Introduction:
I think there is no company that rely on sales who think that their sales force is selling to optimum capacity. Even when you pay or get paid top dollar for your efforts, why do they not sell 24/7, and why do you still have product left at the end of the month? This is a question that we all ask, and the answer to it might not be as simple as you thought.
You have tried everything, you have increased commission to motivate, created competitions and levels with incentives like overseas trips or prizes. Why does this not motivate everybody to sell and go on the magnificent trips? It is only the agents which already achievers that get these trips, and they are the people who actually could pay for the trip themselves.
Why do 20% of your agents give you 80% of your business, and how can you really motivate the other 80% to just increase their productivity by a slight margin?
These are all questions that every Sales manager out there has asked themselves at some point or another. You have looked all over for the answer on how to motivate your people, but you have come to a crossroad.
Over the last 20 years as an insurance agent and broker, I have asked myself these questions when I had people that sold under my brokerage, and throughout this time about myself and my own abilities and sales. I have looked and analyzed these questions from all angles, only to see what is missing.
The Basis:
In all these years, being involved with many amazing companies, and going to training and motivational talks, I have seen one thing that could be missing, no, actually 2.
Firstly, some people are not born sellers, and those who are, motivate themselves.
When it comes to recruitment, we tend to have processes in place like psychometric tests and questionnaires. We have profiling checklists when doing interviews, and we do try our best to recruit the right people. But some people are just not cut out to be sales people, but we take them anyway. To be honest, the sales people that we attract should be people that are already successful in their field, and convincing those to come and work for us is difficult. So, sometimes we take what we can get, because sales managers often have a target for recruitment also. But we need to ask ourselves, are we recruiting for success, or recruiting for numbers. The answer is both.
This is not to say that in-experience is a reason not to recruit somebody. There is also no guarantee that if a person does not make the cut, that they are not going to be successful. I have a colleague at my days with Liberty Life, who was screened by another Insurance company in South Africa, and was declined, and went on to be one of the top producers at Liberty.
There is also the idea that if somebody weren't successful at another company, that they will not be successful at yours. There are many examples of where non-producers moved from one company to another, to become extremely successful. There may be many reasons for success and failure.
OK, so once you have these people aboard, that might or might not be sales people and producing to capacity, what do you do. I tend to find that we find it so extremely difficult to recruit and train our staff, that we tend to carry the dead wood around for too long. This doesn't mean that we must fire at will if somebody does not produce, it means that there needs to be a change in our attitude and motivation of them, especially when we see that our motivational methodology does not work.
Secondly, motivation in training is one-sided and Extrinsic only
We all agree that there is 2 types of motivation, one is Extrinsic (deals with external factors like commission and incentives like prizes) and Intrinsic (deals with being a self-starter and doing something not because of what they can gain, but seeing the work as gain itself). Now I hear you thinking that if only all of your staff can be motivated like that, Wow, how will that increase profit.
In this sense, keep the following in mind. Intrinsic motivation is neglected by companies, because they think that this is a waste of time and resources and money. If they do try to motivate their employees in this fashion, it is focused on results only. One thing is very important, if and when you decide to change your way of motivating, and that is that, although ultimately the goal, when you change it should not be the focus of intrinsic motivation. As an organization, your aim should be to motivate from a caring environment, wanting your employees to be happy. If this is sincere enough, everything will start to change, which "might" actually lead to increase in productivity and sales.
Always remember that you are in a relationship with your employees and with your clients, and if you approach them with love, understanding and a caring attitude, all other things fall into place.
When we look at the psychology and literature on the subject of motivation, we tend to see that it was primarily focused on Behaviorism. If we change our employees habits, activity and knowledge, then productivity will increase. Just as a reminder, I am not arguing that changing behaviors does not have a place, surely it does, but rather why people are NOT changing to required levels? Changing behaviors has it's place, but I am arguing that for them to change, to sacrifice and to move, we might need another approach.
Why do people change?
People tend to do things, motivated by Desperation or Inspiration. Desperation is mostly driven by Fear, but Inspiration is driven by Passion. If you at this moment look at your employees, take the top successful one's, would you say that they are driven by Inspiration or Desperation? And I am not saying that some of them do not have a bit of Desperation driving them, but if you look at them, you might agree that without the driving force of Inspiration, they would not be able to achieve what they did already. If only we can get them inspired?
But how can we get them inspired?
After all my experience and what I have seen on the ground, I understand that we are only scratching the surface when it comes to inspire and motivate our people in this fashion. Many studies have shown that when you create a comfortable environment, people seem to be more productive. We see that where companies have created, for example a crèche on the premises, people tend to be happier in our environment.
This is by all accounts the trend that we all know is working. In psychology, we see that people are moving away from the Freudian concept of "finding happiness", to the idea of "finding meaning" as we see in the work of Viktor Frankl. Not only in the workplace, but in every situation individuals find themselves in, we tend to ask the question: "Why am I here".
The Four pillars:
I truly believe that the world needs to be in balance. As I said earlier about Behaviorism, Desperation and Inspiration, we should at this stage not throw away what we have learned from things, but rather incorporate them within balance with other approaches. I am therefore not saying that you should stop with Extrinsic motivation and move only to Intrinsic, on the contrary, if we are able to incorporate more intrinsic concepts, we can enhance our motivation and change where we are going.
As a religious person, trained in Theology, I strongly believe that we can take a lot from the Bible as a basis for teaching us on everyday life, even if you are NOT religious. The Bible teaches us balance, as does Taoism, Islam and other religious and non-religious studies.
The four pillars that I have created, has it's basis in the Bible. Jesus was in conversation with one of the wise Jewish leaders, who asked Jesus what the basis is to receiving life: Jesus asked him the following: "26 "What is written in the Law?" he replied. "How do you read it?" 27 He answered, "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind'[a]; and, 'Love your neighbor as yourself.'[b]" 28 "You have answered correctly," Jesus replied. "Do this and you will live."
Without going into an in depth discussion, might this be the answer everybody has been seeking on the meaning of life? And more important, how can this insight actually change ourselves, and in this case our organizations?
These verses gives us the insight into what to do to be able to "live". I believe that in the word "live" lies the idea of being happy, content and finding meaning. Let us just focus on a few concepts that is given here.
Heart – This is believed to be the center of emotions, including love and passion.
Soul – It is very difficult to really define the soul, but throughout the ages, the soul was seen as your purpose for which you were put on the earth. It may also be your calling, and yes, the soul has a connection with your creator, Who has given you this life that you have.
Strength – This is what you physically do, the actions that you take.
Knowledge – All that you can learn from experience, books, internet, school, university. Most important also is that when you do something, you need to attain a certain skill-set on how to master your craft.
Interesting enough, and I think the most important, is not understanding that these four pillars should be the ones you build your life, relationships and career on, but in the cement that holds it all together. It all comes together in the words "With all" together with "And". What this tells us is that all of these 4 concepts must be given 100% and in combination with each other to be able to "live".
As an example, you can have a dream, but without putting your passion, knowledge and action into play, will never come to fruition. This shows me that if we can balance all of these 4 concepts, together at the same time, it will carry us to a life and an organization that can "Live".
If we look at the concept of Behaviorism, it mainly focuses on Knowledge and Strength, neglecting the Heart and the Soul, which is where intrinsic motivation comes in to play. Immediately you will see that when you incorporate these concepts, your employees move themselves, as if to be pushed by passion and drawn to a happier life in themselves and by themselves.
Again, we are not arguing to throw out all other forms of motivation, or targets, but rather to understand that just increasing incentives, or changing habits, may not be enough to create change. These four pillars should therefore be the basis for the organization first, understanding their employees first, before asking to be understood.
Relationships:
Spiritual
The basis of the verses quoted from Luke, states 3 relationships. The first relationship is with God, in whatever form you want to define God. We live in a time of great spiritual awakening. People are looking for their connection to something bigger than themselves, understanding and defining their person from a spiritual point of view. People are asking questions and trying to define who they believe in and what they believe in. We live in a world that seems to be much easier to live in, through technology and advances in science and medicine, but we have always have that idea that there must be something bigger, something in us, seeking for and understanding that who and what we are is not a coincidence. However you define this spirituality in your own life, it goes without saying that to be able to live life to it's fullest, you have to have some kind of connection and relationship to the spiritual. People often loose their way in life, and sometimes it has to do with when they discard this relationship in their lives. Although we do not focus on one religious doctrine, we do look in our sessions for the spiritual basis of the individual. Understanding that spirituality, and finding it in yourself, plays a cardinal role in living life to it's fullest. Finding that spiritual connection is the basis for everything in life, including success and motivation.
This spiritual awakening, is an individual and deep personal experience, and our focus is not on giving the individual a set of rules and doctrine, but rather the freedom to exercise free will. Having said this, we should understand that this might be the moment the light goes on in an individual's life.
When we talk about the soul, we understand little of it, but the knowledge that you are here for a purpose, and that life is a gift, changes attitudes and can not be discarded in the motivational arena.
The Self:
We are not only living in the time of spiritual awakening, but also in a time of self-awakening. People tend to be focused on bettering themselves, changing themselves to become what they feel they should become. We focus on letting the individual tell their story, where you have been is just as important as where you are going. People live with extreme guilt about the past, mistakes, pain and regret. In our program "Re-arrange", we help individuals to understand the past, and take another viewpoint on something that they absolutely can not change, but you can re-arrange what happened into a new context. To business and employers, this might sound like it has nothing to do with motivation, success or the bottom line. This is where we make a huge mistake, because however hard we try to live in the moment and is propelled to the future, human beings are creatures of habit. If you do not change the way that they perceive their past, they will keep on doing the same things over and over again.
The mistakes we made in the past, or the successes, plays as much a part in who we will become as anything else. If an individual do not value themselves, no motivation of any kind will work. When people do not love themselves enough, and if we do not value their whole being, past, present, future, heart, soul, knowledge and actions, we are as good as dead!
Your neighbor:
I am not going to go into too much detail here, but it is imperative to understand that humans can not escape interactions with other humans. I also understand that when you are not in a good relationship with yourself, you can not be in a good relationship with people around you, including your customers and colleagues. The verse that is quoted states it categorically that your relationship with other people is and always will be a reflection of your relationship with yourself. We attract into our lives those people who are the same as us, and to change your relationships with others, you must first change your relationship to yourself.
That emphasizes even more the need for people in sales to look inward and change themselves, looking for their passion, being true to themselves before we let them into the wild to go and sell.
Personal:
This program, although still in it's infancy, is very personal to me. I grew up in South Africa, mostly in the Capital of Pretoria. My dad was an alcoholic and my mother was mainly the person who tended to my emotional and practical needs. I am not saying that I had a bad childhood, but it was difficult for me. I can remember that I had my first real feeling of depression at the age of 10, the evening after my birthday party. I can remember that feeling of emptiness inside of me.
I have always felt alone, and I felt that I had this empty space inside of me. I was very successful in most things that I did, Academically, Culturally and in sports. After school I decided to go and study theology at the University of Pretoria. There I took part in many student activities, Radio Tuks, the Rag committee (fund-raising for the underprivileged) and the Student Representative Council. After 7 years of study, I became a minister in the Dutch Reformed Church in Pierre van Ryneveld. At this time I got married and started my career.
After about 10 years, things did not go my way. I decided to resign and took on a new challenge, selling insurance, which I have been doing for the last 20 years. I have had great success, and great despair selling insurance, as it could be very demanding. About 10 years ago I got divorced, which had a great impact on my life, especially being away from my 2 sons. I fell into depression, and my business just nose-dived. I got into another long-term relationship, and had two wonderful daughters from it, but that also did not last. Again I was torn away from my children. In the meantime, I still tried to sell insurance, but for some reason it was not working, still to this day I am not at a level where I want to be. I have in the meantime lost most of my possessions, including my house and my car and most other things.
Like many stories of this kind, I am not telling this for any other reason than the following. I have made many mistakes in my life, I have made many wise choices and I have many regrets and I have or had some sort of depression my whole life. So why am I qualified to do a program like this? Especially because of my story.
I have always been, in my core, a teacher, and I believe that we can learn as much from our mistakes as our successes. Everything that has happened to me, has drawn me to this point where I am today with the insights into the human existence, although it might just be mine. But I truly believe that we are not meant to struggle, we are meant to find our meaning. I have found mine and I am putting all my resources and all my power, soul, heart and knowledge into making the world a better life for myself and people around me. Once I understood that you don't have to be perfect to make a difference, I understood that by making a difference I can make the world a little more perfect.
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