Sunday’s thoughts while shaving…with Albert & Coach Wooden….

OXYMORNS

I love ’em.

• Army Intelligence
• Jumbo Shrimp
• Social Networking

Good friend and a networker who’s done over a million a month in volume Jimmy Bartlett had a great comment on previous blog…

Jim writes

“Mark, it amazes me how people do ANYTHING to avoid actually speaking to another human being, whether on the phone or face to face!”

Got me thinking about Social Networking and what delightful oxymorn it turned out to be.

Why is it the more people learn about tricks, short cuts, etc., on Facebook the less they pick up the phone?  I guess they think they are networking but they sure as hell ain’t being social.

I’ve seen more rude stuff….gosh….a “friend request” is followed by posts on a my wall about their deal and bombarding messages.

Now, don’t get me wrong, it helps my business….these ill mannered bozo’s turn people off and it’s easy pickings for pros or  for people with good manners.

MANNERS

Mom pounded me about manners….smart lady.  Og Mandino writes in The Greatest Salesman in the World, “I will continue to work on my manners for they are the sugar all are attracted to.”

They are…….want social proof?

I see people doing well selling courses about ‘how to listen,’…..and…’listening for money’…..good golly.

Are we actually at a point where people have to pay people to learn the most fundamental of good graces and manners?

Paying money to learn to be polite?

BURNS MY ASS, YOU TOO?

I am thinking about these posts I read at a site for networkers and this learning to listen for money stuff comes up.

Brings up an interesting moral and ethical dilemma, eh?

If someone takes the course and learns to listen but is really listening to learn

• How to listen for what the person needs
• Ask questions [a big part of this nonsense] to ‘probe’ [gathering ammunition]
• Then learn to listen for the ‘opening’
• Then eventually uses the prospects words against them  [firing the ammunition – ‘I thought you wanted your husband home?’]

Isn’t this disingenuous?  Pretending to be interested by asking questions with a hidden agenda?

Will sales go up if you get good at ….ahem….listening?

Yup.  They will.

But is it listening?

More importanly…..Is it ethical?

POP QUIZ: If I pretended to be interested in you….asked you questions….leveraged that information to work the business in ……and used what you wanted to passive-aggressively get the decison I wanted…..and you joined……..and thought I was a pretty nice guy, taking an interest in you……..is that ethical?

Now fast forward…..your in a month and I teach you what I did to you…..how would you feel about it then?

NO NEW GAMES, JUST DIFFERENT PLAYERS

As far back as the 1960’s people were teaching F.O.R.M.

You know…..talk to people about

• F- Family
• O-Occupation
• R-Recreation
• M-Money

Ask them questions about these things…..find out which things they would like to change….and how badly….then bring up the business.

This idea that the money is in the listening sounds pretty much like the old FORM method.

And, it doesn’t work….right?

Here is why……if they are too dumb to see your interest is not authentic, that  you had a hidden agenda all along …..they’ll be too dumb to learn what to do.  Duh?

When we put our hands on a conversation and ‘steer it’…..we are no longer having a conversation….we’re pitchmen.

So now we have ‘professionals’ [wink-wink], teaching us how to listen

.….or are they teaching us a updated sophisticated way to ‘play’ people [re-naming the underhanded FORM technique],by pretending to be interested in them?

Gee, I guess manners……..like listening……. are to ‘old school’ …..but…..heck, what do I know?

Save your dough folks.

IRONY

Love irony…..really love it.

These listening for money experts are teaching you how to ‘converse’ …..

How to appear sincere while strengthing your hidden agenda.  In essence con people about your motives.

Con artist is a term that comes from ‘confidence artist.’

Con men give you their trust…..so you will give them yours…and your money.

So the listening for money experts are telling you they will teach you how to ‘get the prospect’s confidence’ by being a better listener…….’helping others discover their needs’ …so you can set them up to sell them on your program…which is kind of ironic…..

But do you see the irony…..the listening for money experts are running that same con…on the people they are enrolling….

They just got conned on how to con people 🙂

I SHOULD HAVE SEEN IT COMING DEPT.

About 10 years ago I moved from Plum Island, MA to a small town about 20 miles away.  Few  years later The Fabulous Davene and I end our friendship and she moves in.

She had 2 daughters.  They were now cut off from their increasingly important social life.

I am amazed at how they can do like 20-25 conversations at once on Yahoo Instant Messenger.  A few months after they moved in we had a party for them and all their friends came over.

They were in their early teens and I am, at first, amused as they are clamoring like crazy on the back porch.  Seems like they are acting like 10 year olds, interrupting each other, screaming, yelling……

30 minutes pass….it is getting stronger.  I am curious.  I watch.

Not one conversation going on…..they simply do not know how to all be together…..the ‘cool’ technology has stunted their ability to interact.

No, I am not being a cranky old guy……it continues for hours……..I get the fun part…..but I am talking about a hyper…..for hours and no, it’s not normal….it never ends.

They don’t know how to talk to each other.

email…..texting…..cell phones…..instant messenger……I should have seen this deterioration of communication coming …..in all of us.

Take all that crap away from us and in 6 months I bet you might see some real conversations going on.

HONESTY REPUTATION CHARACTER

So anyway…..is it honest to decieve someone that you are interested in them to make the sale…..or is it good business?

Well, I guess that would depend on your definition of honesty for you and my definition of honesty for me.

Is it honest to ask questions and build a pseudo relationship so you can bring up the business?

Lots of sales and teaching people how to manipulate the conversation so lots of sales take place in your group will make money and build your reputation.

But are we developing character?  Do “the means justify the end” as Machiavelli wrote?

Networking is one of the, if not the best environment for personal development.

If we don’t develop personally, we simply will not maximize our potential…..and, as a result have no chance of peace of mind……to say nothing of organizations that will be shaky at best……if we’re shaky, trust me, our groups character will reflect it.

Be more concerned with your character than your reputation, because your character is what you really are, while your reputation is merely what others think you are.  Coach Wooden

For me, listening with a hidden agenda does not develop character and readers of this blog know I am deferring to Coach Wooden.

I love this clip…..address both points.

MOTIVATION OR MANIPULATION?

The difference between motivation and manipulation is pretty simple.

If I tell you why I am doing something then do it to you….it is motivation.

If I do not tell you why I am doing something and do it to you ….draw you into where I want both of us to go in the business…..it is manipulation.

Example?

MANIPULATION:

I call up a friend from High School.  Obviously I am trying to grow my business…..not obvious to my ‘friend’.  Get caught up for a while…..waiting for my chance…..maybe I wait one or two meetings but…..eventually I bring it up…..it’s why I made contact in the first place.

MOTIVATION:

I call my high school chum and tell him why I called.

Which one is honest?

Which type of person, of those 2 scenarios, would we want our kids to be?  Well we better decide right now because they are going to turn out just like us.

…..if you talk to someone and you want to bring up the business…..if that is what you want to do….do it and be honest about it….

Now here is the cool part…..about being honest…..it works!

Would it be OK if I showed you how to get virtually 100% to say yes to my little 30 second commercial [OK, my pitch]….. to say ‘sure,  give me your pitch‘…..?

BOSTON RED SOX & MAKING CALLS

Red Sox were in Colorado this week.  Sox closer, Johnthan Papelbon comes in to 2 games in a row in the 9th inning.

Sox leading in both.  Papelbon uncharacteristically loses……

45,000 people screaming as Colorado hammers this star pitcher. Humilating…..especially on the road.

Next night?  Same thing….

Sox move on to San Francisco.

He got hammered in front of 90,000 people and millions more on TV.

Papelbon CAN’T WAIT to get back in the game in the 9th inning.

The beauty of baseball is everyday everyone starts with a clean slate.

Just like networking.

TRUST

Whoever is careless with the truth in small matters cannot be trusted with important matters. Albert

Pretending to be interested in the life of another merely to sponsor them is being careless with the truth.

And believe me, if a prospect is paying attention, they’ll know if we are careless …..dogs know who to bark at folks….so do people.

EINSTEIN’S THEORY OF RELATIVITY

I know that stress is heaviest during idle time.

It’s taped to my computer.

Only saying that has never come down…..it’s true.

By planning to make calls and not making them……stress goes up.

By making them stress goes down and self esteem goes up.

Once we make it a habit…..instead of trying to get 200 more friends on Facebook…..time changes for us.

We are no longer dreading the time we ‘scheduled’ calls….we are enjoying life…

……and the calling time flies by….

The 1 hour we procrastinate till tomorrow ….seems like 10 while the hour is happening……….guilt, shame, self loathing……but the time flies if we make them.

So if we said we were going to call prospects at 7 on Mon & Tuesday……and we don’t do it Monday….the 24 hours till the next 7 pm calling time is brutal

If we make them on Monday…..the 24 hours till 7 on Tuesday feel completely different……

BUT…..it was the same 24 hours.

That is Einstein’s Theory of Relativity…….honest.  The time is the same but ‘feels’ completely different.

Want proof?

“When you are courting a nice girl an hour seems like a second.

When you sit on a red-hot cinder a second seems like an hour.

That’s relativity.”

Albert Einstein

believe

mark januszewski

world’s laziest networker