“Do the right things and the right things will happen.”

– Kristie Jones

I share this with founders, sales leaders, and reps on a regular basis. I truly believe that if each and every person does what they know to be the right thing then the universe will conspire to make sure the right things will happen. Things like financial security, success, promotions, work/life balance, and much more.

What’s the catch, you ask? Doing the right thing requires #Discipline!

Here are the most common #discipline struggles I see from both sale leaders and representatives:

Sales Leaders:

• Hiring someone you like instead of hiring someone who’s past track record of success proves they’re an “A” player
• Looking over call notes in the CRM instead of actually listening to the call
• Assuming your reps know what you expect of them instead of sitting down and putting it in writing and discussing
• Having your new hire sit with your best rep for a day and then throwing them on the phone instead of putting a formal 2-week onboarding plan together
• Allowing a rep to consistently underperform without taking disciplinary action
• Allowing stalled deals to stay in the pipeline instead of requiring them to be Closed/Lost
• Not holding your reps accountable
• Skipping 1:1 meetings.and pipeline review meeting with your reps.

Sales Reps:

• Calling a client to “check-in” instead of outbound prospect
• Getting off a prospecting call without setting up a FIRM next appointment
• Not time blocking your calendar to ensure you have time for prospecting, administrative tasks, and professional development
• Not having a firm agenda before every scheduled appointment
• Selling to a non-ICP customer and “hoping” it will work out
• Allowing “stalled” deals to stay in the pipeline long after it’s become clear they aren’t going to move forward any time soon- Close them as Lost!
• Not asking the scary questions:
• What could keep this from happening?
• What value do you see in my product or service?
• Is this a budgeted initiative?
• Who on the committee is a dissenter?

There was nothing shocking on the lists, right? You know those are all the things you need to be doing for you and your team to be successful.

Here are some strategies to help you be more disciplined:

• Block your calendar to ensure your least favorite activities get done
• Enlist an accountability partner
• Start your day with you least favorite or hardest activity
• Reward yourself for completing the important, but undesirable tasks

As we head into 2021 being #disciplined should be something you work on. The more disciplined you are the more habits you’ll form and the more consistent your success will become.

What discipline will you work on as we head into 2021?