment of a group of leaders, they may require classroom-style training so they all hear the same organizational message, and you can measure the anticipated outcomes.

Those you’ve identified as up-and-coming leaders may need more clearly defined learning pathways and resources. Other individuals may require a personalized approach utilizing inside or outside resources.

Various classroom, online learning, and one-to-one resources are available and cost-effective today; yes, even executive coaching services are available. My service fits nicely into this kind of developmental and implementation work.

Remember, in most businesses, there is more potential to develop people than technical improvements or cost-cutting measures. Create that learning pathway so your young and mature leaders can be far more effective at influencing and optimizing your most important asset. You are better together.

Did you enjoy this blog? Read more great blog posts here.
For our course lists, please click here.
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Coaches Corner v.12.01.2022

Coaches Corner v.12.01.2022

The Learning Without Scars coach, Floyd Jerkins, is back with Coaches Corner v.12.01.2022: How to Handle An Argumentative Person on Your Team.

Building a team with diverse personalities requires a leader who can handle them. There will be days when you’d like to fire all of them and then others when you couldn’t be prouder. Let me share some tips and strategies to handle an argumentative person on your team so you create more days when you are excited to witness the team in action serving your customers.

Argumentative Dave or Sally

In building a team, there usually is at least one of them that can argue with you about most anything. And they can argue with other team members about most anything. This can be exhausting to work with but does not mean they don’t perform well in their role.

The first goal is to discuss the specific behaviors this person displays and the effect on other people. Be realistic about your expectations going into this conversation. You are not trying to change the person. You are trying to change the way they handle certain situations. As a leader, you have to set that expectation, or the employee will continue to do what they do. And over time, this type of behavior will grate on everyone they come in contact with. It can tear the team apart.

Explain the issue clearly and concisely. Let me know that the constant push back on every issue takes up a lot of time and energy. It is disruptive to the team. Encourage them that when they have questions, please let you know. You are always open to hearing the questions and coming up with progressive solutions, but you need them to stop being so aggressive and pushing or debating every item that comes around. Let them know you appreciate their passions and you want them to stay focused on the work at hand.

New Behaviors Need Reinforcement

Now, just because you say this in a coaching manner, the new behavior you’re expecting will need reinforcement a few times for it to stick. The first time this person gets out of line, you have to correct the behavior. You can’t let it slide, or you are reinforcing the old behaviors and will need to start all over again.

If their outburst happens in a meeting, immediately shut it down. Let them know that you’d like to talk about that in a one-to-one session so the group can stay on track. I think there is a difference between someone like this complaining or having a concern. Someone that is always complaining is the issue. If they express genuine concern and constructively, then it might be time to say, ok, you disagree with the solution; what other solutions do you think would be better for the company and the customer to consider? Essentially, start focusing on the solutions vs. rehashing the problems.

Repetitive Bad Behavior

A key in all this is that you want to make sure you are clearly and concisely stating the type of behavior you expect from this person and under what conditions. If these issues keep happening, then you have to become more formal in the exchange. The previous discussions can take place in the corner of a room, or by the break room, or most anywhere. The new discussion needs to take place in your office. You are at your desk, and the employee is sitting in front of you. The tone of the conversation needs to become firm, no joking around or anything like that. This is becoming serious, and you want to convey that.

Ask the employee if you have clearly communicated the new behavior you are expecting. Listen close to them, but don’t let them ramble to other subjects or other team members or get you off track. Repeat what you have stated previously and be clear about specific instances where you want to see them handle situations differently. 

This whole meeting shouldn’t take more than 30 minutes or even less. Gain an agreement from them that they understand and will work on it. The first time you catch them doing it right, praise them because that’s the behavior you want them to adopt.

If the bad behavior persists, then give me a call. There are other steps to take, but it sounds like they are obstinate, and that’s another issue to contend with differently.

Be Careful About Consuming All Your Time with a Problem

The team members who are easy to get along with often go unnoticed. Make sure to recognize them because they normally shine with praise. Praising should be a natural thing to do from a leader’s perspective, but it isn’t.

Offer sincere appreciation for something they’ve done that aligns with your customer service expectations. Maybe they handled a difficult situation with grace and poise; point that out as why you share the compliment. Take care of the people who take care of the customer.

Did you enjoy this blog? Read more great blog posts here.
For our course lists, please click here.
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Coaches Corner 11.24.2022

Coaches Corner 11.24.2022

In this week’s installment, our designated coach, Floyd Jerkins, walks us through Psychological Income. Please read on in Coaches Corner 11.24.2022 to learn more.

Can You Improve Your Employees’ Psychological Income?

One of the most profound human characteristics centers around our need to be appreciated. When we are in a relationship where we feel appreciated and valued, our self-esteem rises, and we are much more open to making changes and being part of a team. Leaders know this and work to create an environment for people to be recognized.

Employees need economic income and psychological income. To reach peak performance, both are needed to have balance in life while the business pursues high profits. When employees enjoy the economic portion, a question is how much more commitment could they make if they had the psychological income to match?

Managers Becoming Experts in Finding the Things That Go Wrong

More often than not, managers are on the job to find the things going wrong and fix them. Many become experts at this. One of the most serious challenges in motivating people is that over time if all they hear are the negatives, it breeds a less than average mindset or one that goes all out to protect themselves from ridicule. It’s hard to build a team of high-performing champions if all they hear is what they are doing wrong all the time.

The “emotional bank account” is a theory and a practical application. The theory suggests that the more deposits you make into someone’s emotional bank account, their self-esteem increases, trust builds and makes them more open to changes. You are overdrawn in the account if you don’t make purposeful deposits. The person then closes down and isn’t up for much of anything because they are always suspicious of your motives. The practical application is to be well invested in the emotional bank account with your teams through your leadership and communications style and the consideration you show.

Catching Team Members Doing Something Right

Many times, all a leader hears in a day are the negatives. Some staff will bombard you with every negative there is. As a leader, you are often the center of communications, and this can become draining if you don’t frame these issues correctly.

This is one of the biggest keys to making happy employees. As a leader, we often forget to praise someone when they do a great job. Our heads are into other business-related issues. I don’t bet but only on sure things. And I’ll bet your business has all kinds of positive service points of contacts every day. If you didn’t, you wouldn’t last long in the business. Do you see them? Can you make it a daily practice to praise your staff when they perform the correct customer service behaviors you want to see?

A client of mine owns a few McDonalds. They installed the “thank you” process. Each employee was to say thank you when another employee did something for them, or they witnessed a fellow employee performing an uncommon act of service. All the managers started the process weeks before they rolled it out with all the staff. My friend said it was amazing how quickly this caught on and the improvement it made to the attitudes of the staff. It became contagious.

An example from another client. If an employee goes over and beyond to help a customer or assist a teammate, they will get a “good job card” with their name on it at their monthly manager’s meeting. These cards can come from managers, other employees or from customers telling management. They then would get to put their cards into a box. The manager would draw a card out of the box with a name on it. That person would then win a gift of $100 in value. A few of their people didn’t care about getting a card until they saw the same people winning. Then they joined in by trying to go over and beyond at customer service or helping another teammate to win. It became contagious.

Strategy to Make Emotional Deposits: The Magic of Dimes

Business owners go to great lengths and expense to recruit and hire the right people. I’ve always wanted people who worked for me to come to work and enjoy what they are doing.

As I mentioned in this article’s opening lines, we all have basic human tendencies. As a leader, we can nurture people through our leadership style and grow the talent we need to continue to achieve the goals and mission of the company.

Try putting ten dimes in one pocket and moving them to the other pocket one at a time with each positive message you give to someone throughout the day. The idea is to try and break old habits, and I am sure that is what many of us have. How many dimes do you have at the end of the day? Track this for a couple of weeks; you’ll be surprised. If you do well, you will also notice a change in the people around you. It is magical.

You can’t be fake about this, nor be insincere. Remember, in the absence of leadership; people will follow the strangest things. With leadership, ordinary people can do extraordinary things.

Did you enjoy this blog? Read more great blog posts here.
For our course lists, please click here.
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Coaches Corner v.11.17.2022

Coaches Corner v.11.17.2022

Guest writer Floyd Jerkins shares how leadership is like playing the guitar in Coaches Corner v.11.17.2022.

I started playing the guitar when I was about 12. It was easy to fall in love with it and played nearly every day. In those days, Ted Nugent, Black Sabbath, Deep Purple, and the Beatles were among the day’s rock musicians. One of my favorites was the Beatles. Even then, I loved playing the songs and found it pretty easy, so I thought I was pretty good. I knew I was going to be a rock star.

An older friend of mine, who I always admired, created a “paradigm” shift about my perceptions of music one day. At that time, I had no idea what a paradigm was. One day, we got into a lengthy discussion/debate about music. I thought I made a convincing argument.

He started me listening to Buddy Guy, Larry Coryell, George Benson, Jim Hall, Chet Atkins, Glen Campbell, and a host of other guitarists that I had never heard of before. I heard chord progressions, riffs, and sounds coming from a guitar I hadn’t even imagined. I couldn’t even figure out how to move my fingers to play such sounds. The new information rattled my cage for sure.

All I know is after those few days, my whole world opened up to listening to and finding value in all kinds of music. I also found my friend to be even more interesting than I ever thought. Every time we got together, I started to listen first to see what I could learn.

Leadership and Playing a Guitar

In all the hype today about leadership, I found myself thinking – “OK, Floyd, you’ve been a student, and a teacher, and practitioner on this subject for decades. What’s new around the topic of leadership? What are the paradigm shifts? Are there any?” I guess it all depends on what you listen to.

Oprah Style of Leadership- You get a class, and you get a class!

Part of what’s new is that thousands of people are offering information on the subject of leadership. There are books, podcasts, online and live classes you can attend to teach you how to lead. Numerous materials on the subject can be found by your old or new favorite host. There are thousands of old and new ideas and practical solutions offered. What an exciting time to have instant access to more information at your fingertips than you can digest in a lifetime!

Separating Fact from Fiction

Because of so much available information, I work to narrow down the volume of who influences me. Some seem to have hollow words or not near enough depth on the subject. A good sound bite without the substance to back it up is relatively common today. Sometimes I have to read deeper or check out the credentials to know more about where this information is coming from.

What is not new, is that there is still no shortcut to becoming an effective leader or developing an enduring organization. Sorry, there isn’t any silver-bullet to learn how to become an influential person. Never let anyone tell you there is. It takes a lot of hard work, self-analysis, and honesty. Yes, you have to be a useful person to become an effective leader. And that doesn’t mean you’ll ever be perfect. You will make a ton of mistakes and have scars and flaws, just like everyone else.

The Principles of Life and Business are Like Chords on a Guitar

When you learn to play chords, then playing a song becomes easier. You can actually hear the music as it’s played and visualize what chords are used and how it’s strummed. You can then play any kind of music as long as you can hear it. With practice, you can start to create your own music.

When you learn the principles of living a dynamic life or building a company, it’s like learning the guitar’s chords. The principles are tried and true and will never let you down once you master them. You have to practice because you just can’t become a master of them until you do. You will fail occasionally. There will be people who say it can’t be done.

You can learn the principles of leadership and model them to find what works for you. As I tell my grandkids, just be you and don’t try to be someone else. Embrace and love yourself.

Principles are like gravity. You can try to defy, change, or ignore them, but they are always there doing what they do. Learn them, and allow them to be a guiding resource in your life and business journey to reach your fullest potential.

Today, I listen to all kinds of music. My taste is wide and deep. Oh, I can play some on my “64 Fender Jazzmaster,” but my listening skills are much better. I still debate with people I don’t agree with, to learn. Mostly, I enjoy listening to a lot of people because I know I can learn something from them that I didn’t know before. You know, I never want to be that person who thinks the Beatles are the only music there is.

Did you enjoy this blog? Read more great blog posts here.
For our course lists, please click here.
,

Coaches Corner v.11.03.2022

Coaches Corner v.11.03.2022

Guest writer Floyd Jerkins brings us our latest installment of our Coaches Corner, v.11.03.2022.

Can You Improve Your Employees Psychological Income?

One of the most profound human characteristics centers around our need to be appreciated. When we are in a relationship where we feel appreciated and valued, our self-esteem rises, and we are much more open to making changes and being part of a team. Leaders know this and work to create an environment for people to be recognized.

Employees need economic income and psychological income. To reach peak performance, both are needed to have balance in life while the business pursues high profits. When employees enjoy the economic portion, a question is how much more commitment could they make if they had the psychological income to match?

Managers Becoming Experts in Finding the Things That Go Wrong

More often than not, managers are on the job to find the things going wrong and fix them. Many become experts at this. One of the most serious challenges in motivating people is that over time if all they hear are the negatives, it breeds a less than average mindset or one that goes all out to protect themselves from ridicule. It’s hard to build a team of high-performing champions if all they hear is what they are doing wrong all the time.

The “emotional bank account” is a theory and a practical application. The theory suggests that the more deposits you make into someone’s emotional bank account, their self-esteem increases, trust builds and makes them more open to changes. You are overdrawn in the account if you don’t make purposeful deposits. The person then closes down and isn’t up for much of anything because they are always suspicious of your motives. The practical application is to be well invested in the emotional bank account with your teams through your leadership and communications style and the consideration you show.

Catching Team Members Doing Something Right

Many times, all a leader hears in a day are the negatives. Some staff will bombard you with every negative there is. As a leader, you are often the center of communications, and this can become draining if you don’t frame these issues correctly.

This is one of the biggest keys to making happy employees. As a leader, we often forget to praise someone when they do a great job. Our heads are into other business-related issues. I don’t bet but only on sure things. And I’ll bet your business has all kinds of positive service points of contacts every day. If you didn’t, you wouldn’t last long in the business. Do you see them? Can you make it a daily practice to praise your staff when they perform the correct customer service behaviors you want to see?

A client of mine owns a few McDonalds. They installed the “thank you” process. Each employee was to say thank you when another employee did something for them, or they witnessed a fellow employee performing an uncommon act of service. All the managers started the process weeks before they rolled it out with all the staff. My friend said it was amazing how quickly this caught on and the improvement it made to the attitudes of the staff. It became contagious.

An example from another client. If an employee goes over and beyond to help a customer or assist a teammate, they will get a “good job card” with their name on it at their monthly manager’s meeting. These cards can come from managers, other employees or from customers telling management. They then would get to put their cards into a box. The manager would draw a card out of the box with a name on it. That person would then win a gift of $100 in value. A few of their people didn’t care about getting a card until they saw the same people winning. Then they joined in by trying to go over and beyond at customer service or helping another teammate to win. It became contagious.

Strategy to Make Emotional Deposits: The Magic of Dimes

Business owners go to great lengths and expense to recruit and hire the right people. I’ve always wanted people who worked for me to come to work and enjoy what they are doing.

As I mentioned in this article’s opening lines, we all have basic human tendencies. As a leader, we can nurture people through our leadership style and grow the talent we need to continue to achieve the goals and mission of the company.

Try putting ten dimes in one pocket and moving them to the other pocket one at a time with each positive message you give to someone throughout the day. The idea is to try and break old habits, and I am sure that is what many of us have. How many dimes do you have at the end of the day? Track this for a couple of weeks; you’ll be surprised. If you do well, you will also notice a change in the people around you. It is magical.

You can’t be fake about this, nor be insincere. Remember, in the absence of leadership; people will follow the strangest things. With leadership, ordinary people can do extraordinary things.

Did you enjoy this blog? Read more great blog posts here.
For our course lists, please click here.

Coaches Corner v.10.27.2022

Coaches Corner v.10.27.2022

Guest writer Floyd Jerkins brings us our third installment in our Coaches Corner, v.10.27.2022.

A Leadership Rule: What You Do is So Loud I Can’t Hear What You’re Saying

How Effective Are Your Leaders?

You want employees to feel good to be working as part of a team that is working together – and everyone is improving. Many managers would be surprised to learn how little their employees believe management is walking the talk.

You can quickly scan the internet and find thousands of articles on leadership. Hundreds of thousands of terabytes of data on the subject are available. Why then are we still seeing fundamental leadership issues?

Leaders have to be the change they want to see.

Whether Bruce Lee or Gandi said it first, it’s a powerful metaphor for leaders. Yeah, I know, it sounds like a cliche statement, but a modeled behavior makes this a reality. You can’t fake it with lots of words or bravado. You have to walk the talk.

I helped a group establish a renewed mission and vision for their company. First, we had to talk through how they created their first set of statements, how they outlined the behaviors they expected staff to have, and then how they communicated this to their entire organization.

Previously, they discussed their competition many times but tended to over-analyze how they compare to the other companies. They were trying to be just like the other companies their customers touch instead of understanding how they made the customers feel and replicating the same feelings from their organization. Once everyone recognized this, it started a whole new discussion. You just can’t put words on paper and expect everyone to automatically adopt them into day-to-day behaviors.

Every time a customer comes in contact with your company, you have the opportunity to create value by managing these touch points. These “touch points” of interactions form the impressions of your business. Every front-line employee has to walk the talk because hundreds and even thousands of these touch points happen daily. Nearly all of them are manageable by leaders and create coachable moments.

Specific customer service behaviors should be in your mission statement and your employee’s job descriptions. When you include these into training sessions, you begin integrating them into the hearts and minds of your employees. When it is trained in employees and in their job descriptions, they remember it and work towards it. These ideals aren’t just going to happen by chance; they must be planned for.

There is a lesson on the importance of having things detailed, organized, fast service, doing what we tell the customer, etc. If we take care of our customers, they will take care of us. That is such a simple statement, but it has far-reaching consequences in the business.

Remove Pass the Buck Bill

Nothing upsets a customer more than having an employee tell them to see someone else in the business that created the problem. Putting a customer on hold only to wait and wait for the next person in line to start the conversation all over again doesn’t make those enduring experiences customers expect today. I call those employees, Pass the Buck Bill. 

Passing on the responsibility to another employee or department is a common occurrence, yet; it drives customers away and makes your company just like all the other average ones out there.

Can These Touch Points Be Managed? 

Yes, They Can!

Each employee is a manager of customer relations. Even the janitor, because they come in contact with a customer, so they create an impression of good or bad service. Everyone needs to focus on the customer’s needs even if they don’t deal with or come in contact with the customer. Even a ticked-off customer is everyone’s responsibility. The more you can include your employees in this leadership role, they are more likely will become committed to doing an excellent job.

Every Customer is Heard Through Many Ears.

As a leader, you’ll sometimes get “employee ears” telling you all kinds of negative rhetoric about one department or the other. Someone in one department hears a customer say something about another department, etc. It is difficult to listen to these negative comments and not do something, but at the same time, you have to become aware that there are three sides to every story.

Implementing cross-departmental meetings to discuss customer service starts to create a deeper understanding of individual responsibility.

The idea of having different groups together within the business and discussing “how do we rate today on a scale of one to ten” starts the internal conversations about improving customer service. If one group says they are a seven at greeting customers with a smile, then ask why. This opens the discussion about how to get better tomorrow. Even if you start this out as once a week or once a month, it gives the employees their chance to have their say and make it more personal. This whole process intentionally gives them the power to try to improve.

It would be nice to have this just naturally happen between staff, but that’s not the reality. A leader has to set the tone for customer service. The leader has to walk the talk of leadership and be the change they want to see.

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