National association OF
ISSUE 22/ FEBRUARY 2016
MOTORCOACH operators Monthly
2016 Auctions were
a HUGE success!
3 Lessons From a Bad Sales Call
FMCSA Mulls
Safety Regs For
Intercity Bus Cos.
FMCSA Proposes New Rule for Determining
Safety Fitness of
Motor Carriers
UBER AGREES TO SETTLE CLASSACTION SUIT OVER SAFETY CLAIMS/
STOP WASTING NOODLES: 5 SALES STRATEGIES THAT WILL STICK/
Uber has agreed to pay $28.5 million to settle a classaction lawsuit that took issue with...
Whatever sales manager said it’s “a numbers game” is responsible for why customers...
THE RIGHT WAY TO CHECK A REFERENCE/
2016 AUCTIONS WERE A HUGE SUCCESS!/
3 LESSONS FROM A BAD SALES CALL/
FMCSA MULLS SAFETY REGS FOR INTERCITY BUS COS./
HOW TO ASSESS A JOB CANDIDATE WHO DOESN’T FIT THE MOLD/
LEADERSHIP CAFFEINE™—“IT’S NOT WHAT YOU PREACH, IT’S WHAT YOU TOLERATE”/
Over the course of my career, I’ve fired only two people, and both were workers at my...
This year’s fundraising, which took place at the United Motorcoach Association...
I’ve been in the sales business for many years, but even I can still learn something new...
The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration said Monday that it is considering...
When looking to hire for an open position, your ideal candidate is someone who...
The title of this post is drawn from the book, “Extreme Ownership: How U.S. Navy...
NEW BILL INTRODUCES MAJOR SAFETY UPGRADES FOR CHARTER BUSES/
FMCSA PROPOSES NEW RULE FOR DETERMINING SAFETY FITNESS OF MOTOR CARRIERS/
4 STEPS TO EMPOWERING AND OVERSEEING YOUR EXECUTIVE MANAGEMENT TEAM/
A new bill that would require major safety improvements on charter buses is moving...
The U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration...
Many CEOs struggle with managing their executive teams, erring on one or the...
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Chairman’s Message WOW is all I can say what a fantastic start to the New Year and we/NAMO cannot thank UMA enough for supporting our member’s during the UMA EXPO in Atlanta, GA during our Semi-Annual Member’s Meeting. There were over 60 members in attendance not counting the equipment suppliers and tour and travel partners that attended. NAMO Members used this time to connect which each other, learn what’s going on with NAMO, hear from Loretta Bittner, FMCSA about regulations that will affect their business, meet Heather Colache from MEET AC our host for our Annual Meeting in August 2017 as well as Meg Lewis from Resorts Casino where the event will be held. NAMO also unveiled their New MEMBERS ONLY Website designed by board member Kasanya Bohannon, Bohannon & Vines Transportation Group. The new site will give NAMO Members a chance to post used equipment that they have for sale to other NAMO Member. Plans are underway for NAMO Members to join UMA at their Capitol Hill Days April 12th & 13th in Washington, DC. Watch for more updates from your legislative committee and plan to attend. Your Voice is needed, and there is STRENGTH IN NUMBERS! The NAMO Booth on the UMA EXPO Floor saw great traffic and your NAMO Board Member’s were able to recruit a number of new members to the organization. Hopefully all of these new members will attend the conference in August. 4
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Do you know a company that would benefit from being a member of NAMO? Please share this information with our Executive Administrator Mary Presley at tourtrvl@comcast.net and she will be happy to send them information on who we are and how we support each other. Much was said at the Semi-Annual Membership meeting in Atlanta, but the one thing that consistently came up was that NAMO Members Help Other NAMO Members. Marcia Milton, First Priority Trailways a board member gave praise to Transportation Unlimited, Dallas, TX when her coach had issues and she needed someone to rescue her group. This is just one example out of many that NAMO Members continually share. NAMO Members truly care about other NAMO Members Daryl Johnson J and J Charter, Chairman, NAMO
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5
Check A Reference
The Right Way to Check a 6
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a Reference
Over the course of my career, I’ve fired only two people, and both were workers at my family ranch. (I actually rehired one of them a few years later.) In my roles as an operations and logistics line manager in Argentina, a management consultant in Europe, and a leader at the global executive search firm Egon Zehnder, however, my firing rate has been zero. As an executive search consultant, I aim to provide the same thing for clients: very few of the candidates I’ve placed have been fired, and none have in the short term. How is a near-zero firing rate achieved? With great reference checking. Of course, you should assess potential hires in many other ways, too. But reference checks are by far the most important step in making sure that you’re not about to bring on someone who you’ll soon want to let go. This process can be tricky. For starters, you must follow the laws in your country and state, including the candidates’ consent to be checked and their right to access the written references provided. You must also find a way to get past referees’ reluctance (for legal and other reasons) to tell you the whole truth — a tendency cleverly humorized in a little book called The Lexicon of Intentionally Ambiguous Recommendations (L.I.A.R.), which includes examples such as “You’ll be lucky if you can get this person to work for you,” “I am pleased to report that he is a former colleague of mine,” and the more subtle “I assure you that no person would be better for the job.” So how do you make sure you’re getting the right people to give you their honest assessments?
First, make sure to agree with the candidate on a comprehensive and relevant list of referees to call,
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7
including former bosses, peers, and subordinates at several previous places of employment. Narrow your list by thinking about the specific skills you want to measure: former bosses are great at assessing strategic orientation and achievement drive; peers can help to measure influence; subordinates are often the best judges of leadership.
Second, provide the referee with the right incentives. Start the conversation by highlighting
how important it is to have a reliable reference, since the candidate won’t benefit from getting a job in which he’s likely to fail. Explain that you realize no candidate is perfect. All have their individual strengths and weaknesses, and it’s useful to know as much as possible so that if the person is hired you can provide the right kind of integration and support. Emphasize that the referee’s comments will be kept completely confidential. And speak in person or on the phone rather than via email; it’s easier to solicit the whole truth when you can hear hesitation or emotion in a person’s voice or see it on their face.
Third, help the referee avoid frequent biases.
Avoid broad questions such as “What can you tell me about Carol?” since the answer would probably focus on her best or most salient general characteristic (rather than the one most relevant to the job), which taints everything that follows because the referee wants to appear consistent. Instead, after checking the person’s relationship with the candidate, be specific about the role you’re trying to fill and its challenges. Ask whether the referee has seen the candidate perform under similar circumstances. Then, and only then, ask what his or her exact responsibilities were, how he or she performed, and what the consequences were.
Fourth, make sure to ask referees about the candidate’s social and emotional-intelligencebased competencies, focusing on self-awareness,
is, his or her ability to succeed in a new organization. In addition to the essential acid test of integrity, you should determine whether the candidate’s views on things like time orientation, a farming versus hunting sales approach, and the balance between collaboration and competition match yours and those of future colleagues and teammates. Finally, in addition to checking that the candidate can perform well today and get along with the team, make sure to also talk to referees about his or her ability to keep learning, adapting, and growing in a world in which jobs are constantly changing and becoming more complex. Ask for examples of situations in which the person has shown the hallmarks of potential: curiosity, insight, engagement, and determination. Getting to a zero firing rate isn’t easy. But it’s something to which we all should aspire. Great reference checks are the first step to achieving it.
self-regulation, motivation, empathy, and social skills. We tend to hire people on the “hard” (IQ and experience) but fire them for their failure to master the “soft.” References are one of the best ways to assess the latter.
Article by Claudio Fernández-Aráoz seen on www.hbr.org
Fifth, check values and cultural fit. Even if your
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candidate has all the relevant competencies, these factors will be key to the person’s portability — that
8
Getting to a zero firing rate isn’t easy. But it’s something to which we all should aspire. Great reference checks are the first step to achieving it.
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9
FMCSA Mulls Safety Regs
FMCSA Mulls Safety Regs Fo 10 www.greenazine.com
or Intercity Bus Cos. www.greenazine.com
11
The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration said Monday that it is considering new safety regulations for intercity bus companies, such as Megabus, that mostly provide curbside passenger pickups in response to growing concern over accidents involving curbside operations. Under federal law, the agency has to reassess the safety fitness rating of motorcoaches at least once every three years, and it has to assess the safety fitness of certain motor carriers of passengers that serve primarily urban areas with high passenger loads once a year. Because FMCSA does not currently include in its regulations or regulatory guidance a definition of the term “curbside bus operator,” the agency says it’s now considering clarifying that definition so that it can more closely scrutinize companies for safety violations. FMCSA, which also regulates the commercial trucking industry, specifically wants to have all “curbside bus operators” undergo safety assessments every year. It’s defining “curbside bus operator” as a motor carrier of passengers that serves primarily urban areas with high passenger loads and uses 25 percent or more of its motorcoaches for operations with passenger pickups and dropoffs occurring at the curbside or in a parking lot, according to a notice to be published in the Federal Register on Tuesday. FMCSA said it would use that definition to identify, track and conduct the annual safety fitness assessments of every identified curbside bus operator. “FMCSA believes Congress intends for the agency to have increased safety oversight of the bus operators that generally provide low-cost, regularly scheduled passenger transportation service between major cities with curbside boarding and/or disembarking,” the agency said in the notice. Although some of these carriers say they have a bus terminal or station, most of their passengers are picked up and dropped off at the curbside or in a parking lot, according to the agency. “Because FMCSA does not include in its regulations or regulatory guidance a definition of the term ‘curbside bus operator,’ the agency believes it is imperative that one be adopted,” it said.
12 www.greenazine.com
FMCSA, which also regulates the commercial trucking industry, specifically wants to have all “curbside bus operators” undergo safety assessments every year. The agency put out its notice of information and request for comments to follow through on implementing a specific provision in Section 32707 of 2012’s Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act, or MAP-21, that requires an annual safety fitness assessment of certain motor carriers of passengers that serve primarily urban areas with high passenger loads. The agency says this comes as motorcoach safety has drawn more public attention after several serious crashes in 2011, some of which involved curbside bus operators. As a result of the accidents, the National Transportation Safety Board conducted an investigation of motorcoach safety with an emphasis on curbside operations to more specifically pinpoint the characteristics of the curbside business model among interstate motorcoach carriers.
Article by Linda Chiem seen on www.law360. com READ THE ORIGINAL
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13
Major Safety Upgrades
New bill introduces major safety upgrades for charter buses A new bill that would require major safety improvements on charter buses is moving through the California Legislature. This comes two years after a fiery charter bus crash in Orland killed 10 people and injured 39 others. The focus of Senate Bill 247 is on making charter buses safer in an emergency situation when there’s a fire and people need to get out. Among the proposed, mandated upgrades are: -Fire-resistant seats -Automatic emergency lighting
Allen said his company would consider folding or pulling out of California if the bill passes. The bill cites the fatal 2014 crash in Orland between a Fed-Ex Truck and a charter bus as the motivation behind the new proposal. “Most of the deaths in the accident were due to asphyxiation because passengers weren’t able to exit,” said California State Sen. Ricardo Lara, D-Bell Gardens, who wrote the bill. “If these provisions had been in effect, many more people would have survived the accident.”
-Windows that open and remain open during evacuations
If the bill becomes law, charter bus owners will have until July 2017 to make all the upgrades. It’d be up to the California Highway Patrol to regulate them.
-An event data recorder capable of recording during sudden deceleration or hard braking
The bill passed the state Senate in January and heads to the Assembly next.
Additionally, charter buses built after July 2017 would require a second emergency door.
Article by Tom Miller seen on www.kcra.com
The California Bus Association opposes the bill, saying statewide it’ll cost $117 million to retrofit 4,700 charter buses. The improvements would be extensive and expensive. Sacramento-based Amador Stage Lines worries about the estimated $2.3 million it would cost to retrofit its fleet of 65 buses. “This is potentially the most devastating piece of legislation I’ve seen in my lifetime,” Amador State Lines owner William Allen said. “It’s a family business, we’re all family businesses, and this is a significant threat to our existence.” 14 www.greenazine.com
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15
Uber Agrees To Settle Over Safety Claims
Uber Agrees to Settle ClassAction Suit Over Safety Claims 16 www.greenazine.com
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Uber has agreed to pay $28.5 million to settle a classaction lawsuit that took issue with the company’s claims that its driver background checks were “industry leading.” The terms of the settlement, filed on Thursday in the United States District Court in the Northern District of California, require Uber to pay roughly 25 million riders across the United States and to reword the language around the fee that the company charges for each ride. Uber will rename the fee, called the “safe ride fee,” to a “booking fee.” The ride-hailing company said it would use the fee to “cover safety as well as additional operational costs that could arise in the future.” Lyft, a main Uber rival, has made a similar change, Uber said. “No means of transportation can ever be 100 percent safe. Accidents and incidents do happen,” Uber said in a statement. “That’s why it’s important to ensure that the language we use to describe safety at Uber is clear and precise.” The settlement brings to a close a suit that was filed by Matthew Philliben and Byron McKnight in 2014 over whether Uber misrepresented the level of scrutiny it uses when recruiting drivers, who must pass background checks conducted through a thirdparty service. Earlier in 2014, a New York Times article found that Uber and Lyft were actively lobbying against fingerprint-based background checks in courthouses across the country. At the time, lawmakers said that in the rush to add drivers to their services, Uber and Lyft chose speed over quality in background checks. Uber uses Hirease, a private company that said it had an average turnaround time of “less than 36 hours.” Sterling, Lyft’s private background check service, said its turnaround time averaged two business days. State background checks for taxi drivers vary by jurisdiction. But lawmakers said they were often more rigorous than either of these services. Uber has also been sued in civil court by two California district attorneys on similar charges of misleading 18 www.greenazine.com
“We are glad to put these cases behind us and we will continue to invest in new technology and great customer services so that we can help improve safety in our cities,” Uber said. consumers about the company’s safety practices. It is unclear what impact, if any, the potential settlement may have on that case. In the past, Uber has said that it will invest more in researching improved safety technologies like biometric identification and voice verification. The company also pointed out that the Uber app currently shares a significant amount of driver information with riders, such as the driver’s license plate and photo identification. Uber also tracks trips using GPS technology. If the settlement is approved by the court and accepted by riders, Uber passengers who used the service in the United States between Jan. 1, 2013, and Jan. 31, 2016, will be notified by email and have the option to accept a refund in the form of a rider credit or a charge back to their credit card on file. “We are glad to put these cases behind us and we will continue to invest in new technology and great customer services so that we can help improve safety in our cities,” Uber said.
Article by Mike Isaac seen on www.nytimes.com READ THE ORIGINAL
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19
2016 Auctions
2016 Auctions were a HUGE
This year’s fundraising, which took place at the United Motorcoach Association (UMA) Expo, was a huge success. There was a live auction which included a VanHool CX35 which was sold to John Benjamin of Northfields Lines from Eagan, MN. There was also a silent auction, with donations from over 50 companies offering trips, technology, coach parts, clothing and more. This represented a major departure from years past, with many items bringing above-retail values,
20 www.greenazine.com
demonstrating the level of support the industry has for these products, training and services. “We are thrilled to see the support from the industry for the work that we are doing. It is amazing to see companies like ABC Bus Sales who respect what we are doing so much that they were willing to donate such a great coach to the auction. It really speaks to the fact that we are doing things right!” said Christian Riddell, the Executive Director of the Motorcoach
E success! The Motorcoach Marketing Council’s GoMotorcoach program is now in its third year and has helped hundreds of operators around the United States and Canada better sell their products in their respective markets. The program offers training for sales teams of motorcoach operators, a vast library of marketing materials which can be customized and ordered online, as well as a social media library full of images and social posts to help make those efforts more effective. “We are making great strides to help operators be more effective in marketing their services to their respective markets. We are consistently talking to operators who are using the tools and seeing results,” Riddell continued. Funds from this fundraiser and other donations to the council are used to support the development of new products, services, and training, fund attendance to national and regional motorcoach events where they provide training and support, and they are also put toward administrative costs to execute the mission of the council. For more information about the council, its mission or tools, please visit their website at www. motorcoachmarketing.org. To join a free online webinar that will show you how to get started using their tools, visit motorcoachmarketing.org/ jumpstart and join the next scheduled webinar. Marketing Council. “The last two years we have made huge leaps forward with our ability to help operators sell more charters to more people for more money, and we feel that this is a reflection of that effort. We simply can’t say thank you enough to those who donated and those who participated in the bidding and ended up purchasing items. This is a huge part of what makes it possible for us to continue to provide these services to the industry.”
Article seen on www.motorcoachmarketing.org
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21
How To Assess A Job Candidate
How to Assess a Job Candid Doesn’t Fit the Mold 22 www.greenazine.com
date Who
When looking to hire for an open position, your ideal candidate is someone who meets all of the job requirements, right? Maybe not. Even the best-crafted job description may not capture every person who might flourish in the position and some applicants with untraditional backgrounds or non-standard career trajectories may offer something that you may not want to miss. So how do you make sure you don’t lose out on those candidates who bring additional talents, interests, and unusual experiences that can be a real boon to your organization? As a hiring manager, you have to read resumes and cover letters closely, listen carefully to each candidate’s professional story, and consider what’s truly most important to the job, not just what’s listed on the job description. Take David’s story. I heard about David (not his real name) from my coauthor, Joe Gurkoff, who told me that David was trained as an engineer but eventually wanted to shift his career into high tech sales. He had no sales training or experience whatsoever, so, despite his technical skills, he faced a tough task in convincing a hiring manager that he could bring in revenue to a company by convincing customers to buy its products. Fortunately, David had honed his acting skills for years in regional theater productions after work hours. An introvert by nature, he had pushed himself initially just to get up on that stage and deliver his lines without bolting before the intermission. With practice, though, he learned that he could enjoy those moments of facing the audience and convincing them that he truly was the person he was scripted to play. As David thought about the career path he wanted to pursue, he saw how his acting skills could help him sell products to a new audience: a tech company’s potential customers. He could act as a “situational extrovert” in order to have a confident exchange with potential buyers and successfully make his sale. David knew this was possible and wanted to make sure that a hiring manager would understand it, too. So he sold the sales manager of the company that most interested him on the idea of giving him an audition for the job. At the
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audition, David didn’t just tell his potential boss how his acting skills would make him a successful member of the sales team; he acted out a tough sales scenario. The hiring manager was impressed and gave David the job. David had gone out on a limb and it worked. But the hiring manager was also taking a leap of faith and for both of them, the outcome was positive. And David was successful selling those tech products precisely because he was able to combine the knowledge of an engineer with the stage presence of an actor. How can you assure that you don’t miss a David or another worthy candidate whose career story is not the typical one? Here’s how to assess talent when it comes from an unexpected direction: Thoroughly read the information you have about the candidate, whether it’s the summary of the executive search team or a cover letter and resume. Don’t get hung up on a position or job title that’s listed or not listed; look for the skills and strengths that the person has exhibited. A savvy applicant will summarize and highlight the things that truly make them effective rather than relying on job titles to tell the story. Use behavioral interviewing techniques. Ask the candidate to describe a situation in which she effectively used the kinds of skills and strengths that your organization needs. David lacked a formal background in sales, but he could describe and even demonstrate effectively the skills he’d learned onstage that were relevant to the job. Look and listen for self-awareness. How well does he know himself, his strengths, and his limitations? Selfawareness is important for every candidate. When anyone takes a new job and a challenging situation arises, they have to know their existing skills well enough to put them into gear right away. They also have to understand the capabilities that they don’t have, in order to reach out for the help they need to solve a problem as swiftly and effectively as possible. It’s particularly important that the non-standard applicant gain your confidence by demonstrating what he can do to contribute to your team, but he shouldn’t go overboard. As the hiring manager, you want to know that he’s making a reasonable pitch for his unusual combination of skills and experience, and isn’t promising you an impossible array of capabilities. The applicant who can identify
24 www.greenazine.com
what he already does well and where he can improve is a better hire. Use references to help you better understand the candidate. Her boss, colleague, fellow community volunteer, or classmate can identify the tenacity, integrity, sense of curiosity, willingness to learn, people skills, or adaptability that may be as important as her educational background, technical skills, or former titles. Read written references carefully to look for specific examples of how the applicant has developed and used her strengths. If and when you talk with the people who are recommending the candidate, be sure to fully describe the position you’re offering and ask how they could visualize the candidate’s skills and experience could be useful in this role. Demonstrate that you’re open to considering her, but need to have specific reasons to feel assured that she can weather this transition. Focus on willingness to learn. This may be the most important characteristic to look for. The candidate who meets all the requirements of your job description but is set in his ways and unwilling to learn and adapt will have less to contribute to your group than the person who admits what he doesn’t know but has a track record of acquiring new skills. Ask him to tell you about a difficult new skill he had to acquire and how he approached that process. Was he enthusiastic about it? Was he tenacious about staying with it and learning everything on that topic that he possibly could? Ask him what it is about the position makes him excited about learning, and what it is he knows he’ll have to learn. This question is the flip side of “Tell me what you know how to do”, and it can provide assurance that this applicant will truly hit the ground running but also keep moving forward. When considering non-traditional candidates, you may have to make a leap of faith. Sometimes that leap is a small one and sometimes it’s a larger one. Your effort to “connect the dots” between this person’s unique experience and your organization’s critical aims may be a great investment in your group’s success. The payoff can be huge.
Article by Anna Ranieri seen on www.hbr.org READ THE ORIGINAL
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25
New Rule for Safety Fitness
FMCSA Proposes New Ru Safety Fitness of Motor Ca The U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) today announced a rulemaking proposal designed to enhance the Agency’s ability to identify non-compliant motor carriers. The Safety Fitness Determination (SFD) Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM), to be published in the Federal Register, would update FMCSA’s safety fitness rating methodology by integrating on-road safety data from inspections, along with the results of carrier investigations and crash reports, to determine a motor carrier’s overall safety fitness on a monthly basis.
The proposed methodology would determine when a carrier is not fit to operate commercial motor vehicles in or affecting interstate commerce based on:
“Ensuring that motor carriers are operating safely on our nation’s roadways is one of our highest priorities,” said U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx. “Using all available information to achieve more timely assessments will allow us to better identify unsafe companies and get them off the road.”
The proposed rule further incorporates rigorous data sufficiency standards and would require that a significant pattern of non-compliance be documented in order for a carrier to fail a BASIC.
“This update to our methodology will help the agency focus on carriers with a higher crash risk,” said FMCSA Acting Administrator Scott Darling. “Carriers that we identify as unfit to operate will be removed from our roadways until they improve.” The proposed SFD rule would replace the current three-tier federal rating system of “satisfactory– conditional–unsatisfactory” for federally regulated commercial motor carriers (in place since 1982) with a single determination of “unfit,” which would require the carrier to either improve its operations or cease operations. Once in place, the SFD rule will permit FMCSA to assess the safety fitness of approximately 75,000 companies a month. By comparison, the agency is only able to investigate 15,000 motor carriers annually – with less than half of those companies receiving a safety rating. 26 www.greenazine.com
1. the carrier’s performance in relation to a fixed failure threshold established in the rule for five of the agency’s Behavior Analysis and Safety Improvement Categories (BASICs); 2. investigation results; or 3. a combination of on-road safety data and investigation information.
When assessing roadside inspection data results, the proposal uses a minimum of 11 inspections with violations in a single BASIC within a 24-month period before a motor carrier could be eligible to be identified as “unfit.” If a carrier’s individual performance meets or exceeds the failure standards in the rule, it would then fail that BASIC. The failure standard will be fixed by the rule. A carrier’s status in relation to that fixed measure would not be affected by other carriers’ performance. Failure of a BASIC based on either crash data or compliance with drug and alcohol requirements would only occur following a comprehensive investigation. FMCSA estimates that under this proposal, less than 300 motor carriers each year would be proposed as “unfit” solely as a result of on-road safety violations. Further, the agency’s analysis has shown that the carriers identified through this on-road safety data
ule for Determining arriers
have crash rates of almost four times the national average. FMCSA encourages the public to review the NPRM and to submit comments and evidentiary materials to the docket following its publication in the Federal Register. The public comment period will be open for 60 days. FMCSA will also be providing a reply comment period allowing for an additional 30 days for commenters to respond to the initial comments. For more information on FMCSA’s Safety Fitness Determination proposed rule, including a full copy
of the NPRM, an instructional webinar, and a Safety Fitness Determination Calculator, visit www.fmcsa. dot.gov/sfd.
Article seen on www.fmcsa.dot.gov
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5 Sales Strategies
Stop wasting noodles: 5 sales
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s strategies that will stick Whatever sales manager said it’s “a numbers game” is responsible for why customers don’t get back to sales people. Buying a list of names and sending a generic or semi-customized email -- the old spray and pray sales philosophy -- is the equivalent of throwing a handful of spaghetti against the wall, hoping one noodle will stick. While one may stick, all the other noodles will be on the floor and ruined. Those ruined noodles are the future of your business. Don’t throw them on the floor. Instead, throw the ones that are ready to cook in the boiling water and save the rest for later. You may be hungry. Competition to generate revenue is fiercer than ever, as emerging technologies rise to compete for dollars across multiple industries and traditional players fight to maintain their positions. The rise of the internet and big data has made depth of product and pricing information available to anyone -- and seemingly commoditized products, threatening to eliminate the need for sales people. However, hidden within this challenging marketplace are opportunities for elite sales people to disrupt industry norms, increase revenue, and differentiate themselves from competitors in 2016. So how do you cut through the information overload to increase your revenue? These five elite secrets will help your sales pitch stick and allow you to exceed your sales targets.
Hyper-focus your efforts You need to pinpoint the customers that are absolutely perfect for your business. Less is truly more. Start with the following questions and keep filtering your list until you have a small group of “A” prospects. Which customers want the precise product you deliver? Of those, which customers are open to change -- whether trying something new or increasing investment levels? Then, of those, which will have trigger events next year? This is different for every industry. For www.greenazine.com
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advertising, if a brand is launching a new product or re-positioning themselves, it’s a trigger event. Getting married is a trigger event for the insurance industry. Find ways to identify trigger events and reach out to your customers as they happen.
Invest in relationships Business is built on relationships. Your immediate and future success depend upon establishing trust and becoming someone that customers turn to for solutions.
Never eat alone I first read the book “Never Eat Alone” by myself in a Chinese restaurant. Read that sentence again. I was asked on a recent interview what is the best thing you can buy for under $100. Without hesitation, my answer was a meal with a potential client. Over a meal, I get to know them and learn what excites and challenges them. That gives me the opportunity to be helpful -whether it is with my product or introducing them to someone else who might add value. Worst case scenario -- you make a new friend.
Connect without selling Please slow down before you begin a PowerPoint presentation. (Don’t get me wrong -- I love PowerPoint -- I send PowerPoint recaps of family vacations.) But you need to establish a connection, trust, and prove you are focused on providing them with solutions -not trying to preach to them or line your pockets with their money.
It’s about them, not you Just because you see an opportunity for revenue does not mean it is the right fit for the customer. See the world through their eyes. If they just got married, they want to protect their new family. That’s what you can help them with -- not pitch your new insurance product. Walk a mile in their shoes and deeply understand their vantage point.
Questions During every meeting you should begin by asking in-depth questions about their objectives, challenges, fears and aspirations.
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Adaptive storytelling Stop regurgitating your generic pitch. Show your customers how you can scratch their very specific itch. Your product doesn’t change, but its value is different from client to client. Your product/service is a chameleon -- still the same lizard at its core -but your colors change based on your surroundings and you should highlight attributes that solve the customer’s challenges.
The actionable thank you note My mother convinced me that if I didn’t write a thank you note for every gift I received, I may never receive another one. If someone is willing to invest their time meeting with you, that is a gift and should be treated as such. Additionally, a thank you note is a powerful sales tool that can exponentially reward the time, creativity and thoughtfulness you pour into it. Be concise. Be personal. And set forth a course of action -- the action that will bridge the process from meeting to a partnership.
Streamline your sales stack You can spend in the high six-figures “investing” in sales tools, contact lists, subscriptions, etc. It’s easy to feel that you “need” them in order to succeed. Spending heavily is a premature exercise and giant slurp of your most valuable resource -- time. Do not overcomplicate it. Spending hours doing data entry are hours not spent reaching out to customers to drive revenue. Keep it simple. When you are generating more than $50 million, you can invest in the fancy tools to make your data look pretty. Look for simple, intuitive tools that can scale with your business like Pipedrive CRM and LinkedIn Premium to find leads. Remember to spend your time and money on your customers not on fancy tools. If you can stop wasting noodles and focus your efforts on being a true resource for the right prospects -- you will see your revenue skyrocket in 2016.
Article by Fred Schonenberg seen on www. imediaconnection.com READ THE ORIGINAL
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3 Lessons From A Bad Sales Call
3 Lessons From a Bad Sales Call
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I’ve been in the sales business for many years, but even I can still learn something new about how to be a good sales person – and sometimes the best way to learn is by seeing an example of what NOT to do. We’ve all been in this situation where you get an unsolicited sales call – whether it’s at home or especially at work. Most people just hang up or ignore these calls, but I often take a moment to listen to what the caller has to say, so I can use the occasion as a chance to learn something new about the art of selling. The other day I got a phone call from a sales person at an insurance brokerage who was trying to sell business group health, life and disability insurance. Naturally, the sales person had decided to call our company because they thought we might be in the market for a new insurance carrier, and they knew that we were, in fact, a business that might need business insurance. But that seemed to be the extent of the caller’s research prior to dialing. The sales call was rather clumsy and awkward – the caller didn’t make any attempt to engage with me or ask me questions, and instead just launched into a sales pitch. The caller was speaking in a hurried, monotonous voice, as if he was reading from a script. The caller also didn’t seem to know anything about me, personally – he had gotten through and was talking to the president of the company, but he didn’t seem to be aware of what my name and job title were. Finally, the sales person never made a clear “ask” to get me to commit to any further action – the call just kind of ended without ever asking me to agree to an online demo or price quote or any other “next steps.” I ended the call politely, but overall, this sales call was a strong example of what NOT to do in B2B sales. Here are a few lessons from this bad sales call that other B2B sellers might appreciate: 1. Do Your Research: If you’re a B2B sales person who’s selling a complex, high-value product, service or solution, it’s worth investing significant time and energy upfront to really get to know your prospects – who you’re calling, what their job titles are, how they fit into their organizations, whether they’re the right decision makers, and so on. This sales call was a failure
in part because the sales person didn’t really seem up to speed about who I was, what my company needed, or why the sales call should matter to us. 2. Ask Good Questions: This sales call was bad because the caller just launched into a script, without really making an effort upfront to engage with me and ask questions. A good B2B sales conversation needs to revolve around the customer and the customer’s needs. Ask open-ended questions, such as: “What is your biggest challenge right now related to your current vendor/supplier/solution?” or “How do you feel about your company’s health insurance situation?” or “How much time have you spent thinking about and worrying about your IT systems?” Try to build rapport with the prospect by getting them to think about their current business problems – and showing that you’re ready to listen and to offer solutions. 3. Make “The Ask:” Every sales call needs to have a purpose and a goal. Even if it’s just a preliminary cold call, your objective is to get the prospect to agree to have a further conversation. Before the call ends, you need to make “the ask” and invite the prospect to agree to talk further. For example, this could sound like: “Would you like to learn more about our product by signing up for an online demo?” or “Can I schedule you for a followup consultation?” or “Will you share some details about your company so I can develop a customized price quote?” Every sales call – whether you’re the one making the call or the one on the receiving end of the sales pitch – is an opportunity to learn something new about the business of sales. By doing research upfront, by asking conversation-expanding questions, and by clearly inviting the prospect to commit to further action, your sales calls will become more productive and profitable.
Article by Al Davidson seen on www.business2community.com
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Leadership Caffeine
Leadership Caffeine™—“It’s Preach, it’s What You Tolera 34 www.greenazine.com
The title of this post is drawn from the book, “Extreme Ownership: How U.S. Navy SEALs Lead and Win,” by Jocko Willink and Leif Babin. These warrior heroes do an outstanding job relating the lessons from life or death circumstances to our significantly safer corporate and business pursuits. The lessons on ultimate accountability and the many examples and approaches of leadership in action are incredibly relevant for all of us. The theme of “extreme ownership” is an appropriate clubbing over the head that you as the leader own every problem, miscue, misfire and general problem on your team. It’s not the fault of your team members if something goes wrong, it’s your fault as the leader. If the results fall short, it’s not because your team members failed, it is because you failed to plan, clarify, communicate, teach, train or guide execution properly. Too many of us are quick to point our fingers when it comes to explaining why something misfired. Just a few of the many excuses for poor performance I’ve encountered in the past few months: “Corporate did not provide us the investment we need,”
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“The budget passed down from on high was unreasonable,” “The mid-market sales team failed to execute their plan,” In all three cases, it is the leader’s job to execute the assigned mission, regardless of investment and personal opinion of the budget. As for the team, if they failed, it’s the leader, not the team. This tendency to assign and not own fault is a failure of leadership and leadership character. The next time you are tempted to look around and explain why something on your watch failed, stare into the mirror and own up: “I failed. It was my fault, and here’s what I am going to do to fix it going forward.” We need more extreme ownership in this world. The phrase, “It’s not what you preach, it’s what you tolerate,” is a wake-up call for any leader dealing with a poor performing team or one of those brilliant but toxic characters that are found in almost every workplace. We allow problems to linger or performance to suffer, applying duct-tape and bandaids and a heaping helping of hope, and when nothing improves, we grow frustrated, looking for others to blame for the shortcomings and shortfalls. Part of extreme ownership is recognizing that we truly do get what we tolerate. If we tolerate the aberrant and toxic behaviors of one team member, we will end up with a dysfunctional team. If we apply different standards of accountability to groups or individuals, we will get varying levels of suboptimal results. Ironically, I see this leadership and accountability issue manifest most often at senior levels, where many CEOs struggle to get their direct reports to play nice together in pursuit of strategy and execution. In reality, the CEO who is struggling with this issue has made it clear that she tolerates lack of unity. The results never change when you tolerate something less than high performance.
The Bottom-Line for Now: In a world filled with finger-pointing politicians, broke state and city governments and vexing global 36 www.greenazine.com
In a world filled with finger-pointing politicians, broke state and city governments and vexing global challenges, it can truly be said. “we get what we tolerate.” Whether it’s in business or in our public institutions, let’s adopt an extreme ownership mentality to promote positive change. Anything less is a prescription for failure. challenges, it can truly be said. “we get what we tolerate.” Whether it’s in business or in our public institutions, let’s adopt an extreme ownership mentality to promote positive change. Anything less is a prescription for failure.
Article by Art Petty seen on www.artpetty.com
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In regards to the Motorcoach Marketing program, we love it. So far, we have made the 1000 postcards, and we did some full page handouts. We just got a stand up banner. When I get some time, I’ll be making new rack cards for both offices. We made 500 church theme postcards and 500 in the safety theme. We sent out the church cards through a local mailing company to every church within 50 miles. So far, we have had a great response and 4-5 people booked trips from it. I plan on using the safety ones soon by sending them to our new customers. All of our staff and drivers love the modern design and the finished products. Only one of my staff has watched the videos so far, but we will be working on that next month. So far I’m very happy with the service. It works well and looks great!
Chris Knittel
Owner/General Manager New Mexico Texas Coaches, LLC
We Help Operators Sell More Charters To More People. Easier. Faster. Far More Effective. MotorcoachMarketing.org www.greenazine.com
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Empowering Management Team
4 steps to empowering an executive management te Many CEOs struggle with managing their executive teams, erring on one or the other side of this scale:
On the extreme left is full empowerment, which is a totally hands-off management style. Of course, CEOs trust their executives, but blind trust can be dangerous, and it can also hurt performance. With blind trust, CEOs do not see the need for monitoring and verification steps, so processes, alignment, and ultimately, results are doomed to go astray. When a CEO blindly trusts his Senior Executives, they are effectively empowered to do whatever they want, and if a problem arises, the CEO can plead ignorance. On the opposite end of the scale is micromanagement, which is where the CEO assumes and performs his Executives’ responsibilities himself. Micromanagement can be costly. It saps productivity and morale, discourages high-performing employees, and limits a company’s growth.
The Balancing Point There are rare times when leading at the extreme ends of the scale are appropriate. Most of the time, though, the midpoint, which I call “trust and verify,” works best. Here are the most important steps in the trust and verify process:
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nd overseeing your eam
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1. Clearly define roles and expected results. Expectations are made crystal clear in two areas: •
•
Each executive’s role and how it will be measured. The specific responsibilities, authority levels, and expected outcomes, including the metrics used to measure success for each position, should be clearly communicated by the CEO and must be understood and accepted by each executive. Desired company results. The CEO and his executive team jointly create both current and future multi-year goals in the SMART goal format.
2. Teamwork at the executive level. It is common for an executive team to be primarily aligned with, and loyal to, their respective functional areas, creating silos and competition for resources between them. Instead, members of an executive team must believe and act as if their primary allegiance is with their colleagues. When this happens, the executive team is able to make decisions and allocate resources in the best interest of the company, rather than in their own best interests. The CEO must diligently work to create a highly functioning team that holds each member accountable.
3. Regularly align priorities. The CEO should meet at least monthly with each executive for an “Alignment Session.” The purpose of this session is to verify that the priorities for the next 30 days are in alignment with the CEO’s expectations and company goals. Each executive should not have more than 3-5 top priorities at any given time. Any more is the equivalent of having no priorities. At the end of this session both the executive and CEO should have a clear understanding of the commitments for the upcoming month.
previously set the expectation that a revised plan to meet those goals will also be reviewed at this session. The CEO asks for proof of each executive’s claims and dives into enough detail until he is comfortable that he is receiving accurate information.
5. Trust your gut instinct. The “gut” is a source of internal wisdom that lies just beyond the conscious mind. Our instincts often kick in when we draw on patterns we’ve seen but can’t articulate. When the CEO is presented with a situation that just doesn’t feel right, he shouldn’t give in. He should keep asking, digging, or doing whatever else is necessary to resolve the conflict between what his mind and gut are telling him.
6. Monitor your culture. The CEO is directly responsible for developing and maintaining the company’s culture. This is never delegated. Senior executives, however, have a significant influence on it, and the CEO may not always realize how much a particular executive is affecting it. To ensure that senior executives’ behavior is consistent with the company culture, the CEO can routinely survey employee engagement, provide empowerment through a Key Executive Program, and frequently interact with employees by just walking around. Yes, managing your Executives is challenging. By implementing these “Trust and Verify” processes, though, you are truly leading your company and positioning yourself to make it more enjoyable, less stressful and more profitable. How do you currently interact with your Management Team? Leave your helpful feedback in the comments below.
Article by Cheryl McMillan seen on www.blog.vistage.com
4. Verify reported results. It is the executives’ responsibilities to prepare a summary of the progress toward their goals, and metrics relating to the performance of their area of responsibility. If goals aren’t met, the CEO has
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