Salespeople often fall into a rhythm of easing off as the year-end approaches, especially in Japan, where the fiscal year ends in March. This period, leading up to the holiday break, can see a decline in productivity that equates to 8% of the year. To maximize sales, it’s essential to maintain focus and activity through December. One effective stra…

Leaders often rely on “automatic trust,” stemming from their authority, to gain compliance from team members. However, achieving genuine, “earned trust” is crucial for fostering motivation and commitment within a team. Unlike automatic trust, earned trust develops through consistent, authentic interactions where leaders show integrity in both “talk…

There is an abundance of definitions on what is charismatic leadership? The definition proffered during a recent webinar was uncontroversial and acceptable: emotional and intellectual engagement, inspiration to go the extra mile – all quite reasonable elements. Somehow that left me feeling vaguely unfulfilled. Reflecting on charismatic leaders, wha…

Many people ask us at Dale Carnegie, what should I do with preparing my slide deck for my key note presentation? What’s too much? What’s too little? What’s the best way to make this work for me? That is what we will explore in this week’s show. Here’s some guidelines for using visuals. Less is definitely best. On a screen try to avoid paragraphs an…

We get lazy. We start cutting corners. We get off our game. We chill, cruise and take the foot off the pedal. Sales is demanding and a life of constant pressure. The temptation is when we get to a certain level of success we think well, we have done enough. We can justify that coffee break, that longer lunch, coming in late after the first mid-morn…

Before Shinya Katanozaka became President of ANA Holdings he came up with a genius idea. Allow the passengers to order breakfast, lunch and dinner whenever they pleased. Passenger surveys showed the clients were in full agreement. What the boss had not anticipated was that passengers would order the meals immediately on take-off, making it impossib…

Whenever I am in the USA, I love watching the different television preachers in action. I noticed they are master storytellers, usually using Bible incidents to make a point in the here and now. The parables in the Bible are all mini-episodes, which teach a point about success. They are definitely on to something with their storytelling expertise. …

You really appreciate the importance of brand, when you see it being trashed. Companies spend millions over decades constructing the right brand image with clients. Brands are there to decrease the buyer’s sense of risk. A brand carries a promise of consistent service at a certain level. Now that level can be set very low, like some low cost airlin…

We love acronyms! Our workplaces are thriving with them such that we can hold extended conversations composed entirely of seemingly impenetrable codes. They are handy though and this one R.E.AL. is short and serviceable to describe best practice leadership attributes. It always good to have evidence around pontification. “Reliable” is an obvious ch…

Sales people are always under pressure to meet their targets. In high pressure situations, this creates certain behaviours that are not in the client’s best interests. We know we should listen carefully to what the client wants, before we attempt to suggest any solution for the buyer’s needs. We know that by asking well designed questions, we can p…

Basically your job is toast. There is a machine or there will soon be a machine that can do it faster, better and cheaper than you. Our skill set didn’t change much from the start of agriculture 12,000 years ago until the industrial revolution in the mid-18th century. This last 150 years has been busy. We have created a weapon that can destroy our …

My eyes are closing. I am struggling to stay awake. There is something about this presentation that is not working. I thought, it must be me. I must be tired. Later however I realized the problem. I was being lulled into sleep by the monotone delivery of the presenter. The brand by the way is gorgeous. This is seriously high profile, a name that ev…

Pricing is usually set by the boss and salespeople are just there to get out and sell at that designation. The trouble though is salespeople are not convinced by any price setting methodology. They only believe in the reality of the market. The way they know the reality is the degree of pushback they get from clients, when they are trying to sell. …

You have to tell people how it is or you will lose power and authority. If you swallow what you want to say, you will diminish yourself. If you avoid hard conversations, you will have less influence. You need to tell them exactly how you are feeling. This was the tenor of the advice coming from an American communication “guru”. While listening to t…

We can speak to a group and then there is another level, where we try to captivate our audience. What makes the difference. The content could even be the same but in the hands of one person it is dry and delivered in a boring manner. Someone else can take the same basic materials and really bring it to life. The quality of the argument we are going…

Jan Carlzon many years ago published a tremendous guide to customer service. He had the job of turning around SAS airlines and captured that experience in his book “Moments Of Truth”. I was reminded of Carlson’s insights when I was recently checking into my hotel in Singapore. While going through the check-in process at the hotel, a waiter from the…

“Born to lead” is nonsense. Many things shaped that person in order for them to achieve credibility with others. Of course, we can become a “leader” as part of our company designated hierarchy. We sit somewhere in an organizational chart above others, with various reporting lines elevating us above the hoi polloi. We know many people with that augu…

Lawyers in Japan are an elite group. I attended a legal symposium, involving these super elite Japanese lawyers and yet the communication skills on offer were incongruent with their elite educations and high social status. I can never resolve how intelligent people can manage to stand up in front of an audience and position themselves such that the…

Tricky area in sales, showmanship. The word has a certain odor about it that reeks of fake, duplicity, con game, spruker, carnival barker, etc. Yet, like storytelling, this is an important part of the sales professional’s repertoire. Clients are card carrying members of the Great Guild Of Skeptics. They are highly doubtful about salespeople’s claim…

In our lives, we have harvested a lot of experiences, which we can use in our presentations. If we were better organized, we might have had the forethought to keep notes, so it would be easier to refer to them when we are looking for material. Well there is a hint right there – keep notes from now on. You can just jot down in your Evernote or somet…

Imagine my surprise, as an expert in sales training, when I meet salespeople who have not spent even one second trying to master the bridging of the gap between value and cost. Sitting in the audience at a speaker event, next to a thirtyish Japanese sale’s guy, we talked about how he does his sales. He told me he contacts a lead, gets an appointmen…

Japan loves rote learning and parents will pay cram schools to get their kids fully tuned up and on to the education escalator. Rote learning and exam technique is the standard educational approach in Japan right through to starting University classes. At University, unless you are trying for very specific careers like medicine, the elite bureaucra…

Normally when we give presentations, they tend to be pretty dry affairs. We marshal the facts, relate what happened, tell stories perhaps but in a one dimensional way. We are relating what happened, but are not making any attempt to bring it alive. However, what do we seek when we are looking for entertainment or education – we are looking for dial…

“I would be able to sell a lot more except for all the external factors over which I have zero control”. Actually, you have never heard this line of argument before from a salesperson. This is because this statement is an honest appraisal of what they see as the problem, but they don’t express it that way. Instead they bitch about the boss, the mar…

Sometimes you see a confident leader really bomb their presentation. It doesn’t happen all that often, but when it does, the contrast is vast. If they are totally hopeless and they bomb, well that is understandable. But a competent leader shouldn’t bomb their presentation. He did and I was wondering why that happened? It was only at the end, when i…

I have often thought there are so many lessons from the martial arts for our businesses. Here are my musings after 53 years of training in traditional Karate. Stepping on to the floor The dojo is the ultimate equalizer. Whether you arrived by chauffeur driven Roller or took Shanks’s mare, once you step on to that dojo floor only your ability and ch…

Salespeople don't set the price of what they sell. This is usually an obscure outcome decided by someone else inside the machine. It might actually be an elaborate process, where multiple variables are carefully calibrated, mathematical formulae are applied and a price is arrived at. Or, it might be a slightly moist index finger boldly thrust skywa…

The hardest sales job in the world is selling something you don’t believe in yourself. The acid test is would you sell this “whatever” to your grandmother? If the answer is no, then get out of there right now! It is rarely that clear cut though. The more important test is whether what you are selling solves the client’s problem or not. Selling clie…

One of our problem areas is what to do with our hands when we speak. Judging by most of the presentations I see in Japan, few speakers have worked this out yet. Here are some common habits we can improve upon to make ourselves much more persuasive and professional. 1. Hands in front of the body. The arms and hands when held in front of the body cre…

Okay, now its time for the show, Soredewa ikimasho, so let's get going. The hush has now swept across the room. All eyes are fixed on the MC, breaths are being held, awaiting the announcement of this year’s winner. Amazingly, it registers that it is your name they are calling to the stage. Emotion wells up. Your team join you for handshaking, shoul…

If we are presenting a brochure, flyer, price list, hard copy slide deck or any other typical collateral item, then we should adopt best practice for greatest success. Have two copies always, one for you to read and one for the client, unless you are a genius of reading upside down (which by the way seems to include all Japanese!). At the start, pu…

We are all pretty average on recalling events, people’s names, locations, sequences, inanimate objects, etc., but we are geniuses on remembering feelings. We are especially good on how people made us feel and what super memories we have developed in this particular department. Business is deemed to be logical – cool, balanced, unswerving on the roa…

The Master of Ceremony (MC) goes to the microphone to get the programme underway but the audience are simply oblivious, caught up in their own riveting conversations. The situation is much worse at receptions where alcohol is already flowing and the people down the back are generating a roar, a positive din, that drowns out the speakers. Here are s…

Usually this isn’t even a question for most presenters, because the organisers have already set up the room when you arrive. Our speaking spot has been designated for us. But have we been designated a spot by experts in public speaking or by the venue crew who usually just haul chairs, lug tables around and set up the stage? Sadly the coalescence b…

To succeed in our own business, we need three critical skills: the ability to master our time, to clone ourselves and to be persuasive. Time: Poor time control leads to inefficiency, wasted efforts, stress and missed opportunities. Entrepreneurs are geniuses at trying to do too much. This means they are run ragged with time demands and no good solu…

There is an old truism in sales, “sales is nothing more than the transfer of the enthusiasm of the seller for the product or service to the buyer”. What are we doing when we are speaking? We are selling! “Hang on a minute there Greg. I am a professional, I am not a car or vacuum cleaner salesman”, you might be saying to yourself. That sort of self-…

Having a buying need and doing something about it can often be quite disparate ideas. When the buyer is looking at the gap between where they are now and where they want to be and they judge it is pretty close, they don’t feel any urgency or need to buy. They will have certain drivers pushing them along in their role in the business, but this gap p…

Sadly, not everyone is like us – wonderful, charming, amusing, attractive. Despite our best efforts to be a role model of perfection, setting them a good example, others persist in being a major pain. Here are some selective tips on negotiating with the difficult amongst us. 1. Meet on mutual ground Try to meet, rather than engage in a protracted e…

The chances of speaking to a 5000 person business audience happening and happening regularly in Japan are remote for most of us. Nevertheless, in case you find yourself in front of a very large audience, here are a few hints on how to adjust to the increased size of the event. Get there early and go and sit in some of the most far-flung locations. …

In sales in Japan we chill, cruise and take the foot off the pedal. We get lazy. We start cutting corners. We get off our game. The temptation is when we get to a certain level of success we think well, we have done enough. We have to facedown “average is good enough” self-talk. We need to make sure we are doing the basics like a demon on fire. The…

The classic movie half-time locker room Churchillian oratory from the coach, whipping the team into a frenzy for the coming onslaught is now gathering dust in Hollywood’s archives. Today’s most successful coaches are masters of human psychology, combining insight with superb communication skills. What about leaders in business in Japan? In my exper…

When we stand in front of an audience, we are representing our personal brand and our firm’s brand. People evaluate us and our companies based on how we perform. Think back to the presentations you’ve seen and I’m sure you’ll agree that many speakers are missing passion and commitment to the topic. Don’t be like that. Typically, we speakers enter a…

Often the first reaction to hearing no from the buyer is for the salesperson to panic and go harder. They somehow imagine they can force the buyer to buy. The immediate impulse is to go straight to the answer to counterpoint the objection. This is mainly an emotional reaction based on the adrenalin flooding the brain with the fight response. We nee…

Bosses are often oblivious to the idea of diversity. I don’t mean diversity as mainly considered in Japan, which is usually about lack of inclusion of women in the workplace. Diversity here means variations amongst the team in terms of communication preferences. Here are two decisions to determine the best communication style to deal with your boss…

The usual frequency for most people for giving formal presentations is once in a blue moon. In other words, we don’t do so many in a year. This presents a problem, because as we know, repetition is key to learning and improvement. Instead of hanging around waiting for someone to invite you to speak, you need to get out there and beat the bushes for…

Buyers should buy and not quibble, hesitate or question. That at least is what salespeople hope for. The reality is we want buyers to object. If we don’t get a commitment to buy right then and there, the next best case is they give us an objection. No objection then no sale. Let me explain why. If we are giving our presentation and at the end the b…

You are at an event, it could be internal presentation or an industry event and you are been chosen for a prize or recognition. Award awarded and now you have to speak. This is where we are genius at snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, as we make a dog’s breakfast of our remarks. Very depressingly, we go from hero to zero in rapid order. It …

The hardest sales job in the world is selling something you don’t believe in yourself. The acid test is would you sell this “whatever” to your grandmother? If the answer is no, then get out of there right now! It is rarely that clear cut though. The more important test is whether what you are selling solves the client’s problem or not. Selling clie…

Getting the team motivated is hard enough without us screwing it up. Here are seven things we should eliminate: Showing a lack of common courtesy You are a super busy boss. Are you barking out commands like a tyrant, with no thought to say “please” when requesting action or adding a ”thank you” when it is completed? Do you come to work full of worr…

Why are so few business leaders good communicators, given all the education they have received, starting at varsity and then later, through their workplace organisations? Leaders are often told they need to be “authentic”. That means to some, that it is fine to be dull, obtuse, monotone and forgettable. While dramatic oratorical flourishes are not …