Episode #139: Is Your Sales Mindset Under Your Control

The morning dark gloom of heavy ponderous rain clouds, piling snow drifts or driving, cutting razor blade sleet can have a serious impact on our sales mood. We may be thinking to ourselves, “what a lousy day to have run around town juggling umbrellas, trains, taxis and bags of samples to visit clients”. The next day, the rains have departed. Brilliant azure blue skies and a friendly warm sun seem to say “what a beautiful day to make sales calls”. Neither comment is acceptable for the pro salesperson, because sales masters are not randomly controlled by the inequities of the weather.

These are not the only barbarous mood bear traps we need to look out for. Does your mood of the moment impact completing unpalatable tasks or conversely do they in turn impact your mood? That proposal you have to get out, but don’t want to start because it is time consuming, complex and difficult. You reel back, you move away from the pain, because you may even have to think!

Where is your sales discipline for doing all the dull bits of the work? The sales pro doesn’t put the reward first. They put the task completion ahead of the reward. They don’t stand in front of the empty fireplace bellowing about what they want – heat. They put the logs in there first and then they light the fire. They understand the natural order of the sales universe. How about you?

Living an intentional life means controlling both the head and the heart. The bigger picture makes the bump and grind of the everyday palatable, because there is a higher purpose in our life. The size of our WHY in the fight makes all the difference.

What if we don’t have a strong WHY or a strong enough WHY? Well, that is going to mean trouble. We better deduce, distill, select or create one. No WHY and sales gets real hard, real fast, real often. Sit down and think about what you want to do, what you need to do and what you wish you could do.

If we decide we will alone will determine our mood, our feelings, our orientation and not let externalities invade our moods, we can keep doing what we need to be doing, when we need to be doing it. Our mood control in sales is a critical function of our sustained and consistent success. The stronger our WHY the less relevant or impactful our mood cycle.