Life experiences and how they impact your abilities to build conversations in sales

B2B, experiences, problem solving, Sales

One attribute that I have found very useful for B2B sales people, is the ability to ask questions to identify the core problem without getting the customer to feel that you are doing an interrogation. If a customer feels that she will just jump away.

But if you don’t understand what is driving the need for your product or service, you will end up being compared just on price.

If you can understand the Real Problem then you can become an advisor and help the customer in their journey. There’s one more reason why understanding the core reason is important….is it that the customer is actually facing a problem or is it that because she has seen others do it, so she doesn’t want to miss out – FOMO.

Visiting different places, interacting with different types of people from different cultures makes one sensitive to different nuances in the way people interact. You can gauge better about what’s being said and what’s left unsaid in a conversation. You can also therefore place yourself in the customer’s shoes and understand the dilemma she is facing.

All this helps in the ability to have a better conversation where you weave in stories and figure out the points where you can put in the questions that also help you build trust.

Till next time then.

Carpe Diem!!!

Games – constraints – enjoyment

constraints, ego, Energy, problem solving

As children we love playing games. If we don’t have any games to play, we even create our own. Even when we create our own games, we tell the others about the “rules” of playing the games. You can’t have any game without rules because then the children won’t know how to play.

However within the rules, the children have so much fun and so much creativity. Even professional sports have well defined rules , but each player playing the game, is different in the way she plays. We love sports simply because we see how players use their talent to win against the competition.

However when we are faced with challenges in our work life, we end up thinking of all the constraints because of which we are not able to achieve our dreams and goals.

If we were to think of problems and constraints as rules of the games that we are supposed to play , wouldn’t life become much more enjoyable and fun. We would be at our creative best in trying to find a way out of the situation.

Children don’t have a fear of losing therefore they find different ways to win within the situation. If they lose, they dust it off within minutes and are ready to play the next game.

Our problem is that our ego comes in the way and we adopt a fixed mindset. This ego creates fear, which in turn stops us from trying out different things.

If you have been reading my blog posts, then you will know that fear is a way that our brain plays games with us so that it can conserve energy.

As with games, the more you practice the game, the better you become. Similarly the more problems/constraints you work on the better you become at solving them. Go at them with ferocity

Till next time then…enjoy life

Carpe Diem!!!

Puzzles are no “child’s play”

possibility thinking, problem solving

Yesterday I spoke about how the puzzles are so difficult for people like me to solve. Even though I talk a lot about being open to possibilities, to think laterally etc. there are times when you give up or come out with compromise solutions.

However the puzzles that we give children to solve, have a single solution which needs to be identified. Most children are able to solve these problems by trying multiple times with an open mind. They also don’t operate on time pressure generally.

In the corporate world we generally have time pressures, but maybe I could be using it sometimes as a excuse. However when we are dealing with humans in the problem, there is no fixed solution because human beings can change stance. Then we are dealing with a moving target.

The main thing about myself , I would think is that I run out of patience, in trying out different options. I think that’s one take away after working on the puzzles.

Working on these puzzles is addictive in nature. So some kinds of puzzles like the simple to medium Sudoku, and word puzzles I am able to solve quite fast. But puzzles like Mashu have taken me an enormous amount of time for me to figure out eventhough the instructions seem to be simple.

The big difference between children and me I think is that I tend to take the instruction as the only possibility and not trying out the possibilities that have not been listed, assuming they are not allowed. This is the biggest problem with most of us adults. We don’t try to identify unlisted assumptions and explore solutions using that.

Till next time then….see what other possibilities can be explored.

Carpe Diem!!!

Puzzles for children- can create possibilities

possibility thinking, problem solving

I was recently cleaning up a storage space in our house. I came across some books which my son had used at different stages of his schooling. Some of those books I gave away to my maid for her children.

There were a few books of puzzles, which were not used and then there a couple of books specifically for mathematical puzzles.

I started working on some of the puzzles. I had known about SuDoku and I used to enjoy the simple and medium difficulty ones. So I started with those. But then there were others like Kakuro, Hutoshiki, Heyawake and Mashu.

I tried my hand at Mashu initially but I got so engrossed that I didn’t have the time to go to the others I have listed above.

Mashu is all about drawing a pattern with one line which does not cross itself. As a concept this is very simple. But when you get down to drawing using the constraints that have been placed, it is just mind boggling.

Maybe as adults we get so fixed with our ideas, we don’t think of other possibilities. We use the same parameters to solve all problems. But children don’t put limits, hence for some of them these puzzles are literally “child’s play”.

I have still not been able to solve a single Mashu puzzle on my own without referring to the solution to give me a starting point. That’s how tough it seems to me. But it has also made me more humble and made me think ata few more ways now than I used to.

If you are fed up of your daily routine, try using the time you have spare and start solving puzzles, it will help you open up to possibilities for solving problems that you are faced with.

Till next time then.

Carpe Diem!!!