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Tipping Dominoes

April 15, 2012 By Leave a Comment

Remember what you were doing in September 2008? That’s when the sales paradigm, and the global economy, broke into a million little pieces. And all the kings horses and all the kings men are still re-assembling the component parts. But not the same way, ever again.

For those of you still waiting for things to go back to the post-industrial mindset economic halcyon days… they are over. Your expertise is needed. More than ever. To be part of the new business development paradigm. And that paradigm favors individuals who are comfortable working cross-functionally. Who are comfortable on both sides of the technical/non-technical table.

There’s more to “you” than whatever you were “before” 2008. In fact, the global economy requires everyone to expand the “who you are” beyond corporate mindset and status quo thinking. Beyond postgraduate degrees and professional certifications. Think horizontal, as well as vertical. Think 360 degrees, taking 10,000 foot eagle’s eye view of the business terrain. It’s time to start tipping the dominoes.

Starting in 2008, I saw many technical professionals, colleagues of mine, displaced when their companies downsized. This was unheard of. So many engineers were schooled to feel that their technical acumen was an insurance policy for career longevity. Yet they found themselves on the outside, looking in. And not knowing why they were in this predicament. It’s time to start challenging siloed mindset and start tipping the dominoes.

Starting in 2008, I was spending more time untangling the disconnects and dysfunction of my clients’ out-of-touch business models, than I was selling marketing solutions. Before we could even get to the solution, we needed to determine the root cause of why these manufacturers and service companies were stuck with a client base that didn’t grow and with projects that utilized only part of their capabilities and capacity. The last thing they needed was a marketing solution. The first thing they needed to do was take a good look at what they had become over the years. Even the status quo is no longer comfortable. The dominoes have started tipping.

Starting in 2008, I was coaching entrepreneurs and MBAs. These very bright, very smart young people told me of conversations they were having with their technical or non-technical counterparts. These conversations sounded amazingly like the same ones I had 25 years ago as a corporate newbie. These conversations sounded amazingly like the ones I was having with current customers, you know, the ones with the disconnects and dysfunction.

The digital millennium allows our customers and prospects to access all the information they need to acquire about our business – without our having to “sell” them anything. Even if they require a custom solution which your out-of-date website inadequately explains while it fails to engage the reader. It strikes me as absurd that social media and web companies are all the rage with B2B companies. How can your company effectively utilize social media when your business model and certainly your sales methodologies are outdated?  It’s time to start tipping the dominoes.

We all have to mean business, regardless of our respective job descriptions. We have to work horizontally as well as vertically with our colleagues and customers. That’s the dialogue I began with you on April 18, 2009. That’s the dialogue I continue today, starting my fourth year, in this blog, and in Do YOU Mean Business? Technical/Non-Technical Collaboration, Business Development and YOU, now available on Amazon.com.

You continue to inspire our collective conversations. It is my sincere desire to inspire you to move 1 millimeter outside your comfort level, so that you will, indeed, mean business and revenue generation for your customers.

               Babette N. Ten Haken

 

 

 

Filed Under: Books, Business Development, Collaboration, Do YOU Mean Business, Engineering, Sales, sales engineering Tagged With: , , ,

Does Your Job Make You Bullet Proof?

March 15, 2012 By 2 Comments

The financial meltdown of 2008 demonstrated, among other things, that no one is essential to their company unless they are meaningfully and legitimately aligned with revenue generation and the business development process.

No one has job security, even if they feel their technical expertise and/or seniority are insurance against unemployment.

The individual who is ill at ease communicating across disciplines within their organization, or with C-level (corporate) decision-makers at customers’ companies, does not bring real value to their company’s table. The marketing and sales professional who views their job as an eighteen-month tour of duty until their next promotion provides only short-term, tactical return on investment for their company; they are disposable once company goals are met. The engineer who is not able to make their technical information accessible and understandable to non-technical professionals becomes a liability rather than an asset to their organization.

It’s scary out there in the career world. All you have to do is listen to the news to get a sense of the precariousness of the economic outlook for the job market. Companies are working leaner and meaner as they struggle to contain the costs of doing business. They are focused on achieving more with less. Organizations are looking for individuals who have the mindset and capabilities that allow them to be trained to function across disciplines. It’s your responsibility to utilize the opportunities at your company to prepare yourself for (a) your next manager, (b) providing enhanced value to retain your current position, or (c) your next job.

There’s no room for finger-pointing or excuses. You have to mean business – and revenue generation – for your company.

The common denominator across everyone’s job descriptions, whether stated explicitly or not, is revenue generation. Revenue generation drives your company, whether you are in the business-to-business sector (B2B) or the business-to-consumer (B2C) sector. Without a revenue stream, you don’t have the luxury of perpetuating the us-versus-them and status-quo mentalities. More important, aligning  your perspective and output with your company’s business development process at least grows the skill set you offer to your current employer.

By enhancing your capabilities to include this broader perspective of revenue generation, you become more valuable to future employers. 

Do you mean business for your company? Companies need to do a better job of generating revenue by focusing on a fluid and ongoing process that brings in the appropriate people early on in the business development cycle. This process accomplishes the tasks of market identification, product development, and maximizing revenue generation and profitability through optimizing company-wide resources. Conducting business by bringing together technical, marketing, sales, finance, manufacturing, operations, and logistics resources to work together in providing solutions for your customers moves everyone one millimeter outside their comfort level.

In the long run, you really have no other option.

Identifying common themes running across all disciplines, and making sure everyone seated around the table understands the terminology and principles of the team, provides opportunities for collaboration and innovation. Deconstructing corporate silos can become a powerful business development tool. Think about how utilizing common-denominator teamwork looks to the customers contributing to your revenue stream. This process allows potential and even current clients to view the breadth and depth of your organization while you solidly demonstrate a collaborative, synergistic corporate culture.

Talk about a differentiator from your competition!

This left brain / right brain, technical/non-technical business development process may feel extremely awkward to you and your colleagues. If departments learn to communicate across disciplines, you will collectively realize that siloed infrastructures and status-quo mindsets are unprofitable. Fiefdom-building will be less easily achieved and turf wars less readily tolerated.

 This type of business development-focused model self-selects for non-technical and technical professionals who are receptive to and excel at interacting productively with each other and with clients. You and your internal team members will mean business.

Have I just described YOU?

[This post appears courtesy of a post for www.doyoumeanbusiness.com and is an excerpt from Chapter 3 of Do YOU Mean Business? Technical/Non-Technical Collaboration, Business Development and YOU, available on Amazon.com April 2012. For more information and a complementary download, click on the picture of the book at the link provided.]

Filed Under: Books, Business Development, Collaboration, Job Functionality, Sales-Engineering Interface™ Tagged With: , , ,

Jill Konrath’s Foreward – Do YOU Mean Business? by Babette N. Ten Haken

March 8, 2012 By Leave a Comment

The sales process is tough. If you’re in sales, you know how much time it takes to set up meetings with potential prospects. They’re not receptive to your advances. They’d rather stay with the status quo than change. The budgets are tight and all they’re concerned about is price.

If you’re a technical professional who’s involved in the sales process, you’re under pressure to make pitches that convince prospects to do business with your firm. But for some reason, what you’re told to do just doesn’t feel right.

Sound familiar? The truth is, in the past few years your prospects have changed – radically. Since virtually everything they need to know can be found online, they don’t need to meet with you. Nor do they have the time. Everyone is crazy-busy, trying to handle more work and impossible deadlines with fewer resources.

As a result, their expectations of us, as sellers and technical professionals, have changed, too. They’re tougher on us. More demanding. We have to prove we’re a valuable resource before they’ll even consider having a relationship with us. But saying good things about ourselves or our company falls on deaf ears.

Despite all this, fewer than 10 percent of sellers have altered how they approach prospective clients, create opportunities, or differentiate themselves from competitors.

To be successful today requires a major rethinking of “what works.” In my first book, Selling to BIG Companies, I introduced new strategies to help sellers get their foot in the door of targeted accounts. In my second book, SNAP Selling, I focused on new strategies for dealing with frazzled, harried decision-makers.

Babette Ten Haken challenges stereotypes as well. I first met her seven years ago, when she called me with a question. Having recently taken on a sales role, she was perplexed at the divisions between the sales and technical functions. And, she felt like she was being pushed to do things that not only didn’t work, but also compromised her belief system.

She was right. And since that initial conversation, she’s been a woman on a mission to help sales and technical professionals be more successful with business development. In Do YOU Mean Business?, she challenges traditional stereotypes and shows you what actually works in today’s business environment.

You’ll find answers to questions such as:

  • What should your sales process look and sound like when you’re interfacing with prospects and current customers?
  • What resources are available to you as technical and non-technical professionals working together?
  • How can you become valuable resources to your customer’s decision making?

If you knew more about Babette’s background, you’d realize just how much she knows where you’re coming from. Trained as a scientist, she spent years facilitating left brain-right brain meetings as a marketing research professional in the pharmaceutical industry. Following that, she transitioned into total quality management and Voice of the Customer research.

To her, the cross-over interface between sales, business development, and engineering is fluid. For over 25 years, she’s been doing this “simultaneous translation” between technical and non-technical colleagues that resulted in very productive and profitable outcomes.

When you read Do YOU Mean Business? you’ll see what I mean. She’ll shake up your perceptions and then deftly guide you through what it takes to be successful. It’s well worth your time to read it.

-          Jill Konrath, business strategist and author, author of Selling to BIG Companies and SNAP Selling: Speed Up Sales and Win More Business with Today’s Frazzled Customers

Receive a complementary audio download of an interview Babette Ten Haken gave about her book, as well as  a download of Chapter 1 of Do YOU Mean Business? Technical/Non-Technical Collaboration, Business Development and YOU by clicking on the image of the book in the upper right hand corner of the DYMB site. Available on Amazon.com in April, 2012.

Filed Under: Books, Business Development, Do YOU Mean Business, Engineering, Sales Tagged With: , , , , ,

Your Best Sales Partner May Be an Engineer

November 29, 2011 By 6 Comments

Technical/non-technical collaboration for business development is considered the equivalent of being asked to cross over to the Dark Side from the Star Wars movies or walk across the abyss in the movie Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade . Many of you dismiss this concept as non-viable without letting the collaborative force be with you and crossing that conceptual chasm in a non-discipline-driven leap of faith.

In my recent blog post “Collaborate with Technical Colleagues and Close More Sales”, on Josh Hinds’ tremendous SalesTrainingAdvice.com site, I address the opportunities that many of you on the sales side may be ignoring in remaining true to a sales only perspective when trying to generate revenue for your company.  After the economic meltdown of 2008, the world has become a different environment for many aspects of life. Governments and economies are tottering and the status-quo of just about everything is being challenged. Which makes people more desperate to hang on to the status-quo than ever before. But there’s no security in that tack.

Sales people may avoid working with an engineering collaborator like the plague. There’s a lot to be learned from our colleagues from other disciplines who sit across the table from us during those dreaded Monday morning meetings. Taking the initiative to reach out to them expands your knowledge base, makes you more comfortable communicating outside of your discipline and allows you to be more productive in your business development efforts.

Whether a technical or non-technical professional, you cannot afford to ignore your role in your company’s revenue stream. And one of the first ways in which you can engage in this process is collaboration across disciplines.

Doesn’t it make business and career sense to move yourself one millimeter outside of your current comfort level and join forces with your technical/non-technical colleagues?

No one’s going to get you to take that first step but you. And there’s a tremendous return on your personal investment waiting for you on the other side.

 

Let's continue this discussion!  I have a book coming out in February 2012 on this topic. Click on Do YOU Mean Business? Technical/Non-technical Collaboration, Business Development and YOU . Let’s talk.

Filed Under: Books, Business Development, Collaboration, Do YOU Mean Business, Sales-Engineering Interface™, Simultaneous Translation Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Think you have all the answers? Did you ask the right questions?

November 22, 2011 By 2 Comments

All of us know a “Know It All.” One of “those people” who is the first person to answer the question, even when the question was directed towards someone else.  We know one of those people who cuts off the person answering the question because “that person” figures what she has to say is far more important (at least in her mind) than what the other individual could possible offer as a response. After all, a “Know It All,” well,  thinks that they know it all… as long as they control the conversation and keep the topic within their know-it-all frame of reference.

And as irritating as “these types” of people are, we all tend to be a “Know-It-All” to our colleagues, at some point.

…….Particularly during those cross-functional meetings when we lose patience with our non-technical colleagues, whom we figure could not possibly be as smart as we are.

…….Or we lose patience with our technical colleagues because they keep asking us to clarify discrete data points when we want to extrapolate these findings into a broader context across demographic segments.

After all, we are professionals. We know our “stuff.” We’ve studied for our degrees. We are rock stars in our companies. We Know It All. At least we feel we know it all. Because we live inside our departmental and discipline-driven Know-It-All Boxes.

So we become impatient with our colleagues’ questions. We don’t understand why they don’t see what we see and why they simply don’t “get it.” Or else we give up on them because we figure they just won’t ever “get it.”

If you Know-It-All, then you “know” there’s no security in being a Know-It-All.

Did you ever consider that being a Know-It-All is disruptive? It’s lecturing. It’s grandstanding, it’s limiting and it’s certainly not collaborative. Did you ever consider that your cross-functional colleagues are asking all the questions that you have not asked? Perhaps they are inquisitive because you’ve gotten them to think out of their boxes!  They are asking those “right” questions, not to put you on the defensive, but to stretch everyone’s brains.

This status-quo habit of ours, to react negatively and defensively when our cross-functional colleagues question us, prevents colleagues from determining what they don’t know. And you certainly won’t  expand yourself outside the confines of your discipline-driven box unless you ask the questions you missed out on asking. Those really good, probing, in-depth, honest, let’s get the cards on the table types of questions.

The “right” questions.

So unless the meeting agenda is entitled “all about me,” what happens if you don’t talk? At all. And listen. And refrain from pontificating in an all-encompassing summation that you feel solves everyone’s problems? What if you start the conversation off with some really good questions and the only other thing on the agenda is to ask more of those really good questions, so that you generate a free-wheeling discussion? The meeting becomes self-directing and self-generating. The really good facilitators always love when discussions get into this type of auto-pilot, self-directed, self-facilitated mode. Then they know they have done their job.

The objective of this type of discussion forum is to not reach an endpoint, but rather to observe, collect and embellish upon all of the dialogue that is happening around the table. Then, the possible outcomes are endless. Then the discussion becomes creative and collaborative.

You will never Know-It-All. And why would you want to? Asking the right questions is so much more enlightening.

Interested in continuing our dialogue?  Click on this link to learn more about my new book: Do YOU Mean Business? Technical / Non-Technical Collaboration, Business Development and YOU, available February 2012. Let's start talking!

Nancy Nardin blogged about my book this morning: "An Engineer and a Sales Rep Walk Into a Bar..." on her great blog, Smart Selling Tools. You will enjoy this post as well!

 

Filed Under: Books, Collaboration, Core Capabilities, Do YOU Mean Business, Engineering, Job Functionality, Sales, sales engineering, Sales-Engineering Interface™, Simultaneous Translation Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Being Relevant To Your Customers

November 15, 2011 By 2 Comments

Everyone is involved in the business development process: finding markets and identifying customers for our product and service offerings. No one is exempt from this process, either. Even if you are a technical professional who is transitioning into a sales role!

We all talk about “doing our homework” before we call on current and potential customers. What does that phrase really mean? The Digital Millennium overwhelms us with information. And not all of it is relevant to our customers.

 

I recently asked this question of Sam Richter, an internationally recognized expert on sales, marketing, leadership and web search as well as author of Take The Cold Out of Cold Calling.

To  download our entire interview, right click here.

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

 

Here are some points to keep in mind when using the web to locate information.

Everyone’s in Sales ...

Sales has gotten a bad name. Your customer thinks you only are calling them to convince them to buy something from you or to sign off on your technical solution. They often feel you have no clue whether they are even interested in your products and services, or whether your solution is relevant. So think before you call your customers. Do your homework to determine what is important to them, not you, such as: their business objectives, how can they earn their bonus, whether you even have product or service solutions to help them achieve their goals.

Establish your Relevancy...

Being relevant to your customers allows you to be regarded as a valuable solutions provider. Find information on what that other person is concerned about and ask really good questions based on this information. You don’t get permission to show up and immediately fast forward and ask those “deep discovery” questions until you have proven your relevancy and trustworthiness to that prospect or customer. Then they will invite you to ask them these questions. Do you have stories you can share showing how you have helped others?

Your buyer doesn’t care about you or your company, no matter how nice you are and how great your company is. They have problems which are keeping them up at night. You need to be aware of these problems before you meet with your customer. They want to talk about themselves, their company and their problems. Not yours.

Focused Web Searching, not Surfing, establishes Relevancy...

Before you fire up Google, write down a list of questions you want answered. You want to search the web, not surf it.  Your goal is to unearth  the trigger events that are shifting your customer or prospect’s company’s decision making processes and creating problems for them. Keep in mind that a company only puts good things on their website, so that is not a reliable source of information. Use the left hand Search side of a Google results page to fine tune your results. Click on the “News” button to find out if the company you are meeting with has been featured recently in the news. Tip: use quotation marks around words and it treats everything as a complete phrase.

We are connecting on a human level, not a technical level or a sales/marketing level...

Your homework can be as simple as going to LinkedIn. There’s a high likelihood that when you are meeting with someone, they have a profile on LI.  Find out about them: who are they, where have they worked, what is their experience, where did they go to school? We are trying to find information to connect on a human level. You might be selling a very technical product, but the person behind that decision is a human being. If you do not have that ability to connect on a human, emotional level, then you become perceived as a commodity.  Once you connect on an emotional level, then you become a valued provider and, more often than not, can even charge a premium for that product or service.

You are trying to determine what their problem looks like today. You are asking them to envision what the future would look like if you solved that problem. You want them to know you can work together with them to bridge that gap. You are telling them about some relevant experience and information that you have, which shows how you have solved problems for others. This discussion is the same, whether you are technical or in sales. You are solving their problem. It’s the same mindset. And as a sales person, your ability to understand what the buyers’ problems are, and translate and connect with the appropriate technical expert in your company, is huge.

Business development involves The Platinum Rule, not The Golden Rule...

The Golden Rule assumes that others want to be treated the same way you do: do unto others as you would have it done unto yourself. However, just because you feel that your products and services are wonderful doesn’t mean that they actually are or that your customer is even interested in them. The Platinum Rule, proposed by Dr. Tony Alessandra, states “treat others the way they want to be treated.” 

Most people sell via the Golden Rule. “I love my company and we will spend the next hour going through our catalog so I can tell you how great we are.”  Platinum Rule business development involves “Hey I’ve done some homework on your company. I see you are moving in this direction. You have this capacity and this equipment. Are you able to move in the direction you wish?” Now you can share a story of how you have helped similar companies. And, if you show that catalog, you can tailor the content to fit the reality of this customer’s needs.  You don’t know what your customer needs until you ask.

Entrepreneurs often approach venture capital or angel investors from a Golden Rule perspective: this idea is so important to me, that I am sure it also is important to you. They have to approach funding from a Platinum Rule perspective: I have this idea, what do I need to know to determine whether it is important to you?

Web searching provides data for asking questions, not finding answers...

When we search on the web, we’re not looking for answers. People confuse Google and searching for finding answers. Companies are not putting out “click here to find out what our problems are” information for you to find. Yet it’s your job to determine what their problems are.

What you are looking for is “trigger events:” something that is going on in that company’s world that is changing things. Press releases, mergers, acquisitions, new technology. By adding quotes around search terms and “+” between words, you get a lot of press releases related to trending information about that organization. Google isn’t the only search engine you can use. Mool.com/media is a new search engine based on media. It deals with news related to companies who are not in the news frequently, such as industrial manufacturers. Another alternative search engine is biznar.com. Click “advanced search” and search for information by date ranges, key words, etc.

Think of data differently...

Most of the time when we think of data, we think of information we can put into an Excel spreadsheet. Engineers are so data oriented. They are looking for data that means 2+2=4.  What you are really looking for is 2+2=8. When I say data, I am talking about disparate pieces of information that can help us come up with hypotheses so we can ask better questions. What is the holistic nature of the issues, what problems might this company have? How can I ask better questions based on the information I find? The data we are talking about is what you find via different search techniques.

This doesn’t have to be that hard. The goal is to get the other person to start talking. Find that one article, not a lot of information. It allows you to ask a question that gets that person talking about themselves and their company.

The most powerful search engine ever created is that person sitting across the table who you are trying to get to talk. So shut up and listen. The key is, you have to have permission first, to ask the question. Make the other person feel important. Ask that question and then be quiet and let that other person talk.

There is an art and science to web searching. Those in the engineering profession have the mindset to connect the dots. They are wired to be very successful.

Sam Richter is the Founder and CEO of SBR Worldwide/Know More! and SVP/Chief Marketing Officer at ActiFi, a software and solutions firm serving the financial services industry. He was named by InsideView as one of the Top 25 Most Influential People in Sales and he was also named as one of the Top Chief Marketing Officers on Twitter. He is a member of the Business Journals/ “Forty Under 40” list honoring the top Minnesota business leaders under the age of forty. He also was finalist for Inc. Magazine’s Entrepreneur of the Year and he’s one of the more highly recommended persons on LinkedIn.

Go to http://www.samrichter.com/ and the Warm Call Center. Download the Know More! Tool Bar which accesses the most relevant sites for your search. His book, Take The Cold Out of Cold Calling, is available on Amazon.com and via his website, www.takethecold.com.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Filed Under: Books, Business Development, Core Capabilities, Customer Focus, Engineering, Job Functionality, Sales, sales engineering Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Do YOU Mean Business?

November 9, 2011 By 2 Comments

Do you dread those Monday morning cross-functional, technical / non-technical meetings? It doesn’t have to be that way, you know.

You can start by asking yourself how you impact your company’s revenue stream. Which generates your paycheck, by the way. If you feel the responsibility for generating business is up to someone else -traditionally the sales guys and gals - I’ve got news for you. It’s up to you, as well. In collaboration with everyone in your organization who touches the customer. Even if you are a technical professional.

Now that’s something to think about…

How capable are you participating in today’s business development continuum if you are unable to put yourself in your customers’ shoes? And that includes your internal customers from other disciplines, seated across the table from you in those dreaded Monday morning meetings.

I was interviewed on November 4 about my book: Do YOU Mean Business? Technical / Non-technical Collaboration, Business Development and YOU. For those readers who do, as well as those who do not, know my platform: I have a firm belief that successful business development is fueled by businesses, organizations, and institutions which value synergy between technical and non-technical professionals.

Have I just described your workplace? Or how you were educated and trained? There’s a rather large gap between the ideal and the real, I’m afraid. So how can you, as a technical or non-technical professional, span that conceptual, discipline-driven communication and collaboration gap?

Businesses are losing revenue because of lack of collaboration across technical and non-technical disciplines. Especially those businesses organized with a traditionally siloed infrastructure. Which describes the majority of business models. In this type of vertical organization, there isn’t much opportunity for lateral flow of information across departments or even disciplines.

I’ve been a “simultaneous translator” between technical and non-technical disciplines for most of my career. Even though I came from very technically focused training, I have always worked across disciplines. I eventually became the “go-to” individual for my company, due to my bringing a broad-based perspective to cross-functional team meetings. Oh, did I tell you that this perspective was productive and profitable for the companies I’ve
worked with and for?

I’ve had the privilege of working with manufacturers and technical service companies over the past few decades. And I am a coach and mentor for some very bright, yet very frustrated, engineering and business school graduates working for major companies. I can tell you that this cross-functional disconnect fueled by our professional disciplines is very much alive and well. Why am I hearing the same stuff I heard when I was a corporate newbie?

I sometimes spend more time untangling the misconceptions of discipline-driven status-quo, or “the way things are” mindset, than I do working on pointing mentees, companies and start-ups in the right direction. Something has to change.

My book takes what I know, that “simultaneous translation” not-so-soft pretty powerful skill set, and teaches it to you. You can’t move forward until you understand what is holding you back. This book gives you a 50,000 foot eagle’s eye view of the business development landscape so you can develop the mindset and communication skill set to increase the value you provide to yourself, your clients and your organization. Oh, and we work on business development and revenue generation skill sets, too. After all, that’s the main event.       

This book was inspired by my clients, colleagues, mentees and my network. The book is written for business owners,  C-level executives, VP's of Engineering, Sales or Business Development, Sales Engineers, recent technical or non- technical graduates and entrepreneurs who want to be “more than” rather than the “same as.”  And it’s written for technical and non-technical professionals who are beginning to understand that all the degrees, certifications, and expensive education that you have invested in are not going to make you bullet-proof and your job secure in this competitive global environment.

If you’d like to hear the complete audio version of my interview about my new book, Do YOU Mean Business? Technical/Non-technical Collaboration, Business Development and YOU  click on the book title link and opt-in to receive the audio download, updates about my book, and some great gifts I will be providing as we move towards the launch date of February, 2012.

What are you waiting for?

 

Filed Under: Books, Business Development, Do YOU Mean Business, Engineering, Entrepreneurship, Sales, sales engineering, Sales-Engineering Interface™, Simultaneous Translation, Startups Tagged With: , , , ,

An Interview with Anthony Fasano

July 20, 2011 By Leave a Comment

I recently had the honor of interviewing Anthony Fasano, who just launched his new book:  Engineer Your Own Success:  7 Key Elements to Creating an Extraordinary Engineering Career.  Anthony is a design engineer turned executive coach, speaker and author.  He now spends his time helping engineers around the world to create careers that are exciting, enjoyable, and rewarding while being well-balanced.

 BTH:  When did the "idea" for the book become your mission? What was your turning point in finding your writing "voice"?

AJF: After traveling around the country for over a year speaking to engineers on the topics of career growth and development, I realized that the information I was giving out was much needed and based on the response of my audience they were successfully using this information to advance!  Earlier this year, I finally decided that this information should be in a book that all engineers can have access to.  I guess over a year ago when I started writing daily career inspirational messages to engineers and other professionals known as A Daily Boost From Your Professional Partner, I realized that not only did I really enjoy writing but my readers enjoyed my content!

BTH:  Why did you feel compelled to write this book? What was your perceived need from your constituents?

AJF: I felt compelled because I knew that I could only speak or coach to so many engineers on a weekly or yearly basis, however with the book I could get this career development information to thousands of engineers with no geographic limits.  The need that I found was that engineers are very technically savvy but when it comes to communication, networking, leadership and other soft skills, we struggle.  It is totally understandable that we struggle with these skills because they are never taught to us in school.  Once I experienced this myself as a young engineer, I made it a goal to develop my skills and then transfer the information I learned to as many engineers that I could, hence the book - Engineer Your Own Success.

BTH:  What is the biggest shortfall in the engineering community in terms of career development?

AJF: First of all, I believe that the college curriculum does not include enough classes (if any) on the topics I mentioned above, specifically communication and leadership.  In addition to that, TIME is a huge shortfall for engineers.  Many engineers realize that they need to develop some of these softer skills but due to stressful project deadlines, they don’t have the time to do so.  That’s why my book and daily e-mails give them information in the form of easy to use strategies so they can fit some developmental tasks into their busy daily schedule.  Chapter 6 on organizational skills also provides strategies for being more efficient, to be able to get more done in less time.  The newfound ‘free’ time can be used to develop and advance or simply to enjoy with their families.

BTH:  Has this shortfall always been there or has the recent economic meltdown contributed to it / made it more profound?

AJF: I think this shortfall has always been there, but the technology today and all of the different avenues of communication draw more attention to these skills.  Also the more distractions that are out there make it critical to have great leaders in your company to keep everyone on track.  The economic meltdown has unfortunately forced many engineers into unemployment and these soft skills become even more important for those unemployed as prospective employers today are looking for well-rounded engineers.

BTH:  Why will readers benefit from your book?

AJF: By reading this book you will discover ways to:

Set goals that are in alignment with your true desires,

  • Find the right mentor and get the most out of the relationship,
  • Obtain the credentials needed to easily reach your goals,
  • Become an effective communicator,
  • Network your way to impactful relationships,
  • Get and stay organized in a way that will increase productivity,
  • Be a confident leader as you rise up the ladder to success!

You won’t learn many of these skills in a textbook, course or even your company, however all of these things together will change your life both personally and professionally forever!

BTH:  How does your book differ from other resources available to the civil engineering community (if any)?

AJF: There are some other resources and they are all good, however mine does differ in a few ways.  First of all I have advanced during the same generation as most of the engineers who will read the book so feel I feel like this book is very much geared towards TODAY hence the section on social networking.  I also felt like some of the other books were very long and at points difficult to read so I tried to make my book information packed and to the point.  It ended up a very easy to read 200 pages or so. Lastly I am a very inspirational person (or least I am told so) so this book represents me and who I am, which is different than any other book.  Intertwined with the information I give the readers is a lot of inspiration that will motivate them in their career.  It’s one thing to give people information that they can use, it’s another thing to inspire them to use it!

BTH:  What's a key excerpt/quote from your book? Why do you feel it is significant?

AJF: One point that I make in my book is the statement that:  Developing relationships is directly related to developing your career.  In today’s world people are always in a hurry and they forget how important it is to build solid relationships with other professionals.  Most people today would rather text someone one line rather than call them or grab lunch and really bond with the person.  The more solid relationships you build, not only will there be more opportunities available to you, but your career will be much more enjoyable!

Order your copy of Engineer Your Own Success: 7 Key Elements to Creating an Extraordinary Engineering Career within the next 24 hours and receive two incredible bonus gifts (FREE). Go to http://engineersuccesstoday.com. A portion of each book sold will be donated to Engineers Without Borders.

Filed Under: Books, Core Capabilities, Engineering, Job Functionality Tagged With: , , ,

Are You Articulate Or Do You Talk In Circles?

December 7, 2009 By Leave a Comment

OK. Before you read my blog, you gotta read yesterday’s (Sunday, December 6, 2009) Dilbert comic strip. Or rather, Dogbert The CEO. No further explanation needed.

If I asked you “what do you do” could you tell me in about 45 words or less (Dilbert took 49)? What would you tell me? Would I understand the services you could deliver to me and the benefits I might anticipate from working with you?

I’m not talking about what you sell or the technical aspects of what it does. Features and benefits are irrelevant – even for highly engineering services. I am talking about what YOU are all about and what your delivery of your skill set brings to the table. Because that’s what the communication interface is all about, be it sales or engineering. People aren’t buying standardized products or services. If they were, they should be dealing with robots or worse yet, customer service reps.Instead, they are making decisions about whether incorporating you and your company’s skill set will make a difference to the competitive viability of their company.

I have spent countless hours asking engineers what their value proposition is. And they have talked in circles because they haven’t ever been challenged to define it. Instead,perhaps engineers have felt I would be wowed by their technical skills, how many certificate names and numbers they could rattle off, and their experience, and post graduate degrees. They have attempted to distract me from my original question by spinning the discussion all over the place. Guess again.I didn’t forget my question. And I would ask, and re-ask the dreaded question again and again. Evading the answer is not an option.

The majority of CEOs and business owners/decision makers want to understand how well your service quality delivery integrates into their company. They care about how well you can anticipate, even project, their needs. The more you talk in circles, rattling off your resume instead of providing a value proposition, the more you become stereotyped, “dilbertized” and commoditized as, well, an “engineer.”

How can you inspire your clients? How can you describe your deliverables in a nontechnical manner that they understand? I am not talking rah-rah. I am talking your ability to simply and succinctly put into 45 words what working with you will deliver to them. Or do you talk in circles, going in one direction and then the other? Trying to cover all bases. Trying to say what you think folks want to hear?

Jill Konrath, award-winning author of Selling To Big Companies (I book I strongly recommend) defines a value proposition as:

“A value proposition is a clear statement of the tangible results a customer gets from using your products or services.It is focused on outcomes and stresses the business value of your offering.” (p 52, Selling To Big Companies)

If you are impeccable with your word, you will arrive at your value proposition. And once you arrive at your value proposition, it will be your constant, the fulcrum of everything you do. Because it is WHO YOU ARE. And your clients will know this. Innately. That they are dealing with the real thing. Because of your passionate commitment to who you are and what you are prepared to do for your clients.

Yet how many of us are able to take this self-introspective look at ourselves and define ourselves? Most of us talk in circles. And I’ve got news to you. Talking in circles is incredibly frustrating to clients and makes them ill at ease. Because if you don’t know who you are or what you can deliver, how can they entrust their company business to you?

Any of you who are freelance consulting engineers need to pay attention to this blog message. If you have been displaced, you more than likely have hung out your shingle as a freelance engineer. If you become part of the engineering outsourcing groups, they will place you in temporary employment.

Are you prepared to determine whether this is the type of company you may want to work for on a permanent basis? If so, you need to be interviewing them. If you are waiting for them to “discover” you, and offer you a permanent position, you are leaving your fate in the hands of someone..

If you wish to make your own opportunities, you need to stop talking in circles. Take the time to develop a value proposition that is articulate, succinct and a strong statement about who you are, the value you bring to the table and how this value translates into a competitive advantage for customers, peers and future employers.

Start thinking about it.

 

 

Filed Under: Books, Core Capabilities, Core Personal Values, Engineering, Sales-Engineering Interface™, Weblogs Tagged With: , , , , ,

Are You Impeccable With Your Word?

November 29, 2009 By 1 Comment

These are the days of Personal Branding, reinforced by your internet presence via LinkedIn professional profiles and participation in online discussion groups, Facebook, Twitter and various other venues. There are country western songs parodying the online persona you can create and how that compares with reality (yes, I like country western music… opera too for that matter).There are blogs, led by Dan Schawbel’s Personal Branding Blog, that extol the virtues of creating your Personal Brand. Sales Aerobics for Engineers training and consulting incorporates social media into business development strategies for technically intensive companies.

So much for all this internet hoopla. It seems daunting keeping your online personal brand strategy up to date. The bottom line is: are you impeccable with your word? If folks had to describe what you are about, personally and professionally, how many of them will say your word is your bond? Think about it.

Dan Schawbel and many bloggers – this one included – emphasize that the internet is not the place for hiding behind a murky veneer that doesn’t match up once people meet you in person, listen to interviews or participate in webinars. Yet, how many of us are comfortable with who we truly are, 24/7/365? How many of us constantly strive to do the best possible job we can at any point in time? How many of us are impeccable with our word?

Don Miguel Ruiz, in his landmark book, The Four Agreements, lights the beacon for the importance of being one and the same with your word.And this one singular agreement – as are the other three – becomes critical to your providing value to yourself, your customers and your organization.

If you are true to your word, you don’t have to remember what you said to anyone because you tell the same thing to everyone. There is consistency and uniformity in your responses as a person and as a professional. You don’t tell people what they want to hear; you don’t say one thing to one group and another thing to another group. Come on, you know people like this within the workplace. Perhaps this is your own modus operandi. I strongly suggest that you cease disrespecting yourself and your peers. Strive to be impeccable with your word. It is not easy, not easy at all.

In this most challenging of economies, with companies zigging and zagging as they jockey for competitive position, being one and the same with your word, values and ethics is no mean feat. In unifying your approach, you focus your energy towards the underlying principle of impeccability with one’s word. And you know what happens when you engage in becoming impeccable with your word? You have more energy to give, professionally and personally, because you aren’t as fractured or compartmentalized. This is a journey you take by yourself, for yourself. And ultimately, everyone is on the receiving end of your efforts.

In this most challenging of economies, with self-help books, how-to sales books, online sales blogs and folks looking for recipes for personal and professional success, you are only as good as your last sale. If your year-end sales record is your greatest self-defining moment , your context for self-evaluation must reside on a constantly shifting playing field.Take a step back, and another step back. What is the 50,000 eagle’s eye view you have of yourself? At the end of the day, do you peers and friends define you as “Oh, that’s Bob. He sold $250K of new business this year. Wonder how he’ll do next year.” And…?

In this most challenging of economies, your engineering and technical acumen will only carry you so far. There’s more to who you are than your last completed project or the last technical certification you received.OK, so you are a Six Sigma Master Black Belt. Look, I used to process map my kids’ weekly sports practice, game and tournament schedules during high school (I’ve since recovered). Being precise and organized and minutiae oriented is admirable. Being the go-to person who organizes chaos is a pretty good skill set. But…..?

We all bring far more to the table than our jobs allow us to. What if we decided to “bring it” anyway, all the time? What if you take the time to discover or re-discover “what” you are all about and become impeccable with your word?

Being impeccable with your word allows you to bring passion, enthusiasm, objectivity, consistency and energy into everything you do for yourself, your family, your clients and your organization.

Yes, this is something that all of us need to work on daily. Being impeccable with one’s word has a significant impact on our relationships. We feel everyone has changed as a result of our being impeccable with our word. In fact, we are the only folks who have changed and, in turn, the people we interact with are impacted, and react, well, differently because we are truly bringing ourselves to the table, authentically, impeccably, every time they meet with us.

Did you ever think about what the real meaning of Walking The Talk is?

Be impeccable with your word.

Filed Under: Books, Core Capabilities, Engineering, Personal Branding, Sales, sales engineering, Sales-Engineering Interface™, Weblogs Tagged With: , , , , , , ,
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