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How about Trading Places in your organization?

August 25, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Here’s a thought.

What would your day be like if you traded places with the sales guys? Or the Director of Business Development? Or the customer service guys and gals? What if these folks “took you to work” and you shadowed them for a day? Participated in their meetings, answered their phone calls… as a sales guy/gal and not as an engineer?

You know, sort of like when your kids take Mom or Dad to school for show and tell. Except this is for big people.

What would your company be like if your sales guys spent a day in engineering? And answered your phone calls? Or at least your phone calls became conference calls so they could hear the conversations you deal with during the day. You know, have your business development / sales folks become junior engineers for the day.

Another version of this idea is Monday Morning Musical Chairs.Everyone meets in the Board Room and circles the table.You can even play music and everyone can sit down when the music stops. Except there is always a chair for everyone. And then look under your chair for a piece of paper with the department / position to which you’ve been assigned for the day.

Question: why does cross-training need to be made into a game in order for everyone to accept it? Be honest with me. When you were reading the above paragraphs, your mind kind of opened up, didn’t it? You became a bit child-like and went back to “that place:” the place in our minds where our childhood still exists and where we liked to play with the other children.We were open to new ideas and a constantly changing playing field on the playground at recess.

It’s just a thought. And it adds a light-hearted quality to our passion and dedication towards our jobs.Perhaps trading places is a way of bringing back humor and an out-of-the-box perspective to our careers.

What if you, personally, traded places once a month? Do you think you might find out a complementary career path you could pursue? Perhaps you will unearth some new talents, different perspectives and a fresh way of communicating with your colleagues.

You know, I used to “sign myself out” in a former corporate life and spend a day with the venture capital guys.It was pretty amazing. I learned stuff like how not to fall asleep due to a post-lunch food coma during those 1 PM meetings under fluorescent lights dominated by lengthy PowerPoint presentations. I learned about watching the dynamics of body language during meetings, and how it worked or didn’t. I learned there were a lot more departments floating around than I knew about. I visited the Ops folks and fell in love with prototyping and ramping up to full production runs. And the machinery! Oh the machinery! (I travel with safety glasses at all times in case any prospect or client invites me to walk around the plant).

I realized I had something to share with folks who normally were outside of my typical interdepartmental contacts. I learned who were the movers and shakers. I identified the guys and gals who would make the best skunk works new product development team. (And by the way boys and girls, I actually got to work with these folks on a new product that is still top of category.) I learned there were people in my organization who were just as frustrated as I was but had learned how to work across silos and disciplines for at least part of their day. They were the true leaders and teachers. It was revelatory. And I am who I am today and what I am today because of all of these folks and the hours we spent interacting and brainstorming and learning from each other.

Trading Places is sort of like an internal apprenticeship. It’s not just for the white collars or the blue collars or the MBAs or the new hires fresh out of some college.You don’t know until you get there and you won’t get there until you decide to sign yourself out for a day and trade places.

Or convince management to have those once-a-month “musical chairs” Trading Places meetings.

Just some food for thought. Think about it.

 

Filed Under: Professional Development & Social Selling Tagged With: , , , ,

Are you on your clients’ and prospects’ A-List?

August 16, 2010 By 2 Comments

How do you go about differentiating yourself to your clients and prospects? I’m not talking about standing out from your sales-engineering competition. I’m talking about just plain Standing Out as a sales-engineering expert.

How are you going about being the sales-engineering Supplier or Vendor of Choice and placing yourself Top of Mind for your clients and prospects?

It’s easier to build from your existing client base. And clients are a great source of referrals for new business development. So why make things harder on your business development strategy than the economy is already doing?

It takes more than just being on-call 24/7 and bending over backwards to provide what your company perceives as “client service.” Sometimes this type of effort is seen as nothing more than reactive, crisis management. And this tactic places you and your company firmly in the “Mr/Ms Fix-it” category.

Here’s a checklist of how you can serve your clients which can result in your being the individual and the company of choice for new business development.

  1. Determine your sales-engineering geography. Make it easy for your clients and your prospects to do business with you.Keep things simple. Keep discussions succinct.Stay on mark and on topic. Have discussions that are easy to understand and relevant to your clients’ and prospects’ needs. Ask questions that require more than yes/no answers. Provoke them to spin out tactical concerns into broader-based considerations. See how big of an environment any decision they have to make falls into. Grand Canyon or just a pothole?
  2. It’s not about constantly closing. Be more than a portal for sales of your company’s products and services. Your clients and prospects aren’t going to call you back if they feel you will manipulate their discussion into your self-serving sales spiel. You shouldn’t constantly be selling or closing. You should be listening to your clients and prospects. Root causes can have some fairly extensive contexts, if you keep listening instead of jumping into problem-solving mode the minute a problem is defined.
  3. Jump over onto the client side of the table. Get on the same page with your clients and prospects. What’s motivating you (business development) may not be what’s motivating them in seeking your counsel (cash flow, personnel, infrastructure, an ERP system, etc.). If you don’t know what’s holding your clients and prospects up on making decisions to do business with you, take the time to do so. There’s more to their business life than doing business with your company.
  4. Become top-of-mind before clients and prospects make a decision.Are you the go-to guy or gal for your clients and prospects? Are you a resource for them on business, marketing and engineering trending? Are you a sounding board? I’m not talking about giving away expertise. However, business discussions involve factors and knowledge beyond the tactical engineering problem at hand. Are you keeping up with current events outside of engineering? You’ll be more interesting to yourself, let alone your clients and prospects.

Becoming an expert by increasing your knowledge of the business environment adds to the value of your engineering expertise.Sometimes it’s simply a matter of reading the newspaper on a daily basis. Sometimes it’s a matter of participating in LinkedIn groups and reading relevant blogs, such as this one. The sum total of increasing your knowledge about the business environment in which your clients and prospects are making decisions is critical to your differentiation. Plus, who doesn’t want to get a better sense of the dynamics of the marketplace?

Want to get on your clients’ and prospects’ A-List? Decide that you deserve to be on that list. Then go about rounding out your expertise and perspective to earn your place at their table.

Think about it.

 

Filed Under: Sales, Pitching & Business Development Tagged With: , , ,

Is Word of Mouth Syndrome the fulcrum of your company’s business development strategy?

August 10, 2010 By Leave a Comment

“Everybody knows who we are” the Business Owner, an industrial manufacturer, declared. “We don’t need to market or advertise.”

“Gee that’s great!” I said. “You must win 100% of all the business that’s out there, and have no competitors, right?”

The Business Owner sat across the table from me and mused, “Well, that’s not exactly the case…..”

I asked: “Have you ever considered that marketing and advertising, critical elements of your business development process, are the front end of cash flow? Rather than being the sprinkles on the cupcake?”  Needless to say, we had a very productive discussion.

Does your engineering or manufacturing firm suffer from Word of Mouth Syndrome? It’s really contagious. Many owners of engineering- and technology- intensive companies have this syndrome without being aware of it.

Word of Mouth Syndrome can result in cross-contamination with It’s The Way We’ve Always Done Things Syndrome, also known as The Status-Quo Syndrome. And it’s the best way of keeping your company out of touch with the issues and variables that impact your customers’ decision to do business with you.Because it’s not about “selling” them on you, it’s about being in tune with what’s impacting their ability to make decisions.

The symptoms of Word of Mouth Syndrome include a tendency to feel that all potential clients – as well as current clients – know who you are and where to find you.This symptom is tied to the delusion that, especially regarding current clients, your company should be top-of-mind in the vendor selection process. Except that your company is blindsided when other competitors, sometimes unknown, win business that you felt was yours. Just because you are “Who You Are.”

Word of Mouth Syndrome can be perpetuated by your Principals and employees continuing to maintain social and professional memberships – or “networks” if you please – that reinforce their position within their Word of Mouth Universe. And most of the time, they have neither the time nor inclination to expand their membership beyond The Way We’ve Always Done Things. It’s comfortable and risk free.

Time out…..

The Internet is the new Word of Mouth. And your clients – or prospective clients – may come from geographies and disciplines you’ve never considered. And they will use the Internet for due diligence about you personally and  professionally. So marketing and advertising within your known Word of Mouth universe limits your business development opportunities.

You know, “marketing” and “advertising” are not dirty words. Nor do these strategies need to resemble slick, cheesy, Madison Avenue formats. Marketing and advertising should be an extension of the words you use during every day business discussions.You establish Authenticity.

Marketing and advertising achieves two important goals:

1.Reinforcing your current customers’ decision to do business with you

2.Motivating prospective customers to make the initial decision to do business with you

Recommended initial Business Development Treatment Plan for Word of Mouth Syndrome: You don’t have to spend lots of money on marketing and advertising, either. That’s like throwing spaghetti against a wall and hoping it sticks. There are some subtle ways of getting your name out in front of potential clients that don’t “hawk your wares” but, rather, underscore what your firm is all about in a focused strategy that tells your story.

All you have to do is decide what your firm is about.And get everyone on the same page. Which includes everyone who your Internal customers (aka, employees) “touch.” Hey, I told you Word of Mouth Syndrome is contagious. So you have to engage everyone in your treatment plan, which should include:

1.A weekly round table discussion of Who You Are from the perspective of your Internal Customers (e.g., you). You may be surprised at the discrepancy in perspectives that are brought to the company table.

2.A monthly round table discussion of Who You Are from the perspective of your External (Current) Customers. Compare with #1.

3.Participation in LinkedIn discussion groups within your engineering, technical or manufacturing disciplines. There’s no greater way to keep one’s “ear to the rail” than listening to the collective Voices of Your Prospective Customers. You can’t develop business in a vacuum.

4.Revising your website content to reflect these conversations.Oh, did I mention the importance of your website? If you have a website that you consider “informational” – which is a fancy word for requiring the visitor to call you for more information – you are operating in the Status-Quo. Having a relevant, content-rich website that anticipates the mindset of customers is the best antidote for Word of Mouth Syndrome your company ever had.

5.Engaging in Internet advertising that reaches a broad-based engineering-specific audience. Print advertising is costly with ROI difficult to calculate. Plus you are preaching to the choir within a set universe.

It’s great that Everyone Knows Who You Are.

Now, how about Everyone ELSE finding out Who You Are, as well?

Think about it.

Filed Under: Entrepreneurs and StartUps, Sales, Pitching & Business Development Tagged With: , , , ,

Do you bring passion to your engineering career?

August 3, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Last week, I had the privilege of working with the heads of two entrepreneurial companies, one retail and one IT. I’m a strong believer in stewardship. At least once a month, as part of an Expert Board panel, I provide business development and sales insight to start-ups and companies taking their small businesses to the next level.

Let me tell you: this is fun. Because these entrepreneurs are passionate about their businesses. And as much as these folks learn from what I and the rest of the board recommend, I also learn from these entrepreneurs. Their perspectives impact mine. And their enthusiasm is infectious.

How many of you are passionate about what you do?

Do you sit in meetings waiting to be called on if the conversation (ever) gets to the technical side? Is that the only time during the meeting when the light comes on, the spark is ignited and you “do your thing?” Technical Passion On Demand?

What about the rest of the discussion preceding your performance art or following whatever solution you suggest? Do you participate? Does your spark turn off and you retreat back into “cubicle mode”?

And while we’re at it, are you passionate about what everyone else on the team brings to the table? Are you passionate about the business development continuum in which you work? Because – news flash here – you work within that continuum.

You are not a discrete variable that is taken off the shelf when needed and put back on the shelf after your skill set has been deployed.

You know, these entrepreneurs last week didn’t have anywhere near a full understanding of the nuts and bolts of the business development and sales engineering process. Yet they were willing to keep an open mind about the ideas which were being placed on the table. They remained vulnerable, of course, and perhaps a bit defensive, concerned that the Expert Board might quash their ideas.How delighted they were when we took their ideas and built upon them. They became even more passionate about their quest to take their businesses to the next level.

Can you picture this scenario?

Because they were willing to stray outside their comfort level. Because we didn’t say “no you can’t do that” but rather “here’s what I would suggest to take that idea and make it even better.”

Because they were willing to stop playing it safe.

How passionate are you about the engineering expertise you provide for your company? How can your position at your company allow you to bring your passion for engineering to the company table? How receptive are you to bridging the gap of What You Want (aka What Frustrates You) and What You Have at your company?

Like these entrepreneurs, you will reap the reward of what you bring to your company table day in and day out. What your company offers you is an opportunity to bring your spin, your perspective and your passion for engineering to the capabilities offered to their customers.

It’s what we all bring, our capabilities and our areas of specialization, that creates the greatest value to ourselves, our organizations and our career path.

Remember when we were starting out? We were all start-ups, entrepreneurs of ourselves. We had no baggage, no status quo, no concept of “I’ve always done it this way.” We simply had our own passion about the possibilities out there.And yes, we were naïve as well.

We are still that start-up personality and passion. There are projects that “fire us up” and rekindle that spark.You know, where you fearlessly move forward and assume risk because you are so intrigued by the engineering problem or business case on the table.

What would happen to business outcomes if you brought that passion to your company’s table for each project?

Think about it.


 

Filed Under: Entrepreneurs and StartUps, Professional Development & Social Selling, Sales & Engineering Collaboration Tagged With: , , , , ,
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