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fostering success - Wish Group

Jun 16 2014
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The Definition of Success Changes With You

By Comments & Opinion, Success & Inspiration, Entrepreneurial, Achieving Wealth, Business Insights, Foundations of Success No Comments

entrepreneur-successIn my blog post last week I talked about how failure makes you a stronger person, but this week I want to focus on success. Success can mean a number of different things depending on the individual, and your definition of success also changes as you continue your career.

For example, it was announced last week that my company, The Wish Group, made it on the PROFIT 500 list of Canada’s Fastest Growing companies – number 364 respectively. Of course I’m extremely proud of my team for getting us this far, especially since this is the third year in a row that we’ve received this award.

This is considered a success, but this wasn’t the end game for me. My end game is becoming one of Canada’s premier providers of business solutions – a goal that’s radically changed since I first started my own business. Back then, I was simply focused on becoming a world-class leader of teleconferencing solutions. Thanks to multiple meetings with different entrepreneurs and spurring ideas back and forth with different people, my goals have now changed.

From chatting with these various entrepreneurs throughout my career and watching my own goals change, I’ve found that people define success in two different areas:

Money Made – This one is the most common definition, for better or worse. I’d say that the majority of people and not just entrepreneurs define their success by how much money they make. While money is important, becoming wealthy shouldn’t be your only goal. The most successful entrepreneurs I’ve met are the ones that see the wealth they’ve accumulated as a means to further their business, be it by funding new ideas or improving their current ones.

Difference in People’s Lives – This point is a big one for me. I personally want to help as many people as I can find their true calling in life, be it an entrepreneurial endeavour or otherwise. This means that I create as many jobs as I can, and mentor people to watch them grow and become successful on their own. While this may not always work with everyone who walks through my door, I at least hope that I touch their life far beyond just a paycheck.

How you define success isn’t important, what matters is how you reach that success. Let the accolades and positive feedback that you receive along the way motivate you towards your goal of success, and then push yourself one step further.

May 20 2014
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Pushing Aside Fear When Selling

By Comments & Opinion, Success & Inspiration, Self Education, Business Insights, Sales Advice, Foundations of Success, Personal Accountability One Comment

In my blog post last week, I talked about fear holding you back when you’re an entrepreneur and discussed different methods that I thought would be useful for getting over your fears. Once you’ve understood and overcome your fears, you’ll be able to help others get over theirs. This will come in particularly handy with your sales team.

Your sales team may be holding themselves back from getting new clients simply because of their fears. However, like I discussed last week, these can be overcome with constant work and luckily most sales people have very similar fears, either consciously or unconsciously. Here are the most common fears of sales people that I’ve seen, and what you can do to help them overcome it.

Fear of Closing the Sale – No matter how amazing the product or service you’re selling is, it’s extremely rare that people will blatantly tell you that they want to buy it. Most of the time, you have to ask people to buy your product – which is a surprisingly big fear for most sales people. When I’ve asked people in the past why they’re afraid of closing the sale, they told me that they were afraid of coming across as forceful or stubborn. In reality, you should NEVER be afraid of what other people think of you. At the end of the day, you’re doing your job just like everyone else. You shouldn’t fear how someone will react to you doing something that you love.

Fear of Following Up – Tying in with the above fear of other people’s perception, some sales people never follow up with their prospects because of a fear of being perceived as annoying or obnoxious. You need to put this aside, simply because it’s extremely rare that you or anyone will sell something successfully on your first try. In fact, according to The National Sales Executive Association, only 2% of sales are made on the first contact, while an astounding 80% of sales are made on the twelfth contact or higher. If your sales people never follow up due to fear, they’ll never sell your product or service.

Fear of Rejection – This is the big one, and it doesn’t only happen to sales people. Fear of rejection is one of the biggest and most common fears that people have. There’s no set method to get over a fear of rejection, but the best piece of advice that I can offer you is to not take it personally. While your personality does play a role in whether or not you make a sale, most of the time your prospect won’t buy a product from you for a variety of reasons, not because they dislike you, so there’s no point in blaming yourself for a lost sale. Just learn your lesson from it, and move onto the next prospect.

Does your sales team regularly talk about their fears with you? If so, how do you mentor them to overcome them? I look forward to discussing this topic with you.

Mar 03 2014
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Don’t Halt Creativity in Your Office – Let it Grow

By Comments & Opinion, Success & Inspiration, Entrepreneurial, Business Insights, Foundations of Success One Comment

fostering-creativityNo matter what type of industry you’re working in, creativity is the foundation of exceptional work. If you’re not fostering that creativity in your workplace, your team won’t produce the best work that they’re capable of. I touched this point briefly in one of my previous blog posts, but I decided that I should expand on this issue because of how important it is. Making sure that your work environment is a transparent and accessible space for ideas to flow will let your team reach new creative heights, allowing them to produce stimulating work at the same time.

Be a Mentor: I know I’ve discussed this point to no end in other blog posts, but I come back to it so often because I can’t stress how important it is to provide an avenue for creative growth. You simply can’t bring someone onto your team without providing constructive criticism and constant mentorship. However, you can’t micro-manage people either; you need to find a balance where you can give them a space to devise their ideas, and then see how you can help these ideas grow.

Have an Open Door Policy – and Mean it: Tying in with my last point, a phrase that is often tossed around by leaders when a new team member is brought in is “my door is always open”, yet this isn’t always the case. When you tell your team that your door is always open – mean it. Be available to them when they have ideas, suggestions or even just banter. Not only does this make you more human from your staff’s point of view, it also makes them more comfortable with you. This means that they’ll feel at ease when they suggest outlandish (and often creative) ideas.

Encourage Open Discussion: When you come together with your team for a brainstorming session, you should ask everyone present to throw an idea on the table, no matter how “bad” they feel the idea is. This open exchange of creativity often leads to some great ideas created from a thought that could have been discarded. A great idea is simply a bad idea that has been refined.

Reward Great Ideas: One of the simplest and most effective ways to foster creativity in your workplace is to reward great ideas. Of course, this doesn’t mean punish bad ones, but when there is a fantastic idea brought to the table you need to praise and reward these efforts. Don’t go overboard and give every admirable thought a new car – it can be something as simple as a cup of coffee or showing them praise in a companywide e-mail.

Do you feel like you’re doing enough to encourage creativity in your workplace? What methods do you use at your office? Do you feel like your team is comfortable sharing all of their creative thoughts? I would enjoy discussing this topic with everyone in the comments. 

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