Failing Forward – The Skill All Successful Salespeople Master!
By Michael J Griffin
7 minute read
Even very successful salespeople fail more than they succeed. Not every prospect becomes an appointment, not every customer interaction ends in a successful sale. I learned long ago that “Failing Forward” in daily sales activities is the secret ingredient that lifted me up to future sales success. “Failing Forward” means learning and growing from your sales mistakes, customer rejection, and marketplace changes.
Dr. John Maxwell wrote the book “Failing Forward” and I have gleaned key insights from reading the book, applying it to my sales career and select book summaries (100 Must Reads and 12 Minute Read Blogs) to adapt them to your world of sales. Read on!
Dr. Maxwell’s Big Idea. The difference between average salespeople and achieving, successful salespeople is their perception of and their response to failure, mistakes and customer rejection. This impacts their life long sales career. Failure and customer rejection are not a single events, it are a process that regularly occurs in the life of every salesperson: Not all customers buy from you!
Chapter 1: The Four Lessons I learned from Maxwell’s book.
Realize that there are differences between average salespeople and consistently achieving salespeople. Here are the four lessons successful salespeople learn from failure or rejection.
Lesson 1: You might not be responsible for your failures, but you can sure take responsibility for your future success.
Lesson 2: Failures Are portals of discovery – Be open to new ways of doing things.
Lesson 3: Turn failure into knowledge and knowledge into success.
Lesson 4: Take action after failure to help you make the most of the new opportunities that come your way. Don’t keep repeating the same mistakes!
Chapter 2: Seven things failure is not! Change your perception of failure.
Learn a new definition of failure and success. Salespeople are too quick to isolate sales rejections in their life and label them as failure – need to see them in the context of the bigger picture. For this review let’s also consider customer rejection as “failure.”
Seven things failure/customer rejection is not:
Failure is not avoidable – all salespeople fail every week! We all blow a big sale sooner or later.
Failure is not an event, but a process. Sales success is not a destination – it is the journey you take and what you do day to day – success is a consistent sales process, and so is failure.
Failure is not objective. You are the only person who can label your actions a failure.
Failure is not the enemy – it takes adversity to achieve success. It is fertilizer to be a better salesperson.
Failure is not irreversible. If this was true, we might as well stop prospecting and meeting new customers!
Failure is not a stigma – they are not permanent markers. Make each failure a step to sales success. Make sure you work for a sales coach that allows and teaches you to “fail forward.”
Failure is not final – failure is simply a price we pay to achieve success and if we learn to embrace that new definition of failure, then we can move ahead. It’s the price you pay for success. I have found the best salespeople are those that learn and take positive action from their rejection, mistakes and failures.
Chapter 3: If you have failed, are you a failure? Remove the “ u” from failure
Salespeople need resilience as rejection and losing the sale are part of a successful sales career. Three ways unsuccessful salespeople respond to fear of failing:
Paralysis – people stop doing anything that might lead to failure. They are stuck at their desk brooding over the fear of rejection.
Procrastination – steals people time, productivity. They focus on unimportant stuff to put off the hard work of sales. Start everyday doing the important: Prospecting, researching, networking and sharpening your selling skills.
Purposelessness – Salespeople love to sell, they enjoy meeting people, they believe in their product and they take risks to achieve success. They have focus and purpose. Zig Ziglar said “If you aim at nothing you are sure to hit it!”
Can’t avoid fear – to conquer it, you have to feel the fear and take action anyway. You have to know that you will make mistakes. As soon as you take action it gets easier. Sales experience gains competence. The whole process starts with action. When it comes to overcoming failure – you have to take action to reduce your fear.
Chapter 4: Find the exit off the failure freeway.
People who get used to failure make the same mistake over and over. If you always do what you’ve always done then you will always get what you’ve always gotten. The people who stay on the failure freeway see every obstacle as someone’s fault. Blaming others is a cop out. Making excuses is a cop out. Think about how you learned your favourite sport. Constant early failure on that swing or stroke, but your attitude to learn the correct way helped you play the sport and win. Do the same with your sales skills and process.
Chapter 5: Change your response to failure by accepting responsibility.
Salespeople’s reactions to failure or rejection:
They are angry – taking frustration out on others, blame others.
They cover up mistakes. Their need to save face or show they are perfect.
They speed up – try to leave troubles behind by working harder and faster, but without changing direction.
They back up. May lie first and then back up to cover up. Need to be able to admit it. Admitting your mistakes takes integrity and courage.
They give up. This is a “poor me” attitude.
Every failure is an opportunity to take the right action and begin again. You need to take full responsibility and admit mistakes. It takes character and a teachable spirit – we need to get ahead of ourselves and take responsibility for our actions, accept correction, change course and move on.
Chapter 6: Don’t let failure outside of you get inside of you.
No matter what happens to you, failure is an inside job. We can’t control the cards we’re dealt, but we can control the way we handle them. Start by cultivating the right attitude. The law of human behaviour- sooner or later we get exactly what we expect – is this optimistic or pessimistic? – The answer reflects your attitude. I have found successful sales people are practical optimists. Realistic about the changing marketplace, their skills, and product.
Martin Seligman observes that people who bounce back are optimists. No matter your natural bent, you can cultivate practical optimism by learning contentment, confidence and resilience. No matter what happens to you in the marketplace, a positive attitude comes from within. Handicaps can only disable us if we let them. The real and lasting limitations are created in our minds.
Chapter 7: Say goodbye to yesterday - is the past holding your life hostage?
The ability to put things behind us, like bad customer experiences, and move on is important. Failures don’t have to stop a salesperson from being productive and moving forward to a customer that will buy. No matter how dark a person’s past is, it need not colour their future. Salespeople experience either a breakdown or breakthrough. Signs of being held hostage by their past:
Comparison to other salespeople. Why not celebrate their success. Nike calls it “coopetition.”
Rationalization – excuses never lead to sales achievement.
Isolation – withdrawal. Salespeople need to get out and network.
Regret – it saps a salesperson’s energy. It’s like the fish that got away. Keep fishing.
Bitterness – the inevitable consequence of not processing old hurts or rejections. Past hurts can make you bitter or better – it’s up to you.
Chapter 8: Change yourself and your sales world changes:
Who is the salesperson who keeps making the mistakes of not failing forward? The person who doesn’t know themselves. If you are continuing facing obstacles in the marketplace – make sure that you are not the problem.
Why are your customers so hesitant to change? Maybe the problem is you! Know yourself first. How would rate your strengths, skills, product and market knowledge, and your attitude? What areas do you need to improve? Are you teachable? To reach your potential you need to know who you are and who you are not. See yourself clearly to see both good and bad. Admit your flaws accurately – own up to what you can do or should not do. Always work on your strengths – to excel do what you do well. Not pursuing what you want is a problem of motivation buttressed by skill, not achieving is a problem of persistence.
What are your next steps to make “Failing Forward” part of your life? A few ideas:
Buy the book “Failing Forward” and read it. While you take notes.
Go to YouTube and listen to videos by Dr. Maxwell on Failing Forward.
Create a “Failing Forward” presentation and teach it to your sales team with your life examples of “Failing Forward.”
List out all your sales and life failures and chart your reaction, attitude and action that you took to improve from each “failure.”
Use this weekend to review how you “Fail Forward” and what you need to do to make it part of your journey of life success!
Michael J Griffin
CEO and Founder of ELAvate
A Failure Forward Expert!