Tag Archives: Sales

Enhancing Training Effectiveness thro’ the Law of Diffusion of Innovation

Any form of training is ultimately a change management program where the organization expects its executives to approach a problem with a different behaviour, attitude, or a skill. In a highly competitive market where customers are spoilt for choice, the main challenge for salespeople is to effectively demonstrate the value of their products and services to handle the discount issue. There are two approaches in scheduling a training program: a conventional Giving-on-a-Platter (platter) approach and a rarely practised Earning-One’s-Stripes ( Stripes) approach. The following example will compare and contrast both the approaches.

Aristo India is a leading manufacturer of sliding wardrobes and kitchen cabinets with HO at Bangalore. Mr. Kuruvilla Kurian, the Sales Director had a different approach to having a Value-Selling training for his pan-India team which include:

Voluntary Participation: Only those salespeople who are interested can apply for the program. In a Conventional Platter approach, attendance is compulsory as decided by the senior management and HR.
Efforts prior to Participation: Application for a training program does not guarantee enrolment. Each applicant needs to write a 500-words essay to articulate one’s raison d’ etre. The essay was carefully evaluated by Ms. Sudipta Shetty, Head-CRM to understand the applicant’s sincerity and the originality of thought. – In a platter approach, there are no efforts. Participants either click on a link to register or fill up a form for enrolment.
Post-Training Implementation: Based on their essays, a 2-day program titled Value-Selling of Premium Wardrobe Solutions was designed. During the program commencement, the participants stated the challenges which were predominantly external factors like customers do not listen, they are price sensitive, they are interested only in discounts etc. During the training program, the participants underwent role plays simulating the real-life situations. By the program conclusion it was shown that some of the problems had an internal locus of control for the sales team like inappropriate body language of the seller, miscommunication, lack of probing, listening etc. The videographed role plays were replayed with exhaustive debriefing.

Post training, Kuru and Sudipta decided that conducting similar role plays for each region internally could be a better way of enhancing the learning effectiveness. Sudipta took the initiative in arranging the same. A review session with the trainer on a virtual platform was subsequently arranged for implementation of the action plan.

In the platter approach, normally the program gets concluded with a standard feedback form.

THE DIFFUSION OF INNOVATION theory describes the pattern and speed at which innovative ideas, practices, or products spread through a population which can be correlated in the present article to bringing a cultural change (in beliefs, attitude, values etc.) through training. The main players in a group are classified as innovators, early adopters, early majority, late majority, and laggards. The new ideas are adopted sequentially first by the innovators and lastly by the laggards.

Innovators ( 2.5%) : They are willing to risk and accept any new ideas.
Early Adopters( 13.5%) : Are already aware of the need to change and are comfortable adopting new ideas.
Early Majority (34%) : They need the evidence that the innovation works before willing to adopt it.
Late Majority ( 34%): They are sceptical of change and will only adopt if it has been tried by the early majority.
Laggards ( 16%): Are bound by tradition and are conservative.

The characteristics of the Platter approach are:

It targets the entire population irrespective of their intent and the degree of willingness to change.
Being mandatory it may degenerate into an ‘event’ in terms of food, ambience, entertainment thro fun/videos and freebies for the majority (early and late) and the laggards.
A CHRO from a renowned construction company shared that their managers are interested only in branded programs from IIMs where the main motive is certification.
Quite often the line managers are reluctant to nominate their reportees for the program complaining that it affects the completion of their immediate tasks. I am not sure whether they too belong to the majority and the laggards.

How does the stripes approach differ from the platter approach? The former targets only the early adopters rather than the entire group. It also does not link training program to certification, promotion, or increments but only to the interest and the initiative of the participant. The diffusion of training to other segments like majority and laggards is ultimately decided by the program quality and the way the early adopters spread the message.

The platter approach makes training mandatory treating all the subgroups like early adopters, late majority, laggards in the same bracket whereas the stripes approach creates a demand for training. The first batch of Value Selling program for Aristo India was targetted for the early adopters. This in turn has created so much buzz that others are willing to enrol for the second batch but only after going through the rigour of an essay and a selection process. Remember, anything that is given on a platter is never valued. The difference between the two approaches is summarized in the table below.

PLATTER VS STRIPES APPROACH


	Platter	Stripes
Management Paradigm	Training is mandatory	Training is optional
Target Segment	Random, no specific target	Early Adopters
Enrolment	By Default	Selection thro’ an Essay
Participant Mindset	Reactive	Proactive
Locus of Control	External like certification	Internal – Job Enrichment
Efforts by HR	Normal	Extensive
Buy-in from the non-attendees	Not Applicable	Creates demand depending on the program quality and the buzz.

Should You address your customer as Sir/Madam?

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“Sir, do you have any requirement of centrifuges?” Said Biswas during one of the role-plays in our Value-Selling Programs. My partner, Ramiah Daniels and I have been questioning this habit of sales and service people addressing customers as Sir/Madam (rather than by the latter’s name) for quite a while. The common justifications provided by the participants are:

Customer feels respected.
Easy to build rapport during client interaction.
Customer has to be treated like God.

Can we question the veracity of the above statements?

As indicated in the figure, the behaviour displayed that is visible is like the tip of the iceberg. What might be the attitude, belief or paradigm underneath ( and thus invisible) such words?

Legacy of the colonial mindset: On similar lines, It was customary to address the judge as My Lord by the lawyers, the practise which has been slowly dispensed with.
Shift in Power structure: As a salesperson when you address the other person as Sir/Madam, you are handing the control to the other person by putting him/her on a pedestal.
NLP Perspective: The basic premise of Neuro-Linguistic Programming, NLP is your body physiology ( neural system -N which include your posture, breathing rate and the way – shallow, normal, or deep, eye contact, the skin resistance etc.) is determined by thoughts/belief system and by the words ( Linguistic – L ) you use. The NEURAL affects the LINGUISTIC and vice versa. Both simultaneously run a specific behaviour pattern which becomes your dominant behaviour which is the programming (P). The eye contact is evasive; the voice tone being less confident, displays the obsequious and the servile approach of the salesperson. Is it fair enough to assume that by addressing someone as Sir/Madam by default, the salesperson has already lost half the battle?
Less Effort: When you address someone as Sir/madam; the salesperson does not have to take any effort in asking as well as remembering the full name of the customer.
Low Self Esteem: The salesperson feels he/she is the prime beneficiary in a business transaction by collecting the order, which in turn helps him in reaching the sales targets leading to a low self-esteem.

If the customer were to be God, does he behave the same way while negotiating hard on the price and the payment terms?

Is there a better way of addressing the customer by his name? The conventional norm is either prefix Mister with the Surname, or address by the first name. For example, while meeting a prospect say, Ramiah Daniels, you may say, “would you prefer to be addressed as Mr. Daniels, or Ramiah?” I doubt the customer says, ”you better address me as Sir.”

There are several advantages when you address the customer by name:

Confident Behaviour: Your body language, eye contact evokes confidence. Your handshake is firm.
Respect from the Customer: The customer reciprocates with similar respect to the salesperson.
Improved Customer Engagement: You may be able to connect with the customer when you listen to his full name carefully. Almost a decade back, I was having a meeting with one Mr. Reginald Borges who was the GM at APW president then. When enquired about his relationship with Dr. Ernest Borges he said, “ Happens to be my distant uncle.” Incidentally Dr. Ernest Borges was a renowned cancer surgeon at the Tata Memorial Hospital in whose memory a road ( at the beginning of a 2-km stretch in Parel) has been named.
Higher Self-Esteem: Remember, in any business transaction, the customer also enjoys the benefits of the products over a long duration which can help a salesperson raise his self-esteem.

Is there anything wrong in addressing someone as Sir? Not at all- if you are meeting someone reverential, exceptionally talented or to whom you have great admiration and respect, please follow your natural instincts.

Barring the above exceptions, is it possible to inculcate the Ritz Carlton philosophy while interacting with regular customers: ‘Ladies and Gentlemen serving ladies and gentlemen?’

P.S.To explore more such learning insights visit: Value-Selling for Premium Products and Solutions commencing on 11th January 2022

Acquiring New Customers through Contextual Selling

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Thursday, 25^th June 2020 at 11 AM (IST)

Perspective: The success rate in conventional cold calls is less than 5%. Thanks to internet and with easy availability of information coupled with Covid-19 crisis, your potential customers are wary of meeting unknown salespeople; whether on-line or in person.

When the competition is a mouse click away, retaining old customers becomes a challenge. However it is only through new customers that organizations and salespeople can hope to achieve growth. The practical webinar will show you not only the roadblocks but also powerful techniques to reach out to new customers!!

Major Themes:

Shift in Customer Loyalty due to multiple vendors
Imperative for Continuous acquisition of new Customers
Business Etiquette while selling ON-LINE and in person
Why are new prospects wary of talking to unknown salespeople?
Stereotypes associated with Salespeople
Breaking the stereotypes through Trust & Rapport Building
Intent, Competence and Commonality: Toolkit to enhance Sales call success
Role of reference and recommendations in acquiring new customers

Resource Person: Rajan Parulekar, B.E. (Electrical), MBA

Author of Contextual Selling®: A New Sales Paradigm for the 21^st century
Completed Enhancing Sales Force Performance program at IIM-A in February 2013
Trained around 15,000 managers and sales executives from 1000+ companies since 1995.
Conducted programs for culturally diverse groups in India, Malaysia, Singapore Sri Lanka, Qatar, Muscat, Bangla Desh etc.
Best Sales Performance in Asia award while working for Wiltron USA in 1990
Winner of International Taped Speech Contest by Toastmasters Int’l USA in 1997
Worked with Larsen & Toubro, Wiltron and Toshniwal in Sales and Marketing
Advanced Toastmaster (ATM) certified by TMI USA.

For Whom: The program is recommended for sales executives selling high-value products, services and solutions from Automobiles, Engineering Products, Chemicals, capital Equipments, Electronics, Telecom, IT ( Software and hardware) sector. The program may not be suitable for OTC/FMCG sales.

Investment: Rs.1950/-, US$ 40 per person.

Payment Mode: NEFT/Credit card/Google Pay: +91 98802 36793/PayTM: +91 98450 14098

For details : contact : rajan@paradigm-info.com, madhura@paradigm-info.com

WhatsApp: +91 98802 36793/98450 14098

Paradigm Trainers Private Limited| https:// http://www.paradigm-info.com

Reason and Excuse: The Crucial Difference

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Amit, a participant who had attended my sales training program around four years back called me over phone two days back.

A: Sir, I am working for a small Indian company selling Test and Measuring Instruments (TMI) What is the secret that our competitors, the giant multinational companies, go on consistently getting orders from customers beating us all the time? I know they have technically superior products. But are their sales engineers likewise?

I: Amit: such companies not only have a good product range but also have a systematic sales and a training process.

A: Now I understand why the salespeople from MNCs are so good.

I: But is that your real question? What is bothering you?

A: My main worry is, how do I improve my order booking performance? I am not sure of my job in these difficult times.

I: what is the reason?

A: I come from small town called Akola, working in a company which does not have a great brand. On top of that, our company does not spend much on training either. I am so passionate about attending training programs and learning new things.

I: You said you have attended my training program four years back. After attending did you ever felt like clarifying your doubts or getting new insights from the trainer?

A: No sir, I was extremely busy with my work.

I: Did you ever get time to refer to the course material?

A: No sir.

I: You said, your company does not believe in training, but you have attended my program.

A: Yes sir, that was an exception.

I: If I am not mistaken, along with the course material, I had presented a copy of my book Contextual Selling?

A: Yes Sir, I have started reading the book now. It is quite interesting.

I: After four years?

A: Now I am having some time. All these days there was absolutely no time.

I: Did you pay for the training program?

A: No sir, the training program was sponsored by the company, and the course material as well as the book was a part of it.

I: So you did not buy the book either!

A: Sir that is OK, being from a small town, I have an inherent disadvantage compared to my counterparts from competition who are from metros. They have all the exposure and opportunities.

I: Out of the three legendary Khans in Bollywood, who have the advantage of lineage and pedigree?

A: Obviously it is Amir and Salman.

I: Anyone who did not have such an advantage while entering the industry?

A: I think it was a Shahrukh.

I: Any other examples you can think of who have made it big and carved out a niche?

A: Irrfan Khan, what a great actor he was!

I: Anybody beyond the Khans?

A: I think of Nawazuddin Siddiqi, Ayushman Khurana etc.

I: You said you belonged to a small town which was your main disadvantage. Can you think a of a cricketer from a small town and still made it big?

A: Is it Dhoni from Ranchi?

I: You are right. Which year did you complete your engineering?

A: In 2008.

I: Did you attend any training programs or self-development activities for the last 10 years?

A: No

I: Did anyone prevent you from attending such programs?

A: No. But I feel training the executives should be the responsibility of the company.

I: Why?

A: Ultimately it helps to reach the company goals.

I: Do you have monthly, quarterly, and annual targets?

A: Yes.

I: Do you deserve to get your commission, incentive or bonus (whatever is applicable) if you were to reach your targets?

A: Certainly

I: Do you feel good quality training can help you improve your sales. Negotiation and communication skills?

A: Yes.

I: Amit, in that case, can you see that you also need to take responsibility for your development.

A: I can see your point.

I: Let us look at a concept of Locus of Control.

Locus of control states that the degree of stress perceived by a person depends on the control (or the lack of it) that he/she has on the situation. The cause of the stressor may be seen as stable or unstable, global or specific, and internal or external.

1.Stable and Unstable causes are enduring and temporary, respectively. My competition is always going to have an upper hand is an example of stable interpretation.

2. Global and Specific causes are relevant to many events or to a single occasion, respectively. E.g. Competition products are technically superior, is an example of global interpretation.

3. Internal or External causes indicate personal characteristics and behaviors or the result of environmental forces, respectively. E.g. I feel inferior because I am from a small town and not trained is an example of internal representation.

The more stable and global the cause of a stressor seems, the more people feel and behave as though they are helpless. Likewise, the more internal the cause of a stressor seems, the worse people feel about themselves. Together, these feelings and behaviors contribute to a depressive reaction to the stressor. Let us look at an example:

It is not advisable to take either of the extreme positions (Global or Specific, Stable or Unstable etc.) but should be treated as a continuum where a combination of both can be thought of.

Test & Measuring Instruments (TMI) range consists of products like Oscilloscopes, Logic Analyzers, Protocol Analyzers, Signal Generators etc. TekEdge was considered as a market leader in TMI in general and Oscilloscopes in particular. There was a small company called Le Croy which had some unique offerings in Protocol Analyzers. However the company was much smaller to TekEdge. Analogous to David Vs Goliath battle, the Le Croy engineers while making an offer used to intentionally keep their price low vis-à-vis TekEdge offer.

A new manager called Santosh wanted to question the Global paradigm of TekEdge being superior in all respects. To one of his clients, he quoted a price which was $1000 more than the competition. When the customer questioned Santosh’s logic, he said, “even though my competition is big in the overall TMI market, my company has a unique advantage in the niche Protocol Analysers segment which is tailormade to your application. Santosh changed his paradigm from Global to Specific and was able to close the order with a premium.

Another example: consider a case where a guy’s girlfriend breaks up with him and he thinks that his love life is always in the dumps (i.e., a stable interpretation), that nobody really cares about him (i.e., a global interpretation), and that he must not be a dateable guy (i.e., an internal interpretation). Such an interpretation could contribute to a depressive reaction, such as him coming to the conclusion that he might as well not try because there is nothing he can do about it and that he is pretty much a lost cause.

I: I hope you might have understood the concept of Locus of Control and that your interpretation (of your competition, your company, customers and yourself) being stable, global & internal was causing you considerable stress. Would you agree with that?

A: Yes.

I: I shall ask you three simple questions, One, what was your original problem?

A: Sir, my original or the surface problem was: What makes the sales engineers from competition so successful?

I: What was the actual or the fundamental problem beneath the surface problem?

A: How should I improve my performance?

I: What is the root cause?

A: I am lazy. What I felt as genuine reasons were excuses. I need to take responsibility for my development.

As human beings we go on telling a number of lies to others, but rarely do we recognize the lies we tell ourselves!

Rajan Parulekar, rajan@paradigm-info.com,

Behavioral Dynamics of Personal Selling

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To understand the salespeople’s attitudes and beliefs towards salesmanship; a questionnaire used to be administered during the Sales Training program commencement. One of the questions said, ‘In a sales call who should talk more? Customer or the Salesperson?’ Majority of them voted for the latter. In a sample size of 285 participants, around 78% participants responded that they feel that they speak for 80% or more during a sales call.

The interesting part was the above statement was perceived by the group as a positive correlation to sales success. When probed deeper about the reasons for dominating the conversations the answers given by the group were:

To Engage with the customer
To educate the customer.
As I know more about my products, I have to talk more.
To beat the competition.
To close the order fast.
As the time given by customer is very short, I have to speak as much as possible.

After taking the groups through a psychological process called Cognitive Dissonance, which is a gap between the beliefs and the reality, the participants were shown that the above are apparent reasons and the real reasons why salespeople tend to dominate conversation is out of fear ( of rejection ) and the desperation to sell!

Let us try to understand the above language from a Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) perspective. The language verbalized by the salespeople is not the reality but is the map of an individual. The map is not the territory. The map is arrived at by three universal modelling processes which are Generalization, Deletion and Distortion. If there is a close approximation between the map and the territory then the salesperson is able to perform successfully in his given role.However with a great divergence, the perceptions will be flawed and he may not be able to achieve his quotas.

The above modelling processes have their validity and relevance in day -today life. However they may also create the problems depending on the context.

Generalization: Generalization is the process by which elements or pieces of person’s model of the world become detached from their original experience and come to represent the entire category of which the experience is an example.* ( Leslie Cameron, Bandler 1985, p224) When a person has learnt a process, say of driving a car, he moves from unconscious incompetence to conscious competence. While coming out of the garage, he knows to put the reverse gear, turn the car, change the gear and put on the accelerator without looking down. In a way he need not have to learn the activities every time he drives the car. In a similar manner from a sales perspective, when an executive goes for a sales call, majority of the activities are common like introduction of the self and the company, ice breaking, understanding the client needs etc.

However the dysfunctional aspects of generalization happen when he goes through some setbacks when the self -talk revolves around the following statements: Today, you can sell only on price. Clients don’t respect my time. They buy only from competition.

Deletion: Deletion is the process by which people selectively pay attention to certain aspects of their experience and exclude others. This allows them to focus the awareness and attend to one portion of their experience over others. This process makes coping possible and protects them from being overwhelmed by external stimuli *( Leslie Cameron – Richard Bandler 1985, p225)

Some of the examples of deletion are the ability to focus on a book in the drawing room when TV is blaring and children playing. Another example is when you are in a party with a group of people and you are talking to an important client over phone. The negative examples of deletion is self-talk by a Salesperson: John does not respect quality products.

Distortion: Distortion is the process which allows people to make shifts in how they experience sensory data. Without this process, they could not plan for the future or dream into reality.

Positive Examples: fantasy allows a salesperson winning the Best Sales Performance Award which motivates him to push harder; abstract and surrealist paintings by Picassos and Dalis are other examples of distortion. The dysfunctional examples of distortion are: A successful salesman in the past who is reprimanded for his abysmal performance in the last three quarters says, “I am perfect.”When he has lost order due to poor follow-up he says , “ that’s because the design department didn’t give me the specifications in time.”

From the above it can be observed that modelling processes discussed above are not good or bad per se. Generalization prevents us from reinventing the wheel on a day-today basis, deletion helps to focus on important issues and distortion helps us to be creative.

Let us look at the number of categories where the salespeople can get into a self-defeating mode and the ways the seniors, mentors can help them come out of it.

Sr. No.	Deviation	Example (as verbalized by a Salesperson)	Challenge (as perceived by the Sales Manager)
1.	Simple Deletion	I am tense	About whom. what?
2.	Comparative Deletion	Competition offers better product and at a lesser price.	Better in what way? Price how much lesser?
3	Lack of referential index	Their salesmen are trained.	Who are they?
4	Cause and Effect	I have lost orders because Dinesh from Pre-sales did not give the support.	Have all the orders been lost because of Dinesh? What about those orders which you have won? Any body apart from Dinesh you can contact?
5	Presupposition	I talk more because I know my products are better than my competitor.	Does the customer buy because of your product or has he a problem to solve?
6	Mind Reading	My manager does not like me. Customer is biased towards competition	How do you know that?
7	Nominalization (Event to be converted into a process for more possibilities)	I am a poor negotiator.	Is it possible to improve your ability to negotiate?
8	Modal Operator of Necessity	I have to achieve my quota this quarter.	Can you choose to achieve your quota? (Less anxiety)
9	Modal Operator of Possibility	I can’t share the LOST ORDER statement with my manager.	What happens if you share? (worst-case scenario) Instead of can’t what happens if you won’t?
10	Complex Equivalent	Customer hates me… he yells at me.	Are you sure his yelling means he is hating you?

It may be noted this is an indicative list to identify the mental roadblocks faced by the young salespeople. The sales manager or the HR manager is advised not to use the challenges in an indiscriminate manner; lest the damage may be caused to the young executive. An adequate amount of credibility and trust which needs to be created by the manager which will enable the executive to make the necessary behavioural changes in reaching the designated goals.

For more such experiential insights please attend our On-line Program on: Value Selling for Premium Products and Solutions : 3rd -11th April ( 4 Sessions) : https://paradigm-info.com/training-programs

Rajan Parulekar , Paradigm Trainers Private Limited, rajan@paradigm-info.com , 98450 14098

Putting your best foot forward- Does it work all the time?

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As a startup founder, if you were to make a presentation to your potential investors, with an opening slide: Few Reasons why you should NOT Invest in our Company, what would be the outcome? You would sum it up as nothing but a disaster!

Rufus Groscom and Alisa Volkman started a company in the US called Babble which was an online magazine with blog network. The company had positioned on the new paradigm of parenting by challenging the dominant parental clichés. In 2009 when they approached for the Venture Capital (VC) funding, their first slide was: Five reasons why not to invest in Babble. They received a $3.3 Mn funding.

Looks a bit counterintuitive! Isn’t it? Normally the convention is to highlight your strengths which works well when your target audience is either neutral or has a positive disposition towards your offerings. But does a typical investor look upon you in a similar way?

Just imagine when you say that you have a ‘killer idea’ and that you will reach your breakeven in the first year and will scale up to 20x revenue in the next two years what must be going on in the investors’ mind? Rather than getting impressed, a conventional sales pitch is normally looked down with scepticism. The investor is also operating from a position of strength which is due to the funds at his disposal as well as the number of ‘killer ideas’ he has encountered in the past. Psychologically he is tuned to find out the follies in your sales pitch. What happens when you take a counterintuitive approach of focussing on your weaknesses?

You create Trust: When you put your cards on the table you look vulnerable which makes you look trustworthy. Your investor feels that if you are speaking about something wrong, there might be a lot of things you may be doing right. You are perceived with a positive intent. In the conventional sales pitch, the intent is perceived as getting the funding by hook or by crook! (for details refer Trust: The Difference that Creates the Difference, from Contextual Selling)
You look smart: You may speak about your strengths but if they are hyped the investor may feel you are beating your own trumpets. However, when you critique yourself, you may be perceived as smart.

Teresa Amabile, professor of Business administration at the Harvard Business School conducted an experiment on how a writer is perceived by her audiences. A sample of a New York Times book review was taken. The book review which was primarily of a complimentary nature was modified with a critical tone; major part of the content remaining the same. Minor modifications were made from inspiring to uninspiring, tremendous impact to negligible impact etc.

People rated the ‘critical’ reviewer 14% more intelligent and having 16% greater literary expertise vis-à-vis the ‘complimentary’ reviewer. After all an amateur can appreciate art but only a professional can critique it!

Objections are Pre-empted: There are two groups who have been given a task of identifying reasons for being happy. Group A has to list three reasons whereas group B has to list for 12 reasons. Which group according to you should be happier between the two? Most of us would opt for group B.

Norbert Schwarz (Professor, Department of Psychology, University of California) in his article Ease of retrieval as information has given an interesting example on Availability Heuristics. Also called as availability bias, it refers to the mental short cuts that come to people’s mind while evaluating and solving a problem. Group A may think the reasons of happiness can be attributed to spouse, children and the career. The available answers which were quick to find makes them happy. Group B may explore possibilities beyond the first three which may include vacation, hobbies etc. but may find it hard to reach the magical number of 12 and they start questioning themselves whether they are happy in the first place or not. So, the counterintuitive answer is A.

Looking at the Startup founder’s admission about his challenges the investor now has to struggle hard to find out new problems (as those have been already pre-empted in the first slide) and he concludes that the startup’ s problems are not that significant!

Coming back to the Babble story, a few years later Rufus and Alisa approached Disney for a takeover. The opening slide was: Why you should NOT buy Babble? And the reasons included

Poor user engagement,
Only 3-page views per visit
despite being a parenting website 40% of posts were from celebrities etc…

Disney bought Babble for $40 Mn.

A note of caution: Aspects like technology model, IP, revenue stream, scaling, breakeven, competition, manpower cost, future disruption etc are going to be equally important and the presenter needs to be focusing on the strengths too. The article only wishes to point out that speaking about the negatives may be also relevant at appropriate times!

Rajan Parulekar, rajan@paradigm-info.com

Achieving expertise also depends on the domain!

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Why is there a gap between efforts executives put and the results they get? The linkage between the improvement in one’s skills vis-à-vis the efforts put can be termed as structure of growth.

Last two weeks I was conducting training programs on Effective Value Selling for Capital Equipments which were in the price range of Rs. 50 L to Rs. 1crore.( Approx. $100k-200K) Selling of CNC machines involves considerable technical complexity and the sales engineers need to understand the customer behaviour in a sensitive manner. For most of the participants, I perceived a huge gap between the job role and the skill set possessed.

Remember the adage, practise makes a man perfect. Generally it is assumed that the improvement of a skill is directly proportional to the efforts, time spent and the intelligence of a person which is partially true. But it also depends on the domain in which one is working. Most of the domains may have the following types of growth structure. There are a number of growth structures but the major ones are: Logarithmic, Exponential and Sinusoidal ( Please refer figure: growth figures )

Logarithmic Growth: Here one tends to get visible results during the initial phases of activity. But the growth becomes harder as you go along. For example, in athletics running 100 metres in 14-15 seconds looks an achievable task for a beginner. Chopping off the next second or two is relatively easy. But to break the 10 second barrier only athletes at international level can achieve. One needs to be an Usain Bolt to reach a figure of 9.79 seconds where the runner up can be behind by just hundredth of a second. Same is true in cricket where a cricketer can scores a century on debut and become a celebrity but then it is only people like Sachin Tendulkar who go on reinventing their styles and techniques even after reaching a few milestones.

The first phase of logarithmic growth is steep and success comes easily. The second phase is like a plateau where the rate of growth slows down considerably. (refer figure a. logarithmic growth)

Thanks partly to media hype, you see such growth in music ( with pop stars, Little Champs in Saregamapa shows etc.) and in sports like IPL Cricket. With some talent and average efforts some people in such domain, become instant celebrities overnight. The real challenge is in phase 2 where you need to maintain your disciplined habits. You need to move away from your regular routine and break away from those habits. You can even develop a technique which may be beyond the textbook. Tiger Woods reinvented his swing in the second phase.

Exponential Growth: There are some fields where one needs to put lot of hard work initially and the results will not be visible for considerable time. Mastering a field like Physics, computer science, music takes a hell lot of time. In the HBR Article titled The Making of an Expert by Anders Ericsson, Michel Pretula and Edward Cokely, the authors propose that to master a particular field it takes around 10,000 hours of systematic efforts. The results may not be visible initially so one needs to have lot of patience (refer figure b. phase 1 of exponential growth ). And one day, a miracle happens. Suddenly things fall in place and what you were struggling all these days and years, the obvious answers are revealed. The pieces of jigsaw puzzle get into the right place. Kekule developed the model of Benzene ring in his dreams by correlating a serpent swallowing his own tail, Einstein worked on his special theory of relativity for a number of years as a clerk in a Swiss patent office. Marie Curie had to process tonnes of pitchblende in inclement weather and in an ordinary laboratory for a number of years before extracting a few milligrams of radium. Science whether applied or pure is a typical example where the structure of growth is exponential. Einstein, Kekule or Marie Curie did not get the success overnight but had enough perseverance to sustain the phase 1

Sinusoidal Growth: Fields like spiritual growth are neither exponential nor logarithmic. You do not start your spiritual journey as your hobby or for earning a livelihood/achieving fame. ( with the exception of fake gurus,babas & bapus ) It only comes out of genuine suffering or existential dilemmas of life. ( Refer figure c. Sinusoidal Growth ) It is said if you have not suffered a breakdown you may not get a breakthrough. Initially you start from a negative state, you may get results for some time, again you fall down and each time you raise the bar. Siddharth Gautam had to experiment with different techniques that were available in his time from the age of 30, and by 36 he realized chasing the techniques itself was a mirage and he was enlightened to realize his Buddha nature.

Each field may have either one or combination of the above growth structures. So to be an expert and an authority in a specific domain, it is not only important what traits you carry ( which is your DNA ) but to see whether there is a synergy between your traits and structure of your domain.

Remember, Vinod Kambli and Sachin Tendulkar had similar talent. Sachin could sustain in the phase 2 of logarithmic growth; Kambli could not.

As a professional remember, a formal education at the university does you no harm, provided you start learning there afterwards. It is simply beyond attending a 2-day company sponsored training program.

Ground-rules for Implementing Key Account Management

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Can I send Salil, my Sales executive, age 23 years for the Key Account Management programs? said Jagdish,,Sales Manager of an engineering company. I had to tell him the following aspects which determines the ground rules for implementing Key Account Management (KAM)

Needs a Different Mindset: Successful Companies who have implemented KAM look at it as a Strategic way of doing business and not a sales activity. You need to have commitment to work with priority customers differently. For example Supply Chain management can be an integral part of KAM
Commitment from Top Management: It cannot happen at the Sales Manager’s level. The buy-in has to be at the CEO, CMO, VP-Sales level. The sr. people should sponsor at least 1-2 such accounts and interact/visit them regularly.
Select the Right Person: Maturity is the most important attribute while selecting the Key Account Manager. It is not necessary that your top-performing salesman can become a good Key account Manager. He has to be more of a generalist with good understanding of finance, inventory, planning, influencing skills and the ability to see the big picture. A typical salesperson who is desperate to close order may be a misfit. One key competency is to understand the customer’s business beyond his immediate requirement.
Identify Key Accounts Carefully: Lynette Ryalls in a HBR article says the number of accounts should be within 5-25. Even a company like Xerox does not have more than 100 customers as Key Accounts.
Appoint and Train the KAM: The communication and influencing skills of the Key Account Manager has to be exceptionally good. He should be able to talk technicality at lower levels as well the macroeconomic environment, the interest rate with CFO and CEO comfortably.
Put the right Metrics: He should not be judged on top-line results. In case of rate contracts with low margins when the cost of servicing a key account is high, the consequences can be disastrous. Performance should be judged more by the margins or net contribution. Another yardstick can be the lifetime value of the customer.
Rework on the KAM cases every six months: All major accounts need not be key accounts. There are some unique parameters on which you should decide which customer remains in the Key account basket and those who need to be taken away.

How Culture affects your Context and Behaviour

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A number of readers ask me the significance of the word Context in my book Contextual Selling. Generally speaking American, European cultures are considered to be low context cultures whereas the Asian cultures like Japanese, Chinese, Indian are considered as high-context cultures.

Social Psychologist Richard Nisbett says that the orientation towards independence (low-context) or interdependence ( high-context ) actually decides the cognitive processes of thinking, decision making etc. In one of his experiments, a group of American and Japanese people were shown images which consisted of a big fish and a number of small fish with sea weeds around. The Americans were able to recollect the big fish; the Japanese more of the small fish and the seaweeds. That background of any situation can be termed as the context.

In the low-context cultures your communication has to be clear and to the point. People are individualistic and perceive themselves as being unique, self-made and autonomous. The communication is understood at a binary level yes/no, black/white 0-1 etc. In a business meeting involving Americans/Germans, you talk business and come to the point straight. If he does not want to buy your product he may say , “ Sorry I do not want to buy your product.” On the contrary, in Asian cultures, there are shades of grey between black and white. Remember, when an Indian client tells you, “we shall get in touch with you”. You need not necessarily take him at face value. The meanings can vary from: you may go now, I do not like the product/your demeanour, I am busy, I have already bought it from your competitor etc. That means one need to read between the lines in Asian culture. You not only have to hear what your customer says but also what his body language conveys. In case there is a divergence between his body language and the words; better believe the body language.

Independence is the hallmark of low-context, In high context culture there is equal (sometimes more) emphasis on other people’s opinion, the interdependence. Now do you know why we value others’ opinion more than us? And why most of the career options for students get narrowed down to engineering and medicine. If it is matrimony, then the bride has to fair and lovely no matter whether the groom is pitch dark.

Hazel Rose Markus, another social psychologist carried out an experiment at the San Francisco international airport. He had kept four blue and one orange pens at a counter to fill up the immigrations form. The US/Europeans picked up the orange pen which was distinct. The Asians picked up the Blue which was more common.

Thomas Talhelm, a psychologist from University of Virginia has made an interesting hypothesis in his article in Science in May 2014. He says the culture whether having high or low context is linked to farming of rice and wheat.

Rice which is mainly grown in Asia needs complex irrigation system, standing water which needs to be drained out every season. One farmer’s use of water may affect the other’s farm which gives rise to an interdependent paradigm. Wheat on the other hand, generally requires only rainfall and needs half the effort of that growing of rice. It also needs less of coordination and cooperation. ( Remember the giant mechanized wheat farms in the US?)

To test his hypothesis of wheat and rice corresponding to Independence and interdependence mindsets, he carried out an experiment in China. Wheat is grown in the northern side of Yangtze river, whereas rice is a major crop on the southern side. Talhelm asked the two groups to identify two common items from bus, train and a rail track. The people from north identified bus and train which are modes of transport ( low context) whereas people from the south side identified rail and rail track having commonality. ( High-context) when asked to draw pictures of self and others the farmers from north showed a big picture of self vis-à-vis small picture of others. Whereas for the rice growers of south, it was the other way round. May be this is the way our context, our environment conditions our thinking. I do not know whether the South Indian and the North Indian orientation has anything to do with the above hypothesis. ( with inputs from an article originally published in NYT by Mr. T.M. Luhrmann)

Does success in Small Value Sales a Guarantee in Key Accounts too?

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This question when asked by my clients, I am reminded of Marshall Goldsmith’s book, What Got you Here, Won’t Get you There! One of our clients nominated his star performer, Akshay for our training program. The main reason being he was not able to reach his desired targets in selling high-value capital equipments, the way he was selling laptops and mobiles in his previous organization. It is generally believed that a great salesman can sell anything to anybody. Translated otherwise, most of us feel that a great salesman is the one who can sell a refrigerator to an Eskimo. The above statement is not true for the following reasons:There has been a paradigm shift from a Sellers’ to a buyers’ market. Today’s customers have more choices vis-à-vis their counterparts in 90s.

Thanks to internet, today’s customers are knowledgeable. A person before buying a mobile or a car has done enough research on the net comparing products technically as well as commercially.
If you try to sell something a customer does not need, there is possibility the customer express his anger and frustration on twitter/trip-adviser etc. and in no time the contents may go viral.
In a low-value sale, generally the customer knows what he wants to buy and the interaction between the salesperson and the customer is transactional. The salesman needs to inform the product features, the price and the competitive comparison.
In case of a high-value sale, or a key account sale, quite often the customer may not clearly know what he needs, he may have a vague idea. He needs a solution not a standard sales pitch. Precisely for this reason the salesman needs to be an active and empathic listener and also willing to probe deeper. He also needs to understand the customer’s business that is customer’s customer. Here the interaction is more on relationships. You will observe that the some of these competencies can be acquired but others are natural traits like strategic thinking. This is one of the reasons why a Star Performer in Small Sale may not always succeed in high-ticket deals or Key Account Management.

Paradigm Trainers Private Limited is having training programs on Key Account Management and Advanced Negotiation Skills in Bangalore ( 14/15^th Nov.) and Mumbai ( 21/22^nd Nov.) for more details : www.paradigm-info.com

Thursday, 25th June 2020 at 11 AM (IST)

Thursday, 25^th June 2020 at 11 AM (IST)