Saying I can’t is easy. It absolves us of ownership. When we say we can’t it allows us to avoid the effort. It let’s us stop. Saying we can’t allows us to avoid failure. It’s easy to say I can’t.

The problem is, can’t is almost always code for . . . I don’t know how.

Saying I don’t know how is more difficult. Saying I don’t know how makes the effort ours to fix. It puts the onus on us. It forces us to do something about it. It makes the problem our responsibility. It’s an indictment on our capabilities. It’s admitting a weakness.

Because we don’t like to admit we are incapable of doing things we say we can’t. Saying we can’t let’s us off the hook.

We can’t get to quota, because it’s too high. We can’t beat the competition, because we don’t have that feature. We can’t get to the executives, because we don’t have the right title. We can’t lose weight because we’ve tried everything. We can’t travel to Europe, because we don’t make enough money.

Saying I can’t stops the discussion. Saying I can’t allows us to walk away and feel OK about it.

Saying I don’t know how changes everything. When we say I don’t know how we have to go figure it out. I don’t know how to beat the competition, without that feature. I don’t know how to make this high quota. I don’t know how to get to the executives with my title. I don’t know how to lose anymore weight. I don’t know how to travel to Europe on my salary.

Saying I don’t know how hurts, but at least once you start saying it, you’ll know what to do.

I have a big weakness.  I know it and it got the best of me this a.m.   I am very short and impatient with new idea laggards or as Seth Godin put it the “resistance.”   I inappropriately tore into someone this a.m. who I felt was being a resistor and it wasn’t fair to them.

I have been working an initiative at work that is different, it is outside the norm.  It leverages new tools, communication approaches and engagement.   I have been working it since March.   The process has been painful in many ways.  I’ve encountered the resistant at multiple different stages.  The people who say, “I don’t get it,”  ”Have you gotten executive approval?”  ”This isn’t going to work.” “It’s too risky, what if people do this and that with it.” ” We can’t do this because . . . ”    I am continually having to address these people and it makes it hard to be successful in introducing new things.   I really struggle with the people who ask these questions and make these types of statements.   I see them as being in the way.

The resistance, as Seth Godin calls it, is that part of our brain that wants to be safe, it avoids change, follows the rules and likes the status-quo because it’s predictable.

Seth describes the resistance at work in his book Linchpin like this:

You work with people who are totally at the mercy of the resistance.  They assist the devil by being his advocate in meetings.  They  follow the rule book, even parts you didn’t know about. They love what worked before and fear what might be coming.

He’s right and I don’t handle these people well.  My personality is like that of a shark.  Not the aggressive nature, but the metaphor by which sharks must keep moving to breathe.  Sharks need to keep water moving through their gills in order to breathe.  If they stop moving, they run the risk of suffocating.  In this manner, I am a lot like a shark.  I breath progress, and momentum.  I can’t stand the feeling of stagnation.  I need things to keep moving.

I bit this persons head off today because I felt like they were being the resistance.  It felt like they were slowing things down.  They asked me one of those fear based questions.  They asked if we had approval and support from another group.   It didn’t feel as if it was asked in a way that suggested they were looking to help the effort or improve on it but rather to control the effort.  I didn’t handle it well.

I apologized both on the phone and in a separate email.  Regardless of his question, I was wrong to respond the way I did.

That being said, moving forward I need to be more cognizant of how I engage with the resistance.  No one ever wins by trying to “stamp” out the resistance.  It takes tact.  Tact, currently I am not very good at.

Selfishly, I wish I didn’t have to deal with it.  I wish the resistance would flip the switch and start from the positive, what could be gained, how things could be better, etc.  I wish the resistance could see they have more to gain than lose by moving forward, by change.

The biggest irony in this tale, is much of the early resistance has come back and said they were wrong and they like the new effort and the value it is providing.  This is always nice to hear.  But man, it would be so much nicer if the fight just didn’t have to happen.   Until then, I need to get better at managing the resistance, because fighting it just doesn’t work.

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Last week I posted my thoughts on people who are coachable.  My take, it’s the most important trait you can hire for.  You can see the post here.

One of the most interesting things about the post was a comment left by David Brock CEO and Founder of Partners in Excellence, a sales consulting firm.  David made the point that just as important to finding good coachable people, was making sure those people had coaches.

. . . Great managers need to both coach and be coachable.

We do face a real challenge, hiring people that are coachable is great, but they need to get the right coaching. Too few managers invest the time in coaching or coach effectively.

While the data is a few years old, we did a survey of several 100 sales managers a few year ago. One question was, “How frequently do you coach each sales person?” The response astounded us, 68% coached their sales people once a quarter or less.

Managers don’t understand coaching and don’t integrate coaching into the fabric of the business. To drive high performance, it’s critical to have coachable people, but it’s as critical to coach them!

David makes a great point.  To hire coachable people and then not coach them is not only inefficient, but foolish.  We need to coach the coachable.

My management style is to coach.  Some people like it and others can’t stand it.  To me a coaches job is to bring people along.  It is to get as much out of them as possible.  Coaching is about providing people the support, feedback, and honesty that will allow them to grow and be the best they can possible be.  Not everyone likes to be coached as they don’t like to be told they aren’t good at something, or that they need to improve.  A lot of people don’t like the openness and exposure that comes with coaching.

It’s because of this, coaching is hard.  Coaching takes an investment in people, management doesn’t.  Management isn’t an investment in people, it’s an investment in process, goals, and delivery.  People are just another resource to be managed.   This can work in the short-term, but not in the long-term.

Coaching is an investment people.  To be a coach takes time, commitment and understanding.  Coaching requires an understanding of the person as a person, what their motives are, their career aspirations, their strengths and weaknesses, their capabilities, their learning style, their personality, and more.  Coaching embraces the individual not the resource.

I like this part of leadership.  I get motivated and inspired by watching others reach their goals, grow as individuals and achieve greatness.  Because of this, I coach.

I invest in the people that work for me.  I challenge them to set higher goals.  I look to understand who they are and how they tick.  I want to know why they do what they do everyday, how they do it, what they want to do next, what causes them anxiety, what is a breeze, what they use as a crutch and what they avoid.   It all helps me to be a better coach.  I look to coach my people every chance I get.  Like David said, it’s not a quarterly effort, but should be an ongoing process.  Coaching happens throughout the days, weeks, and months.  Coaching is situationally driven.  Coaching is about capitalizing on situations.  Coaching requires being on the lookout  to provide opportunities for growth or improvement.  Good coaches provide support when the opportunities appear, not at some regularly scheduled time.

I like what David said.  He’s right.  Hiring coachable people is only half of the effort.  Coaching them is the other half.  Hire coaches and hire coachable people and then coach them.  It makes all the difference in the world.

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How many new ideas do you have in day, a week, a month or a year that you DON’T act on that would — get more sales, make life easier around the house, make a great new business,  be a great book,  beat the competition, save money, improve the neighborhood, make a great product, improve meeting effectiveness, eliminate the silos, speed up the process, make customers happier, limit the defects, shorten the sales cycle, sell more product, lower prices?

How many great ideas do you let get away?

Ideas are how we make a mark on family, neighborhoods, work, communities, countries, the world.   Without ideas, it’s difficult to leave a mark.  Without leaving a mark have we really existed?

Ideas are a gift.  They come to us to make things better.  Ideas are our way to contribute, to share, to make a difference.

How many ideas have you not acted on in the past?     How many are you NOT going to act on in the future?

The answer will determine your mark.

It’s hard -

to be successful
to challenge the status-quo
to exercise everyday
to be comfortable making your customers uncomfortable
to eat well
to fire someone you like
to recycle
to read 10k’s everyday
to read a book a month
to blog everyday
to create new stuff
to get up at 5:00 am
to go to bed at 2:00 am
to tell the boss you can’t because of your kids football game
to accept you made a mistake
to change direction
to not quit when it sucks
to do the paper work that HAS to be done
to sit in the pain
to call out the elephant in the room
to call yourself out
to accept criticism
to keep learning
to do the hard work
to NOT do the easy work

It’s easy -

to take credit for others work
to quit while you’re ahead
to blend in with the crowd
to be agreeable
to say yes
to let others do it
to accept excuses
to blame others
to spectate
to ignore
to procrastinate
to settle
to take the shortcut
to ignore the data
to do the easy work
to NOT do the hard work

There are two paths to chose from, one sounds easy and one sounds hard, chose carefully.

I took my daughters to the driving range last week.  It was their first time.   I didn’t want to overwhelm them with “lessons” so I just let them hit.

After about 20 minutes, Kenna, my 4 year old looks up at me and says; “Dad, I like this, but it sucks!”

Welcome to golf, I thought to myself.

I also realized this is what life is all about.  We do things that suck.  Unfortunately, too often we measure our desire to continue to do them on whether or not it sucks.   When things suck, they don’t feel good, so we want to stop.  The problem is, we can’t get good at anything if it always feels good.  Most people quit or say it’s not for them when it starts to “suck”.

Sometimes sucking does really suck and it means it’s time to move on.  Other times sucking means your growing, your getting closer, your working hard, or doing more than others.  When that happens keep going.  Victory is not far away.

“It sucks” happens in everything and with everyone; entrepreneurs, start-ups, selling, athletes, parenting and more.  You can’t get away from it.  When it sucks just remember why your doing it.  ”It sucks” is part of the journey.  Embrace, don’t run from it.

After her difinitve statement, Kenna put her head back down and starting swinging again.   She’s asked me to go golfing at least 10 times since then.  We’re going to go today.  I’ll take my kids do anything they say sucks, if they ask me to.  That means they’re on the right track.

What do you like to do that sucks?

My daughter Kenna learned to ride her bike last year with out training wheels. She was only 3 years and 10 months old. We were in Venice Beach California on vacation. She was good at it. She took to it right away. I put my hands on the back of her seat, she started to peddle and away she went. It was a big deal. I was so proud of her.

To celebrate we went for a family bike ride. That didn’t go so well. Although she had the physically ability to ride her bike, her mind wasn’t quite there yet. She’d panic when it came to turn or stop. She would freak out if people would get too close to her. Needless to say the celebration ride was less than enjoyable and although she rode her bike the rest of the vacation, it wasn’t with out incident.

When we got home, she asked us to put the training wheels back on. We didn’t, BUT she wasn’t much into riding her bike the rest of the summer, trading it for a scooter or her younger sisters stryder.

This spring everything has changed. Her mental capabilities caught up with her physical abilities.

Now we have a blast. We go for bike rides at least twice a day. She rides off the curbs, over dirt mounds, and peddles as fast as she can. She loves it and so do I. It’s fun riding bikes with her.

I see this in sales and in business all the time.

It’s not enough to have the ability or the skill or even the talent. The mind is required too. Unlike kids, who’s physical ability or talent gets ahead of their developing minds, in adults it’s just plain stubbornness or worse a bad attitude.

If your wondering why that super talented sales guy continually eeks out quota or why that brilliant project manager can never seem to get the project right, it may not be their capabilities, it might be in their head.

Skill, talent, capability are all critical but if the mind isn’t coming along for the ride too, it won’t matter.

The mind matters.

I spent the entire day landscaping my front yard. I wish I had taken before and after pictures. It was a lot of work. I pulled 8 or 9 shrubs, raked up 400 square feet of mulch, put down new metal edging, moved 4 sprinkler heads, and put in place 18 new shrubs which will be a new hedge. They still have to be planted. I did this with my brother in-law who is a great landscaper.

I’m exhausted.

I spend most of my days sitting in front of a computer. I’ve become extremely sedentary. Most of the hours of my day are spent like this one; in front of a computer. A change of pace felt great.

I used to do a lot of manual labor. During the summers when I was a kid, I did construction, learned to roof, did landscaping, and washed dishes. I did it all. I learned what hard work was early. I don’t do much hands on work anymore and I miss it, kind of.

It was hard for me to get into this “change of pace”. I instantly realized I’m not nearly as strong as I once was. It took me a little while to let myself get dirty and submerge myself in the effort. Once I did, it was great. I was working outside. I was covered in dirt. I could see the progress we were making. I was learning new things. I was getting exercise. It was a complete change of pace and I loved it.

A change of pace is good. It refreshes the mind. It works other muscles, intellectual and physical. It breaks the cycle. It’s all too easy to become single threaded.

Although I’m tired, I feel great. I didn’t think about many of the things my mind spends most days pondering, translating, evaluating and processing. My brain went on a mini vacation.

On Monday, My brain and I will be back in front of the computer for 8 plus hours and my ass will be stuck to a chair. But, this Monday I suspect they will be a little more rested than normal.

Break up your day, your week or your month. Do something you haven’t done in a while. Wake up at 4:00 a.m. and go for a walk on the beach until the sun comes up. Build a dog house. Become a Big Brother/Big Sister. Play on a softball team. Do something you don’t normally do. Do something your not specifically good at. Get out of your comfort zone. It’ll give your mind a rest. It’ll make you feel good. When you get back to your regularly schedule program the story may be a bit more entertaining than you remember.

Despite all the work done today, I still have 18 shrubs to plant. That means 18 two feet by 3 feet holes to dig. Isn’t change of pace great?

It’s what you do that others don’t.

Seth Godin has a defining post up today. It’s defining in that it crystalizes, in the simplest of terms, the difference between greatness and success and average and mediocrity.

Seth talks about the last 10% .

In most fields, there’s an awful lot of work put into the last ten percent of quality.

Getting your golf score from 77 to 70 is far more difficult than getting it from 120 to 113 or even from 84 to 77.

He’s right.

This holds true in sales. It takes ten times more effort to consistently be at 150% of quota than it does to consistently make quota.

I’m often asked what is the difference between good sales people and great sales people. I posted about the difference here a while back. After reading it I recognize much of what I talk about regarding the great sales people requires the last 10%. It’s a lot harder to know you customers business than your own products. It’s a lot more work to find dormant or latent opportunities than it is to respond to a customer request. In the future, when I’m asked what’s the difference between a good and great sales person, I’m going to say the last 10%

The last 10% in sales is HARD WORK, period. There are millions of sales people, all trying to win over your customers. The bar is already high. Sales is filled with Type A overachievers. This makes the last 10% in sales harder than in other fields.

The last 10% is the difference between good and great sales people.

The next time someone asks me what the difference between a good and great sales person is, that’s what I’m going to tell them. And then I’ll say, It’s the difference between good and great anything.

When I was a kid, I had a Siberian Husky. He was a runner. It was my job to walk him. Only being in second grade, he was tough to walk. He would pull me down the street, desperately trying to run. It didn’t take me long to devise a more efficient way to get him his exercise, while limiting my exertion.

I came up with a way to tie his leash to my bike and let him pull me down the street. It worked brilliantly. I would connect his leash to my handlebars. Up onto the sidewalk we would go. I would put my feet up and he would pull me down the street. He would run and run and run. It was awesome. He was fast. I thought it was the coolest thing in the world. After all, I said, he was a Husky, that’s what they do, pull sleds.

It worked great for about a week when I noticed a crack in my handlebars. The stress of his pulling, was literally tearing my handlebars a part.

As a 7 year old boy this is TRAGIC!! A bike, to a 7 year old, in 1975 is everything. My bike is broken. I’m doomed. What am I going to do without my bike?

Devastated, I take it to my mom. She reminds me she didn’t think my dog walking approach was a good one. Despite ignoring her forewarnings, she bought me new handlebars and saved my summer. Or did she?

A few weeks later, after the frustration of walking the dog grew again and the comfort of having my bike back was cemented, I couldn’t resist. I was back at it. It was how I tied him to the handlebars that was the problem, I convinced myself. So, I re-rigged my dog walking contraption and away we went, again. A week or so later, my new handlebars were breaking in the same spot.

Needless to say, Mom was a lot less empathetic this time. I didn’t have a bike for the rest of the summer. It was brutal.

We do this in sales. We try new and creative things. They work for a little while, but then stop working. Rather than adjust we keep trying them, thinking maybe this time will be different. It won’t be.

Sales requires creativity. It requires a willingness to push the envelope. It requires vision. But it also requires a willingness to change course. It requires we know when what we are doing is no longer working, or isn’t working at all.

I’ve seen my share of broken handlebars, only to see the reps come back, the new ones broken too. It’s costly when we do this. It’s also too easy. It’s hard to come up with new ideas. It’s hard to change our approach. But, we need to. It’s better than not having your bike for a whole summer.

If what you’re doing isn’t working, do something else.