I love it when I teach participants in the Leading Yourself and Leading Others experience how to Actively Listen and they practise with me.

It’s so great for me to be on the receiving end and this week that’s exactly what happened.

As much as I confess I am not a guru, nor perfect, there seems to be this expectation that Shirley has it all together. It’s really interesting for me when participants see for themselves that I too, have my own spaghetti and that I get triggered too.

I had a real life example we could use.

I have people wanting to enrol in the next Loyal Lieutenant Masterclass Series and I’ve been procrastinating on picking a date.

During the active listening demonstration, I became aware of a limiting belief I was carrying that people do not want training in December or January and that these months should not be offered.

During an earlier conversation, one potential client mentioned that January is actually a really good month for them because it’s quiet for them with clients and gives them the opportunity to work on systems and do training.   Well that busted that limiting belief.

And yet, here I was during our practise listening session still not wanting to pick a date. I was still resisting. How come?

I was scared.

Scared of what?

Scared to reach out and make the call. Scared that I would be seen as being “pushy”. Scared I might not have enough people for the class.

This was silly, as most limiting beliefs are.  Limiting beliefs are decisions we make at some point in time. The good news is, that we know how to make decisions, so we can simply make another one and as David Bayer says, the moment of transformation occurs when we see our unintelligent thinking as unintelligent.

During our listening practice demonstration, I decided to create a survey and send this to those whom had expressed interest. They can tell me the best days and months for their business and team members, that way I can make sure I’m serving them.

Making a decision usually requires us to take action. Taking action provides us the opportunity for feedback. Are we on course or off course?

Once we have clarity, we generally only have to take a little bit of focussed action.

So here’s the link to the survey. If you’re interested to join the next Loyal Lieutenant Masterclass Series, click on the link and let me know your preferences for days, time and month to start.

TLL Masterclass Session Preferences

The masterclass series is a 9 week online training facilitated by me. We meet once a week for 90 minutes. Every other week I provide training on a topic e.g. how to create a workflow diagram, how to create a special type of job description showing Key Performance Indicators and Key Behaviour Indicators, which make it so much easier to supervise staff plus they know exactly what they have to do to succeed in the role and the right way to write procedures.

Participants have homework on each of the topics and then we debrief the following week. This interactive format has proven to be extremely successful. Participants love the short sessions as opposed to a day’s training. They also report that they love hearing and seeing the feedback on each person’s homework. They learn so much because they are doing the work. Accountability is built into the masterclass series. What they produce for homework is practical, usable and relevant to their work.

So rather than just picking a date and hoping for the best, here’s the survey if you’re interested in registering for the next masterclass series. Click on the link and let me know your preferences.

TLL Masterclass Session Preferences

Regards Shirley

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P.S.S. Click on the link to choose your preferences for the next Loyal Lieutenant Masterclass Series.  TLL Masterclass Session Preferences

This week’s thought might seem a little simple and mundane and yet there is a deeper message here.

We engaged a repair man to fix the windows in our new house.

With some brute force from Ross to get them open and a large screwdriver or pole to hold them open, I scrubbed and scrubbed and scrubbed to clean, what I estimate was 40 years of gunk and grime. Yuk. Double yuk.

I didn’t want the repairer to spread all that debris over the floor.

It took me weeks to systematically get them all cleaned and it was only last weekend that I figured out a better method for cleaning them.

Now you might ask, “Why didn’t I engage a professional window cleaner to clean them?”.

Two reasons:

1.      I didn’t expect they would take as long as they did to clean, and

2.      The renovation budget was way over maxed out, and

3.      I just thought of number 3, we were out of time to organise a third party.

For the first half of the windows, I struggled to scrub the build up of grime off the frames. I applied as much pressure as I could and went over and over and over the frames and they hardly looked any cleaner. Very frustrating.

So, as often happens, when things aren’t working out how we want, we ask “How can I do this better? Is there an easier way? There has to be a better way to do this?”

I looked in my cupboard. I found a cream cleanser and some Gumption. I decided to give the cream cleanser a go.

OMG! This stuff glided on and off. It wasn’t perfect but it was so much better than the earlier results I had achieved.

Not only was it quicker, it also increased my enthusiasm and motivation to get the rest of the windows cleaned.

When you have the right tools, the job is easier, gets done quicker with better results and is more motivating.

Now to the main point. How long do you struggle with something before you finally go looking for a better way?

How often do you “go it alone” without asking for advice from others who may have more knowledge or experience than you?

Your task this week is to look at your list of jobs and choose one that you’re struggling with or frustrated by the lack of results and send your brain looking for the answer to the question, “what’s a better way to do this?”

Try it. Your brain is a goal achieving machine. It must answer any questions you ask it. So ask better questions and do it quicker.

It’s so much easier and so much more rewarding when you have the right tools.

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“Some will. Some won’t. Next” was a saying I learnt from Bob Johnston, international sales trainer.

Bob’s intention was to help salespeople to not take it personally when potential customers said “No”.

When you think about it, it’s actually quite logical. Some will want your service or product and some people won’t want it. Some won’t want it now and some won’t want it ever. For those who don’t want it ever, move on to the Next potential customer.

This affirmation not only helps with mindset, it also helps with productivity because the salesperson doesn’t waste time or energy following up someone who doesn’t want the product or service and the potential customer doesn’t feel harassed into buying something.

This leads to my next point. It’s okay to say “No”. In fact, salespeople prefer you to say “No” if you don’t want it because it frees them up to move on.

I appreciate it when people say “No thankyou” to me. I don’t take it personally. They have their reasons. I accept their decision.

It sends me bananas (frustrates me) when I take the time to follow-up with people and my calls aren’t returned. It means I’ve either got to invest more time to follow-up, just in case they do want the product or service or I make the decision myself that they don’t want it and move on. The latter decision could well be an incorrect decision because they may want the product or service at a later date. Who knows?

Recently Ross and I have requested quite a number of quotes from various trades as we’ve renovated the house. We always make it a point to let people know when we’ve decided to go with another supplier.

Your mission this week is to be assertive. If you have decided you don’t want to purchase something, or you’ve chosen a different supplier, please speak up. The salesperson will appreciate it.

They know, Some Will. Some Won’t and they can move on to Next.

This week I’ve been totally perturbated, causing me to procrastinate.

Another way of describing perturbation is to freak yourself out.

Perturbation occurs when you are challenged and feel uncomfortable just before a breakthrough.

Vocabulary.com refers to perturbation as a “state of agitation”.

So what caused my freak out?

I decided to create a new online training program called The Loyal Lieutenant Masterclass Series, to support Seconds-in-Command to step up and create systems and processes in their businesses and/or departments.

No big deal.

I’m very comfortable “teaching”.

I’m very uncomfortable “selling”.

In the past, my “sales” webinars have ended up being “training” webinars, meaning attendees got enough training to feel confident that they could do it themselves and yet without the support and the in-depth training, I know they won’t be able to do it or will become too overwhelmed.

So this time I challenged myself to change my presentation and this freaked me out.

I’ve had to totally change my mindset. I’ve sought training and assistance from various people. I couldn’t do it alone.

One of my mentors helped me to see that consumers’ buying habits have changed. Before Covid, many were reluctant to buy online. Before Covid, most marketers thought they had to nurture their subscribers before offering them a solution to their problem.

According to my mentor, consumers want instant gratification. If they’ve got a problem, they want a solution and they want it now. They don’t want to be “nurtured”. They want their problem fixed.

That’s the mindset I’ve adopted. The seconds-in-command, the leaders, the managers who’ve registered for the webinar on how to create systems to save time and money have a problem and I have the solution that can help them, and they want it now. I am doing all of us a disservice if I don’t offer them the help, even though I’m as uncomfortable as hell in making the offer.

I’m sharing this with you because I want to encourage you, to freak yourself out. Get uncomfortable. Commit to doing something that will challenge you. Seek help and guidance. It’s the only way to grow.

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