Leadership is no Sunday stroll in the park. It's more like a hike up a steep, rocky mountain, often in unpredictable weather. You'll face challenges that'll test you and moments that'll have you questioning if you're cut out for it. Whenever I deliver keynotes on leadership topics, I touch on the most critical aspect leaders need to become exceptional: You have to value your people.

What are customer needs? Answering that question may not always be easy – but it’s crucial for business success. After all, knowing what the customer wants is the starting point for creating winning products and services. Just as importantly, it’s the basis for forming long-lasting relationships. The State of the Connected Customer report reveals that 62% of customers expect businesses to anticipate their needs, and 73% expect companies to understand their unique needs and expectations.

In the age of social media, it’s not hard to picture what an engaged customer looks like. They’re the superfans liking and commenting on every post a brand puts out there. You know the ones; Apple, Disney, Starbucks, American Girl Dolls (for those of you with kids of a certain age), and so on. They’ve built a passionate base of engaged customers who’ll talk your ear off, online and in real life, about every ‘exciting’ new thing.

It is easy to get caught up in the importance of sales when you are running a business. After all, sales are the lifeblood of any business. However, the truth is that there are many other factors that contribute to the success of a business. Increasing sales is probably high on your list of priorities. But, if you want to build a successful business, there is another critical area that you cannot afford to ignore – financial management.

In managing customer relationships — or relationships with any key stakeholders — it is critical to manage the balance of power between the company and any one customer. This can be done by diversifying the customer base, understanding (and be willing to use) customer pressure points, and (in the case where a company is locked into a single key relationship) ensuring that the customer is as dependent on the company as the company is dependent on the customer.

A good leader will question everything. They will look at things from all angles and won't be afraid to ask tough questions in order to make better decisions. So today, I wanted to share some tips on how to ask better questions to grow your business faster and smarter. Asking questions is a great first step, but if you want to get ahead, you have to ask the right questions.

If we reward people for speaking their truth, we can create better and more productive workplaces. When people are afraid that something bad will happen to them because of their decision to speak up, in most cases, they won’t do it. And can we really blame them? This is, seemingly, leadership’s failure to foster the type of culture that encourages and rewards people for speaking up.

Managing emotions at the workplace can be a nightmare for leaders. When problems arise and tensions are at an all-time high, emotional outbursts cannot be avoided. It is essential that leaders and managers be aware of and able to deal with different emotions and the underlying reasons behind them. By understanding and acknowledging the role emotions play in the workplace, you can create a positive environment for your team and help them to excel at what they do.

Have you ever had to work or interact with someone who just sucked all your energy? Maybe you can't put your finger on exactly why, but just being in the same room as this person made you feel tired, irked, or uninspired? I think most of us would answer yes to this question (with a specific example or two leaping instantly to mind), and that apparently includes scientists, too.

According to data from Objective Management Group (OMG), which has assessed more than 2.4 million salespeople, 95% of the very best salespeople emphasize listening over talking, but more than half of the worst salespeople take the opposite approach, emphasizing talking over listening. While the primary skill to prioritize listening is asking good, timely questions, only 28% of all salespeople ask enough questions. Even worse, that drops to just 4% of the worst salespeople.

When I have an unreasonable customer, I have no problem encouraging them to do business elsewhere (again, after making reasonable attempts to satisfy them). The investment of time and emotional resources are often not worth trying to satisfy such a person. Better to lose one out of 50 customers--especially if that customer is taking 10 times the time and effort to deal with.

You hear about disruptions in industry, in tech, in art. Something or someone who comes along and makes the world abruptly shift, seemingly overnight. Well, there are disruptions in sales calls, too. Questions, actions, and behaviors that have the power to change the conversation and how the client sees you.

Choose the Best Time and Strategy for Cold Calling. Ultimately, picking the right time to make your sales calls is essential to sales success. While these six rules of thumb are a good place to start, you may find different strategies work better for your business. Test these approaches and adopt the ones that work for you. You might be surprised to find how many more prospects you can reach with a few simple tweaks.

In order to trust you as an organization, your stakeholders need to believe three things: that you care about them (empathy), that you’re capable of meeting their needs (logic), and that you can be expected to do what you say you’ll do (authenticity). Just like when people lose trust, organizations that are losing trust — or failing to build as much trust as they could — tend to get shaky or wobble on one of these three dimensions.

Companies have been bracing for a recession all year. Although GDP continues to grow, most firms are still anticipating an economic downtown, and many have made talent changes already. With so much economic concern, experts say, it’s essential that employees continue to show their value, particularly as managers begin preparing for year-end performance reviews.

You can be a manager without being a leader. Management is a position bestowed upon you, which sets out roles and responsibilities, in relation to yourself and your team. But you cannot be a truly successful and highly competent manager without learning and integrating key leadership qualities. And in today’s fast-changing and increasingly remote business world, managers need to be effective leaders.

We all thought we knew what he wanted to hear—“semantic memory”—which was what he was studying. There were five guys there, all of us first-year students (and all male). The first one got up and he said, as you would predict, “semantic memory.” The second and third guys said the same. I knew at least two of them were lying and just sucking up.

"I am fine with my current product lineup..." is one of the worst things that a salesperson can hear. They are happy with what they currently have, and if they are already using a solution of yours you have to tread very carefully to ensure that you don't lose a current customer in pursuit of a higher package or price tag. So today, I wanted to share with you a few responses

Selling original or quirky products is often an uphill battle. However research that involved an analysis of quirky products sold by some 7,000 craft entrepreneurs on Etsy suggests that effective storytelling that helps people relate to such offerings can turn them into successes. This article shares three storytelling techniques that work.

People today are bombarded with messages from morning until night. We can't check email or drive to the store without seeing flashing banners, mostly aimed at selling us something. Today's consumers are experts at tuning these messages out, leaving salespeople with an important question: Do you ensure your message is seen and heard? Connecting with clients today is often about building trust.