Starting Different. (3 Tips for This Coming Week)

We are Starting Different this week.

We are not Starting Over, we are Starting Different.

3 TIPS TO KEEP IN MIND THIS WEEK:

1) Cut Yourself Some Slack (You’re Gonna Screw Up)

2) New Circumstances = New Conversations

3) Serve & Sell (Pricing in the Pivot)

1) Give Folks A Break This Week When They Screw-Up

(This includes YOU.)

Mistakes are more likely during times of disruption.

More mistakes (big and small) made by everyone in your world– your clients, your team and your family.

Get used to it. We are all distracted.

Give people a break.

Show them that you got their back.

As my friends at Arch Insurance say:

Be the Solution

“Focus on fixing the Process, not blaming the People.”

How many mistakes did you personally make this past week?

This morning I found my Apple Airpods… in my washing machine.

Yesterday I got lost walking… in my own neighborhood.

Yeah, truth.

And those are just two of my smaller mistakes.

I made some real doozies this week.

Clients and family did as well:

One ended up in the hospital because of a one-inch mistake.

Another ended a 50-year friendship with one triggered-conversation.

So… cut everyone some slack this week.

2) People Breathe Easier When Winston Wolf Arrives

(a $12 Trillion Stimulus package looks a lot like Harvey Keitel in a tux)

This week a lot of folks will start to see the path forward.

And they will see that path differently than they did last week.

Because they will start breathing and thinking again.

Last week they were speaking in absolutes:

“We have to let everyone go– business is over.”

“We have no budget for anything– ever again.”

“You can’t… we won’t…” (You heard them, right?)

Because people in companies of all sizes went into Fight or Flight last week. And even worse: they FROZE.

They FREAKED OUT like there was a blood-spattered car in the garage.

It’s impossible to speak with folks rationally when they believe there is a saber-toothed tiger in the room with them.

You can start having rational and consultative conversations with them again when they start to breathe their way through this.

Your conversations can now be about solving problems.

Circumstances will start to change this week.

New circumstances will mean new conversations.

3) Please Note: The Cadillac’s and Corvette’s Aren’t Free

This week GM has been asked to build ventilators at cost.

GM has not been asked to give away their standard products.

We all (metaphorically speaking) have “ventilator” products that we can customize to help folks now– for less than we charge for our standard offerings.

We have skills/expertise that can help our clients during a crisis and some of those things we can offer at cost.

There is a difference between making a living during a pandemic and profiteering from a pandemic.

Two weeks ago I was asked by my best client to deliver a series of 5 – 6 live webcasts to their employees globally on Essential Brain Shortcuts in Disruptive Times. (You can find a version of that 30-minute webcast on YouTube– or if you connect with me on LinkedIn). The webcasts were scheduled for delivery at all kinds of hours for different time zones. And I needed to be available for significant testing of their webcast platforms prior to the first live session, in addition to rehearsing and then delivering the actual live webcasts.

It was a highly customized deliverable that consumed almost 100% of my time– one that I am extremely proud to have been a part of because it made a difference for hundreds of people.

It was not one that I charged my full fee for.

My client asked me to help his Team breathe a little bit easier (metaphorically speaking) and I could build him something at cost to do that. That is how we manifest our values– the behavior that optimizes our customer’s experience.

But he wasn’t asking me to deliver my flagship training workshop, my version of GM’s Cadillac to all his Team around the world for free.

You can offer special discounts on your Cadillac product.

You might consider different delivery options and even special payment terms.

But you don’t have to give away your core product in the interest of serving your clients in a time of disruption.

One of my core training courses is the live Two-Day

YESCALATE® GET TO YES FASTER® Workshop

which in it’s 3-hour Talk version was awarded the

Vistage Speaker of the Year Award.

And that core offering is available as an online course.

(Use code 2020 for 20% off for the next 20 days.)