Articles - Changing Minds

“I don’t get it!” retorts Joe!

“We had the best price both in cost and trade in, the unit was the most cost effective of the three competitors, yet we didn’t get the deal!”

“You mean after all the preparation and the long meetings we had on that deal they went with someone else?” Bill the sales manager exclaims.

“I thought we had worked out all the numbers to the penny and it was the best logical choice for that guy!

Did the competition give it away?”

“Oh no, we were actually the lowest in price and the highest in trade in! I am at a loss on how we can get them to change brands!” a rejected Joe responds.

Can you relate to the above situation?

Welcome to the club as most people can in one way or another.

Is the above scenario only relative in the sales environment? Regretfully, the answer is No!

How many of us have been involved with an employee (spouse, child, friend, sibling) that isn’t complying with our wishes?

Or how about getting a group of volunteers to buy into an idea that will advance the cause of the organization ten-fold?

Been there, right?.

We plan the presentation; we build up the benefits, and polish the idea or concept till it looks almost too good to be true!

I have done it myself more times than I care to recall!

Seems we have all been in this same scenario, what is it that we need to do differently to get past these hidden barriers? …

Over the past several weeks I’ve come across several situations where changing someone’s mind was needed to make things move forward, and yes the job got done!

So how did it happen?

People have a natural resistance to being sold or told. We have to acknowledge this fundamental principal of the human mind. It is a survival instinct, plain and simple.

Think about your own reactance to being sold or told.

Yet this is the mode of persuasion utilized by so many for so long, by so many!

Our minds are set up to respond with the devastating word NO, it’s been ingrained into us from an early age. We are also preconceived to believe that change is a painful prospect.

How many times has a change resulted in something that was positive? Chances are very few.

You remember in last week’s article that changing minds was the challenge with a coaching client of mine.

Here’s a brief review: He is the owner of a small business and was very frustrated with a longer term employee. One behavior the employee had was avoiding admitting or taking responsibility for his errors. There was also a long list of other negatives from previous conversations.

It was obvious to me from the conversation that the chance of his long term employee changing was remote, but my client did not seem to want to see this.

So should I tell him?

Should I describe to him in detail how stupid just the idea of him not taking action is?

Should I have told him that perhaps he should reevaluate how important it is to him to continue his successful business that will be in ruins if this employee is allowed to continue to be destructive?

I wonder how much more the resistance would have been built up if I proceeded along this course of action.

Instead, the strategy was to know what the “belief” was behind the continued choice of retaining the employee.

After questioning, listening and listing everything he was saying on a pad, I turned the pad to him and asked, “What would you recommend to me if I had an employee like this?”

His body language and contemplative look told me he was more than aware of the answer.

My next question was not about the employee; rather it was about what are the beliefs that cause him to not take action.

Yes, this took even more questions and contemplative looks, yet we finally arrived at several beliefs and determined their source that needed to be addressed.

He seemed relieved to understand the barriers. Consequently, they did not seem as overwhelming as before. (It’s great when a customer does this; you have now become their consultant.)

Our next action was to develop a strategy that would take the continued employment decision off him and put it on the employee. Through a series of measurable performance standards and a methodology to keep accountability, every employee would either perform or fire themselves.

We even discussed how this could be utilized to direct an employee’s behavior and potentially change it! He was amazed at how powerful this strategy was.

Had the business owner’s view of the crisis changed? Was he able to develop a strategy with the new information he had at hand?

On a phone call the other day with him, we discussed another issue that had come up in his business.

I will tell you this; there was a different person on the other end of the phone. His view of the situation, the choices and actions that were being taken were very different than just a few weeks before!

Could this have happened simply by telling and selling him?

So let’s go back to Joe and Bill at the beginning of this article and their sales dilemma.

Do you suppose they could describe the “beliefs” of the customer?

What about the “source” of those beliefs?

If they could, how might it have changed the situation? How might it have changed their proposal and approach? Might they now be better prepared to change the buyers mind?

Yes, you and I can approach any influence or persuasion situation with the established “Alpha” strategies of piling up facts, features and benefits to overpower the resistance.

These continue to work and have for decades.

Yet, by applying the “Omega Strategies ®” of reducing or eliminating resistance we can persuade much more effectively and quickly. Actually, it has been proven this is the only way for long term consistent change. (Check out the teleconference recordings with Dr. Schaefer and Vince Harris.)

When we put both in our tool box, we now have a real power house!

So, the next customer or employee that puts up resistance to a change, stop and explore the belief and its source that is behind it. You may surprise yourself at what you discover and how easily you can now influence them in a positive way.

All it takes is some well place questions, listening and a real concern for the other person.

Here is a quick example of how beliefs can justify anything:

“We all get heavier as we get older because there’s a lot more information in our heads.

So I’m not overweight, I’m just really intelligent and my head couldn’t hold any more so it started filling up the rest of me! That’s my story and I’m sticking to it!”

Want more on the “Omega Strategies ®”, working with beliefs or establishing performance standards? Give us a call or check out the web site.

Exploring the reasons beliefs are so important to understand and include when developing strategies for sales or change.