Do you remember how empowering it was to get a permission slip or a hall pass when you were in school?  Those little pieces of paper, as simple as they were, seemed to hold such great promise. Permission slips A couple of weeks ago we held a sales training session in Phoenix and as we were debriefing afterwards, the idea of permission slips surfaced.  Many of the ideas we presented and challenges we made were around practices and behaviors many in the room already knew they should be doing.  The unbelievably simple reason they hadn’t done so already?  Nobody (including…

I recently had the opportunity to spend three days with some extremely talented high school students, and they completely blew me away with their abilities, focus, presence, and drive.Kevin has talked about recruiting a new generation into the insurance industry and based on what I saw, the talent is readily available, anxious to get started, and extremely well prepared to come in and shake up the traditional way of doing business. Making it happen My daughter is in the DECA club and they’ve been faced with nothing but obstacles this year. Having lost both their marketing class and their advisor,…

This is the fourth of 10 challenges for you to consider embracing to create a new year that is more productive for yourself as well as for those around you.  I have borrowed ideas from a book I read last year, The First 90 Days: Critical Success Stories for New Leaders by Michael Watkins.Read previous challenge articles:First Challenge – Promote yourself Second Challenge – Accelerate Your Learning Third Challenge – Match Strategy to Situation Fourth Challenge – Secure Early Wins Whether you are in a new role or simply looking to perform your current role at a higher level, it’s…

Fire yourself - at least from those activities that deliver you the least amount of value.My brother reminded me recently of a 1989 Wall Street Journal article by Peter Drucker titled “Sell The Mailroom”.  The premise of the article is that organizations should look for those internal functions that, as critical as they are, don’t necessarily lend themselves directly to the organizational purpose.To quote Drucker, “If clerical, maintenance and support work is done by an outside independent contractor it can offer opportunities, respect and visibility. As employees of a college, managers of student dining will never be anything but subordinates.…

This is the third of 10 challenges for you to consider embracing to create a new year that is more productive for yourself as well as for those around you.  I have borrowed ideas from a book I read last year, The First 90 Days: Critical Success Stories for New Leaders by Michael Watkins.Read previous challenge articles:First Challenge – Promote yourselfSecond Challenge – Accelerate Your Learning Third Challenge – Match Strategy to Situation Arriving at your desired destination always has to start with a clear picture of where it is you are currently standing.  If you don’t take the time,…

Networking – different images can come to mind with this loaded word.On the negative side you might picture a tacky cocktail reception with people milling around looking for the next potential sale, not caring at all about the people or their interests.It can also be a powerful word and one that conjures up images of getting closer to your own goals as a result of working together with a group of people all focused on similar outcomes.Networking is a key component to our membership and we design our programs to make it a prominent part of the agenda when we…

We have spent quite a bit of time in this space talking about how you establish the brand you want. A big part of the brand revolves around the things you need to be talking about and where you need to be talking about them.  What you also need to consider and be equally aware of is how much what you don’t say affects your brand, as well. I don’t know if it’s just me, but it seems the general rules of professionalism and communication protocol have become very loose, or abandoned altogether.  All too frequently, I experience the following:…

This is the second of 10 challenges for you to consider embracing to create a new year that is more productive for yourself as well as for those around you.  I have borrowed ideas from a book I read last year, The First 90 Days: Critical Success Stories for New Leaders by Michael Watkins.Read previous challenge articles:First Challenge – Promote yourself. Second Challenge – Accelerate Your Learning If you have committed to being a professional, whether you did it consciously or not, you committed to a lifetime of learning.   And I don’t just mean the learning that comes with experience. …

It’s a new year, which always means a fresh start, new opportunities, and, hopefully for you, a new role.  And while most of you aren’t formally taking on new leadership roles, I would like to suggest that you increase the scope and impact of whatever role you currently fill in your organization to the point of it effectively being a “new role” for you.  Over the next several weeks, I will touch on 10 challenges you should consider as you embrace a 2012 that will allow you to have a greater impact on your own responsibilities and results, as well…

We’ve done a lot of reading this year, and while we’ve gotten something out of everything we’ve read, we have a few favorites we’d especially like to share with you. If you’re interested in seeing our full lists with some additional commentary, check out our reading lists on each of our LinkedIn profiles (Kevin on LinkedIn, Wendy on LinkedIn).Also there are a few books that we’ve talked about in previous posts (here, here, and here), so we didn’t feel there was a need to include those again. The Challenger Sale: Taking Control of the Customer Conversation – by Matthew Dixon,…