Sandler’s Behavior, Attitude & Techniques

July 5th, 2010

Whatever we do, whenever we interact with the world, we do so through our attitude, behavior and technique.

As managers, we must get to know our salespeople well enough to be conscious of how these three dimensions may appear to prospects and how they may affect the sales efforts of our salespeople. And that’s not always easy. After all, when we attempt to understand any of these traits, we quickly move into the realm of psychology or the social sciences. But there’s nothing to fear if we keep it simple.

ATTITUDE: What we ponder, and what we think about, sets the course of our life … At this very moment how do you feel about yourself, your company, and your product? Do you have a deep sense of self-appreciation? Are your beliefs setting you up for victory or defeat? What is your current level of confidence and motivation? People will only perform in a manner that is consistent with how they see themselves conceptually

Attitude often can be controlled and directed. But that requires people to explore the roots of their attitudes, and then take positive steps to banish negative feelings by focusing on the positive. As managers, you must encourage the spread of the positive roots, and “root out” all the sources of negativity. A positive attitude moves us toward positive behaviors and positive results. A negative attitude does the opposite.

BEHAVIOR: Do you have a reason to stretch and are you stretching to reach it? How well do you use your time? Do you have a plan in which you have conviction? Are you willing to do the daily activities required to execute your plan?

Behavior, too, is affected by many influences. Some influences can be controlled, while others cannot. But we can’t know what influences are controllable until we attempt to master our fate and consciously guide our behavior.

Encourage your salespeople to repeat positive behavior until it becomes habit. Help your salespeople determine who they want to be, then encourage them to play the role until they become it. That’s not masquerading; that’s personal growth!

TECHNIQUE: When you are in front of a prospect, how effective are you? Are you leading the buyer-seller dance, or is your prospect? Are you developing strong up-front contracts every step of the way? Are you finding out what’s really going on or are you settling for smoke and intellectual nonsense?

Technique stems from conscious striving combined with unconscious impulses. But technique can be mastered even more easily than behavior, through training, observation, practice and mentoring. The sky’s the limit with technique.

Technique can compensate for poor attitude and poor behaviors, but only to a very minor degree. A bad attitude and inconsistent behavior will torpedo even the most polished technique. All three aspects of our professional tool kit must work together for us to be complete and successful as sales professionals.

If we focus on attaining a positive set of attitudes, repeatable, systematic behavior and consistent, professional technique then, over time, we can ensure success.

© Sandler Systems, Inc. All rights reserved.

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