Questioning, a much under used tool

Leaders are supposed to have the answers.  Some feel admitting they don't have all the answers is a sign of weakness.  "Leading with Questions" is aimed at business situations, but contains much advice that would benefit personal relations. 

We all asked a lot of questions as children.  Something happened to many of us as we grew up.  Authority figures such as parents, teachers, bosses mostly told us what to do and we went along.   

Stephen Covey in his famous book made his fifth habit of Highly Effective People: "Seek first to understand and then to be understood". Questioning is a tool to help understand situations and people.  See http://www.therealjohndavidson.com/2012/07/stephen-r-covey-pointed-way.html

Questioning needs to induce co-operation.  When a problem is encountered it is important to understand first, before jumping to conclusions or blaming anyone.  Make it a conversation not an interrogation.

Trust and openness are required.  Questions can be one way of building trust.  Employees have become used to doing what they are told unquestionably, but would sometimes like to be asked their opinion.

Timing can be critical.  A good ice breaking question might be "Is this a good time to talk?"  Avoid busy or stressful times.  Some people might feel uncomfortable answering questions with other people present.

"Yes or no questions are sometimes necessary, but open ended questions allow a wider range of possibilities.  Every great invention started from a question.

 From Peter Drucker we learn it is important "to hear what isn't being said" and "the most common mistake in solving problems was the emphasis leaders put on finding the right answer rather than the right question".

 While you are trying to understand others you should also question yourself.  Are you sure?

One last quote, this one from Nguib Mahfouz, a Nobel Prize winning author: "You can tell whether a man is clever by his answers.  However you can tell whether a man is wise by his questions".

 There are other good books on questioning.  This one has good advice on how to make more effective questions in a wide variety of circumstances and examples of questions, some of which might help you to open a few doors.

For the "to be understood" part check this out http://www.therealjohndavidson.com/2011/06/tell-to-win-offers-winning-formula.htm

David Brooks helps us to know a person

David Brooks has been a regular part of my schedule on the PBS Newshour.   He represented the conservative view although lately not so much.  He always came off as an intelligent man, but when this book was first mentioned it seemed out of character, but upon further reflection not really.   He does come off as a reflective man, thinking carefully before speaking.

 From the author, "Before a person is going to be willing to share personal stuff they have to know you respect their personal stuff".  As a reporter he soon realized questions were tools to finding out what a person really knows and feels.  

A childhood close friend committed suicide.  Confronted with depression he and others tried to cheer up his friend.  More important he realized later was to listen.

When responding to what a person said repeat what they said to be sure you understand.  Paraphrasing their words can often get closer to the truth.  Before replying it is often a good idea to give yourself time to get it right.  One gesture David suggested was to hold your hand out front.  

We all have an ongoing story.  Daniel Gilbert says "Human beings are works in progress that mistakenly think they are finished".  The strangers we meet all have interesting stories and many of them are willing to listen to yours.

It is natural to judge people from superficial information, but be slow to assume.  Everyone is part of a group, but not everyone is the same.  We have all been influenced by our "dead ancestors".  

The subtitle "The Art of Seeing Others Deeply and Being Deeply Seen" reaches out to our human needs.  For many of us it is well worth the effort.

A lot of what I read reinforced what else I had read.  But learning of his personal experience and his study gave a fresh impression.  I have received a lot of good advice and wish I had followed more of  it better.  Check  http://www.therealjohndavidson.com/2019/12/an-antidote-to-chaos-series-of-rules.html

A few years ago at a Toastmasters meeting one speaker suggested you could read the New York Times Book Review and not bother to take the time to read the book.  You could appear very knowledgeable.  My intention with my blogs is not to summarize a book or a film, but acquaint any readers with some reasons why they might want to follow it up.  Not everyone would (or should), but I believe there is some wisdom or bit of enjoyment to be had if you are in the mood.   My belief is that if good ideas are allowed to percolate the world will be better off.

The Social Conquest of Earth deals with the really BIG questions.

Bill Clinton was asked by Fareed Zakaria to make one book choice and he insisted on making two--this was one.  It asks the really big questions.

The author, E. O. Wilson takes us through an evolutionary history of humans with some cultural elements.  Our survival was precarious with lots of little details that are critical--grasping hand, capturing fire, having a nest to defend,  sex and bonding for more effective parenting, bipedal posture to free hands and give a different perspective.  Intelligence developed as memory increased.  All critical details that led to our present abilities.

Humans see themselves as at the top of the heap.  Wilson studied insects and noticed that some insects such as ants, termites, wasps and bees had a social organization equal to humans.

Insects are useful as a comparison point for social organization.  A  key thing for eusocial insects is a nest to defend.  Once that is established specialization can move to more complexity so that the whole colony is strengthened.  Humans are in a parallel universe.

Genetic adaptations are very common and when coinciding with the right circumstances can expedite cultural adaptations.  Most adaptations are minor and are not carried on.

Humans do most of their perception through sight and sound whereas almost all other species rely more on the  chemical senses, taste and smell.

Along with Charles J. Lumsden, E. O. Wilson developed the concept of "gene-culture coevolution." Culture and genetics developed hand in hand.

Religion is thought to be a type of glue holding us together in groups.  I have been encountering this theme elsewhere in recent books, but the foundation is better established here.

Papal policy has been against contraception on the basis that the only purpose of sex is procreation.  The author points out that in evolutionary terms sexual pleasure helps to bond males to females.  He also feels that homosexuality serves a benefit to the group by providing diversity.

The arts have played a role in evolution.  Cave paintings go back thousands of years into pre history.  It is difficult to prove pre historical music because no one kept musical scores, but we do know there were rudimentary instruments.  Wilson speculates that music combined with other arts helped invigorate humans and points out that it does affect the structure of our brains.

For me wrestling between the merits of non fiction and fiction has been a struggle.  Non fiction is about the truth, isn't it?  E O Wilson sees another path and quotes Picasso, "Art is the lie that helps us see the truth."

In the prologue he refers to a famous Paul Gauguin masterwork with some description and notices that there are three sentences .  "D"ou-Venons Nous.  Que Sommes Nous.  Ou Allons nous."  Translated they become the biggest questions of the book, "Where have we come from?  What are we?  Where are we going?"  At the end we see a reproduction of the art work.

Wilson feels earth could be a paradise for all humans.  Two concerns he brings out are the need to deal with climate change and diminishing biodiversity.

All though the book one is confronted with profound thoughts.  A few insights (for me) have been highlighted but it is important to understand the development.  This book is well worth reading and I suspect any other books by E. O. Wilson.  A source for further E. O. Wilson insights is http://eowilsonfoundation.org

The Second Machine Age

The authors, Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee offer frightening concepts, but hopeful suggestions.  The second machine age is doing what the first machine age did--changing job structure.  Only with the second machine age we are finding machinery that can do more including displacing human labour and even thinking.

One of their basic beliefs is that innovation creates wealth.  The first machine age really got going with the invention of the steam engine by James Watt.
It not only was used for transportation, but also in factories and was adapted in countless ways leading to more innovations.  It is true that new technologies displaced workers, but also true that over time more jobs were created to take advantage of the new technologies.   It is also true that life became more comfortable for more people.

The first machine age mostly reduced physical labour from work.  The second machine age could be said to affect mental labour.  New machines could take over much mental drudgery and figure out many things faster and more reliably.  It has also been economical to transfer many clerical and communication tasks overseas displacing lawyers, office workers and others.

The Second Machine age has speeded up innovations and is forging ahead at exponential speed meaning adjustments are falling behind and machines are taking up a higher percentage of formerly paid for labour.  New opportunities are being developed, but unskilled work is disappearing and wages diminishing.

The authors were stunned by driverless cars offering greater safety now (with a few exceptions that will probably be covered in near future). They had read of all the difficulties surrounding the idea, and concluded that driverless cars would be in the far distant future if ever.  However recently they agreed that driverless cars are already here and will improve.  GPS is only one innovation that made that speeded up their possibility.

Another innovation, 3-D printing has only recently been announced and applications are increasing daily.  The authors expect this one innovation will lead to many more manufacturing shortcuts squeezing out more jobs.

Free internet actually helps the GDP to decline, but in fact people get value out of the internet.  Free access to information/entertainment.  Many people who made their living organizing and selling information will continue to lose their jobs while others leverage free information to make more money or at least to enjoy life more.

We are already at the stage where we don't need as many workers working as many hours to provide all the manufactured goods we expect.  Medium wages have stopped tracking productivity and life expectancy of poorer people in the US is falling.  As a global society we have a problem.  The authors quote Voltaire, "Work saves us from three evils., boredom, vice and need."  Inequality could escalate, we could have have a violent revolution or civilization could crumble.

Education is considered basic.   They noted that Montessori schools have been a foundation for Larry Page, Sergey Brin, Jeff Bazar, key innovators.  The self organizing skills that they encourage are likely sources of innovative success.

Other ideas explored include negative income tax, building infrastructure, encouraging immigration (where entrepreneurship seems to spark) and emphasizing more scientific research.  Their thoughts all have merit, but I am a little disappointed in that the problem they painted seems overwhelming.

Innovations add not only to our wealth, but potentially to our enjoyment of life. There is actually a tremendous opportunity for the future of man, but I fear greed will have to be overcome if the majority of our descendents will be better off than we are.

One last redeeming thought.  Machines don't ask questions, only provide answers, meaning you still need humans to figure out innovations.  So far.

To learn more and take part in discussions visit:  http://www.secondmachineage.com/

PUT MARKETING STRATEGY INTO SELLING

A salesperson might be considered the last link to the customer. By the time a product or service reaches the sales person, marketing is just about done.   Or is it?  This post is meant to concentrate on how a sales person can apply marketing strategy to actually selling.

The sales person is the critical link with the person who actually buys or the person who is considering buying (or theoretically should be considering buying).  A lot of information can be gained in these contacts, some that can be captured easily with numbers and some that are more difficult.  The marketing department should certainly be interested in this knowledge, but it is most critical to the sales person.

Marketing begins by asking questions and searching for answers. The focus is on looking for solutions to problems that benefit both sides to a sale.  The buyer has to see value in the solution, but the selling company has to make a profit.

A salesperson has been given a solution so perhaps the first question should be how well do you as a salesperson understand the solution?  Do not be afraid to ask questions.  The people higher up in the chain have been working on this solution for awhile and to some degree assume it is obvious, but that is not always the way it is initially perceived by prospects.  Do you understand the problem the solution is supposed to somehow mitigate?

One step is to use the product your self.  You are apt to encounter some confusion, some awkwardness the first time you do anything.  You will probably learn some limitations which will allow you to avoid over promising.  Your prospects will likely go through this process, although not all exactly the same.

You can't wait until you have mastered every aspect of the solution.  Every prospect becomes an opportunity to learn more.  They will encounter problems you might not have anticipated.  They may also find better ways of applying your product than you had been aware of.  Discovering new applications should not always be a surprise.

You have been given an idea of what the problem is that your product solves, but who has this problem? Who might recognize this problem?  How serious is it to them?  How does it fit into their overall priorities?  How can you demonstrate or present your solution effectively.  The process of understanding the problem is similar to that of understanding the solution.

The purpose of this research is to refine your targeting and your presentation.  Some people will find your solution more understandable than others. Some will have a greater need for your solution.  Some will have the authority to take advantage of your solution.  You will come to understand what the obstacles to acceptance of your solution are and better ways of dealing with them.

There is a difference between marketing and actually selling, but an understanding of both will benefit each.  A salesperson has to manage their time to balance the opportunity including preparing, doing (actually communicating with prospects) and understanding.  They need to understand human nature to overcome fear and indecisiveness. They have to have some understanding of the political environment for the decision process. They have to persist in the face of rejection, but also develop the judgment of where persistence makes sense and when to shift efforts.  Above all all salespeople must earn trust so their solutions will be accepted.

Developing a data base (another blog post) will help you in future targeting and prioritizing.
Some of my thoughts on developing a data base:  http://www.therealjohndavidson.com/2011/10/using-data-bases-for-selling-part-one.html http://www.therealjohndavidson.com/2011/11/using-data-bases-for-selling-part-2.html

For an explanation of the difference between marketing and selling see:  http://www.therealjohndavidson.com/2011/09/are-selling-and-marketing-same-thing.html

THERE ARE TWO DIMENSIONS TO NUMBERS WHEN SELLING

Numbers are everywhere, but for salespeople the key ones are those that reflect an effort to make a sale. Most sales people get very discouraged by rejection particularly when they make their first efforts. They are likely to be told that you just have to contact enough people and you will get more sales. That is true, but only tells part of the story.

For many years I worked with newspaper carriers and learned that I was expected to take them out canvassing which basically was knocking on doors asking for subscriptions. Its terminology reflects a numbers mentality. I remember one morning after a very frustrating canvassing effort where I had recruited one young boy and he only knocked on doors for 1/2 an hour and brought me 1 order. My colleague, Rick Hill reported 48 orders, but it took him four hours with 6 canvassers. I was embarrassed, but worked out the mathematics and realized I had gotten the same production on a per head per hour basis.

What a difference! Not only did my friend get much more reward for his effort, but there were a few other lessons. My one order could have been considered flukey, but when you have more than one person making an effort over a period of time you have competition and you might even have co-operation where some will help out a beginner. You also have a learning curve and some confidence boosting. With the larger numbers Rick had more youngsters wanting to join his crew.

I did improve in this numbers game after making all sorts of efforts to encourage youngsters to participate. Considered a fairly good manager in terms of training carriers for delivery and keeping their accounts up to date, but I really was not too impressive at selling. Then I met Roma Dempsey who had come over from another newspaper. She kept some of her top sellers.

She offered to take me with her crew and help boost our techniques. Like myself she would talk to the canvassers telling them what to say and giving them a pep talk. Where the difference came was she took the most successful canvasser and had him work with other youngsters. She rewarded him for this training effort. Before too long my canvassers were performing much better and the process became fun.

That made me realize the other dimension of numbers.  First we deal with what every body understands, quantity. More hours, more doors, more phone calls, are some of the ways we measure quantity.

Quality is a lot more difficult to measure, but is more critical. When I got into more direct sales I recognized the importance of prospecting, qualifying, targeting, product knowledge, presentation skills and following up. As you improve in these areas you will get more rewards for your effort.

An important equation is Quantity x Quality=Results. When you fail to make a sale there is always a reason. One of the most basic is that your prospect was not properly qualified. They might not have had the interest, the ability to pay, or the authority to decide. More attention to those details in advance will save a lot of wasted time. Perhaps you couldn't answer one of their questions. Product knowledge can make a difference, but perhaps even more important is understanding the prospect. Maybe you were too abrupt in your approach or maybe you took too long to get to the point. You might even be able to salvage the sale if you follow up by answering the question or making the product more relevant to the prospect. If you didn't ask the right questions you would not understand what they are interested in.  As a rule the more efforts you make, the more skills you develop. The knowledge and skills need to be developed. The more you study the more you learn.

Believe me there would be no need for sales at all if people would just figure out that the new mousetrap would improve their lives, on their own. If you have any thing for sale including ideas it does pay to learn a bit about selling as nothing happens until somebody sells something.

If you are not involved with "sales" (I respect you for making it this far) you might not see the relevance to you, but I am sure you have some ideas. Until you are accepted as an authority you have to deal with those who think they already are. You need to identify who really can help you, who might have a reason to help you or let you help them. How can you best present your idea? Should you give up just because they didn't respond well to your first effort? Should you look for someone else who might be more responsive? These are selling questions. Improve your quantity (of efforts) and your quality (of efforts) and you are more likely to sell your idea. Your idea might be as simple as I can help you if you are willing to reward me.

The photo was done by my brother Marshall http://www.fotoworks.ca on a trip through South Dakota.  It is of a bunch of cowboys herding a much larger bunch of cows. You can interpret in different ways--I was just drawing attention to the numbers of the two sets of animals and trying to solve a problem.