The Danger of Don’t
March 21, 2014 @ 2:49 pm by ACT
The Danger of Don’t
As coaches and trainers, we have the distinct pleasure of working with people who want to keep growing and improving. Part of our job is to help them discover and eliminate what is holding them back from their full potential. While there are a multitude of potential blocks, few things are more destructive to top performance than working from a “don’t”.
We discovered the power of “don’t” when working with our clients who are sales professionals – they were rarely asking for introductions from their clients. Whenever we would ask if they requested introductions, the most common response back from them was, “No, I don’t want to…”, with various endings to the sentence. The most common don’ts were:
- I don’t want to pressure my clients
- I don’t want to look needy
- I don’t want to hurt the relationship
- I don’t want to be perceived as “that person”
Unfortunately, they would then do nothing. It reminded me of my days as a therapist when I was trained in hypnosis. In our training we were taught to never use the word “don’t” while someone was under hypnosis. For example, you were never to say “Don’t smoke” if someone was trying to quit smoking. For some reason, the word “don’t” messes with the subconscious and usually keeps the person from success. The same thing happens in life when we focus on what we don’t want to do or be rather than putting our main focus on what we do want to do or be!
So if you are one of the many sales professionals who want to grow their business and yet are not asking for introductions on a regular basis you need to:
- Reveal your “don’t”: Get it right out in front of you so you can address it!
- Determine how to ask for a referral in a way that does not lead you to your feared “don’t”. For example, if you are afraid of looking needy, how would you ask for an introduction out of strength? If you “don’t” want to pressure clients, how would you ask in a style that would be completely comfortable for them?
Focus on the do: How do you want to come across to them? What is your vision of how you would like to be asked for an introduction? And then do that!