Controlling Your Inner Dialogue

One of the biggest problems ALL of us have is controlling our inner dialogue. This is the conversation you have with yourself on a daily and on-going basis.  Now some people have a great internal dialogue - one that tells them to "go for it," and "you can do it." While others have the internal dialogue of:"what if I fail?", "what if I make a mistake?", "what if someone learns that I tried and failed?", "what if I get rejected/lose/embarrassed?" 

Have any of these rung a bell inside your head?

These are self-limiting dialogues. These are just the opposite of the dialogues that athletes, top business people, movie stars, and high self-esteem people have running in their minds on a daily, moment to moment basis.

Controlling your inner dialogue by focusing your self-talk on what you want rather than what you are afraid of can be the biggest single thing you can do to change the outcome of your life - personally, professionally, spiritually, and family wise - that you can ever do. In business, this is more important than an MBA or some other degree that you are considering to make yourself better.

Today - commit to rewrite your future by starting first to rewrite what is being said over and over in your mind. This is internal programming that will keep you locked into be less than you can be. It is typical of most people who grew up in self-limiting home when they were growing up.  And 90% of us have them - and you know who I am talking about.

Start by changing your mind by doing the following things EVERY SINGLE DAMN DAY:

1. Turn off the TV. Now. Start with that - and stop watching stupid mind numbing TV shows that show peoples' problem, and crass no-brainer, no-creativity Hollywood, keep you down shows.
2. Start reading every singe morning - morning - yes - morning - something inspirational, business-oriented, happy, positive, goal directed.  Read for one (1) hour minimum every day. EVERY day. You will not know what happened to your life once you make the decision to do this!!!
3. Turn off the radio in your car. Same crap as #1 above. "But how will I know what is going on?"  I don't know - but some how I do . . .  But not in the detail I once did. And only then when I read the newspaper, read Newsweek, Time, and every other publication I could - to "up on events." But these didn't help me when I was younger - except I was better informed than 90% of the population -AND I became a great debater!
4. Instead of listening to the radio - listen to something educational or inspirational - like a Program from Nightingale Conant - which you can buy or go to the library and check one out
5. Get up an hour earlier every morning to read
6. Make your day one big affirmation. Make each minute you have each day to find out what's right rather than what's wrong - what you can do better - how you can make yourself feel better - (not at the expense of others), do better, and thereby become better.
7. Decide right now you are going to be the best at what you do by your standards mixed with what the boss needs/wants, your clients' needs/want, colleagues needs/want, your family needs, and at the same time feel happy by knowing you are striving to become better and better - rather than worrying.

That's all there is - Try this and see what happens

Packaging Your Expertise - Part 3: Show You Know

So, this is Part 3.  We covered in Part 1 what to "package" what you do or have done - and align that with what the client wants or needs. Part 2 covered how to actually understand all the things you have done and be able to articulate it clearly and succinctly.

In Part 3 we are going to cover "show what you know."  Okay, it rhymes. Pretty exciting, eh? (for my friends in Canada and Maine is the "eh"). 

Sure, but I hope the rhyme, makes you think, most of the time. (Okay, I will stop).

Getting Out of the Middle of the Pack
Here is what I want you to consider: Would you hire someone who is mediocre? The answer is, if you even have to think about it is "No."  Unless you're just not paying someone, then you're desperate, . . . and probably dumb.

But let's stick to the premise you wouldn't hire someone mediocre. You may not be able to attract the best (now the arguments will fly), but you should want to attract someone who is pretty good in their job.  And here is, what I think, is a key differentiator: Someone who gives a damn about what they do.

Giving a Damn - or Passion, Zeal, Zest
Let me explain "Gives a damn." Gives a damn is someone who cares enough to have analyzed their work. The person knows the top 5 reasons why people fail in the role, and the top 5 reason why people succeed in the role. They know the top 5 trends affecting the role, they know how technology is advancing the role and the work they do, they can tell you in clear, exact words, the meaning of what they do to bring about results.  They know their job "inside and out."

How many people do you know that can answer these questions - without stammering and hemming and hawing?  You have to admit - very few. Here's a poke in the eye: Do you?

Can you articulate the answers to these questions unerringly?

Be able to show you know - with confidence. "Here's
where I am going, here's where the industry is going,
I can help you get there."

Here's another question: How do you demonstrate this passion to become the best?  Because that's really what we are talking about here. It is the passion to become better, improve, to become one of the world's first and foremost.

Being middle of the pack sucks. You should demonstrate why you are not "middle of the pack." Your differentiator may be the fact that you are passionate, articulate and bright. You know your business cold. Whether you are an accountant, a SARBANES consultant, an IT developer, a Health and Human Services Caseworker, a Lobbyist, a sales person or wedding planner. The list could go on forever.

If you can articulate clearly, that you know what you know, and where you may be deficient, you hold a key to a lot of doors that would not necessarily be open to you and certainly differentiates you from the middle of the pack.

Packaging Your Expertise - Part 2

Okay - so we discussed a little bit on packaging your expertise the last post by looking at the job description of a companies job requirement. Some of you may see think as "basic" but I am telling you that in my dozen years plus of working in consulting roles, interviewing candidates and working with clients who need temporary contract workers, this "basic" thing that we call it - is probably the most violated concept because either we think it so basic that we do nothing about it, OR, we are just plain lazy, OR maybe we just don't get it.

In any case - here is an antidote to the above.

Create "Major Headings" and Columns
Just lay out the four to five major requirements across the top of the page of paper.  There will be four or five headings. Draw lines separating each of the headings, creating columns.

Got it?

In each column, I want you to think - on paper - what your work entailed specifically around each of the headings. You must write out the information in "bullet form" if you can, in each column. Try to get as many real life experiences as you can regarding each of the areas that the client is interested in - in each heading.

Detailing Your Experience (= Expertise)
You should have at least six to 10 experiences in each column. Now that you have these laid out, review them, see if you can tighten them up so that when you are asked - "Hey, I see you've written Java code for the Android and built the interface back to the SAP system at Harry's Garage - can you tell me about that?"  You can now say - "Well I have about six or seven things to discuss with you about that - at a high level here they are: and then BLAH"  Don't dive into the detail -yet. You can then say; "I can go into detail on these if you'd like."

Now what you've done - is you have built yourself a road map - that you can follow and the client who is talking to you can follow.

Yes - of course you can ask the client the question "Can you tell me what area you would like me to address, because I have a wealth of experience and don't want to get you side-tracked."

Leveraging Who, What, Where, Why, When and How
The exercise of taking the major areas and addressing "who, what, where, why, when and how" in each major column will prove invaluable to your conversations with clients. Think on paper using these "Six Honest Serving Men" to question yourself, gets your brain in motion.

This goes for whether you are interviewing for a project, or a job, or presenting to a client as a consulting firm or consultant. You stay at the "10,000 foot level" first. And then you can do a deep dive into the minutia. 

3 Big Mistakes
Three big mistakes many people (experienced consultants) make are the following;
1. They go too deep too early. In effect they answer questions that aren't asked and they miss an opportunity to show the breadth of what they know.
2. The second mistake is they don't know how to package their expertise. The best way to package it is based upon how the client defines things. By using the "terms" that the client uses as your major headings over each column, you and the client are "in-sync" and "in tune" with each other.
3. The third big mistake is not planning ahead. We think we know all our stuff and don't need to prepare. Then we forget - we freeze - we are not always perfect when asked a question that comes out of the blue.

This packaging technique is not complicated, nor does it take a lot of ingenuity. But it is effective. Try it, you'll be surprised.

Packaging Your Expertise - Part 1

One of the most difficult things to do that I have found with most people is that they do not know how to "package" their experience and expertise. 

You Are An Expert

Let's be clear - you are an expert in some-one-thing or multiple things. You are. You have to be.  The truth is this: you have just not learned how to step outside of you head (or body) and look at the work you have done and put in a conceptual box or multiple boxes that is understandable and digestible to the buyer (an employer) of your services.

You would not believe the number of people I meet or talk to that are interviewing for a position and they don't know how to explain what they have done or their expertise.  What reflects this the most is their resume.  And one of the first things most people like me or potential buyers notices is that the qualifications do not meet the speifications of what the client is looking for in order to hire.

Resume or Not to Resume?
Hold on a minute - I said "resume."  In most cases, you will not even use a resume when you learn the concepts on this blog. Yes, I said it - not use a resume.  The resume, as we knew it 20 years ago, is for all intents and purposes - dead.

But for the sake of simplicity here in this short article - let's use the resume as the basis of our discussion, because I want you to understand the concept of "packaging."  What I mean by packaging is a concept of tailoring your resume to what the client is looking for. You can look at the resume today as your proposal to the client to demostrate how you have the experience and expertise to do the job the client needs to have done.

Now - earlier I said the old resume is dead, and resumes are not used any longer. Well, that is somewhat correct.  The resume is dead if you are a consultant - in that your resume is no longer your "marketing device." This means the resume should not be sent to a thousand potential employers if you are applying for work.  Please remember this - the resume is not a marketing device. And very rarily will it be used - ever - when you are a consultant.  I am digressing . . .

Matching Your Skills to What the Client Needs
However, if you are contracting (or looking for full-time employment), you must realize that the resume really only a screening device for clients. It is the clients' first line of defense to weed you in or out.  Clients use your resume to see if what you have done, matches what the client needs to have done.  So to be perfectly redundant, because this is important, as a potential contractor, your resume needs to match what the client is looking for.  This is the first step in understanding packaging. Needs must match skills. Where skills equal the ability to to get things done.

Okay? Got it?  Because this is critical. I have seen very qualified people not - not - take the time to rewrite the resume to match the client's job specifications. Also - don't waste your time applying for an accountant position if your life's work has been in sales. Prospective clients just toss the resume into the trash bucket and become annoyed. And you waste a lot of time and hope. Staying in the metaphor of the resume - this is true of anything you are selling - especially when selling your capabilities.

Packaging Your Experience into Expertise
So back to packaging.  Take the description of what the client is looking for and write out by hand on a separate piece of paper, all the things you have done under each item in their job description that matches. Do this in bullet form.  What did you do, where did you do it?  I digress there and realize it: Do this exercise by hand because your brain to hand back to brain creates a different connection than that of typing (trust me on this - I have read the studies and experienced this myself and taught this to countless number of people).

Okay - got it?  (This is my pause - to make sure you digest this - I know it can be annoying. But I want to make sure you get things in chunks. By the way, you should do this idea of chunking too when working with a client.)

Okay - you wrote out the bullets under each one of the job requirements - what did you do and where you did it. Now in your resume, make sure you bulletize these in each place where you worked in the resume.  Take out any and all irrelevant things that do not match what is in the job description - unless - they are related to the work being required by the client.

Okay - got it? 

Now - with those things that you did that match the job description - answer the question in one sentence: what results did you achieve? What issues or challenges did you face trying to achieve the results? What lessons did you learn so that you wouldn't repeat them in the future? Did you create any new processes, any technology (new spreadsheet, form, templates, software), or something else, that would enable you and the people you would be working with - that eliminates problems, gets things done better, faster or cheaper?

Creating a "Communication of Expertise" Device
When you begin to write these things out - you are pulling your experiences out of your head onto paper, and creating a vehicle to communicate to the prospective client your expertise - on why they should hire you - without stating: "Hey, here's why you should hire me . . ."  You are creating a "communication of expertise" device.

This is the beginning of packaging your expertise. When you follow these steps, you begin collecting what you have done, where you have done it, what results you have achieved, issues/challenges you ran into, and methodologies and processes you created that can be leveraged by the client to ensure that they get things done faster, cheaper, with more quality, without risk (or reduced risk).

When you do this - whether it for a resume - or not, you are beginning to clarify what you can do for the client. You are packaging your expertise. When you do this over and over - you become better at explaining what you can do for the client. You can take the same information and build a website, a blog, and - and - this is important - start targeting prospective clients better than without performing this key exercise.

By the way - when you talk to the client - this is the same method by which you prepare for the "interivew." We'll get into that later.  And because there is a job description - this tailoring the resume to the job description is pretty easy.  However, what if there is no job description? Or worse, what if the job description is written out - but it is inaccurate or flat out wrong? Well, we'll get into this later, as well.
Just remember this for now: everyone has expertise a client somewhere needs. You just need to learn how to to package your expertise better. And better means that it is easily understood by the client and it matches their needs. 

We will talk to you later. 

Observe Your Thoughts - What Is Holding You Back?

Interesting title for a blog designed to enhance and help building a base of long-term, repeat, profitable clients - Yes?

No?

Wait. What?

Observe your own thoughts? What kind of nonsense is this?

How often do you really sit down and take the time to observe what you are thinking about? We know you are a genius - or near genius. You make rapid decisions, split second decisions based upon instinct and experience and knowledge.

Faulty Thoughts?
But have you considered, that some of your thoughts are actually - get this - faulty? Did you ever consider that some of the thoughts you have are from beliefs that your parents, your teachers, your relatives, or religious figures may have passed onto you? And these beliefs are operating underneath your conscious - just under the radar - hard to detect - but are filtering out things that are true (potentially helpful to you) yet you can't see them?

Our beliefs serve us well in most cases. They do filter out things that may not be pertinent to what we need. Or if they didn't we would be able to count the dots in the ceiling tiles in our office in a split second like Rain Man (Dustin Hoffman).

Self-Limiting Beliefs and Concepts
Yet there are self-limiting concepts that we acquired that may not be true for us that we have reinforced throughout the years by believing they were/are true, that really don't serve us well.

Let me give you a couple:
"I am not a good speaker."
"I am not good in front of clients."
"I cannot write well."

Okay. These are somewhat bland and not juicy, like, "I can never find a date." But those kind of beliefs get somewhat personal and this is not an Ann Landers (I know she has passed on) blog site.

But what thoughts do you have swirling around in your head to which you are viewing the world right now?

Are you a little less than confident? Are you a little unsure, unsteady, wobbly?

Rewire Your Thoughts
Observe your thoughts. Capture them in a journal. Ask where did I get this from? What evidence do I have that this is accurate? Rewire yourself. Rewrite the self-limiting thought patterns and design them into a more positive, self-affirming thought pattern. For example, taking from the above: "I am good in front of clients." Then go out and find books and articles and CDs on this subject and read and study how to become good in front of clients. Immerse yourself - flood your mind with the new ideas and strategies. And believe it or not, over time, you begin to put into practice these little ideas you have picked up along the way. And voila, you are now much better in front of clients.

Can it be that simple? Yes. It is that simple.

The Power of Optimism and Positive Action

The Story of John
John is assigned some tough accounts. He has emailed and called 10 people - and none of them are there. No one is answering the phone calls or emails.

He is distressed. It's now 10AM. He is thinking: "What's the use? People are so busy, how am I to get into see a prospect?"

He doesn't want to make anymore calls, so he pretends he has an appointment, and he leaves the office.  What else is there to do?

I don't know where he goes but he comes back in the office later that day at 4PM, shuffles some papers on his desk. He talks to the people around him in the cubicles. Can't help but like John - he is jovial.

He leaves but is back in the office the next day. Similar routine to the day before.

The Story of Megan
Megan is John's competitor across town. She is in the office about 30 minutes earlier than John is.

She too makes 10 calls - no luck either. She too is distressed.

She thinks a little differently and she tries to figure out what to. She all of a sudden recalls something she read some where in a book that some managers have a tendency to come back to their offices around 11:30 to get somethings cleared off their desk before going to lunch.

She decides to give this a try.

So she prepares her list of prospects to call - it's now 9:30. She has two hours. She doesn't have an appointment for the morning, so she asks herself, "What's the best use of my time right now?"

She ponders the answer: I could go down and get a cup of coffee. I could go about calling more prospects - but that won't be fun. Or will it be fun?

She remembers what someone once told her - "Attitude is a state of mind that one chooses. And you can chose a positive or a negative state."

She thinks: "Let's make this fun. Let's see how many more calls and emails I can send out before 11:30AM." She creates a little contest with herself.

So she gets her list of prospects and calls. And sends emails.

She calls one prospect and he answers the phone. "Unbelievable, finally!" she thinks to herself.

She goes into the, "Can I have two minutes to explain who I am" speech? This client says "Sure." But then says "I am not really interested right now. Call back in a few weeks."

Megan, is a little discouraged and then she remembers: Attitude is a chosen state of mind. 

She decides to "trick" herself to look for the good in the situation. She looks at what was accomplished: she got hold of someone! And looking at it from a positive perspective, she believes she should continue to call and email.

She gets two more "hits" - one is a full appointment with a prospect.

It's now 11:30. She goes through her list of prospects and sends the emails of introduction and makes phone calls up until 12 noon as she committed to herslf. Except at 12 noon, she decides to keep calling and emailing people.

She gets two more appointment. One person she called at 11:45AM and the last one was at 12:10PM.

Why did she not stop at 12 noon? She was preparing to stop at 12noon as everyone has probably gone to lunch. But before she stops, she recalls a client explain how often he misses lunch and just works at his desk during lunch most days.

So, she figures, "What the heck, I will give this a try." And she sticks around making calls during lunch time hoping to catch managers eating lunch at their desks.

The Difference Between the Megan and John
John is experienced. John used to do all the right things. He has just drifted into some bad habits. He has a hard time recovering from his pessimistic thought patterns.

Megan is processing her distress a little differently. She is incorporating new ideas to get around obstacles. She is not only persevering, she is incorporating different approaches to her routine. She is viewing her work from a perspective of a student and is detached from it being a personal problem.

John is on the border of making this personal and pervasive. He is using escapist actions to avoid the unpleasantness of the difficulties to getting appointments.

How to Become More Optimistic - Quickly
First, when your brain is getting wrapped up in taking something personally - stop the thought pattern. It's not personal. In the case of John - no one on the other end of the phone or email even knows John. How could it be personal then? It's not - unless you begin to think of it as a personal affront. Which is very easy to do.

Second, don't allow something to bleed into everything else. If you had a bad appointment - it doesn't mean your next appointment will be bad or the meeting with you boss later will also be bad. Look to see what happened: Was I unprepared? If so, next time I will be prepared. Was the client in a bad mood? Then this was the client's problem not yours. Don't allow it to become "Personal and Pervasive." Don't allow the feeling (or vibration) or "failure" to be picked up and carried to the next event.

Third - don't stew over things. The word is ruminate - to chew. We sometimes allow our mind to think about something negative. It then becomes "pervasive" in a larger way. The negatives start "piling on" like a football game, and we see things negatively - almost everything. The person who cuts us off, the rude waiter, our boss who cancels our appointment to catch up and so on. It becomes "me."

Last - look for the good. And then get into some positive action. Do something positive. Like in the example with Megan above, she made a game of calling prospects (how many can I call?). She did something toward her goal. She acted. The positive action stops the thinking, the pondering, the ruminating. This is very important. Note - it is positive action toward the goal. Not going for the beer at 5. Although, going to workout (not the beer) can be positive action, if you explain to yourself you will be back to do the positive action - and that you are using exercise to workout the stress.

To recap: Don't allow things to be personal. Know that this was only temporary (it was not forever and pervasive and always). Do look for the good. And act - do something positive to move you in the direction of your goals.

Measurable Business Results - Differentiate or Die

Why is it that We as Professionals Don't Do this One Little Thing?
Most companies providing professional services "forget" what the client is ultimately buying.  Frankly, client also forget!

Both the seller and the client get wrapped up in the technology and how it works too often.  The provider of professional services actually "trains" the client this way though. If you review marketing literature most companies provide - large corporations and small firms - you will probably find more discussion on how things are done or what was done rather than what was actually achieved.

My Experience with MBRs
Several years ago the firm I was working with went and visited Gartner.  It was a long meeting, in which we talked about SLAs, how our model worked, who we were, who our clients were, and did I mention SLAs?  It seemed like we mentioned SLAs over and over.

Most clients want results.
And then later, they may want to
know how you are going to do it.

Toward the end of the meeting we brought up results we acheived for our clients.  I mean, real, tangible results.  We coined the term "MBRs" or Measurable Business Results prior to our meeting, as I kept on saying to our COO and CEO and anyone else that listened, that the work we were doing was far, far different than our competitors.

Our Competitors Talked Certifications
While our competitors were talking about certifications of ISO this, and ISO that, and SEI CMM certifications this (and in reality there were no such things as a SEI certification!) and that and this, our firm was able to go in and talk to a client about what they needed done - or more exactly achieved.

Sure some of our competitors could talk about results from a cost reduction, but they could only talk about this from a "labor arbitrage" point of view as they were just swapping out US labor costs for offshore labor costs.  Jeez, anyone can do that.

The Value Prop We Didn't Know We Had!
Our firm was able to guarantee in writing that by this date they would have X amount of customers, at least this amount of revenue, and depending on the type of client they were dealing with they could get even more specific to the industry (i.e. hotel bookings, airline bookings, car rental booking, gas and oil trades, etc). 

Now here was the real kicker: They were able to guarantee this in the contract, before they even began the project.

When I got there, we really did not tout this as a real distinction. But that was because they were so accustomed to doing this, that the some of the people there did not see this as important or a critical market distinction.  Because I came from the outside and looked in - I saw this as a critical differentiator.

So when we got to Gartner - we started talking about these MBRs.  And this made us unique to Gartner.  All of a sudden we stood out. We were different. They, like I, could not believe we would contract, up front, to drive MBRs in our contract.

To Stand Out - Well, Just Stand Out
So, if you want to be unique, understand the value in what you do.  I know MBRs are "risky" if and only if you don't know how to drive them and achieve them.  In reality - results are what the client is buying.

We Train Our Clients To Pick Us Apart
But because we are used to selling features and benefits - the old way of selling - we actually train our clients to buy from us that way.  And what do they do?  They try to understand the only thing other than price. That is - how are you going to do what you are doing?  This is allowing the client's technical staff (IT, legal, procurement) to pick apart the proposal. 

It's All More or Less - "Death by Duck Bite" 
Death by Duck bite looks like this - which you may have seen before:

1. Who are the people on this project? Can I see their resumes? Can I interview them? I don't like Jack, you need to replace him.
2. What is your approach? Don't you think you should start with this group first? Don't you think this should take two weeks and not five weeks? How come you have four people doing this - can't you get just two people to do this?
3. What is the price? How much per hour for these people? What - are you kidding me?  I can get them for one-third of the price -
4. Your competition says that they can do half of this off-shore at $22 per hour. Can you match this?  They also are saying this and that - can you do this and that?

Get the picture? If you want to avoid the trap of being picked apart - avoid selling features and benefits and get into selling results.