Resources to Help You Love Honing Your Craft

Happy Valentine’s week! We thought it would be a good time to show our readers some love. If you have been part of any Maestro training, you have learned about the 40/20 rule—for every 40 hours you spend working, you need to spend another 20 hours honing your craft. In order to be a true sales professional, that’s the kind of commitment it takes.

Everyone loves this rule. After a week of hard work, who doesn’t want to spend more time reading a book about sales psychology or practicing question trees? Right?! Okay, so the 40/20 rule isn’t one of the most popular suggestions we share.

While an extremely effective way to get better at your job, it means putting in more work and more hours, and not getting paid for them. So, this week, only because we love you, we thought we’d share some of the more fun ways to hone your craft.

ON SCREEN

TED talks are a great way to learn things in an easy, enjoyable manner. They are also a great way to discover new authors and bloggers. There’s even some reality TV that can count toward your 40/20!

Adam Grant

You could read Adam Grant’s new book, Think Again, or you could wait for us to review it on our blog next month, and in the meantime watch some of his TED talks. In “The Surprising Habits of Original People” you can hear him explain why procrastination isn’t necessarily a bad thing [Editor’s Note: Now I know why Rachel submitted this so close to the deadline!], why the “first-mover advantage” is largely a myth, and how which web browser you use is a good indicator of success.

In “Are You a Giver or a Taker?” Grant explains how to keep your organization safe from the takers and why encouraging people to seek help is best for everyone. He also warns us not to overlook the disagreeable givers, who might just be the most important people in an organization. The great thing about Grant’s talks is that they line up perfectly with his books, so if you can’t get enough you can read Originals or Give and Take.

David JP Phillips

A few weeks ago, we wrote about the value of storytelling and the biological responses that take place when individuals listen to a story. Don’t feel like reading a blog right now? Fine, be that way. You could watch David JP Phillips’ “The Magical Science of Storytelling” instead, in which he tells stories to his audience in order to demonstrate their impacts.

In other words, he tells a story in order to teach us about the benefits of storytelling. And if you read our blog, you know that people remember a lot more details if the facts are part of a narrative. But our blog was not written in a narrative form, so you probably don’t remember it. Just watch Phillips. It’s clear to me now where I went wrong.

Simon Sinek

Sinek has also presented the topics of some of his books as TED talks. In “How Great Leaders Inspire Action” he explains how starting with answering the “why” instead of the “what” completely changes how we see companies and their products. Apple, for example, starts with “why,” while TiVo started with “what.”

Amy Cuddy

At Maestro we are all about giving you actionable tools that you can use right away, and that’s why Amy Cuddy’s TED talk, “Your Body Language May Shape Who You Are,” is so powerful. Cuddy delves into her research on non-verbal communication, why “fake it ‘til you make it” is a real thing, and how two minutes standing in the bathroom in a victory pose can help you get a job. It’s fascinating, immediately useable, and based in science—no wonder we love it!

Reality TV Shows

Wait, what?? It’s true. There are some reality TV shows that can actually teach you about pitching, sales, and business strategy. Shark Tank is likely the first one you think of—talk about a stressful pitch! The Profit on CNBC with Marcus Lemonis is also a fun show to watch that provides plenty of ideas for anyone in small business.

ON STAGE

This idea came to us from one of our workshop participants. She told us that she does improv, and that it’s a great way to hone her sales skills. When you think about it, her approach makes a lot of sense.

Depending on who you ask, there could be four, five, or maybe even ten rules of improv. There are certain ideas, though, that are part of any kind of improv, and they will help you in sales as well.

Yes, and

The first idea is saying “yes, and.” If you’re improvising with someone, and they say, “Oh no, we’re trapped in a volcano!” and you say, “No we’re not. We’re in my kitchen,” you have killed the scene. In improv, even if you don’t agree, you can’t say “no.” You can’t even say “yes, but.” It’s “yes, and.”

The same thing is true in sales. In order to keep the conversation moving, you have to say, “yes, and.” You might get an objection that your prospect is already using another provider. “Yes, and they do a great job of x and y. How would your process be improved if you could also do z?”

Really Listen

Improv teaches you how to really listen to your partners. We all fall into the trap of thinking ahead in a conversation of what we’re going to say next. That’s great for when you’re developing your question trees, but once you are in an actual conversation, it’s critical that you stay in the moment.

In improv it’s impossible to think ahead, because the scenarios are so crazy you can’t anticipate them. You have to focus on every word your partner says and pick up on any non-verbal cues in order to move the scene forward and make it work. Sales is the same. Really listen to what your prospect is telling you. Look for non-verbal cues. Showing you’re listening will help build rapport and trust.

In improv, part of your job is to make the other person look good. You are either both going to fail or you’re both going to succeed. Sales is the same. By truly listening to what your prospect needs, not interrupting, and not disagreeing, you both win in the end.

Speaking of Failure

Whether you’re in improv or sales (or both), you are most assuredly going to fail. That’s just part of it. If you fear failure, you can’t be good at improv or sales. You have to accept that failure is a truth of the business and that you can always learn from it.

Our workshop attendee said that improv also prepares you for anything. If you’re used to hearing people say things like, “How are we going to get out of this volcano when all we have is a monkey and an apple pie?” nothing said in a sales meeting will be able to throw you off your game.

ON THE AIR

A baseball game lasts three hours, and the amount of action involved is only about 18 minutes. Have you ever listened to baseball announcers on the radio? Two people have to fill two hours and 42 minutes of time! Think about how much information a baseball announcer has to study and prep before a game.

They get all the information on what happened the last time the Astros played the White Sox, but guess what? Tomorrow the Astros play the White Sox again! How are they not out of things to say?! Talk about mitigating risk!

What’s so impressive about these seasoned announcers isn’t how much they are talking. As we’ve mentioned before, for good conversational flow in sales or anywhere, you want to be speaking less. The impressive aspects are how well they adapt to whatever happens in the game, and how well they listen to each other and react to what their co-announcer has said (yes, and…). With a limited number of networks covering the games of just thirty teams, they have to truly be the best at what they do. If you want to listen to someone who is prepared yet agile, listen to a baseball game.

We want you to work hard on your 40/20, but we also want you to enjoy it and have fun. If you have unique ways of honing your craft, we want to hear about them. Happy Valentine’s from Maestro!

If you really want to hone your craft, contact us about setting up some workshops for your team at Mastery@maestrogroup.co.