Ep. 182 Decisions that Deliver

Did you make any New Year’s resolutions? Do you know how to keep them? Joe PIci will  you reach your goals.

The Sales Edge Podcast Transcript

Voiceover:

Get ready for an unfair advantage over your competition. This is the sales edged podcast. Were globally recognized sales expert and trainer Joe Pici helps you sharpen your skills for booking more appointments and closing more deals. And now here's your host Joe Pici.
 
Joe Pici (JP):

Hey team, welcome back. This is the Sales Edge and I am your host Joe Pici and thank you so much. And it's 2021, and we're already past the first week of 2020 20 and it's exciting and hopefully you've gotten a jump start on the year. I know we have and we are continuing to help our clients get where they want to go. You know help them attract and retain clients, recapture lost revenue and just make 2021 a growing growing year with new clients servicing their former clients. And so this is a great time and and we want to thank you. And the sales says podcast is sponsored by Pici and Pici, which is a speaking, training, coaching, consulting company. Which is focused 100% of our efforts on helping our clients get in front of that target market be able to close more business attract and retain, more more clients. And so then we have the SMB platform, we're so excited about, this is a virtual membership program. The front end will be up in the next couple week. You'll be able to go sell more virtually and find out website, but the back end has been up for business since August 1st. We've been doing a membership portal every Thursday night. I do a live coaching or training to members and there's downloads, there's videos, there's Content, e-courses coming and so thank you to our host. Today believe it or not. We are on podcast number 182. It's exciting and humbling. And I remember when we first got started, you know, the very first podcast I did was inside my walk-in closet. And so now we are in a studio and now we've got more features and more things to give you. But we all have to start somewhere and and that came from a decision and that's what we're going to be talking about today. Decide and quit deciding. You know in this ongoing ever changing world we live in decision-making is getting harder. It is absolutely getting harder and and we don't make that a small thing. And and visiting with many of our clients and also potential clients and individuals are B2B or b2c. There's a lot of angst. There's a lot of challenge in making quality decisions. 
And so a couple weeks ago, I did a podcast on how decisions and choices affect your actions and how your actions deliver results. So today we're going to go a little deeper into decision making. This is not going to be the last one. Because decision making is one of the cornerstones, of all success whether it's in your business whether it's in your individual life, whether it's B2B or B2C. It is absolutely a Cornerstone. and my challenge to you is, let's focus on being better decision makers. You know, here's a question for you. Do we, do you, do do all of us, do we have challenges making decisions?

Second question.
Do we have challenges in making quality decisions? And so it's hard. And so why do we struggled with making decisions? You know every day we have to make so many decisions, hundreds and hundreds of decisions. Some are consciously some are subconsciously. But I mean, it can be something as simple as you know, if you have an alarm clock and it goes off, Do I hit the snooze? Don't I hit the snoooze? Is it, do I get on the stationary bike? Don't I get on stationary bike? Do I do a protein shake? Do I do a bagel? I mean, it sounds so simple and yet, you know, do I turn off the air conditioner? Do I turn on the air conditioner? I mean, it's unbelievable that we don't even think but, some of those decisions we make have very little consequences short-term. But long-term consequences come from habitual decision-making that's counter to where we want to go. So a decision okay, can be defined as a course of action, purposely chosen from a set of alternatives to achieve organization or individual objectives or goals. So any time you have a decision to make you have more than one choice. Okay, to do or not to do. And so this is a this is a course of action you're purposely deciding on from a alternatives, what's the best course of action? A decision making process is continuous. Okay, and indispensable, when it comes to managing business activities. In other words, you have to make decisions and having a decision making process is vital. Now here at Pici and Pici, Pici and Pici, which owns you know, we have multiple companies, but we had to come up with a decision making process. You know, and and when I'm working with clients when I coaching, I coached him on decision-making processes. And so decisions are made to sustain the actions of all business. So whatever decision you make, that's going to affect, like we said in a previous podcast, that's going to affect your actions, which ultimately determines results. 
A quick example: Decisions we made March 1st of 2020, we're realizing positive consequences now. Now you don't realize consequences, positive or negative, immediately. Some you do, but it's just like you want to lose 20 pounds you go to the gym.

And you worked out and the only thing you get from going to gym working out for the first time to sore muscles. It hurts. You didn't lose a pound. You didn't gain a loop on your belt. You didn't see a result. But continuous effort going to the gym, eating the right thing, Okay, getting exercise, getting right. All of a sudden you start seeing positive consequences, but they don't come immediately. And so Oxford Advanced Learning says "decision making is a process of deciding about something important, especially for a group of people in an organization". So, you know, there's so much in the way of decision making. So when we look at decision making, you know, I've always said you either make decisions or they may be made for you.

Let me say that again, you either make decisions or they will be made for you. Another thing and as I am selling and negotiating constantly to sell training coaching speaking and when I'm working with my clients that are selling, I often let them know and I let Joe know that, that a decision not made is a decision made. Let me say that again. It's really not complicated. A decision that is not made is really a decision made. So if a person you're selling to says, well, I need to consider that, that doesn't mean they're not going to say yes later, but what they said now is they're not ready to move forward. So that was a decision made. That doesn't mean that decision won't change tomorrow. I think we get confused. You know, I don't know what they were thinking. Well, yes is yes and no is no if they don't say yes, they said no, but they don't say no they said yes. And so, that's why a decision not made is really a decision made. You know this morning, Okay, as I got up about 340 this morning and and I walked into my office and there was the stationary bike. I got a hip flexor and it was a little sore this morning and I had to make a decision. And I stopped looking at the bike which means I made the decision and I snapped back on. Well, you just made a decision here. So I reverse the decision and I got on the bike. Now that decision was made, yes, but I didn't want to complicate the issue here, but that's how simple it is. Let's talk about some of the reasons why decision-making is so important. Number one good decision making process is going to save you time. You know decision making process instead of a gut feeling is going to help you. And if you have a process, for example, when I have to make a decision, I take that information and I plug it into a system which gives me a sooner than later answer.

So a good process in decision-making will help you save time. I know people that labor over decisions, they labor over decisions. And so here's one thing you may want to consider in making your decisions. Something confronts you, somebody wants to sell you something. I was dealing with a client a potential client now a client the other day. And they were considering hiring me and we went to proposal and they were considering the boot camp and and so a couple thousand dollars, you know, and so it's a lot, it's not a lot, whatever. But the product and service they sold, generates a very high index for the company. And so I said to them in without without an attitude, not in your face, I said, let me help you with your decision for a second for your consideration. You're wondering should you not invest the couple thousand dollars to come to Orlando for the training and that's a good you need to think about that. However, have you considered the ramifications or the consequences if you wait? So we have what three or four months before the event and then another six months before the next one. Have you considered the consequences of waiting nine months to the next one, of potential lost revenue? And all the person said to me was, wow. Are you always so logical about your decisions? Well, I worked to be. Emotional decisions can get you in trouble.

And so think about that when you're making a decision.
 Now the second thing is, why you have a process is you develop trust and respect from the people around you. Your clients, your employees, your peers. You know, if they trust that your decision making is sound, if they trust you make quality decisions, number one, they're going to want to be your client, number two, they're going to want to work with you. And your peers will have a higher trust for you. 

This third one is, You're going to increase motivation. When your clients, employees, and peers they see you as a great decision maker. It's going to elevate their motivation to perform. It's going to help them say hey, you know what? We can trust that decision, the past one. Therefore we going to work harder because we know that that decision was was worked on, it wasn't something that was just off the cuff. Now another reason to have a good process is you're going to reduce conflict. You know lack of direction and quality decisions will create conflict internally between you and your clients. Between you and your peers, people you work with.

 And four, because at the end of the day, lack of clarity creates conflict. And so, you know, they want to know, people around you want to know where we going and how we getting there? So all of these things they want to know that they can trust you. They want to know that you're making good decisions. But the clearer the direction is, the less conflict you will have. Not only with your teams, in your clients, but internally. Because a lot of people struggle with internal conflict and that because they struggle with making your decisions.

And number five, you're going to increase productivity.

You know when doubt delivers indecision, doubt delivers frustration. Lack of clarity slows down production. So therefore good decisions increase high productive teams. And I know here personally, when I make quality decisions, Okay, I'm more productive. If I make a bad decision, I'm fixing it. Which means that tends to turn productivity down. And so if you want to increase productivity with yourself and your teams, make sure we're making process driven decisions. You know a decision making process can be regarded as checks a check and balance system that keeps the organization growing both vertically and linerally.

And so, you know a decision making process seeks a goal. The goals are preset business objectives, company missions, and its vision. To achieve these goals companies may face a lot of obstacles. And operator and operational challenges. And so I don't care if it's in your sales division, your Administration division, your your marketing Division. I don't care if it's operate. I don't care what it is, there's decision to be made. In each division should have the same process of decision making. And so many give you a few things that you can do. A few steps that you can take when you're looking at decision making. Okay just a few that you know number one you want to define the situation to find a challenge. You know anytime you have to make a decision, usually it's because something's not working the way you want it to work. Or you want to get to another level. So you want to define that. The second thing is you want to gather information and collect data. If you're going to move forward, you've got to have data, you got to have history. You want to collect and gather information. When we were launching the SMV, when Dawn really mastermind this thing and when Dawn took point on project management to really open up our second training business. So, you know, of course, you know that

Pici and Pici was about 80% live and then the other 20% was was virtual through, you know coaching. Well now Pici and Pici is doing virtual coaching. But we launched SMV as a virtual membership platform. And so when we were going to do that, What is he gather information? She went to the best of the best when it came to membership site development. Okay went to the best of the best. We've always developed great content. That's our world, we have content. But she looked at how do you apply content? So we spent time and money and she did tremendous gathering of information and data.

The third thing. you want to develop and weigh all your options. So you want to weigh the pros and cons. You want to look at best case scenario, worst-case scenario. A good business person is not cynical, but they are skeptical. And they always should say what's the worst thing that can happen? And then what's the best thing that can happen? Hopefully the best thing that can happen outweighs the worst thing that can happen. And that you want to choose the best possible option. So when we looked at the platform we're using for SMV. We have a list of things that we needed to check off and as we were checking them off, we were looking for the best options that would serve our business. That would serve our clients. Then if you do all that, you want to plan it and then execute it. You want to take it to market. You know so many times people do all these other things but then they never execute. And only in the execution, do you collect raw data.

Once you execute then you take your follow-up actions. Which are to assess, are we heading in the right direction? Do we need to make adjustments? And so, you know decision-making doesn't have to be hard, if you have a process. A good friend of ours, for years. Gosh, probably 21 years, is Andy Andrews, New York Times bestseller. Many times over. He wrote a great book called The Seven Decisions. Hey let me recommend you go on Amazon and buy that book for this reason. The number for decision is to have a decided heart. You know, we need to decide and quit deciding. We need to learn how to make decisions but and we need to have a decided heart. I recommend you read that book. You know, we're going to continue to explore decision-making. The pros and cons, the ins and outs because, it's that important. You know a couple things here. You are more than welcome to give me a call at 407 947 2590 for a cup of joe. Or if you'd like me at one of your events, virtually or live, to come in and speak for you. We do have some seats available at our sales bootcamp and the end of April and our business of speaking training and coaching boot camp at the end of April. And we're about 50% sold out right now. So if you want to come to those events get just give me a call. The other thing is take out your phone and type in one word to texting sales edged. Make sure it's one word. Send that to 55678, That'll take you to a Pici and Pici link, which will take you to a splash boat page. Tremendous downloads on there. Also links to our podcast. Hey team, listen, please if these podcasts are of value to you, can you like them? Can you share them? Can you write a comment on them? And also, can you give us some input, you know, you can send me an e-mail at Joe@piciandpici.com or call me. And we always want your input.

What you like, what you don't like. We have thick skin here. What you'd like to hear more of. So this has been the sales as podcast. Hey guys decide and quit deciding. 

Voice over:

Thanks for listening. New episodes will air each Tuesday and Thursday. So make sure to subscribe whereever you listen to podcasts and give us a five star review. The Sales Edge is sponsored by Pici and Pici Incorporated. A firm which provides training, consulting, and keynote presentations. Empowering corporations and individuals to attract and retain quality clients for higher revenues and growth. Make more money in sales. Speak with Joe in person by calling 407 947 2590 or visit wwww.piciandpici.com