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Explore over 350 articles that will help you grow your client relationships and improve your personal effectiveness.
Are You Learning Every Day? Take a Page from Leonardo
I could easily be a dinosaur. That’s because I earned my MBA in 1981 from Dartmouth’s Tuck School. I looked at the course catalog recently, and realized that I’m like the doctor who went to medical school before the invention of penicillin and the discovery of DNA. Most of what MBA students study today was not on the curriculum 32 years ago. The point is this: the half life of knowledge is incredibly short, and what we learn in school is dwarfed by what we should and must learn outside of school. As so-called “educated” professionals, the ability to rapidly learn and flex our minds is the key to occupational longevity. We must be, as Einstein said to a friend, “passionately curious.” Look no further than Leonardo for one of history’s most prolific and motivated learners.
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Can We Start Over?
When you find yourself getting into an argument, and arguing about how you're arguing--you need to reset. At work, if you start a presentation and it's not going well--or new information comes to light that you were unaware of--you need to reset. Use this simple question: "Do you mind if we start over?" It's a powerful way to get the conversation back on track.
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When a question is the answer
My new book comes out on February 7th. It’s called Power Questions: Build Relationships, Win New Business, and Influence Others. Why a book about questions? Good questions challenge your thinking. They reframe and redefine the problem. They throw cold water on our most dearly-held assumptions, and force us out of our traditional thinking. They motivate us to learn and discover more. They remind us of what is most important in our lives.
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Questions You Must Ask Your Boss
It can and does happen even to top performers: You see the axe falling on others, but you know it couldn’t happen to you. You’ve consistently gotten good performance reviews, and you play a key role in your organization. Your job is important! Yet...you now realize there may be some subtle, almost unnoticeable warning signs that you are ignoring or dismissing.
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Do You Have Time to Think and Reflect?
Do you ever have the nagging feeling that you don’t have time to really think anymore? You’re not alone. A variety of factors have conspired to rob us of time for reflection about ourselves, our lives, and the problems and issues that our clients face.
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Are You Easy to Do Business With?
Some businesses are very hard to interact with. I have dealt with insurance companies, for example, which seem to put up barriers to prevent customers from talking to people who can actually solve their problem. If you buy a consumer product, like a camera or software program, and it breaks, good luck trying to call the manufacturer.
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Two types of questions that will deepen your client relationships
Once you have acquired a new client, the next challenge is to create a personal connection and deepen the relationship. The right power questions will help you do this. I like to ask what I call Passion questions and Depth questions.
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Using Power Questions to Build Peer Relationships with Sales Prospects
Sometimes it can feel like buyers have the upper hand. They have many service providers to choose from. Everyone calls on them and aggressively pitches for their business. How can you be viewed as a peer, as someone who has something valuable to offer, rather than a commodity vendor? Thoughtful power questions can help you earn greater respect immediately.
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