Welcome to SALES with ASLAN, a weekly podcast hosted by ASLAN Co-founders Tom Stanfill and Tab Norris, geared at helping sales professionals and sales leaders eliminate the hard sell. At the end of the day, we believe that selling is serving. ASLAN helps sellers make the shift from a ‘typical’ sales approach, to one that makes us more influential because we embrace the truth that the customer’s receptivity is more important than your value prop or message.
The goal of these interviews is to spotlight various experts in the world of sales and sales leadership – sharing informational stories, techniques, and expert interviews on the sales topics you care about.
The following are notes from Ep. 164 – Plan to Crush 2023 – Part 1
In this episode, Tom and Tab kick off the new year by taking it “back to basics.” The start of a new year is a good time to refresh, reset, and plan for the year ahead. So with their first episode of 2023, Tom and Tab discuss mindset, opportunity, and a “plan to crush” the year ahead.
Listen to the conversation here:
Or check out the full transcript:
00:14
Tom Stanfill
Tab. Welcome back to the podcast studio in another episode of Sales with Aslan. How the h*** are you?
00:22
Tab Norris
I am good. And, I haven’t seen you in a little while. We had a little break, but it’s good to be back. Back in the studio.
00:30
Tom Stanfill
Back in the studio. We had a little break. That probably was good for you. Not for me. Probably good for you. I know a little of me goes a long way, but you, of course, are loved by all at all times.
00:40
Tab Norris
Tom, that’s impossible. 30 years, probably. We’ve been in this for 30 years and we’re not tired of each other yet.
00:47
Tom Stanfill
That’s true. Because we worked together prior to Aslin.
00:51
Tab Norris
We have been together almost 30 years. 29 years.
00:55
Tom Stanfill
We need to go together to Europe to celebrate our anniversary. We can tell Elizabeth and Claire, although we did kind of do that. We went to Ireland and played.
01:05
Tab Norris
That is exactly that’s true.
01:07
Tom Stanfill
That was we did. We’ve already celebrated our anniversary.
01:09
Tab Norris
Yeah.
01:09
Tom Stanfill
That’s funny. That’s funny. Oh, man. We talked about the show, this kind of New Year, kicking off the New year. What do we want to talk about? We both agree. I think it’s a good time to get back to the basics. The beginning of the year is about planning. Typically, it’s about restart refresh. Let’s stop and take time to assess what we want to do, what we want to accomplish, how do we get there. By the way, Tab, I suck at that.
01:44
Tab Norris
Refocusing getting all fresh.
01:47
Tom Stanfill
Well, no, the concept. No. All about the concept. No, I’m all about the concepts. I’m all about vision and planning. I’m all about goal setting. I’m all about mindset and being positive. I’m all about that. What I’m stuck at is actually the execution of it. I shouldn’t say I’m stuck at it. What I should say is I’ve had to learn to do it. I am not a natural. I’m not wired to write down my goals, to come up with a plan, to figure out how I need to navigate barriers. I’m naturally wired to fly by the seat of my pants. Kind of creative. Read the room.
02:22
Tab Norris
I know.
02:24
Tom Stanfill
This is so critical of, I think of being successful, especially as we potentially are moving into some strong headwinds. Whether it happens or not, I don’t know. Everybody’s talking about some potential recession, and there’s a lot of clients that we’re talking to who are preparing for a tough market.
02:46
Tab Norris
It is funny. Yeah, it is funny because I think, regardless, some of our listeners are probably feeling that real heavily in certain markets and industries right now because we’re seeing it, and then others are probably maybe they’re not. I think this is relevant for anyone because we’re going to have challenges no matter what. Think about when went into 2020, people, that New Year. Everybody was like, this is going to be awesome. This is going to be great. All of a sudden, everybody got smacked in the face and the world fell apart. So, you know, you never know.
03:22
Tom Stanfill
Well, and as my mentor has said to me recently, he said, what you want to do is not predict the position. Yes, right. We can’t predict the future. There’s no way to predict what’s going to happen. As a matter of fact, you could just do not listen to this podcast. Go buy stock. You can predict the future. Although maybe it’s for entertainment value tab, but we want to position. If you position it for, okay, the market might be down, or we may have some headwinds, we might head into a recession. What do I need to do if that happens? If you think about the things that could happen, now is the time to stop. I’m talking to myself, stop and think about what is it that we want, how do we get there? What are potential barriers to reaching our desired destination? I think it starts with as were talking about, it starts with mindset, because I actually think that’s the bigger barrier, whether we head into a recession or it’s the best market ever, people with the right mindset always seem to crush it.
04:33
Tab Norris
Yeah, they may have a dip or they may have whatever, but it doesn’t matter. They press on and it really I mean, you see the mindset is so important in all markets because you’ll see the opposite, too. People get fat and happy because they don’t have the right mindset.
04:49
Tom Stanfill
That’s true. Yeah.
04:50
Tab Norris
You know what I meant. You kind of slide and you don’t do the things you need to do, and then it bites you later. I do think this is a very timely kick off to your topic.
05:01
Tom Stanfill
Yeah. I think of it as two decisions because you and I really haven’t prepped too much for the show. I know we both kind of have different thoughts about this and work together for others, but I think of it as two decisions. I’m curious to see what you think, but I’ll share my two decisions first. I think the first decision you have to make that had developed the right mindset is either focus on the problem or focus on the solution. If you focus on the problem expands. If you focus on the solution expands. As I go back, like if were starting to look at our market, and let’s just say there’s a concern in our market that the budgets are shrinking, for example, well, one of the things that I’ve done before, and I’m going, okay, that’s scary. If the budgets are shrinking and demand is down, that face value, that’s a little scary.
05:56
Tom Stanfill
If you stop and say, well, what’s the solution? What’s the opportunity? So what’s the size of the market? I think in our market. Let’s just say our market is a $10 billion market. Let’s say it drops to 8 billion.
06:11
Tab Norris
Exactly.
06:12
Tom Stanfill
Let’s say it drops in half. Let’s say that our whole market drops from 10 billion to 5 billion. I still have to get a really matter of fact, I did a graph one time for myself and our team and the slice of the market that we had to win to hit our number was so small you couldn’t even see it in the price chart.
06:32
Tab Norris
You got a magnifying glass?
06:34
Tom Stanfill
Yeah. I think we can make it. I think we’ve got opportunity.
06:38
Tab Norris
Oh, yeah. It is crazy. Like, I was talking to a new client the other day, and I was just talking about goals for his team in the upcoming year. He goes, right, we’re going to double sales in 2020 in the next 18 months. I’m like going because non negotiable. We can do it all day long. We looked at the mark. Same thing. It was the same thing. Who cares what’s going on in the world? There is so much opportunity. I love how you simplify that down. Like, you can focus on the problem or the solution. It’s just where are you going to put your mind?
07:15
Tom Stanfill
My greatest thing? By the way, if you focus on the problem, you’ll be right. If you focus on the solution, you’ll be right.
07:22
Tab Norris
That’s right. And you can always find a problem.
07:26
Tom Stanfill
I always think about this guy I met, Tab. He was actually acquaintance. He wasn’t a friend necessarily. I just knew him and I had lunch with him. I guess I met him at some kind of social thing and he was in real estate and were talking about being entouraged. We were young. I would say we’re in our mid to late 20s. So this is in the 80s.
07:46
Tab Norris
This is before you knew everything.
07:48
Tom Stanfill
Yeah, well, yeah, I probably thought I knew everything. He thought he knew nothing. I don’t know. You can go both ways. I remember he said this to me now. This is before the internet, okay? He said, I don’t think you can be an entrepreneur. All the good ideas have already been.
08:07
Tab Norris
They’Re all done.
08:08
Tom Stanfill
All the good he goes, all the opportunity, all the opportunities. Everybody’s already figured everything out. Everything’s been innovated, everything’s been developed. This is before the Internet, didn’t it? He was done, his entrepreneur, he was all tapped out, was zero. Yeah, we’re done. I’m like, I’ve thought about that. I’m like, in a couple of more years, the internet was and then.
08:30
Tab Norris
Of course, never ending.
08:32
Tom Stanfill
I mean, you think about all the stuff that’s been developed since that guy said that because it was mindset he saw. He saw the opportunities small and declining and other people, which we could name lots of them. Bill Gates might be one. Saw the Steve Jobs course.
08:54
Tab Norris
Let’s go simple. The guy that invented the Stanley drinking cup. Have you seen these or yeti? I mean, whatever. Really?
09:04
Tom Stanfill
What’s? The Stanley drinking cup.
09:06
Tab Norris
All the kids have them, college kids. It’s just a big cup and it’s got a straw in it and it looks just like every other cup, and they charge double and it holds liquid just like all the other ones. It got in it holds liquid and they can’t keep them in stock. And I’m, like, going, wow.
09:25
Tom Stanfill
There’s always opportunities when COVID hit. You just got to be able to shift. So you focus on the problem expands. You focus on the solution expands. The other thing I would say the other decision to make is either you can focus on what you can control or you can focus on what you’re concerned about. In other words, Covey talked about. There’s the circle of concern and there’s a circle of control or influence. What you can influence or I think of it as control and what you’re concerned about, like what happens in the market, what’s going to happen politically, what’s going to happen with the next pandemic. You have zero control over that, but you do have control over what you’re going to do, what you’re going to learn, how you can change your career, what you can flex. You can either get really caught up in things you can’t control or you can focus on what you can control.
10:22
Tom Stanfill
I think those are two decisions that I try to make and focus on as I think about my planning and my success or when I’m attacked with doubt and fear, I’m like, well, I love that.
10:39
Tab Norris
Of course this is why you and are such good partners. I could never come into pull this together in a beautiful two big things that now I’m going to stick here on my desk that I’m going to use, which I really like. I totally agree with you. I love it. I wrote down a couple of things that I think feed beautifully into what you just said. Me, I can be a little tactical.
11:07
Tom Stanfill
Well, I also know you have a really positive mindset. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you negative. I’ve done that. Like you said at the beginning of.
11:15
Tab Norris
This podcast, I’m pretty positive. I was just thinking about what are some things I do because I think I probably do focus on the solution more than the problem. I would say number two would be more of a struggle for me. I do sometimes worry about things that are really not in my control. Just as a human being, we probably.
11:40
Tom Stanfill
All do to surgery. It’s a temptation for us all.
11:44
Tab Norris
Yes, but like you and know, I sometimes can be called a little overly optimistic. Kind of been my thing. Even though my wife says I’m becoming less and less optimistic every year that.
11:55
Tom Stanfill
I’m married the older you get. Well, bad things can happen.
11:59
Tab Norris
They are happening, and they can happen. Yes, they can, but no. I just started jotting down a couple of ideas, and it’d be interesting now to throw a couple of these out and see how they kind of match up with you. How do I try to create a positive mindset? The first thing I wrote was, I focus on the good things. I focus on silver linings. I always try to find a silver lining. I mean, I really have always done that.
12:26
Tom Stanfill
Something good is going to be something.
12:27
Tab Norris
Good is going to come out of this. It feels bad right now, but this is going to make me better. It’s going to make us better. There’s going to be something. I don’t know why I do that, but it fits right into what you said about the market drops or this happens. Look at the opportunity this could create. That’s exactly what that is. It’s just kind of having that mindset.
12:53
Tom Stanfill
That’s so true. Because you learn from pain. Yeah, pain teaches pain is a great teacher. So every time you struggle, you’re learning. That can be leveraged into learning something. That’s a great way because yeah, we’re going to face headwinds. We’re going to struggle. I mean, like our situation, like, we hit the pandemic. All we did was do onsite workshops. What was the silver lining is we had to develop a virtual workshop, which improved our solution. That’s it.
13:25
Tab Norris
We doubled our solution. We now offered something that we really needed to offer anyway. We would be in a real bad spot right now if we didn’t have it. So it’s really good. That was my first, and the second thing I had was practice gratitude. Like, the way I stay positive is I constantly focus on what I’m grateful for. There are so many things that we should be grateful for. When you really tap it, I’m a big journal guy. I journal every day, and I just find I’m writing, and I’m usually writing things I’m struggling with or whatever. By the time I get to the end, I’m talking about all the things I’m grateful for. Gosh, but look, think of all these things that have happened. I don’t know, that helps me with my attitude, my positive mindset.
14:16
Tom Stanfill
I’m struggling with that tab. And I’ve gotten older.
14:20
Tab Norris
Oh, really?
14:20
Tom Stanfill
Yeah. And I realize that’s a choice. We just moved from the house we loved, and we downsized for reasons it doesn’t matter to share. So that’s been challenging. I wake up in a town home now, not my home, that I lived in for 18 years. I used to walk down the hall to the kitchen, and I’d look outside the backyard, and I would see my backyard, and I love that view, and I love my kitchen because I like to cook. Now I walk downstairs and I hold on to the railing because my knees are a little more knee hurts. 70 years ago, a little arthritis which makes me think about my arthritis which makes me think I’m getting older. It’s like I don’t like it as much. Yeah, right. I can think about and I have a choice. I can say what is the positive, what’s the good thing?
15:09
Tom Stanfill
I can either choose to think about the good things, the reason we bought the town home, the reason we lose or I can focus on my knee hurts. I have to walk downstairs. Oh, and I forgot something. I could go back upstairs. Dover lining. I’m working out.
15:22
Tab Norris
Tab.
15:22
Tom Stanfill
I’m working out.
15:24
Tab Norris
See you’re in habit. Stacking.
15:27
Tom Stanfill
Stacking.
15:29
Tab Norris
You’re good. I think we all struggle with it. I do. I think this is why this is such a good reminder. I just think about your situation. I go, man, you’re in a really great situation. A short term, you got some challenges, but my goodness, I see where it’s going and what you guys are going to be doing a year and a half from now. It’s going to be fantastic.
15:48
Tom Stanfill
Yeah, well, I can choose to focus on maintenance, lack of maintenance. Like I have zero yard. I don’t even have any I have no equipment. I have a lot more.
15:58
Tab Norris
Yeah.
15:59
Tom Stanfill
I mean, I can focus on that.
16:00
Tab Norris
You can play more golf. Think about it. Your golf game is going to skyrocket spring.
16:06
Tom Stanfill
So good.
16:07
Tab Norris
I love it. This is a great reminder. So that’s a silver lining and gratitude. My third thing was hang with positive fueling people.
16:18
Tom Stanfill
Oh, yeah, that’s brilliant.
16:21
Tab Norris
If you want to have a good mindset, who you hang out with matters.
16:26
Tom Stanfill
Do they make deposits in your bank account? How do they see the exactly.
16:30
Tab Norris
You just talk about if you’re going through a hard time, set up a lunch with a positive person. Go grab coffee with somebody. So anyway, I’m getting real tactic.
16:40
Tom Stanfill
I love it.
16:41
Tab Norris
It was really good for me. I just started thinking through this. This is another one that I know you practice. Find a ways to have a victory every day. You want to give yourself a positive attitude. Positive mindset look for ways to have victories every day. My last thing I had is I don’t know if this is mindset positive.
17:10
Tom Stanfill
That’s okay.
17:11
Tab Norris
I’m going to throw it out there.
17:12
Tom Stanfill
Because I’m throw it out there. Tab.
17:14
Tab Norris
I’m throwing it out there. To me if you want to have a positive mindset, you need to be courageous. I know that sounds a little crazy but what I’m saying? It’s almost like.
17:28
Tom Stanfill
The opposite of that is fear of failure.
17:30
Tab Norris
Yes. To me fear of failure makes me have a negative mindset. It makes me scared. I start pulling in.
17:37
Tom Stanfill
Embrace it.
17:38
Tab Norris
Embrace it and be courageous. I’m not saying I do this, I struggle with this. But I love that. I remember Benjamin Me and we bought a zoo. Remember the movie We Bought a Zoo? One of my favorite lines in there was and I wrote it down, you should. Sometimes all you need is 20 seconds of insane courage. Just literally 20 seconds of embarrassing bravery, and I promise you something great will come of it. I love that quote. And that’s really what it is. It’s like you got to just keep moving to have this positive mindset. Keep moving. I’m reading a book that my wife introduced me to call Chop Wood, Carry Water, which I highly recommend by Joshua Medcalf. Simple little read, but so powerful. He talks about he says, I just got to read this. Every little thing we do, no matter how mundane, matters greatly when it’s multiplied by the number of times we do it over time, even the smallest habit of choice can change our lives immensely.
18:46
Tab Norris
Do what separates most wildly successful people from everyone else? Inches, John.
18:53
Tom Stanfill
That’s all that separates them.
18:56
Tab Norris
You take inches over time. That’s all about that right mindset, because that’s going to help you get the right mindset. This isn’t big things. It can be a small thing. It kind of feeds into the habit of victory every day. Right?
19:13
Tom Stanfill
Yeah. It’s like if you break it down, it’s the mindset of it can be done, versus saying, okay, this destination might be such a stretch for me. I want to double my income. I want to move from where I am now to where that person is. Yes, I want to move from I’m a sales rep to one day I want to be a CEO or I want to own my own company. That might seem like a big stretch, but actually the people which really nicely transitions us into the next point that’s it. It really comes down to developing a plan, long term plan, but also a short term plan to say, look, if we just break this thing down, it is achievable. That’s one of the things that I think you’re right about every successful person that I’ve ever met. I don’t mean that it’s always related to making money or just successful in whatever endeavor, successful enrollment they’re in, whether they’re a stay at home mom or dad or they’re teach school or their CEO or whatever.
20:20
Tom Stanfill
They are passionate about breaking things down and coming up with a plan and measuring it and figuring it out and then working their plan, which is the only reason that I’ve had to learn how to do it because I know it’s required. It’s really hard for me because I’m not naturally wired that way. I am not naturally wired. I think that brings us to the next thing. So starts with mindset. Like we go into the next year first. Let’s look at our mindset. Are we challenged with kind of seeing the negative versus the positive and all the things that you shared about how we are grateful. We focus on what we can control. We look for the silver lining. We break it down to the daily successful victories, as you said, which I think the next step is to say, okay, what is our plan?
21:09
Tab Norris
Right?
21:09
Tom Stanfill
Yeah.
21:10
Tab Norris
Okay, that’s great.
21:11
Tom Stanfill
I got a great that’s where I end. Yeah, man, let’s go. Just do it. This is the devils, and as you said, the devil’s in the details. This is where you’re more tactical. I think the first thing I would say about developing a plan is just stop. I am talking to me right now. Stop. I cannot tell you that over times, I’m like, yeah, I’m going to carve out some time. As soon as I just did this, the week between Christmas and New Year’s, I actually did it. I stopped and I spent probably a half a day just thinking through. It’s amazing coming up with a plan. First of all, what do I want? Right? In that. What do you want? Like, if you go to kayak, the first thing they do is say, what’s your destination? You can’t do anything in kayak or TripAdvisor, wherever, any tool that helps you plan a trip until you write in a destination.
22:10
Tom Stanfill
That’s so true for us in life. It’s like, where do you want it? We have goals for Aslan. We have goals, personal goals. I have goals. Related real estate. I have goals. What is it that I want? And I think that’s the first step. I think and this is again, where I don’t naturally do this, but actually write it down, where you could show somebody, which has a huge impact on whether you achieve it, because your focus determines your desire. If you write it like we’ve talked about, we want to go to every state in the country.
22:40
Tab Norris
Yeah.
22:41
Tom Stanfill
That’s become a goal. Now I want that. I don’t even know why I want it. You’ve been to Iowa? Yes. Congratulations. Yeah, but I did it. I want to do it.
22:53
Tab Norris
Yeah, well, I 100% agree with you, and it’s it’s so easy to me, the harder part is, okay, I know where I want to go. I think you’re right. You do have to take time to figure out where you want to go, what do you want to do. To your point, you then have to develop a plan to pull it off, to execute it. This is a study. You may have seen this. I don’t even know if it’s true. I researched it.
23:31
Tom Stanfill
There.
23:31
Tab Norris
Some people say it’s true, some people say it’s not. Supposedly, it was a Harvard MBA study from 1979. Did you remember this? It was prior to graduation. They have you written goals down or they graduated and have you put a plan to attain it. It basically was 84% of the people had no goals. They’re just, like, an MBA from Harvard.
23:52
Tom Stanfill
I think that’s true.
23:54
Tab Norris
Yeah, I do think that’s true, too. You got 13% of the class had written goals but no concrete plans. That makes sense to me, too. Yeah. I got some goals, some specific things, kind of what you just said, I have a destination. I know that. I want to go to all 50 states. I want to do this. And then only 3% did both. They had a plan. They wrote it down, and they had an action plan around it, and then they kind of came back around ten years later, and it was interesting. The 13% that had written but didn’t have an accident had done made two times more money than the 84%. Okay.
24:33
Tom Stanfill
Yeah.
24:33
Tab Norris
The 3% that did both made ten times more than all the rest of them.
24:39
Tom Stanfill
Yeah. Again, you could apply that to money or anything you want.
24:42
Tab Norris
Anything you want.
24:44
Tom Stanfill
Here’s the point about the plan. I believe that’s so true.
24:47
Tab Norris
It does help to have a destination where you want to go, which I think, by the way, that’s huge.
24:54
Tom Stanfill
Yeah. Well, the hardest part is you don’t have that. If you get the destination and you get the plan, what to say yes to. You know what to say no to.
25:03
Tab Norris
Exactly.
25:04
Tom Stanfill
I tell you, the one area where I did this well, when I was young, was football. I wanted to be from the time I bet I was, like, maybe seven or eight years old, I wanted to be a professional football player, and I was clear about what I wanted to do and how I was going to get there. I didn’t have the God given talent, but I made it pretty far. I may remember people would come over to my house. I still remember this. I still can’t believe I did it. They come over to my house. It was maybe Saturday night, and I was lifting weights, and they said, we’re all going to a movie. You want to go? It’s all girls, by the way.
25:37
Tab Norris
Oh, my gosh. You just changed the story completely.
25:39
Tom Stanfill
Yeah. This girl that I really liked, and when you go to the movie, I said no. Well, why don’t you want to go? Because I’m working out. I had a plan. I looked back on that, what an idiot. I got to college level, but I didn’t get to pro level, so I had to go ahead.
25:58
Tab Norris
That’s awesome. I mean, that’s a perfect but it.
26:00
Tom Stanfill
Does tell you I was connected to this plan and this destination. Saying no to that was actually not difficult. They couldn’t believe it. Saying no to that was not a big deal for me. I knew what I wanted. I think that’s the problem, because once you’re focused what is it? That statement of focus energy over time.
26:18
Tab Norris
Equals momentum, or the laser kind of idea.
26:21
Tom Stanfill
It’s a laser idea. Yeah.
26:25
Tab Norris
I love it. Where I really learned the power of this was right out of college. I’m a big talker, especially when I was younger. I have my list of 50 things I was going to do before I die side and all this stuff. Destination has not ever been much of a problem, but it was like and I was talking to this one guy. One of my things was this guy was talking about he’d run a marathon. And I said, well, you know what? That’s on my list. That’s one of the things I’m going to do. I’m going to run a marathon before I die. He goes, okay, when are you going to do it? I said, I don’t know. Someday. He goes, you’re never going to do it if you don’t go ahead and decide you’re going to do it. You’re young, just do it now.
27:05
Tab Norris
I’m like, it’s a good point. Okay, you’re right. I’m going to do one this year, 1990, whatever it was. He goes, all right. I said, good. I kind of like ready to leave? No, which one are you going to do?
27:18
Tom Stanfill
I don’t know. What’s a good one?
27:19
Tab Norris
He said, Well, New York. I was only going to do one. I’d do New York. I said, all right. I’m going to do the New York Marathon. He goes, I’m trying to leave. Okay, how do you have any goals of how fast you want to complete this? He goes, I don’t know. What’s a good one? To the gates of less than 4 hours. I said, can I do that? He goes, of course, if you train right, you can do it. I said, okay, I’m going to do the New York Marathon, 1990, whatever, under 4 hours bye now I’m leaving for sure. He said, okay, so now we got to put our plan together. This is what I was talking to you about. This is what’s so powerful. And then I said, okay. He said, so what we’re going to do is we’re going to sit down and we’re going to put together and it was like three months, and it started small, and then we just had increments.
28:10
Tab Norris
On Saturday you went a little a mile further and two mile further, and it was crazy. Tom that’s when I really learned the power of a goal in developing an action plan.
28:22
Tom Stanfill
You show up at the rate it kind of breaks it down. Like a marathon to me. Sounds impossible, but when you break it down to like, well, I’m going to first run this long, and then I’m going to run this long. I’ve heard people talk about their plan and it’s very defined. Then all of a sudden, your son.
28:37
Tab Norris
Is really good at this.
28:38
Tom Stanfill
Yeah. All of a sudden it becomes you remind me of something else. That’s why you want to write it down. Why you want to nail it is because when you go public with it, like, you told that guy, he asked you, and you said, oh, yeah.
28:55
Tab Norris
Drives it into action. Now I’m going to look like an idiot if I don’t do it. I mean, I’m out there. I’m committed.
29:00
Tom Stanfill
Yeah, that’s what I did with the book. I purposely just write the book because I knew that if I went public with it and I’m going to write a book and I’m going to go public with it, I’m going to tell people. It took me a while, but I had to commit to it. I mean, I committed to it. I went public. So I think that’s important. You might get some people that communicate. They’re not believers in it, but that’s okay. It’s worth holding yourself accountable to something, because once you say it, you’re going to feel like you need to do it.
29:34
Tab Norris
Even if you fail, you’re better off going for it and failing. Yeah, I totally agree. Now, have you ever done this is something I’ve just been connected to. Have you ever heard of vision boarding? Have you ever done anything around that with goals? This is kind of the new thing I’ve just been bumping into. I just been around forever. All it is it’s like a collage of images or words that represent a goal. I’m a very visual person, so I.
30:05
Tom Stanfill
Don’T experiment with that. Yeah, that probably makes it more tangible or maybe creates a more of emotional connection.
30:15
Tab Norris
Pages one of these guys read his book, and he wanted to make $100,000. This is a long time ago, so he had a big $100,000 bill over his bed on his ceiling when he was right out of the college, and it was like so every day he woke up to that. I mean, that’s cheesy, but I don’t know. I’m going to experiment with that. I think that’s pretty cool because you have kind of either words or images that can help you.
30:42
Tom Stanfill
Yeah. I have little things that I’ll write that will encourage me to do certain things or remind me of certain things. I think that’s important for us to build. Like have little rock on my oh, that’s good. See, that’s like little symbols, little things that remind me of things I care about or things I’ve committed to. I think all of that goes into the planning, but I want to say something real quick before we could move on to the last one about planning that’s very tactical for sales reps is stop and think about most of us have grow, defend, and acquire. We have the responsibility to grow, defendant, or defend, grow and acquire. I’ve got accounts I got to defend. I got accounts I need to grow. The hard ones are I have accounts that I need to acquire. I think one of the best ways to plan is to sit back and say, okay, if I defend the accounts that I have, what will my number be?
31:39
Tom Stanfill
What counts? Can I grow? Then, okay, well, that means if I grow the accounts that I have and I defend the accounts I have, then I still got to sell X number.
31:50
Tab Norris
This percentage, this 20%, is going to have to come from acquire, and that’s hard.
31:55
Tom Stanfill
If I want to sell a million and a half dollars and I’m going to get $750,000 from my defendant to grow, then I got to land $750,000 of new logos. Now, what is the metrics that I need to look at that’s going to help me land that? If I have to, what’s the pipeline like? Literally nail down that everybody that’s been successful in sales has a pipeline, and they know the numbers and they like, okay, I got to meet with 50 people that lead to ten opportunities, and I close two. Okay, so great. What are the metrics to have 50 meetings? It’s not fuzzy to them. They’re very clear. They go back to your daily victories, and they break it down to inch by inch or day by day, however you want to think about it. Here’s what I need to do today. They do it first, but they have a plan.
32:51
Tab Norris
Yeah, I love it. I think it’s awesome. And I think aren’t you always amazed? You’re probably like me. You’re amazed that the number that I pick for the year that I’m going to sell, I almost always sell that much. Why don’t I pick a bigger number? Every year? I pick a bigger number and I.
33:09
Tom Stanfill
Sell more bigger number this year.
33:13
Tab Norris
I’m like it’s silly. There is something in our brain that when we do that, it’s just like there’s something in us. I don’t know what it is. There’s some probably neuroscientist out there who could answer that question for us.
33:26
Tom Stanfill
It does drive well, I think it’s because it drives your behavior. It’s like once you focus on something, marketing knows that if they can get you to focus on it and so it starts to engineer your behavior, it pulls you towards what you focus on. I think there’s one other thing that I think it’s key to starting the year. This is the thing, I think what we’ve talked about so far is probably pretty intuitive. I meet very few people that do this last thing. You start with a mindset, okay, this is what I think I need to do, and I’m going to develop this positive mindset and focus on the solution and focus on what I can concern, what I can control, but to develop my plans. But here’s what we don’t do. We don’t assess our ability to execute the plan, because we all have gaps, right?
34:18
Tom Stanfill
We all have a gap. We all have talent that’s God given, that we’re just like it’s special, it’s our superpower, but we also have gaps, and our denial works against us and keeps us from seeing our gap because gaps are painful. And I remember. What we’ve got to do to make sure that we’re going to be successful and operate at the highest level possible is we’ve got to seek feedback. We’ve got to seek feedback and ask other people, trusted people into our lives to help us figure out do we have a discipline problem, a capability problem, is there a knowledge problem? Do I have the wrong values? I’ve got to invite people into my life to help me see, because denial is going to keep me from really seeing what I call the sign above your head that everybody sees, that I can’t see. It’s the thing that’s keeping me from really potentially being as successful as I need to be.
35:25
Tom Stanfill
And I don’t think it’s an option. We all have gaps that we don’t see. We all have blind spots, everybody.
35:31
Tab Norris
The older you get, the more you realize that. I think you just kind of realize they’re a lot more than you thought.
35:38
Tom Stanfill
Yeah. I was shocked when I was doing research for the book. I was shocked when I was watching 60 Minutes and they talked about why cancer is such difficult to kill or eradicate or treat, however you want to call it, is because your immune system doesn’t know it’s.
35:59
Tab Norris
Therefore, your body ramp.
36:04
Tom Stanfill
It just runs rampantly. If your immune system knew that cancer cells were growing, if it knew it would just kill it. One of the ways they started to be successful at treating brain cancer that’s what the focus of the 60 Minutes show was on, is they would inject polio into the cancer, and the body would pick up polio and attack polio. But it also, by the way, kills.
36:32
Tab Norris
Yeah. Get the cancer.
36:33
Tom Stanfill
I thought that’s exactly what happens to us related to our performance. Denial is the cancer to our performance. It’s like we don’t know what cancer, quote unquote, cancer is keeping us. There’s something and so I would highly recommend that you sit down with somebody. I mean, first of all yeah, sure. Watch your game films, listen to your calls like I watch myself present. There’s certain things you can pick up by seeing yourself that will expose some of your blind spots. I would find people that you trust who love you, who know you, and you ask them the question, what are you afraid to tell me that might hurt my feelings?
37:16
Tab Norris
Yeah, I love it.
37:18
Tom Stanfill
How do I make other people feel? What do I need to do that? I don’t know. It’s a lot less painful for them to tell you something that you’re asking them for than to find out later.
37:30
Tab Norris
Yeah, that’s really good. It’s awesome. If you have somebody who can observe you and watch you could just get married. Tap well, that’s true. I don’t even have to ask my wife that question. She gives me feedback anyway.
37:49
Tom Stanfill
Yeah. I was with a group of people not too long ago, and I’ve been a great example of blind spot. A lot was going on at work. I was distracted and we left. And she goes, you don’t listen. What are you talking about? She goes, So and so said this and then you said this, which basically just demonstrated because you asked the same question. You asked the question, they just answered, hey, I’m from Idaho. And I go, Where are you from? Idaho?
38:25
Tab Norris
It was like one of those, oh, that Idaho.
38:27
Tom Stanfill
Yeah. Then you try to cover it. I would have no idea had my wife not said that to me. Yeah, that’s a little painful. But I realized she’s right. I’ve been distracted, and I’m having a hard time listening because my brain is focused on trying to solve problems in my business or my personal life or whatever it is. Yeah, I’ve got to seek feedback.
38:57
Tab Norris
It is funny because I feel like I do that pretty well in sales, but I don’t do it well at home.
39:03
Tom Stanfill
Yeah, good point.
39:05
Tab Norris
Which makes me sad. I’m going gosh, I’m doing exactly what I train and teach and encourage people not to do. I go home and I do the exact opposite. I make assumptions and I do all those things. I think it’s really good. I was kind of thinking through one other way I’ll get feedback. I don’t know if you do this. I’m going to throw this out and get your take on this. What about getting feedback from your customers? Have you done that?
39:42
Tom Stanfill
I’ve done that, but I don’t trust it okay. Because I do trust what they tell me, but I don’t trust I’m seeing the total picture.
39:51
Tab Norris
But as a data point, though, I.
39:53
Tom Stanfill
Do believe it’s a data point. I think it’s great to just do that, not just do that. If I say, hey, how do I make you some of the how do I treat you? Do I come across as other senator or self center? I think it might be difficult for them to tell me the truth because most people think when you’re asking for feedback, you’re really asking for a compliment.
40:18
Tab Norris
Yeah.
40:19
Tom Stanfill
What do you think about this? I think you’re awesome. Thanks. It’s hard for but I do think it’s a data point. I also think if you’re sensing something or, there might be a gap and you reveal that gap to them, and so you’re narrowing them in on something. Hey, I feel like I’ve always done this. I’ve been trying to sell you this one thing, and I realize I may not really understand your business, and I kind of approach it and I realize I need to change. Change, which is a way we kind of tell people sometimes and say, hey, look, I’ve been selling the same way, and now you have just went through this training, and you taught me to sell a different way. How do I have these conversations with my customer? Because I’ve just been showing up and saying, hey, what are you doing?
41:01
Tom Stanfill
Nice to see you, is that I can help you with? Now you want me to have this more in depth business discovery, blah, blah, blah. How do I do that? Well, I think the one thing is just own it. If you own it and you feel like, hey, I might have some gaps here, that’s really what I.
41:15
Tab Norris
Was talking about, because I’ve done that a few times, and sometimes I’ve been amazed at what I’ve received back. Like, goodness gracious, that’s good feedback. But I’m with you. I know we’ve done a lot of this for each other and on our team. Get somebody that you trust to see you, watch you, observe you and make sure that person you have a good because what I’ve seen people do I’ve seen this sometimes too, which I think this is what you were alluding to make sure that you set the expectations and it’s somebody that really you trust because what I mean? Because some people, I get to see them get really nervous, they’re going to get feedback, and they’re not really good because they’re so concerned about messing up or something like that. And you don’t want that. You’ve got to have somebody that you go, listen, I’m going to do my thing.
42:12
Tab Norris
I’m going to do some things well. Some things are going to be may not be perfect. I know that when we’re done, we have a coffee later. I really want you to tell me where I can improve, but I’m not going to worry about that now.
42:23
Tom Stanfill
When I go into this presentation, I like to like if I’ve had a meeting, for example, or I’ve had a presentation, because you guys always give me feedback. Like you said, that’s part of our culture. I know when I’ve screwed up. Like, I know when I did the listen, or I know and I’ll say that, look, I know I could have done this. Is there anything else that I’m missing? Or the other option is let’s just not worry about that. I dropped the ball there. I don’t want feedback.
42:49
Tab Norris
Yeah, I know what I did. I don’t need that.
42:53
Tom Stanfill
Here’s where I want feedback. I want my best performance. Okay? So this is my best opportunity. I feel like I crushed it. Or I have somebody that’s walked with me for a while and knows me and say, I think I’m this way. What is it like to sit across for me? Am I wrong? I think that will help you. I think I want to say one other thing as we close tab is if you’re a leader, one of our biggest challenges as a leader is to have teachable team members. Oh, gosh right. To have team members. We all want team members sitting across from us saying, oh, please give me feedback. Please coach me. If you want that from your team members, the best way to do that is for you to get feedback. Like, if you give feedback from them and you are teachable, you will have a teachable team.
43:54
Tom Stanfill
If you are not teachable, they won’t be teachable. If you role model that and you’re willing to seek feedback, your team members will go, well, this is just part of the way it is. This is our culture. He’s humble. She’s humble. I’ll be humble that’s all of our.
44:08
Tab Norris
Big clients that crush it, that’s what they do. They create that culture. They have enough people that create that culture. The way you said it earlier of a great way to do that is remember you were like, tell me something I know. Tell me something that I wouldn’t want to hear. They’d hurt my feelings. I want to hear that. I need to hear that. Versus give me some feedback. I’d be like, oh, you’re great, Tom. You’re the best.
44:36
Tom Stanfill
Yeah, you want to narrow in discovery. You can have the build out. You could pick something. I also would say be an emotional place where you can hear it. Don’t give feedback if you’re in a vulnerable place, if you’re already feeling bad about yourself, if you’re feeling bad about yourself, get feedback about what you’re good at. You’re also needing feedback about, hey, you have I mean, this is true. Everybody has a superpower like, people everybody’s been gifted with a unique thing that they do better than everybody else. I mean, I just believe that some people are just super good at math, and some people are really good at and, by the way, if you have a court, you have a strength. You have a corresponding weakness. You have a corresponding weakness. You have a course, whatever. So sometimes you need to get feedback. One of your blind spots is what your talent is.
45:22
Tom Stanfill
That’s where I struggle sometimes. Like, what should I do more of? And what should I do less of? Ultimately, it’s all about moving you to your sweet spot, like being in that place. I will tell you, man, if somebody said to, hey, Tom, you’ve been in sales for blah, blah years. I don’t even know how many more years I’ve been in sales. 30 plus years. You’ve worked with hundreds of companies. You’ve done whatever, you’ve seen whatever, what’s the one thing I would do? I would say this. I would say seek feedback. Like, that very few people actually ask people. And you know what? It really reveals your motive. If your goal is to serve your customers, you will figure out how well you’re doing. It’s if your goal is to create a product that your customers want. What do you do? You get feedback. Does it work?
46:17
Tom Stanfill
Do you like it?
46:19
Tab Norris
It’s so funny. I was talking to this customer the other day along these lines, and we had just won the deal, and he had gone through different presentations. He had presentations. He said, Ted, I just got to tell you, I don’t know how a couple of these companies are in business. Do they not get any feedback from anybody? He said those words, and I said, what do you mean? He goes, It’s so awful. It’s just so awful. You get 1 hour, and somebody gives you 75 slides. He said those words about feedback. I was just thinking, I think you’re right. I don’t think people get any feedback. I think people just do their thing. They go and they just do volume. I’m just going to go pitch in front of enough people, or I’m going to do whatever. It’s really difficult to be highly successful.
47:11
Tom Stanfill
Yeah, they really don’t. I think it’s very few people, but it’s always keeping you from the next level. I think, again, if we’re about serving and it’s not about us, feedback is not a problem. It just helps. By the way, getting unsolicited feedback will tell you what your motive is. You find out. Hey, like, for the rep you’re talking about, let’s say they got that feedback. Hey, all you did is you showed up and you showed you 70 slides, and I didn’t really like that. Well, if the rep doesn’t write that down and change or is grateful for that, man, that would hurt. Grateful for that feedback, then it tells them their role, their motive is not to serve.
48:07
Tab Norris
That’s it. That’s it. You’re dying for that kind of feedback. I learned that from you early, when we started aslin because were figuring everything out. Tom, I would go, you’d go, come watch me. Some of them were just remember the early days, and were in it together. But you have tough skin. You got to know we’re going to fail. We’re going to mess up. We’re going to not do it.
48:33
Tom Stanfill
Think about how bad some of this early me, I think, oh, my God.
48:37
Tab Norris
Well, I mean and a lot of times, it’s the inches. It’s the inches. The customer thinks it’s great. That was awesome. We got the deal and all that. You need to be going back and going, yeah, but how could I have done that better? What could I have improved? You know what? That felt awkward. They didn’t know it, but I need to tighten that up.
49:00
Tom Stanfill
I agree. It’s so powerful. The thing is, again, every time you do that, you just get better and better. I will tell you, I’ve never done it perfectly.
49:13
Tab Norris
No. Well, I’m with you there.
49:14
Tom Stanfill
Yeah. As long as I’ve been doing what I’ve been doing, I’ll never do it perfectly. There’s always something I can get better at. The question is, do what it is? The more feedback you get, obviously, the easier it will be to be successful. So get feedback. The best people in the world know they have a blind spot. They seek feedback. It’s less painful when you ask, and it just makes you better and it reveals your motive. All right. Tab. I think this was good. Hopefully this was encouraging, helpful way to start the year. Develop a mindset, the right mindset. Stop and do the plan, do the numbers, do the analysis. Fill in what you want, go public with it, write it out, come up with the details of what it’s going to take to hit your plan and then go through an assessment process. Really, there’s four areas.
50:04
Tom Stanfill
There a discipline problem that you need to address? Is there a capability? How well do you do it? Is there something you don’t know? Do you have the expertise to lead the customer to the best solution? Do you know what their problems are? Do you know what’s on their whiteboard? Are you kind of just reacting and hoping they’ll buy from you, but you don’t really know how to solve their problem? It’s a knowledge gap. Or really you’re not really about serving your customers. It’s really more about earning a commission, which is going to keep you from earning your commission, right? Seek feedback from people who love you and know you and you trust. All right, Tab, well, great seeing you. Hopefully this was helpful. And guys and gals and other people. All people. All people’s. Tab.
50:47
Tab Norris
All people.
50:48
Tom Stanfill
All people. Whatever the people are, all people. Give us feedback. If you like the show, give us feedback and tell us. If you don’t like the show, give us feedback. That’s what we’ve been talking about. We need to get better. Join us for the next episode of SALES with ASLAN.
