The four stages of learning and competency as it applies to sales

What are the Four Stages of Competence?

The four stages of competence have been referenced to Abraham Maslow, but the real creator actually came from Gordon Training International. We are going to look at the four types of competence, with an example, and then use it to understand that this is also is a formula for learning a skill.

More specifically, we're going to examine the skill of selling. 

Yes, selling is a skill. 

Many will have you believe otherwise.  Many will have you believe that being good at selling is strictly based on talent alone.  They will tell you that you either have it or you don't.  I am here to tell you that just like the ability to type, read, write, ride a bike and speak, selling is a learned skill.

Stage One:  Unconscious Incompetence

This is when you don't understand or know how to do something and you're also completely unaware that you don't know how to do something. You may even deny or show disdain for the need of the skill.

You must first recognize that you are unaware and that you have a level of incompetence. Then you need to see the value of the new skill, before continuing to the next level of learning. This can, for many take a good amount of time and to the degree someone stays in this stage will determine how fast they develop in that skill.

Looking at sales, there are many that believe that there is no need to train and perfect themselves as sales professionals. They get by on winging it and making it up as they go along.

As a sales person, you will want to understand where you are at with your selling skills so you can perfect your craft in the same vein as an actor learns his lines and a basketball player learns how to shoot a basket from the 3 point line. It takes practice, study and attention.

The challenge is, how do you know what you don't know as a sales person?

Experience does not indicate proficiency.  You must constantly challenge yourself and be open to growth.  Are you growing as a sales person?  You're time in sales should look like a well performing stock chart.  Ups and Downs, yes, but always trending upwards.  If you're the same consistently, that's not a good thing.  What else has a flat line?  

Start debriefing your missed opportunities and keep a list.  Why didn't that deal close?  What can I do differently next time?

Stage Two:  Conscious Incompetence

Once you've established that you don't know something, you're on the right track to recovery. Even though you do not understand or have the knowledge of how to do something (sell), you now realize that there is something missing. You also come to the conclusion that knowing how to do something has a specific value to you and your life and that it very well makes sense to get this handled.

For example, as a sales person, how often do you hear, "Let me think it over..." Probably everyday, right? If you're still in Unconscious Incompetence you'll accept that answer and move on to another customer. However, once you've heard that one several times and observe other sales people closing more deals than you, maybe you start to wonder if there's a better way to go.

You can't handle this objection or stall yet, you are simply now aware that something must be done. You will then start experimenting (research and training) with different ways to handle it which will lead to you making a few mistakes.  Yet, if you commit to learning from the mistakes, it will reduce the cost of the experience significantly.

Stage Three:  Conscious Competence

With the right amount of relevant training and experience you then reach the level of Conscious Competence. You now know how to do something. In this case, it's how to handle, "let me think it over." You understand that there may be some unspoken objection that the client doesn't know how to communicate with you and you have the ability now to figure it out by asking the right questions. At this level, you know what those questions are yet you tend to more often than not fall victim to emotion and nerves. You still have to think about what you're doing. You have to remind yourself what's happening and what to do next.

"Under pressure, you will not rise to the occasion, rather you will sink to the level of your training." 

-Barret Tillman

You are, however one step away from mastery.  That's the good news!

Stage Four:  Unconscious Competence

If you continue on with your training and have had enough practice, you will reach the final level of Unconscious Competence. This is where you don't have to think about something, rather you just do it. Consider driving to work in the morning. Do you need to think about putting the key in the ignition, putting the car in reverse, backing out of the driveway, etc? No, not anymore. You want to be in this same place as a sales person. You want to be able to handle objections and ask questions like they're second nature to you and selling seems easy.

Many sales people, even ones that have been selling for years, unfortunately can get stuck at a level below unconscious competence and are comfortable getting by with what they have. They rely on it being a "numbers game." Others will try to convince themselves and others in earshot that this is the best it's going to get and that there's only so much you can do. Many find themselves with an ego larger than their closing ratio and that is an expensive self imposed curse.

Question: Are you operating at your highest potential?

If the answer is no, then that brings you to at least conscious incompetence and that means you can change. You have the ability to be at cause for your life, career and circumstances. By making the commitment you make as a professional.  To make sure you bring the best you you got to the table. If you look at a professional athlete, soldier or actor, what is the one thing they all have in common? They hone their craft and they practice it daily. All elite performers in any field practice and train daily.

As a professional sales person, you need to get to that level of unconscious competence where you function at the highest level possible. You need to make sure that your attitude is right, that you're head's in the game and your going to work for a purpose greater than you. From there you need to make sure you have your skills as a sales person dialed in. That you can effectively guide a client through to the sale and handle any concerns and objections effectively. Finally, you need to make sure you're taking an appropriate level of action to create the success you want.

So ask yourself and be honest, what stage are you at as a sales person? There are tools out there that can help you reach unconscious competence. That's what my company specializes in actually. That being said, it doesn't matter what tool you get if you don't use it. A hammer can only work when you swing it. You must be committed 100% to your success and treat it as an ethical issue.

"Success is your ethical duty, obligation and responsibility." -Grant Cardone from The 10x Rule.

Once you view success in this way, unconscious competence becomes your only real option. Just ask Muhammad Ali...  

"I hated every minute of training, but I said, "Don't quit.  Suffer now and live the rest of your life as a champion."

David Bradley is a Sales & Marketing Manager with Cardone Training Technologies. For more information on creating a unconscious competence, development of proficiency, handling objections and real time situational training solutions, call 310-777-0352 or fire off an email to david@grantcardone.com

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Fantastic Article On Creating Large Amounts of Income! By: Evan Asano

Evan Asano, Start up founder, boot strapper.

2k upvotes by Raj Irukulla, Pek Pongpaet, Abbe Diaz, (more)

There's a story of an Italian Billionaire when asked if he had to start over from scratch what he'd do (I searched Google 50 times to find the original without luck). He replied that he'd take any job to make $500, buy a nice suit, then go to parties where he'd meet successful people. The implication being that he meet someone who'd offer him a job, share an opportunity, etc.

I'm almost 40 and of the 5 career type jobs I've had in my life (I run my own business now), 4 came through networking. Only 1 came out of applying to a job listing.

But networking isn't something you just go out and do. It's immensely more effective if you have simple people skills. And when I say simple, I mean spend a couple hours reading Dale Carnegie's "How to Win Friends and Influence People." Read that and try it out at a party and you'll be blown away by how effective it is and how after meeting and talking with a few people and asking them about themselves, how they'll want to help you, without you asking them.

When I asked my old boss who was the most remarkable sales person I've met, what he did to improve his sales skills, he told me that right out of college without any skills or pedigree degree, he took a job as a limo driver. He was reading "How to Win Friends and Influence People" and thought it would be worth trying out. He would ask his customers one simple question when they got in the limo, "So tell me about what you do." That simple question resulted in a huge increase in tips he received. Notice he didn't ask his customers, "What do you do?" There's a subtle difference. If you ask the latter, many people will just tell you in a few words what they do. If you ask the former, it's an invitation for them to tell you their story. Few people will turn that down.

At one point early in my career, I was doing research in the medical field and realized I wasn't interested in it or where it would lead. I wanted to make more money and get into the business side of things (this was right after the tech crash in the San Francisco area), so I spend nearly 9 months relentless applying to jobs, writing cover letters, researching companies. With no success. I was doing it all wrong.

One night, my roommate asked if I wanted to go to a party. Sure, no problem. We went. I didn't know a single person there. At one point, everyone did shots. I wandered back to the kitchen to get a beer. There was one other guy in the kitchen and I introduced myself. We talked for a while, I asked him what he did and he said he worked in biotech. I mentioned I was looking to get into the field, and he said his company was actually hiring. You can guess what my next job was.

There are a million paths to getting rich. And there are countless people who've gotten rich who are jerks, tyrants, manipulative, conniving, and all around assholes. When you're working in different industries, you'll start to feel that all the  successful people are this way. But in reality, these are only the people who leave the most lasting impression, not because they're the only people who succeed.

But there's unlikely anyone out there successful who wouldn't emphasize the value of people skills in succeeding.

So back to your question, how do you get rich quickly:

The high level:

1. Learn relentlessly. Read books and books on success, people skills and anything that might have some inkling of strand of wisdom about success and wealth. Especially read the biographies of successful people. In his autobiography, Mark Cuban talks about how we would buy and read any book on business that he thought might help. The $15 he'd spend was a fraction of the wisdom he picked up was worth. Drew Houston of Dropbox talks about how he would spend every weekend reading books on business, sales, marketing, all day long. Every weekend.
2. Become a people person. This is a learnable skill or skills. No one is born a great salesperson. There may be people (like athletics) with better inborn abilities (outgoing, etc). But the best learn, they read, they study, and they practice, relentlessly. A lot of times, those with the best given talent, don't end up being the top in the field, because at the start, it comes easy to them. The ones that have to work at, work relentlessly and don't ever get complacent. And then one morning, they wake up and the effortlessness at sales or marketing or leadership that they never thought they would achieve, they now embody.
3. Work hard. As an employer, one of the things that stands out the most with employee is a good work ethic. It's worth it's weight in gold. Drop your expectations and ego, and put your nose to the grind and good things will happen.
4. Take risks. Not dumb, fickle risks and not gambles. But smart, calculated risks where you have a good chance at succeeding. You won't always succeed, but you will learn a huge amount in the process and you will garner an enormous amount of respect from people in doing so. 

The nitty gritty:

1. Get a job in a high growth industry. This is where the quick money and the opportunities are. There's a saying how everything rises with the tide. When you're in a fast growth industry (or company), the tide is rising.
2. Work for the best and most recognizable company you can work for. This gives you instant credibility. Starting as an intern at a recognizable company will get you opportunities right away.
3. Become an expert. Pick an area within your industry and learn it inside and out. Start writing answers on the topic in Quora, start a blog on the topic, network with other experts. You'll find pretty quickly that this type of knowledge and expertise will lead to a huge array of options.
4. Create multiple income streams. Start writing, consulting, tutoring, fixing things, just get busy with a second source of revenue. This will get you hungry for more and you'll double your learning. You'll see that a job tutoring on the side, can lead to starting your own tutoring company on the side. Your marketing consulting job can lead to writing Amazon books on marketing.
5. Be too busy to spend money. Feel like you spend too much money? Feel like you don't save enough or at all? Get busy working on everything, your job, learning, networking, consulting, projects, side jobs, overtime at work and you'll find out you won't spend a fraction of the amount of money than before.
6. Finally, start a company. Name a billionaire who didn't start a company. Yes, there are a few. But they ended up running the company they joined (Sheryl Sandberg, Steve Ballmer, Eric Schmidt). Starting a company may seem completely out of reach and unfathomable, but when you've done all the preceding steps, it will be the most logical next one. Successful companies don't start out with 50 employees and a $10M in revenue, they start out small, tiny and scrappy. They start out in their dorm rooms or their parents garages or spare bedrooms. The founders beg, borrow and steal to get what they need. Michael Dell started his company by hacking together computers in his dorm room. Walmart started as a single variety store in Newport, Arkansas. Ever hear of Newport, Arkansas? Yeah, me neither. Richard Branson started out selling records by mail, one at a time. Don't look at the most successful people and companies and see where they ended up or you'll be overwhelmed. Look where they started and you'll see how it's achievable.

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Co-Founder/Lead Graphic Designer

I never had the opportunity to formally introduce our Co-Founder and lead Graphic Designer, Billy Waller.

Billy will be creating a Bio to introduce himself to our viewer's shortly!

Stay Posted:)

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A Step Forward, In The Right Direction By: Brian J Whitlatch

The focus of this blog was to help educate young people about the hidden potential they, and everyone possesses.  I have discovered over the past few days with the immense amount of traffic and support that we have received that there is a great chance that this blog can change lives.  The idea of this alone absolutely thrills me. I possess no greater joy than knowing that I could help push an individual in the right direction.

I remember being a high school student, and sitting in school listening to the constant banter of the importance of further education. For some people, this is a phenomenal path to choose. If you think a little bit outside of the box like myself and many many others, this may not be the ideal path for you. I remember hearing my teachers endlessly speaking of the failures I would encounter if I did not follow this path. Yet, I always thought to myself, is this really the right path for me ? Is this what will bring me the future that I desire?

First, you must set goals for yourself:

• Where do you want to be in five years? 
• What steps are you going to take to get there?
• What are the absolutely necessary elements to of your plan that must be completed?

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An Incredible Short Story On Maximizing Profit Return On Your Business By: David Ryan

Are you your own worst enemy when it comes to selling your business for a high price? Many entrepreneurs expect to reap a nice profit when they make their exit but discover mistakes that crush the value when it’s too late. “Poor seller preparation”consistently appears in the top five reasons deals fail inthe Market Pulse survey published each quarter by the Pepperdine Private Capital Market Project, International Business Broker Association (IBBA) and M&A Source. Avoid these five critical errors and you’ll achieve a much greater profit from the deal.

Value crusher 1: Not owning all of it. To max out your valuation when you close, you must have proprietary ownership of your web domain, business name, business logo and phone number.

Think you do? Think again. One attorney I know worked out of an executive suite for 20 years.When he tried to move and take his phone number with him, guess who owned the phone number? The executive suite.

I am currently working with a business owner who has a great logo well known in the community.  Unfortunately, the graphic designer who created the artwork owned it. There was no work-for-hire agreement assigning rights to my client.

The more boring the paperwork, the more likely entrepreneurs are to neglect it — and to suffer big hits to the value of their business. Case in point: Many business owners fail to run their doing business as “DBA” registration every five years in a newspaper, which is required to keep it alive. Generally, this needs to be done for each county in which you do business.

Do you have international trademarks for all the countries where you sell? Have you kept them up? Many people did not spend the time or money with their attorneys to protect their intellectual property during the recession — and it’s hurting them now.

Value crusher 2: Contracts you can’t transfer. I ask clients to review all of their contracts with clients before we go to market to see if there is a “change of control” problem. Many times contracts say you must tell the client that you are selling the company. Sometimes, clients will balk at working with a new owner, unless your contract allows you the right to assign it to someone else. This is especially true with specialty contractors who have contracts for maintenance or projects that last longer than a year. Naturally, your business will be worth less to a buyer if he can’t automatically continue doing business with your existing clients.

Leases are a minefield. You know the old saw about “Location, location location.” Well, just because you’ve locked down the best locale in your city at a great price, it doesn’t mean your buyer can run the business there. The lease is probably not transferable, unless you have negotiated this.

Many years ago I was helping a client sell a business with six locations.  We were selling to a national public company that was much stronger than my client financially. The public company was in a feud with the client’s landlord, also a Goliath. We got stuck in the middle. In the end my client had to guarantee the lease obligation, which meant he had to remain on the lease and put money in escrow in case the new tenant defaulted.

Value crusher 3: Records gone MIA. I got a call recently from a business owner who outsources to a private-label manufacturer. When I asked to see if there was non-compete agreement in the deal with the manufacturer, he did not even remember if he had a contract. They had worked together for the last 15 years. Imagine the impression it would make if a potential buyer asked to see the contract and the owner admitted he had no clue if there was one.

Value crusher 4: Late financials. Do you produce your financial statements on time — meaning by the 15th to 20th day of each month? I cannot tell you how many times deals have been killed because of a seller’s inability to produce timely financial records. Doing so is mandatory if you are selling to a private equity group or public company. Don’t assume that because your business is small, you won’t attract prospects like this. If your business has a value over $5 million, it will be sold to a private equity firm or strategic buyer 87% of the time, according to recent research.

Value crusher 5: Lack of sales data. To sell for a high valuation, small business owners need reports that show sales by product or service and margins per customer, per location, per sales person. You might think that if you’re a small business, it does not matter. The smaller you are, the more important it is! A big company already knows what your margins are before you negotiate a deal. It has done background research and is just confirming.  If your margins are greater than those of your acquirer, this will be the big reason it will do a deal. Being able to back up what your prospective buyer already knows will help you sail to a higher valuation.

I own absolutely nothing associated with this article, the writing was done by David Ryan, a contributor for Forbes Magazine.  

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Tools To A Brighter Future

I'm going share some of the tools that allowed me to write and create a successful business plan and multiple financial projection spreadsheets.  These tools are necessary in formatting a proper successful approach to a business.  If your looking to use an investor in your business, or attempting to apply for a loan, I would recommend the score.org template.

There are a TON of different templates, graphs, charts, sheets you can use.  Each one should instruct, and cater towards your type of business goals.

Link number 2 is the absolute best spreadsheet templates I've ever worked with !! That's my personal recommendation!

The first is an awesome, all-around, all-in-one template in a word format. It's 27 pages long and comes with everything you need to create a successful initial business plan/financial projection. Enjoy:

1.   http://www.score.org/resources/business-plan-template-startup-business
2. http://www.entrepreneur.com/formnet/finance.html 

(Draft is un-published, more to come, just wanted to get the post out to you guys!)

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Small Business Start-up An Article By Roger Wu

Here's an article from Forbes contributor Roger Wu, it's a must read!!

World cup fever has taken us all.  During popular games, our co-working space typically filled with startups is a wasteland: the computer screens are blank, the seats are empty and the ideas are on hold.  Everyone surrounds the large screen television watching 22 men kick a ball around.  At a lull during the action, my mind started to wander, and I started to think about penalty kicks.  Watching some of the games where penalty kicks determined the outcome, I realized how impossible the odds were for the goalie.  The ball was going to the left but the goalie jumped to the right.  Looking at the physics of penalty kicks it started to make more sense.  The kick is from 12 yards away.  The goal is 24 feet wide by 8 feet tall or 192 square feet.  The ball typically moves at 70-80 mph reaching the goal line in 500 milliseconds.  A goalie can get to one end of the 24-foot goal in 600 milliseconds. If the goalie waits to see which direction the ball goes, which might take one second, it is too late, the ball is in the goal.  Even though a world-class goalie can cover the entire net, a penalty kick is pretty much aguaranteed goal.

As a startup, just like our goalie, you have incomplete information, yet you can’t stand still.  You have to make a decision one way or the other.  If you stand in the middle, you definitely have no chance.  If you try to wait to get a full picture of the industry or your customer base, its too late, the market has moved past you.  You have to move in one direction or the other.  And that one direction could be completely wrong.

Starting a business is not easy, especially in today’s world, where things are moving quickly.  You never have complete information and always have to be anticipatory in your decision-making.  Sometimes, like our goalie, you were correct in seeing the direction of the market, but your timing was off by a bit, or you were completely wrong in where you thought the market was going.  Friendster, SixDegrees, and all of the generation one social networks were correct in that people would want to have profiles and be able to link to one another, yet their timing was off by a few years.  Many of the Web 1.0 companies had spectacular flameouts like Urbanfetch, Kozmo, Boo and so on.  Sony created physical products, like the Minidisc and BetaMax, which could not get traction.  And today, Aereo, was ruled illegal by the Supreme Court.  They were interesting ideas that just didn’t catch on to the marketplace.  They released a product, put marketing muscle behind it, and gave it their all.  And then there are the success stories that we hear about, Facebook, Twitter TWTR +6.25%, LinkedIn LNKD -2.38%, SnapChat, Uber, and so on.  There was no difference in effort between any of these companies only a difference in luck.  Even then the probability of a penalty kick getting in is around 25% where the probability of finding the “next big thing” or even having a successful money making startup is in the realm of less than 2%.

Regardless, none of this outcome is possible if you don’t make a strong commitment to your team and to your startup.  Hence, investors don’t invest in “part-time” teams or those that don’t have enough “skin in the game.”  Pivots and changing your model to survive are a natural part of the game, but not committing fully is a formula for disaster.

In today’s world of apps and sites, most of the successful apps out there do one thing and one thing very well.  They’ve committed to only doing one thing.  TheDark Sky App tells you the weather where you are with an uncanny accuracy.  Uber gets you a car where you are when you want it.  Seamless orders your favorite food to your doorstep.  Even the Yo app does one thing really simply: it says “Yo” to your friends.  Even Internet Giants started by mastering their own domains: Amazon owned books and then expanded into everything.  Google owned search and now has self-driving cars.  Facebook owned social networking and now has a phone.

Early on, these companies and the aforementioned apps have committed to saying that “people will actually engage in this behavior.”  The Dark Sky App team made a bet that people would actually pay $3.99 (yes, even I paid for it) for a better weather app even most weather apps are free.  And the Yo team thought that people would want a new way to “poke” each other by saying Yo.  And so on.

All successful companies made a strong choice and commitment and went for it.  Most of them were wrong.  Yet there’s a comfort in knowing that you gave it your all and that the cards weren’t right for you this time around, even if you look like a fish out of water: when we jump right and the ball goes left.  We have to remember that we are putting ourselves out there for something we believe in, and that we might actually be wrong.  We’ve had people tell us that we would fail, that they are bearish against us, that they don’t think that we have a fighting chance.  But as long as we make a commitment toward one direction, you never know, we actually might stop that kick.

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