Becoming A Master of Persuasion------By: Brian Tracy

Persuasion power can help you get more of the things you want faster than anything else you do. It can mean the difference between success and failure. It can guarantee your progress and enable you to use all of your other skills and abilities at the very highest level. Your persuasion power will earn you the support of others.

You Have Two Choices:

There are always two choices: either you can persuade others to help you or you can be persuaded to help them. It is one or the other. Most people are not aware that every human interaction involves a complex process of persuasion and influence. And being unaware, they are usually the ones being persuaded to help others rather than the ones who are doing the persuading.

The Key to Persuasion:

The key to persuasion is motivation. Every human action is motivated by something. Your job is to find out what motivates other people and then to provide that motivation.People have two major motivations: the desire for gain and the fear of loss. The desire for gain motivates people to want more of the things they value in life. They want more money, more success, more health, more influence, more respect, more love and more happiness.Human wants are limited only by individual imagination. No matter how much a person has, he or she still wants more and more. When you can show a person how he or she can get more of the things he or she wants by helping you achieve your goals, you can motivate them to act in your behalf.

A Presidential Insight:

President Eisenhower once said that, "Persuasion is the art of getting people to do what you want them to do, and to like it." You need always to be thinking about how you can get people to want to do the things that you need them to do to attain your objectives.

The Fear of Loss:

People are also motivated to act by the fear of loss. This fear, in all its various forms, is often stronger than the desire for gain. People fear financial loss, loss of health, anger or disapproval of others, loss of the love of someone and the loss of anything they have worked hard to accomplish. They fear change, risk and uncertainty because these threaten them with potential losses.

Use Dual Motivation:

Whenever you can show a person that, by doing what you want them to do, they can avoid a loss of some kind, you can influence them to take a particular action. The very best appeals are those where you offer an opportunity to gain and an opportunity to avoid loss at the same time.

Selling to Today's Customers

What is selling? In its simplest terms, selling is the process of helping a person to conclude that your product or service is of greater value to him than the price you are asking for.

How Markets Work

Our market society is based on the principles of freedom and mutual benefit. Each party to a transaction only enters into it when he feels that he will be better off as a result of the transaction than he would be without it.

The Three Options

In a free market, the customer always has three options with any purchase decision. First, the customer can buy your product or service. Second, the customer can buy the product or service from someone else. Third, the customer can decide to buy nothing at all.

Convincing the Customer

For the customer to buy your particular product or service, he or she must be convinced that it is not only the best choice available but he must also be persuaded that there is no better way for him to spend the equivalent amount of money. Your job as a salesperson is to convince the customer that all these conditions exist and then to elicit a commitment from him to take action on your offer.

Customize Your Sales Presentation

The field of professional selling has changed dramatically since World War II. In a way, selling methodologies are merely responses to customer requirements. At one time, customers were relatively unsophisticated and poorly informed about their choices. Salespeople catered to this customer with carefully planned and memorized sales presentations, loads of enthusiasm and a bag full of techniques designed to crush resistance and get the order at virtually any cost.

Treat Them With Respect

But the customer of the 1950s has matured into the customer of the 21st century. Customers are now more intelligent and knowledgeable than ever before. They are experienced buyers and they have interacted with hundreds of salespeople. They are extremely sophisticated and aware of the incredible variety of products and services that are available to them, as well as their relative strengths and weaknesses of those products. Many of them are smarter and better educated than most salespeople and they are far more careful about making a buying decision of any kind.

The Need For Speed

In addition, they are overwhelmed with work and under-supplied with time. Because of the rapidly increasing pace of change, down-sizing, restructuring and the competitive pressures surrounding them, customers today are harried and hassled. They are swamped with responsibilities, impatient, suspicious, critical, demanding, and spoiled. To sell to today's customer requires a higher caliber of sales professional than has ever before been required. And it is only going to become tougher and more complicated in the months and years ahead.

Strategic Thinking By: Brian Tracy

The Quality of Thoughtfulness:
The ability to think and plan strategically is perhaps the most important single skill of the effective executive. In a longitudinal study of leaders who, in retrospect, made the best and most effective decisions, the single quality that stood out from all others was the quality of "thoughtfulness."
Thoughtfulness may be defined as a careful concern for the secondary consequences of each decision and each action. This is the essence of strategic thinking.

Your Most Powerful Tool:
The most powerful tool that you as an executive have to bring to bear on your work is your mind - your thinking ability. Everything you do that sharpens and hones your ability to think with greater clarity before acting, will benefit you and help you to move upward and onward more rapidly in your career.

Use a Two Pronged Approach:
The best way to approach strategic thinking is two pronged. This means to work simultaneously on the personal and the corporate.
Increase Your "Return On Energy":
In personal terms, strategic planning is an exercise in increasing "return on energy." Your greatest single asset is your earning ability. And your earning ability is nothing more than the total of the mental, emotional and physical energies that you can apply toward getting valuable results for yourself and your company.

Anything that you can do to increase your return on energy invested will increase your overall levels of effectiveness and contribution in every area of your life, especially, and most importantly in your work.

THE POWER OF THOUGHTS.

What are thoughts?

• Thoughts are imaginations but they are more than imaginations.

• Mental perceptions.•

The way we perceive things, people, situations, environments and ideas.

• Our interpretation of conditions and interactions.

Thoughts are pictures from the mind, which can either be constructive or destructive.

Thoughts are more than imaginations as some think it is. Your thoughts may be holding you in bondage today or as a result of your thoughts, you may be experiencing a glorious liberty today.

Until you change a man's thinking (mindset/orientation), you can not change him or his estate. Romans12:2. And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.The quickest way to affect or influence your thoughts is through sight.

You've got to see something; you can't take or have what you cannot see.

Joshua: 6 vs. 1-2. Now Jericho was straitly shut up because of the children of Israel: none went out, and none came in. 2And the LORD said unto Joshua, "See", I have given into thine hand Jericho, and the king thereof, and the mighty men of valour.

It’s not coincidental that God told Joshua to see; he was not blind but He told him to see! Meaning, he had to see it, he had to see the "done deal", he had to see and relate with Jericho as a city whose king and mighty men were already captured by them! He had to do that with the power of thoughts to back it up.

God couldn't change Abram's situation until he could see and comprehend what God had planned for him. One day, God told him, "I have given you the south, the north, the east, the west. As far as your eyes can see”. Genesis 13:14 -15.

Thoughts are pictures of the mind.

Genesis 15:2-6. God told Abraham, count the stars because you going to give birth to stars they are not going to be ordinary people. Then for the first time, Abraham got the picture of what God was saying; he saw it! God can only do for you what you see.

"The extent of your vision is the boundary of you possession". That's why He gave to you a mind. You have to think. You can discipline your mind, you can determine which thoughts to have and believe. That's the difference between the one who turns out as a drug addict and the one who turns into a businessman.

Think about that farmer that comes to his garden and thought, 'I like it because I have tomatoes' and everything grows and he leaves the weeds to grow. You have to decide to mount guard over your mind. Don’t let every thought come in. DON’T ACCEPT EVERY THOUGHT THAT COMES INTO YOUR MIND.

The thoughts you choose to allow, that's what will affect you. It doesn't matter what happens to you or what situation you find yourself, you have a choice to remain there or to come out of it.

You must choose the way your thoughts should go. You create your thoughts, "for as he thinketh in his heart so is he". Proverbs 23 vs. 7.You are exactly what your thoughts created. Your thoughts can either keep you poor or lead you in the way of prosperity!It doesn’t matter what situation you find yourself, you have to make a choice to come out of the situation. No, don't stay there! We are talking about thoughts. Think, think!

The Law of Saving

Financial freedom comes to the person who saves ten percent or more of his income throughout his lifetime.
One of the smartest things that you can ever do for yourself is to develop the habit of saving part of your salary, every single paycheck. Individuals, families and even societies are stable and prosperous to the degree to which they have high savings rates. Savings today are what guarantee the security and the possibilities of tomorrow.

Start With Yourself:
The first corollary of the Law of Saving comes from the book The Richest Man in Babylon by George Classon. It is to "Pay yourself first."
Begin today to save ten percent of your earnings, off the top, and never touch it. This is your fund for long-term financial accumulation and you never use it for any other reason except to assure your financial future.

Develop New Habits Regarding Money:
The remarkable thing is that when you pay yourself first, and force yourself to live on the other ninety percent, you will soon become accustomed to it. You are a creature of habit. When you regularly put away ten percent of your earnings, you soon become comfortable living on the other ninety percent. Many people start by saving ten percent of their income and then graduate to saving fifteen percent, twenty percent, and even more. And their financial lives change dramatically as a result. So will yours.

Take Every Advantage:
The second corollary of the Law of Saving says, "Take advantage of tax deferred savings and investment plans." Because of high and even multiple tax rates, money that is saved or invested without being taxed accumulates at a rate of 30% to 40% faster than money that is subject to taxation. Self-made millionaires, according to Dr Thomas Stanley's book The Millionaire Next Door, are almost obsessive about accumulating their funds in assets such as real estate, self owned businesses and equities that increase in value without triggering tax liabilities.

Action Exercises:

Here are two things you can do to apply this law immediately:
First, begin today to put away ten percent of your earnings. Set up a special account for this purpose and treat your contributions to this account with the same respect that you do your rent or mortgage payments each month.

Second, become a lifelong student of money. Read the best books, take courses and subscribe to the most helpful magazines. Know what you are doing so you can always make intelligent decisions when you invest your funds.

Partnering For Profit

The way you can stand out from your competitors is for you to position your self as a business part ner, always looking for ways to improve your customer's business.

Help Your Customer's Business:

When you deal with a business person, you can be sure of one thing: that person thinks about his business day and night. It is very close to him. It is dear to his heart. And if you come in and talk to him and ask him questions about his business, looking for ways to help him run his business better, the customer is going to warm up to you and want to be associated with you and your company.

Differentiate Your self from Your Competitors:

As a part ner, you should always be looking to help your customer to cut costs and improve results in his or her area of responsibility. You should look for ways to help your customer in non-business areas as well. You should position your self as someone who cares more about the success of your customer than anything else, even more than you care about selling your product or service. This approach to partnering in profit with your customer is a key way to differentiate your self and to keep your customer for the indefinite future.

Practice the Reciprocity Principle:

There is a principle of reciprocity in business that is very powerful. It is simply this: If you do something nice for someone else, they will feel obligated to do something nice for you. You should be looking for opportunities to go the extra mile, to do more than you are paid for, to put in more than you take out. By extending your self, you improve your positioning in the customer's mind and increasingly differentiate yourself and your company from your competitors who are after the same business. If you do this long enough and strong enough, you will eventually develop the partnership to the point where your competitors don't have a chance against you.

Personal Skills you'll need to improve perfomance

Do you know that employers are looking for workers who have that special something: the skills, tendencies and attributes that help to keep productivity and profits up. Yes all of them are; no employer wants to waste funds in paying an employee that is not adding to the bottom line of the organization. The higher your skills, the more competitive you become at the market place. You decide where you work, you choose the company you want to work with- it all depends on you skills.

Below are a list of the skills that will make you top your colleagues at the work place.

Carefulness: Do you have a tendency to think and plan carefully before acting? This helps with reducing the chance for costly errors, as well as keeping a steady workflow going.

Cooperation: Willingness to engage in interpersonal work situations is very important in the workplace.

Creativity: You've heard of "thinking outside the box"? Employers want innovative people who bring a fresh perspective.

Discipline: This includes the ability to keep on task and complete projects without becoming distracted or bored.

Drive: Businesses want employees who have high aspiration levels and work hard to achieve goals.Good attitude: This has been shown to predict counterproductive work behaviors, job performance and theft.

Goodwill: This is a tendency to believe others are well-intentioned.Influence: Groups need strong leaders to guide the way.

Influence includes a tendency to positively impact social situations by speaking your mind and becoming a group leader.
Optimism: A positive attitude goes a long way toward productivity.

Order: "Where did I put that?" A tendency to be well organized helps employees to work without major distractions or "roadblocks."

Safe work behaviors: Employers want people who avoid work-related accidents and unnecessary risk-taking in a work environment.

Savvy: This isn't just about job knowledge, but knowledge of coworkers and the working environment. It includes a tendency to read other people's motives from observed behavior and use this information to guide one's thinking and action.

Sociability: How much you enjoy interacting with coworkers affects how well you work with them.

Stability: This means a tendency to maintain composure and rationality in stressful work situations.

Vigor: This is a tendency to keep a rapid tempo and keep busy.

Books for the week

"There is only one way to succeed at anything and that is to give everything."
-- Vince Lombardi, American Football Coach

Below is a list of books I'll recommend us this week. We'll do a review of one of the books next week. I encourage us to read at least one of them.
The books will help you in working towards achieving your goal in life.

Enjoy them!

• Time Tactics of Very Successful People by B. Eugene Griessman
• Who Moved My Cheese by Dr. Spencer Johnson
• Time Power by Brain Tracy

Developing A Great Character

Being the Best In Every Area:
What is character? Your character is the degree to which you live your life consistent with high, life-enhancing values. A person who lacks character is one who compromises on higher order values in favor of lower order expedience, or who has no values at all. Your adherence to what you believe to be right and true is the real measure of the person you have become to this moment.

Define What "Excellence" Means to You:
Let us say that one of your values is "excellence." Your definition of excellence could be, "Excellence means that I set the highest standards for myself in everything I do. I do my very best in every situation and under all circumstances. I constantly strive to be better in my work, and as a person in my relationships. I recognize that excellence is a life-long journey and I work every day to become better and better in everything I do."

Organize Your Actions:
With a definition like this, you have a clear organizing principle for your actions. You have set a standard by which you can evaluate your behavior. You have created a framework within which you can make decisions. You have a measuring rod against which you can compare yourself in everything you do. You can continually grade your activities in terms of "more" or "less." You have a clear target to aim at and organize your work around.

Decide What You Want for Your Family:
It's the same with each of your other values. If your value is your family, you could define this as, "The needs of my family take precedence over all other concerns. Whenever I have to choose between the happiness, health and well being of a member of my family, and any other interest, my family will always come first."

Keep Focused:
From that moment onward, it becomes easier for you to choose. Your family comes first. Until you have fully satisfied the needs of your family, no other time requirement will side track you into a lower value activity.

Shape Your Own Character:
The wonderful thing about values clarification is that it enables you to take charge of developing and shaping your own character. When your values and goals, your inner life and your outer life, are in complete alignment, you feel terrific about yourself. You enjoy high self-esteem. Your self-confidence soars.When you achieve complete congruence between your values and your goals, like a hand in a glove, you feel strong, happy, healthy and fully integrated as a person. You develop a kind of courage that makes you completely unafraid to make decisions and take action. Your whole life improves when you begin living your life by the values that you most admire.

Moving Upward and Onward....... Brain Tracy

Don't Sell Yourself Short:
It's not what you have but what you do with what you have that will determine your success or failure. Abraham Maslow, the great psychologist said that the story of the human race is the story of people selling themselves short. He said people have a tendency to settle for far less from life than they are truly capable of. Many people are spinning their wheels in careers where they should be moving rapidly onward and upward. Here's how you can put your career on the fast track.

Be the Best At What You Do:
Which leads us to the next point. If you want to reach the stars in your career, you have to become excellent at what you do. You have to pay any price, go any distance, spend any amount of time necessary to "be the best." Extraordinary rewards only go for extraordinary performance; average rewards for average performance; below average rewards, insecurity and failure for below average performance. And here's a vital key, you are being paid today exactly what you're worth - no more, no less. If you want to earn more, you must increase your worth, your value to others.

The Key to Motivation:
The reason why choosing the right career, why doing what you love to do is so important, is because unless you really care about your work, you will never be motivated to persist at it until you become excellent. And until you become excellent at what you're doing, you can't move ahead.

The Key to Peak Performance:
The antidote to these fears is the development of courage, character and self-esteem. The opposite of fear is actually love, self-love and self-respect. Acting with courage in a fearful situation is simply a technique that boosts our regard for ourselves to such a degree that our fears subside and lose their ability to effect our behavior and our decisions.