Is a Need to Please Hurting Your Business?

When it comes to business, there’s a thin line between “people pleasing” and good customer service. And these days, in crowded and competitive markets, anything less than a customer-obsessed strategy (as coined by Forrester Research) simply won’t do.

That drive to wow customers, clients, bosses, and colleagues can set you apart from the rest. But can a relentless need to please actually be hurting your business and career?

It’s not an easy question, but let’s start with something simple: pizza. Think about it. When a group orders pizza, what role do you play in the process? Do you voice your topping preferences or sit back and think to yourself, “No problem, I can just take off those olives….” Do you give your opinion equal weight or do you politely defer to the group?

If you’re wondering what the group dynamics surrounding a pizza order have to do with running your business, consider the following scenarios:

Do you feel in charge of your business or are your clients running the show?

Do you ever take on troublesome clients even though your intuition is warning you of all the red flags ahead?

Do you let your colleagues encroach on your time, even if you’re stressed by a tight deadline?

Do you ever take on the grunt work or the least favorite task, rather than delegating it?

Do you ever hesitate calling a prospective client or other network connection because you don’t want to bother anyone?

Any of these scenarios signal a ‘need to please.’ And people with this tendency often overextend themselves in the workplace and bend over backwards for others. But it’s hard to achieve your own goals when you’re constantly focused on trying to make everyone else in the room happy.

Let’s consider the underlying feelings behind the action. Is stress or generosity motivating your behavior? For example, imagine a valued client asks for some small pro bono work for his or her spouse’s non-profit organization. If you agree to help out, but are silently harboring negative feelings, chances are you were just trying to please. But if you feel a sense of accomplishment and purpose about the work, it was probably an act of kindness.

Understanding the stress/generosity distinction is key, as people pleasing is generally less about pleasing and more about fending off the rejection and disappointment of others.

By that token, you need to realize that people pleasing isn’t necessarily the same thing as being nice. Niceness and kindness are wonderful traits, and ones that we need more of in the world and business today. However, it is possible to be nice while also expressing your own needs. Standing up for yourself doesn’t make you unkind or self-centered; it just gives you equal footing with everyone else.

The need to please is linked to lower wages and poorer negotiation skills. And while people pleasing is often discussed in the context of women in the workplace, I believe the trait affects both sexes. In addition, continually working on someone else’s terms may lead to frustration and dissatisfaction. These feelings can ultimately ripple through to relationships with customers and clients. As a consequence, always being nice can actually yield poorer customer service in the long run.

If any of the scenarios discussed above sound familiar, it’s time to break the pleasing cycle and begin working or running your business on your own terms. While truly understanding what compels you to please may be more complex than the bounds of this post, here are a couple of tips toward breaking the pattern:

• Recognize the difference between being generous (i.e. wanting to help a customer, colleague, employee or boss) and wanting to avoid conflict and disappointing others.
• Actively manage people’s expectations. You can still say yes to everything, but frame it in terms of what’s realistic for you whether that’s needing more time, money, or resources.
• Be brief and meaningful when communicating (especially when delegating or responding to a request). People pleasers often need to share everything and anticipate other’s reactions when discussing plans. Staying brief exudes confidence.
• Take baby steps. You’ve had a lifetime to perfect this behavior; don’t expect to change it overnight. Something as small as voicing your own thoughts on pizza toppings can be a very empowering and liberating experience.

Most importantly, still be generous and kind particularly toward customers and clients. You can’t get anywhere without being customer-obsessed these days. But be nice for the right reasons. And give your own opinions and needs equal weight as everyone else. After all, your business, your customers, and you are all worth it

How to Succeed Through Internet Marketing

By Adam P Wade

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/6630739

5 Easy Ways to Stay Motivated

Face it: There are days when being an entrepreneur sucks. Here are a few simple steps to getting your mojo back.

No matter what you do for a living, the key to success is superlative performance, day after day after day. And that’s only possible if you make optimism, expectancy, and enthusiasm part of your daily experience.

That’s easy if you’re pursuing your life’s dearest dreams.  But what if, like almost everybody else in this world, you’ve got a job that’s not exactly perfect. Here’s how to remain a go-getter, even when the getting gets tough:

STEP #1: Realize That YOU Are in Control

Your attitude isn’t controlled by the outside world.  That’s an illusion, a fantasy that, if you believe it, you’re simply using to escape responsibility for managing this all-important part of your career.

For example, if you run into snowstorm that’s making you late to a customer meeting, you can get frustrated and start cursing..., or you can look forward to the appreciation that the customer might feel because you were committed enough to fight the weather to make the meeting.

Similarly, when the economy goes south, you can start obsessing about how it’s going to affect your job, or you can be one of those individuals who use tighter budgets as a way to streamline operations, develop new markets and create innovations.

It’s all in how you see it!

STEP #2: Neutralize Your Negative Triggers

Stop letting exterior events trigger negative thoughts.

For example, suppose you’re traveling to a customer meeting but keep running into red lights and traffic delays. That IS a problem, but if you get flustered, you’ve got TWO problems: the fact that you’re late, and the fact that you’re flustered.

And if you walk into the meeting flustered, the customer might wonder if you’re moody and unreliable. So now you’ve got THREE problems.

To get a better result (and achieve a better attitude), modify your interpretation of exterior events that tend to trigger a negative outlook. Once the events in your life take on a different, more useful meaning, they won’t trigger a bad attitude.

For example, while the delays may be making you late, use the extra time to collect your thoughts, consider your options, and decide on a damage control strategy. Or use the time to come up with a better schedule, so that you always leave plenty of time, just in case there’s traffic.

As a mentor of mine once said: “Life is like those signs that say ‘You Are Here’  What you make of where you are is up to you.”

STEP #3: Detoxify Your Media Consumption

Much of today’s news programming consists of “if it bleeds it leads” stories followed by commercials offering some form of (often addictive) security or comfort. The constant flow of negative imagery automatically creates a negative attitude about life, the world, and everything in it.

If you want to maintain a positive attitude, you MUST reduce or even eliminate your exposure to broadcast news programming. Rather than waste time with that garbage, add material and content into your life that will help you become more successful (like this column!) 

Start and end each day reading something positive! When you’re on the road, rather than listening to negative, emotionally-charged talk radio, listen to motivational tapes, music that raises your spirits, or maybe great literature.

STEP #4: Avoid Negative People

You probably have one or more friends, relatives, or acquaintances who make you feel tired and drained. They always seem to have something sour to say; criticisms come to their lips far more quickly than compliments.

Such folk are toxic to your attitude (and hence to your success) because, if they’re not actively tearing down your enthusiasm, they’re trying to get you to think the same way about the world as they do.  What a drag!  Literally.

If you want to maintain a positive attitude, consider sharply limiting your daily exposure to such people. Don’t show up at the daily “water cooler complain-fest.” Don’t go to lunch with the “grouse and grumble” crowd. If you’ve got family members who are constantly negative, tune them out.

STEP #5: Adopt a Positive Vocabulary

The words that you use—both what you speak aloud and your internal dialogue—have a vast influence in how you perceive what’s happening in the world. All words carry a certain amount of emotional baggage, inherent in their exact definition and the way that they’ve been used in the past.

For instance, the words “despise,” “hate,” and “dislike” mean essentially the same thing, but carry very different emotional baggage. If you “dislike” something, but tell yourself that you “hate it” over and over and over, it will intensify the original emotion.

To keep a positive attitude, use weak words for negative feelings and strong words for positive ones. This thwarts the downward spiral of negative feelings and words, and accelerates the upward spiral of positive feelings and words.

The above is based upon a conversation with one my favorite people, motivation-guru extraordinaire Jeff Keller, and is a shortened version of one of the chapters in my newly-published book How to Say It: Business to Business Selling.

Geoffrey James

Geoffrey James is an award-winning journalist and author of Inc.com’s Sales Source column. Previously, he wrote Sales Machine, the world's most-visited sales-oriented blog. James has written hundreds of articles on sales and marketing for publications like Technology Marketing and SellingPower, and has helped dozens of sales training and technology vendors communicate more effectively with their customers. James' newly published book (based on his most popular columns and posts) is How to Say It: Business to Business Selling. If you've got a question about selling or want to get his "insider" newsletter, visit James’ website.

If you’re wondering how to generate press coverage for your small business, you’ve come to the right place. Our team caught up with seasoned Public Relations professional, Mark Scott, to bring you the do’s and don’ts of pitching media. Use the PR tips below to make journalists proud to spotlight your growing business.

Top do’s and don’ts of pitching media:

Do – Read, listen to or watch the media outlets you’re looking to get into so you understand what kind of stories they cover and how they cover them. Do they do live interviews? Do they use prepared/press release copy? Do they use video footage or photos? Get to know the media outlets you want to be in and supply them the things they need. Make it easier for them to cover your story than the 100 other pitches they get each week. Reporters want to know you’re familiar with their work and their outlet and having this familiarity will help you prepare and pitch your story more efficiently.

Do — Make yourself available and keep appointments. If you get a reporter interested in your story, be flexible about when you can do the interview. Many reporters are working on five or six stories at the same time. If they’re only available to interview you between noon and 2:30 on Thursday, make yourself free then or they may just move on to another story. Once you have the interview booked, make sure you’re there in person or you’re there by the phone at the appointed time.

Do — Pay attention to what else is going on in your market or industry when you make your announcements or pitch your story. This will help you find times that are better to pitch than others. If you’re a technology company and you’re planning a major press announcement, don’t do it on the same day Apple is supposed to announce the next iPhone — every tech reporter in the world will be focused on that story, not yours. If you’re pitching a story about your company’s donation to a local charity, don’t do it on the day your city or state is having elections — all your local news resources will be focused on that story.

Do — Become a resource for reporters in your industry. Every story can’t be about you, but you can position yourself and your company as an expert resource to talk about trends in your industry. By helping reporters out with these larger trend pieces with comments, insight and expertise, those reporters will be more willing to cover your big story when the time comes.

Don’t – Hound reporters. Many people think calling and emailing reporters over and over will get them to cover your story. But being too aggressive can actually repel reporters. Know that reporters spend at least a few minutes with every pitch they get and if they’re interested, they will call you for more information. A quick follow up call a few days after you send your pitch can help, but calling day after day on the same story will just make the reporter angry. Be an ongoing resource for reporters in your space, but don’t call over and over on the same story.

Don’t — Invest in flashy press kits. Most reporters don’t have time to wade through thick, complex press kits with photos, big brochures, multiple pages, etc. to figure out what the news in there is. A simple email with a good pitch, a press release and images illustrating the products or services you’re pitching will be sufficient. If your item requires some kind of hand-on experience, follow up with a call to see if the reporter would like an in-person demo.

Let the PR tips above strengthen your pitching efforts and help you land the media attention you want.

From: http://brandmakernews.com/marketing/6928/dos-and-donts-of-pitching-media.html

The Fine Line Between Fear and Courage

I tell my kids, what is the difference between a hero and a coward? What is the difference between being yellow and being brave? No difference. Only what you do. They both feel the same. They both fear dying and getting hurt. The man who is yellow refuses to face up to what he’s got to face. The hero is more disciplined and he fights those feelings off and he does what he has to do. But they both feel the same, the hero and the coward. People who watch you judge you on what you do, not how you feel.

—Cus D’amato, legendary boxing trainer

When we meet with entrepreneurs, the two key characteristics that we look for are brilliance and courage. In my experience as CEO, I found that the most important decisions tested my courage far more than my intelligence.

The right decision is often obvious, but the pressure to make the wrong decision can be overwhelming. It starts with small things.

When founders come in to pitch our firm—one as the CEO and the other as President—the conversation often goes like this:

“Who is running the company?”
“We are,” they both say.
“Who makes the final decision?”
“We do.”
“How long do you expect to run that way?”
“Forever.”
“So you’ve decided to make it more difficult for every employee to get work done so that you don’t have to decide who is in charge, is that right?”

That usually results in silence.

Intellectually, it should be clear that it is easier for employees to go to one decision maker than two. It’s not really very complicated at all. Unfortunately, the clear and present social pressure often overwhelms the long-term benefits of organizing the company properly. Because the founders do not have the courage to decide who is in charge, every employee suffers the inconvenience of double approval.

More importantly, decisions only get scarier as a company grows. When we decided to take Loudcloud public with only $2M in revenue, it was not a hard choice intellectually—the alternative was to go bankrupt. It was nonetheless terrifying to do something that most employees, everyone in the press, and many investors thought was nuts.

When making the right choice requires intelligence and courage

Sometimes the decision itself is rather complicated which makes the courage challenge even more difficult. CEOs possess a different set of data, knowledge and perspective than anybody else in the company. Frequently, some of the employees and board members are more experienced and more intelligent than the CEO. The only reason the CEO can make a better decision is her superior knowledge.

To make matters worse, when a CEO faces a particularly difficult decision, she may have only a slight preference for one choice over another—say 54% kill a product line, 46% keep it. If the really smart people on the board and on her staff take the other side, her courage will be severely tested. How can she kill the product when she is not even sure if the she is making the right decision and everyone is against her? If she’s wrong, she will have been wrong in the face of advice from her top advisors. If she is right, will anybody even know?

Recently, a large company offered to buy one of our portfolio companies. The deal was lucrative and compelling given the portfolio company’s progress to date and revenue level. The Founder/CEO (I’ll call him Hamlet—not his real name) thought that selling did not make sense due to the giant market opportunity that he was pursuing, but still wanted to make sure that he made the best possible choice for investors and employees. Hamlet wanted to reject the offer, but only marginally. To complicate matters, most of the management team and the board thought the opposite. It did not help that the board and the management team were far more experienced than Hamlet. As a result, Hamlet spent many sleepless nights worrying about whether or not he was right. To make matters worse, he realized that it was impossible to know whether or not he was right. This did not help his sleep. In the end, Hamlet made the best and most courageous decision that he could and did not sell the company. I believe that will prove to be the defining moment of his career.

Interestingly, as soon as Hamlet made the decision, the entire board and executive team immediately embraced the choice. Why? If they wanted to sell the company enough to advise the CEO to give up his dream, how could they reverse themselves so quickly? It turns out that the most important data point driving their earlier preference for selling the company was Hamlet’s initial ambivalence—the team supported the decision they thought the CEO wanted. Hamlet did not realize this and interpreted their desire to sell to be the result of a thorough analysis. Luckily for everybody involved, he had the courage to make the right decision.

The general problem can be seen in the social credit matrix described below. The expected social rewards for making the crowd-influenced decision appear better than those for making the decision that you think is right:

  You are right You are wrong You decide against the crowd Few remember that you made the decision, but the company succeeds Everybody remembers the decision and you are down graded, ostracized or fired You decide with the crowd Everyone who advised you remembers the decision and the company succeeds You receive the minimum blame possible for getting it wrong, but the company suffers

On the surface, it appears that if the decision is a close call, it’s much safer to go with the crowd. In reality, if you fall into this trap, the crowd will influence your thinking and make a 70/30 decision seem like a 51/49 decision. This is why courage is critical.

Courage, like character, can be developed

Every fighter that ever lived had fear. A boy comes to me and tells me that he’s not afraid, if I believed him I’d say he’s a liar or there’s something wrong with him. I’d send him to a doctor to find out what the hell’s the matter with him, because this is not a normal reaction. The fighter that’s gone into the ring and hasn’t experienced fear is either a liar or a psychopath…

—Cus D’Amato

In all the difficult decisions that I made through the course of running Loudcloud and Opsware, I never once felt brave. In fact, I often felt scared to death. I never lost those feelings, but after much practice, I learned to ignore them. That learning process might also be called the courage development process.

In life, everybody faces choices between doing what’s popular, easy, and wrong vs. doing what’s lonely, difficult, and right. These decisions intensify when you run a company, because the consequences get magnified 1,000 fold. As in life, the excuses for CEO’s making the wrong choice are always plentiful.

Life excuse CEO excuse Other smart people made the same mistake It was a close call All my friends wanted to do it The team was against me and I couldn’t go against the team All the cool kids are doing it It was industry best practice; I didn’t realize it was illegal It wasn’t perfect, so I decided not to compete We never achieved total product-market fit, so we never tried to sell our product

Every time you make the hard, correct decision you become a bit more courageous and every time you make the easy, wrong decision you become a bit more cowardly. If you are CEO, these choices will lead to a courageous or cowardly company.

One last thought

Over the past 10 years, technological advances dramatically lowered the financial bar for starting a new company, but the courage bar for building a great company remains as high as it has ever been.

http://bhorowitz.com/2011/08/08/the-fine-line-between-fear-and-courage/

Is the entrepreneurial path right for you?

From: http://venturebeat.com/2010/10/12/is-the-entrepreneurial-path-is-right-for-you/

Adapted from: American Express OPEN Forum
http://www.openforum.com/idea-hub/topics/innovation/article/finally-online-businesses-get-some-respect-anita-campbell

Nov 30, 2009 -

Adapted from: American Express OPEN Forum
http://www.openforum.com/idea-hub/topics/innovation/article/social-media-what-is-it-anita-campbell

 
Jan 12, 2010 -

Adapted from: American Express OPEN Forum
http://www.openforum.com/idea-hub/topics/innovation/article/why-should-i-buy-from-this-site-tj-mccue

Apr 20, 2010 -

Adapted from: American Express OPEN Forum
http://www.openforum.com/idea-hub/topics/innovation/article/success-is-a-choice-starr-hall

Go work for a startup company.

Adapted from: Top 10 Reasons to Join a Startup by Ben Yoskovitz
http://www.instigatorblog.com/top-10-reasons-to-join-a-startup/2007/05/23/