You Can't Fail to Succeed... Or Can You?

If you believe success is a dynamic journey rather than a static destination, then you must be moving, constantly, toward achieving it.

How you define or measure success will, of course, change over time. But that you must be moving ever closer to it, is an undeniable truth.

Today, I’d like to examine the value of embracing ‘failure’ in the short-term because of its ability to affect your ‘success’ in the long-term.

If you're an agent, especially a newer one, you must learn to perceive failure at doing things that are key to your success as lessons on the road to success rather than ‘dead-ends’ that lead to nowhere good.

Once that happens, you fear failure less and less and become more likely to engage in the behaviors that produce the results you (and management) use to define and measure ‘success’.

FAILURE IS THE OTHER SIDE OF THE COIN MARKED “SUCCESS”

There’s an interesting enigma in sales. To be successful, typically measured by revenues generated / income earned, you must do certain things . . . behaviors . . . consistently and conscientiously. Problem is, that’s easier said than done.

Most behavior – especially selling behavior – is learned behavior. That means a lot of what an agent must do to succeed is not innate. It must be learned. And there’s the challenge.

To become effective at doing anything, like:
• asking clients for referrals to people they know,
• asking prospects, “How much are you prepared to invest to make _________ happen?”,
• upholding your price or margins when a prospect invites you to do ‘unpaid consulting’,
• etc.
you have to actually do these things! And most of the time, you’ll do them ineffectively. At first.

POOR PERFORMANCE IS PUNISHING

Doing anything that you don’t do well is emotionally painful. It’s punishing. We’d all like to think we’re all that and a bag of chips, right? Well, think back to the first time you asked someone for a date. Did it go well? Did you get a date? Or, did you get a lesson. A lesson in what to do or not to do . . . to get a date the next time you try for one.

I had a good friend in middle school, Tommy. Not his real name -- for reasons that will become obvious in a moment. We both were young and discovered the opposite sex about the same time. It was a most magical time! We’d both come to see girls in our class quite differently than we did the year before the transformation in our perception took place!

Suddenly it was an exciting and wonderful time to be alive! Tommy and I both had our flirtatious moments with young ladies in our class. Soon, we each had an opportunity arise to do something we’d never done before. As you might imagine, things didn’t exactly go according to the plan we had in mind! We both got ‘shot down’ or, 'turned down' for a date. It was crushing to our egos!

But here’s the thing -- we both ‘failed’ at what we attempted to do. The difference was that one of us took that failed attempt as a ‘lesson’ that taught me what I had to do to succeed at getting a girl to go out on a date. That very same result taught Tommy a very different kind of lesson. The result? A commitment – equally strong – "I'll NEVER attempt to do that again!"

I believe Tommy's reluctance only lasted until late in our sophomore year of high school. Too bad. He missed out on some magical moments that didn’t have to be lost – but were – all because the pain of avoiding getting turned down for a date was more powerful than was his desire to go on a date and share a special moment with a young lady in middle school.

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OK, here are 10 points I’d like you to take away from this week’s post:

Point #1:
Successful outcomes are a reflection that you’re doing the right things, effectively and consistently.

Point #2:
Learning to do anything (especially behavior) is, most likely, not going to go well at first.
Point #3:
If you don’t keep attempting to do something, you won’t get better at doing it.

Point #4:
If you don’t get better at doing something, then attempting to do it is punishing.

Point #5:
Punishing behavior is behavior we tend to avoid doing.

Point #6:
Avoided behavior is not likely to become effective behavior.

Point #7:
To become effective at doing anything, you can’t avoid it. You must embrace it. Warts and all. Until they’re gone.

Point #8:
To engage in any behavior consistently and conscientiously, so you can get better at doing it, you must learn to see that even a less than ideal result is a learning lesson . . . not the end of the world as you know it . . . and a barometer of the imminent success that awaits you.

Point #9:
Learning to see a ‘failure’ to do something in the moment . . . must be embraced as a necessary step on the road to a better result in the future.

Point #10:
Successful agents embrace behaviors that produce successful results. Unsuccessful agents do not. Why? Because the unsuccessful agents are more motivated by their desire for 'safe' behaviors and must accept the results they offer. Successful agents, on the other hand, are more motivated by their desire for pleasing results and are willing to embrace such 'risky' behaviors, in the short-run, as are necessary to enjoy significant and above-average success in the long-run. It's all a matter of vision and perspective. Mundane people do magnificent things when their vision and perspective is managed properly.