Somebody just wrote to me this after having posted the Sales Performance article on the Social Competence - Character Model:
Hello Mark,
I find your articles very good, inspiring, encouraging and compelling however the cynical side of me says these are qualities in a perfect world. I don't know if my experiences at the lower levels of organizations has just hardened me to think that everyone as a general rule are selfish two faced power mongers and that there really are people operating on levels of integrity in business.
Why just yesterday I spoke with a childhood friend of mine describe how he enjoyed being around a bunch of "sharp thinking" men at a social/business backyard party with lots of family around and good times. Yet he described how they referred to all of their guests as their prey. I asked "prey?" He said, "well, their customers." "Just throw them a peice of BBQ chicken and they're your friend for life."
What kind of attitude is this for a morally minded person to have? I was genuinely sad that my friend actually respected this attitude. It strikes me as ultimate deception. Pretend to be friends with people so you can sell them something.
Personally I love your ideas and the areas I need to work on most are humility and emotional mastery. I know I can be incredibly competant with a mostly very mature attitude towards responsibility, courage, accountablility and focusing on the whole. Yet when I feel others don't recognize my potential, for example when I'm proposing an improvement in a process and can prove step by step why, or when others are acting in a distinctly selfish or lying manner about something I have a difficult time controlling my anger and reacting not just appropriately but effectively. This is the only thing that affects my confidence.
Otherwise, I can be too confident at times. I know god has blessed me with a sharp mind that can see the big picture and correlate seemingly dissparate facts but I have a hard time moderating my enthusiasm. When people can't see what I see I berate them (usually not face to face but to others, which is probably worse.) At least I am aware of this and that is the first step to countering it but i need some trigger to recognize it when it happens and slap myself in the face (so to speak) before I actually say anything.
So, sir, what can you do for me so I can change? Because I have big dreams but realize I need to master myself before I can develop the relationships I need to in order to accomplish them.
--------------------------------
This is what I wrote and would like to share with everybody: Thank you for your mail…………………….when I read your comments I have to say that these 2 sides don’t really conflict………it is more a question of taking your natural leadership instincts , our natural violent tendencies, our territorial instincts , and our competitive reflexes and urges to win and balance them with theses Social skills I talked about. Why……..for it is not the one with the most natural leadership instincts , or the most natural violent tendencies, or the most territorial instincts , or most competitive reflexes and urges that actually will win, be most loved, be a good father, brother Husband or even child. One will not even be a better friend or sales person with those characteristics.
So in my world there arises 3 main questions:
1. Why do we have these violent tendencies, our territorial instincts , and our competitive reflexes and urges to win?
2. What is it then that makes us have social success with people?
3. How can we combine the both worlds of being a really competitive person and having social skills?
To point 1) Why do we have these violent tendencies, our territorial instincts , and our competitive reflexes and urges to win?
In considering some of the basic of our behavior, let’s take a look at The Origin and Psychology of Behavior, Richard Wrangham and Dale Peterson (Professors in Biological Anthropology at Harvard University), made a study in Demonic Males: Apes and the Origins of behavior (and with that leadership and social behavior).
The study present evidence that only humans and chimpanzees, among all the animals living on earth, share a similar tendency for a cluster of behaviors: leadership, violence, territoriality, and competition for uniting behind the one chief male of the land. Many of you might think and argue that many animals beyond apes are territorial and exhibit violence, and have a social structure controlled by a dominant male (lions, wolves, etc.).......which is all true. This is where Wrangham and Peterson's evidence point that there is a difference of their competitive urge and drive to lead.
The study concludes that leadership has something to do with being competitive and wanting to win! So this is something some people have and it is good……..but only if they can master and control this ability. If not, it could become your weakness in connection with others.
Which leads us to question 2) What is it then that makes us have social success with people?
The things that puzzle me on nearly each personal coaching I have, is that there are so few people that can say or communicate what will give you social success and what are the actual skills that can help you with social success?, what are the talents (natural characteristics) …………..there are so many that answer that you are ether liked or not, which is basically not true.
So the question remains what can give you social success?
Let’s consider again some of the basic of our behavior we just discovered in The Origin and Psychology of Behavior Richard Wrangham and Dale Peterson (Professors in Biological Anthropology at Harvard University). Very interesting findings have been revealed by comparison, bonobos, the second-closest species-relatives of man. The study revealed that bonobos do not unite behind the strongest chief male. The bonobos show deference to an alpha or top-ranking female or male that is most liked (has the best social standing).Which means that they get there, where they are through the support of her coalition and social relationship of other females or males. This can prove as strong or even stronger as the strongest male in the land. Thus social success has nothing to do with having violent tendencies, our territorial instincts , and our competitive reflexes and the urges to win .
So what can we so far conclude………if you really want to succeed you should have both;
1. a competitive urge and a will to win and with that some violent tendencies and territorial instincts
2. Social skills – that people like you and will listen to you
That leads us to question number 3) How can we combine the both worlds of being a really competitive person and having social skills?
Let’s face, we are all limited to our own limitations of behavior – and this article was about modeling and working on the Social Competence. I believe that using Social and Emotional Skills in sales performance is actually what the most people need. For it is about, how to:
• Effectively deal with difficult situations
• Maintain your self-control even when under pressure
• Understand your emotions and gain more social awareness
• Persuade others to support your point of view (this would be where you mix your social skills with your urge to succeed and win)
• More successfully build relationships with your customer
• Use your social skills and social intelligence to strengthen influence, trust, communication, and accountability
• Understand the decision making process of others (very difficult as we are often limited to our own views of how we see the world – and believe me, that can be a limitation).
• Understand the emotions of others and gain more social awareness
• Understand different buying reasons and how to address them at your customer
• Understand feelings and the reasons behind them
• Identify business as well as personal buying reasons and learn how to differentiate among them – to address them directly and effectively .
• Use your Social Awareness to understand how value impacts the psychological buying reflections.
• Understand the customers' value mindset.
• Use emotional intelligence in channel sales in identifying needs & wants of the different decision makers and influencers in the buying process
• Use your Social Awareness to identify the explicit needs of the customer (value expectations).
• Use your Social Awareness to recognize different value expectations at the different levels in the company.
• Develop flexibility in your communication style
• Ask the right questions that help open the discussion and thereby the sale.
• Include the personal value expectations of your listener into your messages/communication.
• Engage in appropriate actions, given the emotional and social content of a situation
Believe me, practicing psychologists in very diverse fields have found that it's not just a matter of developing "cognitive power and skills" to succeed. Whether one considers the counselor assisting a person experiencing feelings of depression, the sports therapist coaching an athlete to reach peak performance, or the business coach assisting an executive struggling to rebound from a major financial set-back, the evidence is clear-- emotions play the major part in human performance that is distinct and separate from the individual's cognitive or physical ability. The research of neuroscientists such as Joseph Le Doux has substantiated the experience of practitioners that the emotional system of the brain acts independent from the neocorter, or logic system. The research indicates that some emotional reactions and emotional memories are formed without any conscious, cognitive participation. An excellent way to address this is through your Social Intelligence, which regards the two distinct mental functions needed to apply it as: the logical factual system and the emotional feeling system.When combining the experience of psychologists and the research of neuroscientists the answer to the question regarding what limits performance is very clear. What stops people from doing what they already know how to do, is both their failure to recognize the impact that emotions have on their actions and thereby others and the ability to know how to change this behavior to others. This would be seen as a lack of Social Skills. This is especially true when there is a failure to apply knowledge and even skills under challenging or stress provoking social situations. I have over the years realized that this performance problem, actually points out the need for a personal development coach to learn how to assist individuals in developing social awareness as well as emotional awareness.
This is why we developed the Social Competence - Character Model, to build the social competence and character necessary for sales responsible to influence the way they manage their customers'.
I do realize that these are very psychological soft skills, but it doesn’t change the important’s of it and having worked so many years with peak performance…….I realize that this is the area to improve and grow tremendously.
If you would like a free telephone coaching on this subject, feel free to send me a mail (mvr@rosenteam.com) and we can set up a call…….
Regards your moderator
Mark
