This week we will dive into Shiftability and reach a bit of a personal conclusion on PURPOSE. Next week I will wrap this all up with a key point summary and actions that YOU can take to put this to work….
OK, LET’s ROLL!
Mitch
From Shiftability comes more about PURPOSE…
Understanding the Purpose of the Client
When you have aligned your understanding of your purpose as a sales professional with the corporate purpose of your company, with your individual purpose at the core, it is easy to make the leap to understanding your client’s purpose – because they are operating in the same threefold context.
You are working with individuals who are trying, just like you, to align and serve their individual purpose with the purpose of their role and the purpose of their company.
The opportunity is for you to start with understanding their purpose in all its dimensions both personal and professional and then work to provide insight and solutions that will serve all facets. Here is one example of what that looks like in action.
In Mitch’s company, one of the Field Apps Engineers had been working with an industrial control company in the Midwest U.S. They had done many projects with the design teams over the years and another large project was coming up for a sourcing decision. Mitch’s team did all of the technical and systems analysis and worked hard to understand the business issues that were being faced. The team proposed a solid answer that delivered on solving the business issues and handled all of the technical needs. They won that project.
Following up with the client’s engineering team sometime later, Mitch discovered the REAL reason they had won. It seems that the head engineer had a young son and he was coaching that young son’s little league team that summer. Experience with Microchip had shown that engineer that their resources and team could be counted on to help keep the project rolling smoothly which meant that he could easily leave work at 4:30 on those two days each week that his son’s team had practice. The personal win was the difference-maker. We will come back to another story a lot like this in a later chapter and see how understanding and operating from purpose deeply influences your ability to deliver personalized insight.
Living and Working On Purpose
Understanding and embracing our purpose will energize and direct everything we do.
Keeping anchored in your purpose is going to be essential to your success in implementing the skills we are going to talk about. It is going to help you overcome fears and obstacles, give you the courage to try new things, and keep you going when things get tough.
Our purpose lies at the heart of what motivates us.
When you ask salespeople why they have chosen this profession you will likely get a wide variety of answers. Almost always when you dig deep it is not the love of competing or greed for money that is the most compelling factor. What truly comes out is the higher-level simple love of helping people. All of the other motivations are in play, but the really big tug is the desire to help people in some way. This really does point to having a purpose and pursuing it.
Operating from a sense of purpose does require a shift in understanding. Understanding why you really do what you do, not just for income. We need to understand why the companies that we work for truly exist and the higher purpose they serve. And then seek understanding about your client’s purpose. You may even end up shifting how they think about themselves and help them see the greater purpose that they serve.