Mission & Vision…

The Board of Directors of a non-profit organization I serve on is updating our “Mission & Vision Statements”.  This is the first time I’ve served on a Board.  So far, it’s been quite the process.  Truthfully, I’m uncomfortable and a bit amused.  Is that common when developing a Mission Statement?  Here are thoughts from Dave Carpenter:

I’m somewhat handicapped with this initiative.  Our effort to reach a consensus let alone a conclusion pushes several of my buttons and I’m trying to be mindful of those buttons. 

Thankfully, our Board has several experienced business professionals.  We have plenty of knowledge, opinions, and time to discuss (and debate) what our go-forward Mission & Vision Statements should be.  I know this is important to making progress.  I’m a willing follower; but there are those buttons. 

Like other organizations, our Board would be considered a “committee”.  You see, I’ve never done well with committees.  I’ve always had more of a charge ahead, “let’s get ‘er done” mindset.  However, part of being an appropriate Board member is to participate in our committee decision making approach. 

It didn’t take much of a self-diagnosis.  I understand the source of my discomfort.  To some, a committee decision-making process can sometimes feel like a decision-avoidance process.  And that’s a button many others have felt: 

A committee is twelve men doing the work of one. 

John F. Kennedy 

I know I have those darn buttons.  Throughout my sales career I’ve always been amazed (and oftentimes frustrated) by committee decision making.  It’s going to be all good though.  Each of us is well-meaning and we are volunteering our time and talents for the benefit of the greater organization.  I suppose I have buttons for Mission & Vision Statement development.  I’m not alone with this, particularly in today’s business environment: 

At the top is the mission statement. 

  And it begat the strategy. 

    And the strategy begat the tactics. 

      And the tactics begat the objectives

        that begat the tasks

          that begat the people in cubicles

who no longer beget children because they're working all weekend trying to finish the !@#$-ing assignments they've been given to serve the all-powerful mission statement.                            

Rick Levine 

Reminds me of this “vision” from Elon Musk to “help” his employees work towards the X Mission? 

Much has been said and much has been written about the importance of understanding the Mission & Vision of the company, community, or committee we’re investing our time in these days.  I’m OK with being exposed to this process and learning new skills.  I’m participating to the best of my (limited) ability.  I’m following the lead of my more capable Board members. 

Once we’re through the mission, vision, strategy process, I’ll rev things back up.  I’ll get enthusiastic about the tactical implementation of whatever our outcome is. 

And that includes the “strategy” piece.  Extended discussions about strategy is another one of those darn buttons.  I’m all about execution.   My personal mission, vision, and strategy statements is, “Let’s go sell somebody something - today!”  

A friend and client of mine offered this on LinkedIn: 

1. Comfort is the enemy of progress and achievement.

2. Vision without execution is hallucination. 

3. Prescription without proper diagnosis is malpractice. 

              Michael Meehan 

The good news is I’m out of my comfort zone so maybe I’m making progress.  As to the rest of my committee’s mission, vision, strategy, debate and discussion… Well Dave Carpenter, I’m just trying to make it to the weekend. 

                                                            GAP 

When life gets tough we could get a helmet… or… we could leverage the peace and share the power of a positive perspective. 

Meaning what?

This phrase is attributed to General George S. Patton: 

Say what you mean and mean what you say.

I was chatting with a friend of mine.  OK, “chatting” isn’t what I meant.  He met with me to ask, “What would Gary do?”  So, I should have actually started this piece saying; I was providing professional sales coaching for a friend of mine. 

That happens a lot, true?  I mean – someone says (or writes) one thing but they really mean something else.  In the case with my friend, he recently had a meeting with his sales manager to discuss “Territory Re-Alignment”.  Indeed…  in the sales profession this is a common, annual ritual companies put their salespeople through. 

It goes by many names. Territory Re-Alignment; Territory Equalization; Territory Re-Assignment.  What it actually means is Mr. or Ms. Sales Rep, we are going to shrink your territory. (BTW – raising quota and changing compensation plans often go with “Territory Re-Alignment”.  Thankfully, those extras were not part of my friend’s conversation with his sales manager.) 

There are other business oriented wordsmithing scenarios we are frequently impacted by.  Take price increases.  This century, subscription pricing is all the rage.  I mean – how many emails to you get every day asking you to “sign up” for some product or service that comes with a subscription payment component. 

Here’s one example.  According to Google: 

Today Amazon currently has 200 million Amazon Prime members around the world. If Prime subscribers were a country, it would be the 8th biggest country in the world by population! 

Speaking of our subscriptions and those emails, how did you feel when that notification comes through saying your subscription was now going to include ads?  Of course, for a “Nominal Fee” you could continue your subscription ad free.  Ah yes, “Nominal Fee”.   I use that phrase myself.  What it means is your money gets transferred to the person or entity who used “Nominal Fee”. 

The best phrase I heard around the context of a price increase was used by ADP (the payroll service company) way back in the 1980s.  (I know, Dark Ages!)  ADP was one of the original subscription-priced services.  Similar to all subscription pricing models, it was easy to offer a discount to attract new customers. (Today, that sounds like this, “The NFL Package for FREE!  *First year only”). 

Every year ADP would analyze each customer account; their level of discount; and then calculate a price increase for the upcoming year.  But ADP didn’t call it a “Price Increase”.  Instead, they coined the term “Price Realization”.  What on earth does that mean?  Well it meant the reduction or elimination of the promotional discount and raising the subscription price back to the then-current list price.  And that meant the customer was going to pay more. 

This mis-meaning situation is common in other aspects of our daily life.  Take the medical profession.  This is a piece from comedian Brian Regan and his perspective about what doctors mean with the word  “Pressure” . 

Even our household budgeting can get fouled up with something as seemingly straight forward as math symbols: 

Addendum to Murphy's Law: 

In precise mathematical terms, 1+1 = 2, where "=" is a symbol meaning seldom if ever. 

                                  Unknown Sage 

I guess we have to be careful to clarify what people actually mean these days.  And who knows what to expect when the “machines” (aka “AI” aka “Artificial Intelligence”) take over.  What does “Artificial Intelligence” mean, anyway? 

                                                            GAP 

When life gets tough we could get a helmet… or… we could leverage the peace and share the power of a positive perspective.

Who’s to blame?

Worried about the economy, interest rates, or layoffs in 2024?  Business Owners; if your company’s sales are down, who’s to blame?  

When companies miss their top line revenue and layoffs usually follow.  Not always though: 

Several years ago, a car dealer in St. Petersburg, Florida fired his entire sales force and sales went up twenty six percent. 

Rick Page 

If poor sales performance leads to layoffs, how do we address the problem?  Is it possible sales specialization to blame? 

I’m not a fan of today’s sales specialization or I would say “over specialization”.  It’s much more specialized than “back in my day”.  OK Gary… here it comes… tales from the Dark Ages again?  HaHa!  Fair enough, but hear me out. 

Thinking it’s too hard  aka “too expensive” to hire experienced sales professionals, many companies hire young, inexperienced reps.  They “promote” these new reps into entry level aka “specialized” roles after initial training.  Specialized aka “limited” responsibilities.  These inexperienced reps often perform lead generation/qualification activities on behalf of more senior, experienced sales reps who are also specialized by industry; by prospect size; by product line; or by some other, limited, assignment. 

These senior, experienced sales reps aka “Account Executives” specialize in lead-development and pipeline management aka “deals” vs. customers.  Worse, they’ve lost lead-generation skills aka “prospecting”.  AEs are supported by “Pre-Sales” or other “Subject Matter Experts”.  Lots of specialization going on here, true? 

Poor sales and the proverbial finger pointing begins.  Maybe Marketing is to blame.  Not enough Marketing Qualified Leads aka “MQLs”.  And the debate between marketing and sales continues… 

Some companies invest heavily in sales training and enablement.  So much emphasis that many sales reps - and their managers - don’t personally invest the time and effort it takes to truly become “trained”.  When any of these specialized reps fail, who’s to blame?  Sales training?  Sales reps?  Sales managers? 

Focusing for a moment on those young, inexperienced, new hires coupled with the Department of Unintended Consequences, sales managers receive these reps as “promotes” after their onboarding.  Since the sales manager is not responsible for recruiting, onboarding, and enabling their own sales people, sales managers don’t become skilled in these disciplines.  I ask again, when their sales team fails, who’s to blame?  Recruiting?  Human Resources? 

Then along comes the Account Management Organization; aka “Customer Success Reps”; aka “Farmers”.  AMO reps aren’t “Hunters” so they don’t develop lead-generation skills either.  (See a pattern here?)  Of course, AMO reps must deal with the dissatisfied customer who the AE over-sold.  Since specialized AEs don’t manage the new clients they just over-sold, they don’t develop those professional selling/relationship skills either.  Back to Rick Page: 

If we oversold or under delivered, then it wasn't a sale; it was a lie.  Lying is easy; selling is hard. 

Adding to the matter leaders often don’t inspect what they expect relying instead on that wonderful soundbite “delegate and trust”.  However, when sales performance slips that makes it impossible for them to determine – you guessed it - Who’s to blame? 

I wonder if sales specialization aka “splintering” is to blame.  Does all of today’s specialization get in the way of what the customer really wants?  Mahan Khalsa put it this way: 

Customers want to buy from a business person who sells. 

Sadly, in spite of customer preferences I fear sales specialization is here to stay; at least until the machines aka “AI” take over.  Except perhaps for St. Petersburg, Florida car dealerships. 

GAP 

When life gets tough we could get a helmet… or… we could leverage the peace and share the power of a positive perspective.

Oh No!

Oh yes… Today, let's talk about dieting, HaHa!  I mean it’s that time of the year, true?  January 1^st; New Year Resolutions; this year I’m (finally) going to drop a few pounds.  The health clubs love this time of year even if we don’t. 

I have written often about writing out an annual achievement plan for the upcoming year.  And within that plan I’ve advocated these four quadrants: 

This year, I’m particularly focused on the “Personal Development” quadrant; and within that quadrant specifically, my weight.

You see, I have my annual physical scheduled for later this month.  I can already hear my Doc, “Gary, it would be best if there was a little less of you.”  He asked me once a couple of years ago if I was motivated enough to lose weight.  Although honest, sadly my  response was, “Probably not.”  Turns out, I was “right” which reminds me of the lyric from the Joe Bonamassa song “The Loyal Kind”: 

I knew it all along and I hate when I’m right. 

My Body Mass Index indicates I’m not obese, yay!  I am, however, overweight, boo!  Turns out  being overweight is not a moral victory over being obese.  Consequently, this is the year I’m going to finally do something about it!!! (I hope.)  Ooops – there’s that proverbial caveat, “I hope”.  Reminds me of my favorite book title from Rick Page: 

Hope is not a strategy. 

With hope duly noted, to get started I’m going to pay attention to David C. Myers’ advice: 

A recipe for well-being requires a mix of ample optimism to provide hope, a dash of pessimism to prevent complacency, and enough realism to discriminate those things we can control from those we cannot.

In my recipe of things I can control I know I can’t become complacent.  So I’m going to be particularly cautious about this dash of pessimism: 

I’ve been on a diet for two weeks and all I’ve lost is two weeks. 

Totie Fields  

Yep, I need to commit to the long term; especially because at my age my “long term” is becoming shorter!  I need to create new and better habits.  Thankfully, I have a terrific role model that I can easily follow; my wife.  Bearing two children and following more than five decades since high school, she still looks wonderful!  What’s her secret?  Two things; (1) she only eats when she’s hungry and (2) she doesn’t eat anything after dinner.  That seems like a doable approach doesn’t it?  

It’s simple enough.  Except, of course, when I’m feeling a bit stressed; a bit down; when my feelings take over my rational thinking.  That’s the moment of truth when I need to retain “control”.  Oh, and my therapist was no help: 

My therapist told me a way to achieve peace was to finish things I started.  Today, I finished 2 bags of potato chips, a lemon pie, a fifth of Jack Daniels, and a small box of chocolate candy.  I feel better already! 

Unknown Sage

Kidding aside, weight has become a national issue and the numbers according to the  National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases aren’t pretty.  Especially the  part about more than 1 in 3 men are overweight. 

In 2024 I will (finally) follow my doctor’s advice; be motivated; and achieve!  God willing and with my wife’s continued leadership-by-example, next year at this time there will “be a little less of me”.  Oh no?  Oh YES! 

                                                            GAP 

When life gets tough we could get a helmet… or… we could leverage the peace and share the power of a positive perspective.

"Plenty of time"...

My wife says I watch a lot of sports on TV.  A lot!  Recently, I watched 3 basketball games on one day; 2 NBA and 1 college.  They all shared one thing in common. 

In all 3 games the score was close as the 4th quarter was winding down. The TV commentators for all 3 games kept emphasizing that the team behind had, "plenty of time" to catch up. The commentator for one of the NBA games insisted 55 seconds remaining in the game was an "eternity". 

Know what? All 3 teams that were behind - lost.  As it turned out there wasn't an “eternity”.  Not even “plenty of time” to catch up. 

Since our childhood and the story of Cinderella we have been impacted by managing/missing deadlines at home and work.  Especially at work; especially in the technology industry: 

Golub's Laws of Computerdom 

·         Fuzzy project objectives are used to avoid the embarrassment of estimating the corresponding costs.

·         A carelessly planned project takes three times longer to complete than expected; if carefully planned, it will take only twice as long.

·         Project teams detest weekly progress reporting because it so vividly manifests their lack of progress. 

Unknown Sage 

Even when drastic steps are attempted, our Unknown Sage tells us we will still run out of time: 

            Brooks' First Law 

Adding manpower to a late software project makes it later. 

In the sales profession December is synonymous with “Year End”.  Some salespeople tell themselves that they still have “plenty of time” to catch up on their quota.  Sometimes at “Year End” miracles happen.  Sometimes.  

Although I carried a sales quota for many decades, I vividly remember one year-end in particular.  After a premature promotion I found myself in over my head and time was running out.  That Unknown Sage warned me:

Axiom of Promotions 

What gets you promoted on one level will get you fired on another. 

As a last resort, I employed what I later coined the “Me-or-My-Successor” closing technique: 

After 26 weeks into my 2^nd year, I was put on a “performance warning”.  At the 39^th week, the Vice President of Sales was asking my Sales Manager to fire me.  Since my company had chosen to proactively promote me (perhaps a bit prematurely) at the start of the year, I asked my Sales Manager to give me 52 weeks to sell my annual quota. 

We agreed that at the end of the 52^nd week, if I was still below 100%, I would resign.  At the end of my 51^st week, I was at 75% and significantly behind the required sales dollars necessary to keep my job.  However, I had been working hard on a very large account. 

I called the executive at my prospect and asked, “Do you think you will accept our proposal?”  “Yes”, was his response.  “Excellent, thank you!”  I reacted.  And then I added, “Do you think you could place your order this week?”  When my prospect asked why, I said, “Because if you place your order next week, it will be with my successor.” 

And at the 52^nd weekly sales meeting, with the Vice President of Sales in attendance, I “roll-called” the second largest deal in the Region’s history; finished my 2^nd year at exactly 100% of my quota; and kept my job. 

In sales as in basketball when you find yourself behind - you're BEHIND!  Don't let anyone, not even me, tell you there’s still “plenty of time”. 

                                                            GAP 

When life gets tough we could get a helmet… or… we could leverage the peace and share the power of a positive perspective.

Christ’s birthday…

Today is Christmas!  Of course, Christmas should be more consequential than just one day, true?  Nonetheless, I’m wishing you a day of peace, hope, joy and celebration with family and friends. 

Whatever our spiritual beliefs, may each of us find meaning to our life during this season in a way that lasts throughout the entire year.  While we may not want to look back and celebrate all of what occurred in 2023, a little reminiscing on our blessings is in order.  Then we can look forward to an even better 2024! 

Lest there be any confusion, may we be reminded of that which was important this year, and that which wasn’t. 

We are reminded by bankers to be of good cheer: 

A little boy received a new drum for Christmas.  Shortly thereafter, his father came home from work and the mother told him, “I don’t think the man upstairs likes to hear Georgie play his new drum, but he’s certainly subtle about it.”  “How do you know”? asked the father.  “Well, this afternoon he gave Georgie a knife and asked him if he knew what was inside the drum.” 

Herbert Prochnow

We are reminded by the gospel to be satisfied with who we are not what we bought: 

You’re blessed when you’re content with just who you are – no more, no less.  That’s the moment you find yourselves proud owners of everything that can’t be bought. 

Matthew 5 

We are reminded by the novelists to remember (and be thankful for) our “fortunes”: 

Reflect upon your present blessings, of which every man has many; not on your past misfortunes, of which all men have some. 

Charles Dickens 

And I am reminded to offer His blessings to you and yours from me and mine. 

“Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!” 

GAP

Intensity…

I read Father, Son & Co. My Life At IBM And Beyond © by Thomas J. Watson Jr. recently.  I was hoping the book would concentrate on the “& Co.” part.  Turns out it was more of a biography about Thomas J. Watson and his son T.J.  I noticed Father and Son were “intense” – typical for people who become titans of their industry, true? 

Do you think Elon Musk is “intense” today?  He’s only the richest person in the world according to this list.  I know firsthand that Larry Ellison, co-founder of Oracle Corporation and #5 on the list, is intense.

At the start of my career, IBM was the dominant player in the technology business. In fact, they had been so dominant for so long that the Justice Department filed multiple anti-trust law suits against them for their monopolistic practices.  IBM spent tens of millions, probably hundreds of millions of dollars defending themselves even though their leadership knew they were in fact guilty of the unfair practices they were accused of. 

Fast forward to 2023.  I wrote a piece this year about technology ( Technology; past, present and future…).  So what does a technology titan of last century have to do with the hype and hoopla around Artificial Intelligence today?  Well, I believe it’s the process and NOT the technology that counts.  That was IBM’s opinion, too: 

In the history of IBM, technological innovation often wasn’t the thing that made us successful.  Unhappily there were many times when we came in second.  But technology turned out to be less important than sales and distribution methods.  Starting with UNIVAC, we consistently outsold people who had better technology because we knew how to put the story before the customer, how to install the machines successfully, and how to hang on to customers once we had them… That was where IBM had its monopoly.  No competitors ever paid enough attention to it… 

                   Thomas J. Watson Jr. 

IBM simultaneously mastered (as have other companies) selling the value of their solutions and not just dropping their price in the face of stiff competition.  Mike Weinberg in his book #Sales Truth © put it this way: 

If you need the lowest price to sell, then you aren't needed as a salesperson. 

Think about it – selling inferior technology at profitable price-points.  IBM pioneered the way to do it and had an intensity about their selling process almost unparalleled at the time.  Almost. 

I competed against IBM in a “David vs. Goliath” matchup when I was an application sales rep at Oracle Corporation.  The market was shifting from mainframes (e.g. Goliath) to mini-computers (e.g. David) and I was on the David side.  I felt I had to match IBM’s level of intensity to stand a chance. 

I was selling Oracle Financials Version 1.0.  It was the latest and greatest technology, but we still needed to battle for every deal.  It required a level of intensity which Oracle became famous (perhaps infamous) for. I can remember to this day being called into George Robert’s office when he led the Chicago sales team and being told, “Gary, dial down the intensity”.  I was winning deals but George was concerned about the stress I was putting on myself (and others around me).                                       

Back to 2023… I continue to believe that intensity properly positioned in our selling process beats technological wizardry every day and twice on Sundays! 

OK George, I’m dialing down the intensity now HaHa! 

GAP 

When life gets tough we could get a helmet… or… we could leverage the peace and share the power of a positive perspective.