What Does Winning Look Like?

How does an employee understand each day they arrive at work if they are winning or losing?

How are these employees able to track each day where they are towards their goals?

Below are a few examples of annual goals that organizations published for individual sales professionals.

Achieve sales revenue of $44.0 million collectively as an organization

Achieve net new business of $50 million for 2023 for business unit

Manage travel and expense to AOP

Too many large organizations cast out annual goals for employees that are very difficult to understand.  Some goals are collective goals that is very difficult for an individual to know if he/she is winning.  Others are downright confusing.  Where does the individual review what the score is collectively?  How would you know where to look to see how you are doing in the above examples?

Instead of this vague approach to goal setting why not keep it simple?   

Organizations like that of Ramsey Solutions in Franklin, TN use  Key Results Area or KRA’s for short show what “winning” looks like to the individual and their position.  These KRA’s are reviewed with the employee and the manager to make sure that the employee truly understands what winning looks like.  The individual employee can take this KRA sheet and review it each day, week, or month to know where they are standing in achieving a high-performance level.

These KRA’s really make it easy for both the employee and the manager to point to any specific areas where the employee is killing it and where attention might be needed to help the employee obtain success.  When employees obtain vague goals, it is hard for them to understand if they are actually winning.  This is an ingredient in a disengaged work environment.  Or for those on the latest vocabulary, “Quiet Quitting” 

People want to know if they are winning or losing at work so they can excel.  No one shows up to work and actively wants to do a bad job.  They want to feel like they matter and that they are doing something to make impact.  Take that away and hope goes along with it slowly killing the spirit and making people do the grind Monday through Friday in hopes that they have a fun weekend.

Our top performers want to know quite often how well they are doing.  Sales professionals especially want to know if they are winning or losing.  It’s healthy to want to know how we are doing so we can improve.  Why not give them something that they can use to gauge against and know often how they are doing.

Dave Ramsey is mostly known for Financial Peace University for helping people get their finances straight, but for business owners they have created Entreleadership which started as a book and now has its own podcast as well as coaching and summits.  They do a fantastic job at creating an environment for their teams and customers to thrive in any environment.  If you are looking for something to learn more about leadership in business or finances, these two are the top places I recommend people going. 

Disclaimer:  I make no money from referring my readers to Dave Ramsey items.  This is just knowledge that I am passing along that has helped me.

The examples on Dave Ramsey’s site allow you to see examples of these KRA’s when you head into goal setting with your teams.  I hope it helps your teams really make greater strides and achieve better results.

“Businesses wonder why it is still hard to be thought of as the brand of choice with customers.  How can our business make more profitable transactions and stay out of the commodity battle with low profits?  I equip your sales team to walk with the customer through the five buying decisions, and in the correct order to generate explosive revenues with greater profits!”

www.kevinsidebottom.com

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1lWIVasmkFsoYL4h0AqIZgH6LC3qaw_gI/view?usp=sharing – client profile sheet

https://www.amazon.com/Sales-Process-Uncovered-Success-Influence/dp/0578421518 - Book

Why Goals Need A Purpose Statement

It’s that time of year again.  Time to celebrate those wins that we had for this past year, time to celebrate the new year coming in just a few short hours.  What will the new year hold for us?  What can we do this new year that we have been unsuccessful in the past years?

If we want to achieve a better tomorrow and a better new year, then we need to start with planning for it.  Goals are just dreams if we do not have a plan of action. 

That is what we are going to talk about on this post.  How can we achieve a better tomorrow by starting our plan today.  If you have been on the goal planning trail for years great, what can we do differently to improve our success rates?  If we are new to goal planning, what can we do to start off with better traction?

One thing that I have done in the past few years is making and refining my Purpose Statement.  Now I have spent a great deal of time and effort to learn about myself and how I am wired.  W

hat I have found is that I am gifted in influencing others to move from here to there by motivating and providing a vision of success with my tenacity to keep moving forward when times get tough.  I am best at this when I am speaking to groups of individuals, teams, and organizations helping them create their process for success and staying disciplined. 

When I am speaking to groups, I actually gain energy.  I know that seems weird for an introvert, but watching people see the light bulb of an idea on how to improve makes me light up as well.  I get encouraged when I know that I am helping someone get to a better way. 

By having my purpose statement, I am better able to direct my goals so that I can have that compass that will align my vision with my steps.  This way I can keep moving in the right direction with my goals.  Not just that I have a goal to lose 10 lbs by a certain time, but that I do so in order to engage with more energy to help others understand how to succeed.

That gives my goals more traction when they are aligned on purpose.  A set of goals with a common focus gives them strength and keeps the fire burning even with times get tough and we want to give up.  I am able to get back off my back when knocked down one more time and keep moving forward so that I can keep helping others. 

I encourage you to do some research on yourself to understand how you are wired when making your goals for the next year so that when you are past the first few weeks of the new year and stress sets in you too are able to move forward.

There many ways to learn more about yourself.  There are assessments like The Predictive Index, Gallop Strength Finders, DISC assessment, Spiritual Gifts Assesssments and Growth Track (churches have been putting these on), and many more.  Pick one and see what you can learn about yourself so that way you can start to have better goals that really fuel your WHY.

For now here is to another year of growth and prosperity!  

Happy New Year Everyone!

“Businesses wonder why it is still hard to be thought of as the brand of choice with customers.  How can our business make more profitable transactions and stay out of the commodity battle with low profits?  I equip your sales team to walk with the customer through the five buying decisions, and in the correct order to generate explosive revenues with greater profits!”

www.kevinsidebottom.com

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1lWIVasmkFsoYL4h0AqIZgH6LC3qaw_gI/view?usp=sharing – client profile sheet

https://www.amazon.com/Sales-Process-Uncovered-Success-Influence/dp/0578421518 - Book

https://kevinsidebottom.kartra.com/page/5AF12 - Sales Process Uncovered Online Training

https://kevinsidebottom.kartra.com/page/68N10 - Trustworthy Online Training

How are Your Goals Doing?

New Years resolutions are made each and every December 31st and fail by the first two weeks of the new year.  Only about 8% of people achieve goals according to the university of Scranton.  Only 8% succeed in their goals.  That is staggering.

We wonder why productivity is low and that we can’t stick to things?  It’s staggering to think about how many people don’t take time to work on their goals.  Now I have to say that it wasn’t until about 5 years ago that I jumped onto the 8% train.  I just pushed forward on whatever I thought I could do which is why I did not have much success throughout the years.  When I got disciplined and wrote down my plan, is when I started seeing change.

Each year I take time in December to look back at what I have managed to accomplish for my goals list, what I need to focus on, and what my core values still are.  I actually use the EOS system for my goal setting and I write them down and work through them each quarter of the year.  This allows me to keep reviewing and seeing how close I am towards the larger goals on a quarterly basis. 

Now I am not saying that I am perfect.  I do miss some goals like trying to get down to a weight target, or achieving my annual sales numbers.  Even if I fail for the target, I am still making movement which is better than aiming at nothing.  If we set a goal and hope to achieve it, then we are at a disadvantage because without a plan hopes / dreams perish.

We need to have action to put forth towards our goals.  Other leadership gurus will tell you that you have to have smart goals.  Which means they have to be specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time bound.  That has been the system that people have been using for the past few years to describe good goals.  That is fine if you just want to check in every now and then to see how you are doing, but for intentional people we need to be checking on them at least once a quarter if not more.

I’m more of an application oriented / task person, so my goals revolve around me using my goals as steps in a larger process to achieve them.  That is why I like the EOS system that I can make smaller goals each quarter for the larger goals.  

If I need to make so many blog posts per year, or videos per year, I need to break down how many I need to do per month and make sure that I action accordingly.  Because I also like to compete with myself, I try to beat the timing each and every time.

We need to have goals and break them down into manageable process steps that we can work to make our goals come true.  By simply putting something down on paper we will not be able to make goals come true.  We need to make a plan and have a process in place to work towards those goals each and every day / week.  

Kind of like waiting till the last minute of semester to study for a final exam.  It typically does not work out well to wait until the last minute which then seems like an overwhelming task.  If we take it small bits over time to truly learn the material, we will be able to walk into the final exam with more confidence.   

We need to set goals and back up those goals with a plan if we want any chance of success.  What are some of your goals that you are working towards and how are you doing on them thus far?  We are over halfway through the year so we need to pick up the pace to finish strong.  We don’t walk to the finish line, we run!

Have a great week!

“Businesses wonder why it is still hard to be thought of as the brand of choice with customers.  How can our business make more profitable transactions and stay out of the commodity battle with low profits?  I equip your sales team to walk with the customer through the five buying decisions, and in the correct order to generate explosive revenues with greater profits!”

www.kevinsidebottom.com

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1lWIVasmkFsoYL4h0AqIZgH6LC3qaw_gI/view?usp=sharing – client profile sheet

https://www.amazon.com/Sales-Process-Uncovered-Success-Influence/dp/0578421518 - Book

https://kevinsidebottom.kartra.com/page/5AF12 - Sales Process Uncovered Online Training

https://kevinsidebottom.kartra.com/page/68N10 - Trustworthy Online Training

How Good Is Your Why When Goal Planning?

Ever wonder why 80% of new years resolutions fail?  Ever wonder why your team just doesn’t seem to hit goals?  Why do most people not even set goals?

The main reason is that growth whether it be personal, professional, or physical is painful.  Growth is not easily achieved which is why there are so few people achieving the next level results. 

I recently took my son to the orthodontist to start his journey for a better smile while getting braces installed on his teeth.  He asked me what it was like since I had them twice.  Yes, it typically takes me double to achieve results than most people 😊  I told him that the initial process is not very hard as they apply the torture devices to your teeth, but that he should expect to have a 6 out of 10 on the pain scale for his teeth for the following few days.

His response was that he was okay just not getting braces.  He didn’t care that it would improve his smile, or fix some issues in his mouth that would help him.  He just wanted to avoid pain and discomfort.  It dawned on me in that moment that I am not alone.  I don’t always want to do the hard things because it will cause me discomfort. 

Most individuals will avoid pain at all costs to live an comfortable lifestyle.  What I’ve learned is that nothing worthy is every easy.  There is some level of pain and risk associated with any worthy venture. 

If we want to grow financially for most cases, we need to gain education, work hard, and budget.  None of this seems fun or comfortable either.  My mother always said, “ nothing ventured, nothing gained.”  I added to that that no pain, no gain.  Okay I may have borrowed that from some weight lifter somewhere. 

If we want to grow, we need to put in effort and accept levels of discomfort / pain.  When we want to gain muscle, we are actually ripping apart muscle strands during weight lifting exercises that repair themselves when we are sleeping that increases their size.  The same is true with anything we want to grow in.

We must accept that we will have some levels of pain to grow ourselves in whatever venture we take on.  We need to review our why and figure out the cost of achieving that why.  If the why is not greater than the costs, then we will have no chance at success. 

We should be adding to the process of goal setting what our why is next to each of our goals to decide if this is a good goal or not.  Otherwise, we are just hoping that we will make it and likely will fail to hit that goal. 

Over the pandemic I had to review quite a few things I wanted to do with my business and had to go through quite a few pain points when I created all my videos, online trainings, marketing ideas, and personal decisions like losing weight.

Each and every one of these things required me to sit down and figure out my why.  If I had a great why I have achieved my goal, but if my why was small or something superficial, I did not achieve that goal.

If you have a goal for yourself, it is a great step to review your why before setting out the goal.  Yes, we need to make goals that are easy to understand and measurable, but we also need to make sure we factor in the pain level we will have to endure to make these goals possible before we set out.  We risk a higher levels failure when things get tough if we have not done this planning.

As we are heading into the fourth quarter of 2021 lets start reviewing our goals that we created for the year and understand why we failed at some and why we succeeded at others.  The why will be a great area of focus. 

If you’re curious I did lose quite a bit of weight during 2021 by dieting which was very painful, but worth it!

If you have any questions, or would like to discuss this topic more, feel free to reach out, I’d be glad to have that conversation.

Have a great day!

Sincerely,

Kevin Sidebottom

“Businesses wonder why the majority of their sales teams struggle at winning profitable business.  I teach your sales team to walk with the customer through the five buying decisions, and in the correct order to generate more sales with high margins!”

www.kevinsidebottom.com