THE PRICE OF INDECISION…life is all about decisions. Salespeople have to make decisions every day. “What do I say? What do I do next? How do I handle success? How do I handle rejection?” Etc. etc. etc. Depending on your personality style the ease of making decisions will vary…Easier for Drivers and Espressives, more difficult for Analyticals and Amiables. Regardless, there are lots of decisions to be made every day.
The real problem comes up when you are guilty of “reconsidering your decisions”. Two challenges come up:
1. Did I make the right decision? Should I change my mind? Should I take an alternative approach?. All this energy “after-the-fact” takes away from getting the job done. It doesn’t pay to re-evaluate everything you have decided…move on! You don’t go to the grocery store with your list of items, make your purchases, go home, and then return half of them later, do you? Sometimes you will come home with things that are a mistake. So what? That just means you won’t buy that item again.
2. Should I alter my course? This issue should only come up for major, long-range planning decisions. You may need to change your marketing strategy periodically. You may need to identify a different target audience every six months or so. You may need to revise your budget occasionally. The main thing is not to make a dramatic change every few days. Follow your big picture plan and make periodic adjustments. If you were driving your car from Chicago to Toronto and you got a bit off course, you wouldn’t go all the way back to Chicago to start over, would you?
The Latin root of the phrase “to decide” is “to kill”. In other words…when you decide to do something, you kill off any alternatives. You move forward and go on to the next challenge. Some Salespeople spend all their time reconsidering their decisions, they agonize over “the right thing to do”. They constantly change their plans, they constantly ask outsiders for their opinion and the end result is… nothing gets done. Have a look at your decision-making process. The cost of continually “second-guessing yourself” can be enormous. Don’t spend your money that way. Have courage, make a decision, be in action, learn from your mistakes, and make adjustments. NO Excuses.