SUCCESS DEALING WITH THE EXPECTATION GAP

My first mentor in the business world, Rusty Hampton, then the President and CEO of Grantree Furniture Rental, taught me something that I later considered one of my life’s epiphanies. He very was instrumental in helping guide me to success. There have been, I would say approximately two dozen or so real epiphanies throughout my life that I considered life changing and this lesson was one of them.

Rusty owned a furniture store in a small town of about 10 to 15,000 people. But in this small market, Rusty was named the furniture executive of the year based on the stores sales figures. He was able to sell more furniture per capita than any other member of the National Retail Furniture Association in that particular year.

This was no easy task, but the more I got to know Rusty, the more I realized how he could accomplish this feat and many more as time went on. My epiphany actually started when he told me a little story about when he owned that small furniture store. It was the slow season and a slow day, so he decided he would have one of his employees work in the storeroom/basement of the store. He took the employee down to the storeroom, which was a shambles and asked him to thoroughly clean and organize it even if it took all day.

At the end of the day Rusty accompanied the employee back down to the storeroom after the employee stated he had completed the job. Rusty was amazed at how the room didn’t seem to look much different than when he had sent the employee to clean and organize it. At first he was upset, but it was quitting time so he sent the employee home, which gave Rusty some time to organize his thoughts about what had happened that day. But, overall the day had not been a success.

Well the next day he accompanied the same employee to the same storeroom. This time he tried something new. The previous night he had written a list of exactly what he wanted done in the storeroom on the following day. He left the employee and the list in the storeroom and went back upstairs. Later that afternoon, the employee told Rusty that he had completed the cleaning and organizing of the storeroom. So, Rusty accompanied the employee back down to the storeroom. Sure enough, the room was absolutely perfectly clean and organized meeting with Rusty's expectations. Now that was overcoming adversity and turning it into a success.

So, what was the difference on that first and second day, the employee had a thorough idea of exactly was Rusty’s expectations for the room where. And, so we go through life believing that everyone whose doesn’t share our self-imposed, life learned expectations is simply not a failure in our eyes. When, in fact, each of us has a different set of expectations based on our personality, lives and experiences. Rusty’s employee didn’t do anything wrong. As a matter of fact, Rusty had to look back at himself and ask why he had not made his expectations more clear on the first day to obtain the success that he wanted.

Rusty subsequently told me, “Most problems between people are the result of gaps in expectations.”

Relationships with clients are no different. If you have what you believe is a satisfied client and one day you discover they are no longer doing business with you, it may well be that you have not met their expectations and yet they never let you know what their expectations where in the first place. In order to be a success in business, you need to find out exactly what your clients expectations really are and then exceed them. Of course, sometimes you may fully understand a client's expectations and still not fulfill them.

Most importantly:

Did your client specify exactly what their expectations were?

Did the person your client gave their expectations to thoroughly understand those expectations?

If both of the above were met, your mutual goal should be to obtain both of your expectations.

If your client fails to give you thorough expectations, you will surely fail at meeting them and end up with a disillusioned client who may go elsewhere without even giving you the opportunity to meet those expectations.

The following is a real, cute story exemplifying the importance of a business relationship and expectations. I had a client that told me in my initial meeting with him that his expectation each Christmas was a large bottle of quality Vodka. We had a wonderful relationship for many years. But, one year we were giving all of our clients a somewhat expensive gift, certainly much more than a bottle of Vodka. So, quite by accident, the bottle of Vodka slipped my mind. Well in January, we still had not received a any business from this client, so I gave him a call. Cutting to the chase, he stated since he didn't get his bottle of Vodka, we would never be receiving any business from him again. He kept his promise. We never received business from him again. Who would have really thought that our business relationship was really based on one bottle of Vodka? I obviously did not have a clear understanding of the importance of his ultimate expectation.

It’s only through clear communications that the gaps in expectations can be eliminated. Think of some areas where you might be experiencing gaps in expectations. The most important thing is to identify the gaps and then begin thinking about ways to eliminate them. Remember that you can't be a success at closing all of the expectation gaps. Your expectations must me reasonable with the person with whom you are working.

Having said all of the above, you still need to accept or move away from people who simply do not have the ability to live up any level of expectation that would be acceptable to you. These people can be the biggest level of frustration of all. If they are not a fit, it is time they left, or, you learn to live within their expectations. Who says your expectations are the right ones anyway?

Success of the Security and Prosperity Partnership Of North America

THIS HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH SUCCESS BUT YOU SHOULD READ IT CAREFULLY. IF THE ABOVE LINK DOES NOT MAKE YOU ACCEPT THE NEED FOR SECURE BORDERS, MAYBE YOU ARE BEYOND ALL HELP.

The partnership was signed onto by United States President Bush, Mexico President Fox and Canada Prime Minister Martin in 2005. Cutting to the chase, it is really all about creating another Europian Union, only this would be the North American Union. The ultimate goal is to eradicate the borders between the three countries.

A brief quote from the joint statement given by the three countries follows:

"In a rapidly changing world, we must develop new avenues of cooperation that will make our open societies safer and more secure, our businesses more competitive, and our economies more resilient.

Our Partnership will accomplish these objectives through a trilateral effort to increase the security, prosperity, and quality of life of our citizens. This work will be based on the principle that our security and prosperity are mutually dependent and complementary, and will reflect our shared belief in freedom, economic opportunity, and strong democratic values and institutions. Also, it will help consolidate our action into a North American framework to confront security and economic challenges, and promote the full potential of our people, addressing disparities and increasing opportunities for all."

I clearly do not see how that will be an advantage to the United States on any level. We need to secure the borders now, build the fence now, enforce the current laws that we already have and give the Border Patrol whatever they need to do their job, now. If our government can't enforce the laws that we already have on the books, how was the proposed "Amnesty Bill" going to make things better.

Thank goodness the people of the United States spoke up resoundingly and did not let Congress and President Bush take away our sovereignty. Okay, yes I voted for him, but I had no idea where he was really headed.And, what was the option, voting for John Kerry, some option. That would have been tantamount to putting the fox in the hen house.

And, yes, I have an United States flag flying in the front of our home.

I will address the war on terriorism on another day when I am more composed. I can only deal with one horrendous issue at a time, first illegal immigration and then the war on terriorism next.

"What say you?"

HOW KISS HELPED TO CATAPULT MY SUCCESS

No, not Gene Simmons of KISS musical fame, although I do enjoy his TV reality show. Yes, Gene does epitomize success, but he is still the wrong KISS.

I mean KISS: Keep It Simple, Salesperson 6 audio cassettes by Fred Herman.

In 1976 I discovered the KISS audio tapes in Success Magazine and bought them. There were 6 tapes and each side was 30 minutes and covered a different aspect of sales, i.e., getting appointments by phone, overcoming objections, etc. I listened to them everyday in my car and I was driving hours daily. I probably listened to each side of each tape at least a dozen times, if not more.

My rate of setting appointments made by phone went from 1 or 2 out 10 phone calls to 6 or 7 appointments out of 10 phone calls. My closing ratio shot up over 80 percent. Using all of the wonderful information in the tapes literally changed my life. I have been in business now for 37 years and done nothing but grow. If you can get a hold of these tapes anywhere, buy them. Fred has tons of awesome stories to support his teachings.

An example of one story was about a fellow who went from business to business selling commercial wrap around towels in a dispenser for lavatories. He carried a large piece of cotton and a 2x4 on all of his presentations. He would hand the 2x4 to his potential customer and have them rub it on their faces. Then he would hand them the piece of cotton and said, "which would you prefer your customers use in your lavatories?"

In yet another example, a salesman for a major automobile windshield manufacturer would go into his presentation with a piece of the latest shatter proof glass that his company had invented and he would also carry a hammer. During his presentation, he would lay the glass on the potential client's desk and hit it with the hammer noting that the glass had not shattered. Well that first year of shatter proof glass, that salesman was number one in his company. The executives of the company sat him down to find out how he had completely outstripped all of their other sales people in sales of windshields. After hearing his story, they proceeded to issue hammers and glass to every sales person in the company.

The following year, the same salesman completely outstripped the rest of the sale people again. The executive brought him in to their offices to find out how he did it. He stated' "this year I decided to try a little something different. I handed the hammer to my potential client and had them strike the piece of glass." And, with the potential client completely involved in the process, he made more sales. The lesson for success in this story is that sometimes it can be the smallest thing that moves you closer to success.
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THE REAL ROAD TO SUCCESS

Now, how to discover the real road to SUCCESS. But, every website you look at is a scheme to get your money not offering anything tangible at the end. None of them offer a real opportunity to ever reach long lasting success. Most of these websites offers are nothing more than MLM and promises. But success is not free as they would like to lead you to believe.

You have to work at becoming a real success. Why not start with your education? Why would becoming a success be any different than becoming a physician, attorney, or any other career. You need to know where to get that education in order to succeed.

The first recommendation is to graduate from college if at all possible. The mere fact that you have a diploma will open doors that would not otherwise be available to you. There is only one problem. Probably, not one single professor has ever been in the real business world. They are academics. Oh, you will have lots of theory, but now you are faced with the reality that you are full of theory. But how will you apply all of that theory in the real, practical world of life, whether it is business or personal.

At about 27, I started my first business. It was hell. I could hardly eat. I was overwhelmed with anxiety. I immediately had to start generating enough revenue to pay my bills.

My saving Grace happened to be a close friend who was the number one stock broker at a nationwide brokerage firm. That first Christmas of being self employed he gave me a gift certificate to Success Magazine (successmagazine.com). At first, I didn’t give it much thought. Then my first issue came and I discovered I couldn't put it down.

But this was only the beginning. In reality, this just opened a huge set of golden doors to all of the things that were available to help me start my own journey to success.

My personal favorites have always been audio books and DVDs. I am a terrible reader but love the audio/visual side aids for training. The real beauty of audio books on CD is that you can listen to them in your car over and over again. But audio books and DVDs by themselves would never have been enough.

When you boil it all down there are probably 10 to 15 books, audio books and DVDs that will literally change your life. Not one of which am I going to introduce to you to as a “secret”. I am going to introduce you to my personal favorites and tell you why they are my favorites. But I am also going to do it in my favorite way. Ever open a 400 page book and it looks overwhelming? Me too, especially since I am a poor reader. I truly believe that a huge number of books are written by authors who are trying to impress their peers, particularly college text books; so, there are an abundant amount of words, big words.

How many times have you said to yourself, "that was a great short read"? If the majority of authors of a self-help books can't tell you everything you will need to know in that book for it to have been effective, they should be able to do it in less than 250 pages, preferably less than 200 pages. As evidence, I offer the author, Og Mandino. He has written dozens of books, none of which are over 200 pages. Cut out all of the words and cut to the chase. I love a good self-help book that uses bullet points with some good short detail on why these bullet points are so key to that book.

Let's start with these:

1. The Richest Man in Babylon - Charles Classon - I like to start here because this book is so inspirational and a short fast read packed with a awesomely inspiring story. This will help stimulate your inner self to a higher elevation while filling you with all of the basics of becoming successful. www.eBeegle.com

2. Law of Success - Napoleon Hill - For shear volume of how to, 1060 plus pages, this is the next step. Napoleon Hill will give you, in detail, everything known to man kind about becoming successful. These are the gritty details incredibly well presented. My son had read this 1060 plus page book 3 times by the time he was 18. He now owns his own company and is a multi-millionaire. And, yes be also graduated from college. But, he will be the first to say that what I am saying to you now is what I said to him and was the real reason (not a “secret“) for his success.
www.eBeegle.com

Law of Success is my only exception to my rule of brevity since it is really about the equivalent to 10 or 12 books rolled into one book.

3. The Strangest Secret in the World - Og Mandino is a story in his own right. You won’t find his books, several dozen, in the business, sales, motivational, etc., section of your favorite book store. You will find an entire rack of these books in the inspiration/religion section. But, my favorite is still this book that is timeless. All of his books are short, insightful and inspirational and they are all timeless.
www.eBeegle.com

The following is a list of sources for success that I highly recommend:

W. Clement Stone - Author, Brian Tracy - Author, Jeffrey Gitomer - Author, Stephen Covey - Author, Dr. Norman Vincent Peale - Author and
Zig Ziglar - Author

You owe it to yourself to see Zig in person at one of his live performances or purchase one of his many DVDs. We all need that extra shot of motivation and inspiration from time to time. Zig will charges your batteries.

Helpful Hint: If it is or was written by a college professor, do not buy it. Unless, they have proven themselves to be a success off campus. We deal in the real world. All of the above can be found at MY FAVORITES to the left.