Category Archives: Sales

June 20, 2012 · 10:47 am

Understanding the Real Cost of Field Sales Professionals

Key Concept ~ Congratulations!  You’ve reached sufficient traction in your burgeoning business to hire your first field sales team.  You know it’s an expensive move, but a necessary step in the scaling of your business.  But are you sure of what the real costs are of deploying field sales teams?  Here are some insights from a project I did a few years ago that shed some well needed light on field sales, and the critical nature of mindfully leading your investment.

Several years ago, I was consulting on business strategy with a custom sales company called SalesForce4Hire®, LLC.  I worked with them to help develop something we called Sales Prototyping®.  Every company in the world prototypes a product before bringing it into production and the market, but rarely, if ever, did we witness companies prototyping their sales process.  The company’s focus is primarily in the medical device space, so a typical sales launch from a traditional company would put upwards of 28 sales reps in the field to launch a new device.  This provides ample coverage of the key population centers, and associated physicians and hospitals, around the country.  This also represents an investment of around $5 million per year!

As we were refining our strategy, positioning and value proposition, I dug into the research to try to determine the true, albeit hidden cost, of field sales personnel in the industry.  As I waded through the research, I was astonished at the inefficiencies that exists in many sales organizations.  Two things immediately jumped off the pages of the research.  First, industrial, business-to-business sales representatives take a lot of office days.  With technology being what it is today, this, to me at least, seemed excessive.  The second issue was how much time was wasted in sales meetings.  Again, with the online meeting capabilities combined with the mobility enabled by smart phones and tablets, this seemed excessive.  Between the two, 98 days a year are spent out of the field!  That’s twenty work weeks out of the year or 40% of the available selling days per annum (including a two week vacation, but not including holidays).  Forty percent of the company’s investment of $5 million for their sales team is $2 million!

So out of the 132 remaining sales days, how much time do field sales representatives actually spend in face-to-face selling time?  According to the research, the typical field sales rep is spending somewhere between two and three hours a day actually selling to prospects (and let’s hope they’re true prospects).  This is primarily due to poor planning resulting in excessive windshield time.  You’d think with the 78 days of office time taken, sales reps would be more efficient once they got their butts out the door.  What we’re left with is somewhere between 33 and 50, eight hour days, of face-to-face selling time for a typical field deployed, industrial sales representative, per annum.

Now, let’s get down to the brass tacks of the real cost of field sales.  I’m going to use a fully burdened, annual cost per sales rep of $100,000 per year (this is conservative in many industries, as the annual cost can easily run upwards of $120,000 to $140,000 per year, depending on the geography and industry).  At the end of the day, the cost of face-to-face selling time for many companies is running somewhere between $250 and $380 per selling hour.  And you thought your attorney was expensive!

I realize a portion of this burdened expense is performance based, and thus variable, but it is critical, especially for a first time entrepreneur, to fully understand the significance of the investment they’re making in field sales professionals.  Please keep in mind, these figures reflect fully engaged sales professionals.  Rarely have I met a sales person that wasn’t ready to jump ship for greener pastures, and the employee disengagement numbers are simply dismal today (for a detailed analysis on the misalignment of employees today, please visit Igniting Creativity in Business).

The point we brought to the surface through this investigation is you had better have a really solid sales launch plan in place before you decide to deploy a field sales team.  We were also able to make a strong case for our value proposition.  Without a finely honed, well targeted plan, you may find your sales acquisition costs are exceeding your profitability.

© 2012, Terry Murray.

SaleForce4Hire and Sales Prototyping are registered trademarks and servicemarks of McGeever©, LLC.

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March 28, 2012 · 12:28 pm

The Transformational Entrepreneur Cited in the Academic Journal of Economic Literature

For Immediate Release – March 28, 2012 -

Terry Murray’s groundbreaking book, “The Transformational Entrepreneur ~ Engaging The Mind, Heart & Spirit For Business Breakthrough Success” was recognized and cited in the peer-reviewed, academic Journal of Economic Literature’s March 2012 quarterly issue.

Performance Transformation, LLC™ (Venice, FL) announced today that their founder and Managing Partner’s book, “The Transformational Entrepreneur”was recognized and cited in the academic Journal of Economic Literature for its contribution to professional business literature and thought leadership.

“We received the unsolicited notification letter from the Journal last week,” responded Mr. Murray. “It was both humbling and exciting at the same time.  I’ve been working on the business side of the life sciences, medical technology and health care sectors since 1988, so I have an enormous appreciation for the diligence of peer-reviewed, academic journals.  As a business executive, and not an academic, this is a distinct honor for my book to be recognized for its contribution to the field of business and economic professional literature.”

The Journal of Economic Literature is published by the American Economic Association (AEA), a professional organization of economists, academics, and business thought leaders with more than 22,000 members.

“My executive career has spanned some truly remarkable changes in the global business landscape,” added Terry.  ”Historically, there’s always been a lag in leadership, strategy and organizational philosophy in response to market shifts in value creation.  I entered the biotechnology world during its infancy.  This was the beginning of the knowledge-based economy and coincided with the boom in personal computing.  Yet the methods, perspectives, and philosophies we were trained for in business school all emerged out of the Industrial Age.  We literally had to discover a new approach to business as usual along the way, but it is only today, some 25 years later, that the strategic imperative of human creativity in business is beginning to move into the mainstream.”

“The Transformational Entrepreneur” will also be indexed in the American Economic Association’s internet database, EconLit, which is accessible at libraries and universities around the world, as well as to licensed institutions and AEA members.  The electronic bibliography indexes over 120 years of economics literature from around the world.  The database complies professional journal articles, collective volume articles, working papers, dissertations, and books of note on the subject of economics and business practice.

“The shift in the source of value creation truly began in the 1980s, but information technology bridged the productivity gap for thirty years, masking the need for a change in the approach to  leadership, strategy and organizational development.  By the turn of the century it was already beginning to hit a point of diminishing returns, right at the time the explosively disruptive power of the internet began to take off.  Even old world industries are doing business in ways they never could have anticipated ten years ago,” commented Terry.

Mr. Murray went on to say, “Perhaps because I was immersed in the knowledge-based economy for so long I saw the need for a more human-centric approach to business.  Research scientists, physicians and engineers, and their creative talents, are the raw material for value creation and competitive advantage in this new era of business.  You cannot lead creatives the same way we once managed assembly line workers.  Two years after I began writing my book, the IBM Global CEO Survey exemplified the perspective and approach I was writing about at the time, reporting that creativity and the ability to cultivate creativity throughout the workplace was the single most important attribute CEOs are looking for in future leaders.”

Terry’s book was published two months after IBM released the results of their bi-annual survey in December of 2010.

About the author ~ Terry Murray is an author, speaker, entrepreneur, and professional business advisor/coach with twenty-five years of progressive experience in strategic development, executive leadership, and the deployment of highly profitable business teams. His work with Fortune 1000 and startup companies has directly contributed more than $1 billion in market capitalization growth throughout his career.

He is the founder and Managing Partner of Performance Transformation, LLC™, a professional and strategic development firm focused on igniting breakthrough performance by optimizing and aligning authentic leadership, mindful strategy, and an engaging, creative organizational culture.  The company’s evidence-based programs and pragmatic approach employs their proprietary Accretive Coaching Process℠.  This innovative, developmental process integrates concepts from published research in the neurosciences, emotional intelligence, performance psychology, quantum physics and Applied Behavioral Economics with Equine Facilitated Experiential Learning.

For more information, please visit http://ignitingcreativityinbusiness.com.

© 2012, Performance Transformation, LLC™.


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March 22, 2012 · 9:49 pm

The Correlation Between Coherence, Flow and Productivity

Key Concept ~ Most entrepreneurs share a common attribute; a burning sense of urgency.  While intrinsic motivation is critical for someone striking out on their own or stepping up to launch and lead a startup business, some balance is required as well. Entrepreneurship is a marathon, not a sprint, and how we regulate our own energy, focus and activities has a bearing on long-term success.

If you’re an entrepreneur you’re probably fairly familiar with eighty to one hundred hour work weeks, juggling multiple priorities concurrently, and literally living your business at times.  If our own fire in the belly isn’t enough motivation, the constrained resources, limited bandwidth, competing priorities, and competitive pressures of leading a startup quickly remind us…there’s always work to be done.  The question is, what happens to our productivity, our ability to creatively leverage our vision, business acumen and experience for the benefit of the business, when we simply find ourselves running too hard?

We all do it at times.  I’ll be the first to admit, I’m a habitual offender.  It started in college.  I launch my first company my junior year at business school and would commonly work sixty hours a week while going to college full time.  By my second semester I scheduled all of my classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays, which in my mind, left a complete five day work week for the business!  I was the classic young man in a hurry.  I did the same thing in corporate, working eighty to hundred hour weeks, flying 100,000 miles a year, and not taking a real vacation during a five year stretch.

My wife kindly forwarded an article to me last week that referenced a host of research studies, some going as far back as 1914 (Henry Ford conducted internal research on productivity, costs, and labor hours), all demonstrating how rapidly human productivity declines after working for eight hours a day or more than forty hours a week.  Winston Churchill recognized this during the war and devised a clever work schedule to maximize his productivity and meet the demands of the Prime Minister fighting the Axis powers on a global front.  He would rise early and work until mid-day, at which time he would go home, take a bath (while giving dictation to his secretary sitting just outside the ajar door), and then a long nap.  He would then go back to work until late into the night.  He was also known to have commented there’s never a good time to take a vacation.  Take one anyways.  And he practiced this even during the darkest years of the war.

The research referenced in the article made a pretty strong argument, and I’m not one to argue with Mr. Churchill, but there was still a part of me that was thinking, yea, well how do you explain my success…it was directly associated with my effort, right?  My wife kindly reminded me that all of our company professional development programs and workshops are based upon peer-reviewed research.  She then added, “Ignoring research on productivity wouldn’t be very authentic, would it?”

So I took the weekend off.

Let’s face it, sometimes a forty hour work week is impossible for us.  But at what cost to our productivity?   One thing is for certain, entrepreneurs would be well served to cultivate emotional resiliency in order to maintain our own optimal level of productivity.  This is a core focus of our programs and workshops; the cultivation of competencies in emotional intelligence.  Building our self-awareness, self-regulation, social awareness, and relationship management skills places us onto the path to self-mastery.  There are actual, biological underpinnings that we can positively influence, for ourselves and those around us, that directly effect our productivity as well as our health (another critical factor, entrepreneurs can rarely afford the time to be sick).

Those capable of self-mastery, of mindfully engaging their emotional landscape (internally and externally), experience multi-dimensional benefits.  First, they experience the physiological and psychological benefit called coherence.1   Coherence occurs when the oscillatory systems of the body (i.e. heart beat, respiratory rate, blood pressure, brain waves) synchronize and become entrained together in frequency.2  Coherence improves physiological function on a biochemical and metabolic level.  We all know that unhealthy levels of stress have a negative impact on our immune system and the health of our heart.  Being in a state of coherence is believed to have the opposite effect.

Achieving coherence also has a positive impact on cognitive ability.  When we are fully engaged and enjoying what we are doing we enter what renowned researcher and psychology professor Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi refers to as flow.  Dr. Csikszentmihalyi’s research looked into the psychological state of a wide variety of professionals operating at peak performance.  When they were fully engaged, focused, and enjoying their endeavor, their biochemistry reflected an increase in cortisol (from the hypothalamic/pituitary/adrenal, or HPA axis) which brought them to a place in which they were taking full advantage of their cognitive and/or physical abilities.  If the HPA axis shot past this point due to stress, adrenaline and cortisol levels continued to rise and performance rapidly diminished.  His work proved that a person’s emotional state is a governing factor in cognitive and physical performance.

Still another benefit of coherence is its effect on our ability to positively engage and motivate those around us.  When we express empathy for another being, entrainment of each person’s physiological rhythms ensues.  Research conducted by Drs. Levenson and Gottman at UC Berkeley observed this phenomena between spouses.3  Research conducted by Carl Marci at Harvard University documented similar results of coherence and physiological entrainment between patients and psychotherapists during expressed moments of empathy by the therapist.4  When people connect emotionally we actually connect physiologically as well.

All of these things profoundly effect our productivity as entrepreneurs and leaders.  We’re all different, but cultivating the self-awareness to see when we’re pushing ourselves past optimal flow can help us self-regulate and maintain our productivity by taking our foot off the gas, even if for a moment.

1.)  R. McCraty, M. Atkinson, “Psychophysiological Coherence”, D, McCraty R, Wilson BC, eds. Emotional Sovereignty. Amsterdam: Harwood Academic Publishers, forthcoming.

2.)  R. McCraty, “The Energetic Heart – Bioelectromagnetic Interactions Within and Between People”.  Institute of HeartMath, Boulder Creek, CA., 2003.

3.)  R. Levenson, A. Ruef, “Physiological Aspects of Emotional Knowledge and Rapport”, In: W. Ickes, ed. Empathic Accuracy, Guilford Press, New York, New York 1997.

4.)  C. Marci, “Psychophysiology and Psychotherapy:  The Neurobiology of Human Relatedness”, Practical Reviews of Psychiatry,  2002; 25(3).

5.)  M. Iacoboni, “Imitation, Empathy, and Mirror Neurons”, Annual Review of Psychology, 2009.

© 2012, Terry Murray.

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March 12, 2012 · 10:00 pm

Performance Transformation Launches Igniting Creativity in Business

PR Newswire – FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Performance Transformation, LLC™ (Venice, FL) announced today the launch of their new professional development programs and workshops designed to cultivate creativity in the workplace.

“We’re very excited to bring our innovative approach into the marketplace,” said Terry Murray, Founder and Managing Partner of Performance Transformation.  ”Regardless of your industry, creativity thinking is now a strategic imperative for cultivating and sustaining competitive advantage in the 21st Century.”

In fact, the 2010 IBM Global CEO survey identified the single most important attribute CEOs are looking for in future leaders is creativity and their ability to cultivate creativity throughout the organization.  However, a peer-reviewed research study conducted by Cornell University  and published in The Journal For Experimental Social Psychology identifies a disconnect.  The research identified a heretofore unseen bias in business.  High potentials that display creativity are often sidetracked on their way up the corporate ladder.

“The accelerating complexity of the global marketplace we’re currently experiencing is unprecedented,” adds Mr. Murray.  ”Creative thinking can no longer be relegated to the R&D or marketing functions.  It needs to be present at every touchpoint throughout the organization.”

More than four years in development and validation, the Igniting Creativity In Business series of professional development programs and workshops are entirely based upon peer-reviewed research from diverse, scientific disciplines.  Research findings from the neurosciences, emotional intelligence, biochemistry, Applied Behavioral Economics, Core Mammalian Emotional Systems, performance psychology, creativity research, Kolb’s Adult Learning Style Inventory, and quantum physics have been integrated into a multi-dimensional, innovative approach for sparking creativity and innovative thinking.

“For the past four years we’ve been focused on developing and delivering programs and workshops that align and optimize leadership, strategy, and organizational culture,” states Terry.  ”Our baseline programs, first released in 2010, Transformational Leadership, Adaptive Team Building, Igniting Breakthrough Sales, The Emotionally Resilient Nurse, and Warriors in Transition set the foundation for the next evolution in professional development.  When we saw the results from the IBM Global CEO Survey a year and a half ago we realized we had identified the fundamental elements necessary for promulgating creativity in business.”

In the past two years, more than a dozen research studies and surveys have been released by global consultancies, universities, and leading institutions all pointing to the growing disconnect between leadership and employees.  Economic volatility and the global recession contributed to this issue. On a macro level, more than 70% of employees are disengaged with their company.  Trust in leadership is at an all time low (10%) and fear dominates many organizational cultures.

Terry goes on to state, “Fear kills creativity.  It is part of our Core Mammalian Emotional System.  When we promote fear as a motivating factor, we get a predictable response; disengagement.  When we promote another of our part of our Core Mammalian Emotional System, seeking, we also get a predictable response; engagement and creativity.”

Today’s multi-cultural and multi-generational workplace provides significant opportunities for devising and implementing creative solutions to challenges and opportunities alike.  It does, however, require a fresh approach to leading, planning, and delivering a culture capable of engaging every human perspective in the business.

“Creative thinking requires both divergent thinking and convergent focus,” added Terry.  ”Diversity of perspectives, coming from diverse people is key.  Inclusion of diverse perspectives has never been more strategically important for companies than it is today.  The other key element for creative thinking that is often overlooked in business is novel stimuli.”

Performance Transformation delivers novel cognitive, emotional, and psychological stimuli through their proprietary Accretive Coaching Process℠, which can include Equine Facilitated Experiential Learning workshops.  The carefully crafted, ground-based exercises with horses introduces a novel, neurological response triggering the development of new neural pathways.  This approach, followed up with a rigorous educational and coaching process helps professionals shift their response to new challenges away from conditioned thinking into an exploratory, neurological response.

Terry concludes, “The challenge is to first promote the formation of new neural pathways in the individual through the introduction of emotionally, cognitively, and psychologically novel stimuli.  To break out of the wheel worn paths of conditioned thinking.  The brain is very conservative with energy, so it has a tendency to follow the path of least resistance.  Developing new neural pathways takes more energy than following established ones.  The more practiced we are in developing new ways of thinking, the easier it becomes to respond to unprecedented challenges in creative ways.  We then work to help client organizations connect and amplify the nodes of though throughout their company.  This approach to cross-pollinating organizational thinking is the key to success going forward.”

© 2012, Performance Transformation, LLC™.

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March 5, 2012 · 5:55 pm

Are You Prepared for the Talent Shortage?

Key Concept ~ Competing for talent is always a challenge for small firms.  The competition for talent in the 21st Century is already accelerating.  Entrepreneurial startups may want to rethink how they attract, recruit, and retain talent going foward.

The global staffing firm Manpower Group™ issued their 2011 Global Talent Shortage Survey (Manpower Global Talent Survey 2011 PDF) recently in which they identified that 52% of U.S. firms are struggling to find adequate talent for open positions.  In all of the Americas only Brazil, at 57%, is experiencing a greater shortage of talent than the U.S.  I don’t know about you, but I find this to be quite a sad commentary on the state of competitive fitness in the U.S.  There are few signs the talent shortage is about to abate any time soon.  In fact, most executives are anticipating the opposite; as we continue to move further away from the Great Recession the competition for talent will continue to heat up.

So, what are companies doing in response?  According to the survey, not much. In response to the shortage of talent (particularly for technicians, sales representatives, and skilled trade workers…the top three areas of talent shortfalls) only one out of five companies is increasing their training and educational programs for their associates.  Only 6% are pro-actively working with local schools and educational institutions to help address the skill gap.  More companies (25%) are changing their recruiting strategy than are looking to change, or even evaluate, their approach to how they lead and develop talent.

What was really startling was the perception held by executives as to the level of impact not filling key openings in a timely manner has on stakeholders (customers, investors, associates, etc.).  Only one out of five executives surveyed felt not backfilling a critical, open position has a high impact on constituents.  The survey goes on to identify 43% of executives believe leaving a position open has little impact, no impact, or didn’t know if open positions had any impact whatsoever on stakeholders.  This certainly isn’t the impression I’ve been getting from the research that continues to emerge from companies like McKinsey & Co., Gallup, RogenSi, Martitz Research, and other global consultancies.  The disconnect this points to is nothing short of astounding.  Hopefully, entrepreneurs, who tend to be closer to the front lines of day-to-day business, recognize just how disruptive this can be for the associates that remain onboard.

We collectively seem to have very short memories.  It was just fourteen short years ago when we went through the last severe chase for talent.  I was running a global service business in the biotechnology/pharmaceutical sector for a major corporation at the time.  The dot.com boom was in full swing, and places like the San Francisco Bay Area, a hotbed for both the high tech and biotech industries, had an unemployment rate of around 1%.  Our own customers were aggressively pirating our technicians away from our business.  Technicians that required six months of training and education before they were fully capable of conducting their work within the highly regulated biopharmaceutical industry.  Even if I could find potential technicians worth training, the skyrocketing wage scale and cost of living in the Bay Area created remarkable barriers to backfilling.  It became so severe, we would dispatch technicians from as far away as Mexico City and New Jersey for a week at a time to support our customers in Northern California.

What’s coming next will make that talent shortage pale in comparison.  More than 10,000 Baby Boomers are retiring every day.  This rate of retirement will continue for the next seventeen years!  Workers from the Gen X and Gen Y generations are simultaneously introducing an entirely different set of expectations regarding their careers.  They are far more mobile than their Baby Boomer predecessors.  They expect opportunities for professional development and a greater sense of purposefulness as part of their employment.  They witnessed leagues of loyal Boomers work for corporations for decades only to be callously displaced at the next downturn.  The typical length of engagement for these younger workers, the ones with the adaptive technology skills companies covet so dearly, is around three years.  Perhaps this is part of the reason companies are so hesitant to provide training and employ professional development plans?  I’ll hire it when I need it seems to continue to be the prevailing attitude, unfortunately, it may not be there when you go looking for it.

Many companies are holding fast to their slash and burn harvest mentality.  Of squeezing every bit of value out of fewer and fewer human resources.  Of expecting more and offering less in return.  The survey and research results of the past few years are clearly demonstrating the effect of this on the workforce.  The majority of workers are feeling over-burdened, disengaged, and apathetic towards their employers.  The social contract, one’s whose expectations were forged in the post-WWII era, between employers and employees is broken. Talent holds the cards now, and it will be talent that will renegotiates this relationship going forward.

This creates an opportunistic environment for entrepreneurs.  Create a better working experience, and the talent will very likely find your firm, however small, an attractive alternative to life in corporate settings.  As an example, my first national sales management position was with a small company in Massachusetts.  We were anything but an attractive employer for top, seasoned sales talent.  We were, however, a wonderful place for high potential talent to germinate, get a few years of real, business-to-business sales experience in the life science market, and move on to a top-notch gig with a major company in the sector.  I chose attitude, intelligence, and the desire to grow professionally over experience.  I chose to train my sales team to sell the way I knew, from my own sales experience in the sector, would work.  I knew going in, I had to catch the talent on their ascent, and provide them with the training and experience they needed to get to where they wanted to go.  I knew my place in the career food chain, followed this approach, and the team achieved exceptional results.  Each sales representative I hired was with us for just a little over two years and every one of them went on to six figure sales jobs with their next company.  It was a fair trade-off, everybody won because we had calibrated our expectations accordingly.

As the talent wars continue to flare up, take a step back and look at what you have to offer.  You may be pleasantly surprised by embracing a fresh perspective in what you define as talent and what you need in terms of experience.

© 2012, Terry Murray.

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February 16, 2012 · 4:06 pm

Why Our Intention Should be a Strategic Imperative

Key Concept ~ We need but look around us to see that the predatory, exclusionary business mindset of the 20th century no longer serves our best interests.  This fabric of the industrial age has grown threadbare.  The research that reveals the current leadership crisis is reaping the seeds it has sown by cultivating an endemic employee disengagement crisis.  Our intention truly matters, it is what resonates in the hearts of those we lead, and those with whom we wish to do business.

I was reading through the newly posted discussion threads from the groups I belong to on LinkedIn this morning and two in particular really struck me.  The first one was on a spiritually-oriented discussion group.  The individual that had started the group posted a rather scathing declaration that no promotional activity is acceptable in the group.  I can understand this, to a certain extent, as we’ve all been involved in discussion groups that are spammed and this can become more than a bit annoying.  But LinkedIn is, after all, a business social media site.  It isn’t Facebook, so shouldn’t we understand why people are on the site?  Because they have a business interest of some sort or another.  I know this is a fine line…one never wants to come off as a shill, and most discussion groups do have a promotions’ section.

What I found rather ironic about this particular post was how it was signed by the person that posted it…the individual’s name and “Group Owner”…on a spiritually-oriented group.  The individual also signs their name with one of those peculiar sequences that can appear, at least to me, to run like alphabet soup…CGI, BMOC, BPOE, ABCDEFG…Isn’t this a form of self promotion?  My point is, between expressing “ownership” and the presentation of credentials with signature, of which I have no idea of what they mean,  left me feeling a sense incongruity of intention.  My background is in the life sciences, so I truly appreciate when someone signs their name with Ph.D. after it…it represents a truly significant accomplishment. But isn’t our growing obsession with becoming certified, often by trade groups that are mere marketing organizations, just another form of promotion?  True certification indicates you have journeyed through an accredited school or training program that is recognized and meets the educational standards of a state board of education.

The other discussion group that was started was by a business coach offering to share the “Dirty Dozen”, his tips for making money in coaching.  The language caused me to recoil. Not cognitively so much, but on a deeper, emotional level. From my perspective, business coaching should resonate with positive intention, holding the space for both personal and professional growth for the one being coached. They’re both so closely intertwined, and many of the problems we see in business today are because people and their firm are thoroughly disengaged.

I read a study released late last year that indicated only 14% of employees believe their company shares their own personal values and beliefs. How can authentic engagement emerge in that type of climate?

I also deeply believe coaching should be highly inclusive. When I followed this gentleman’s link, I had to provide a litany of contact information before I could read what he had to say. For me, this again resonates with intention. I felt like this gentleman was trolling for prospects rather than reaching out with positive intention to share his wisdom. Please understand, my intention is not to be judgmental, it is simply meant to share what resonates within me when I hit landing pages that are a mile long, or must join another mailing list to access something that may have peaked my interest.

It’s readily apparent that the old ways of doing business no longer serve the broader interests of community and society. As Einstein so apply stated, “We cannot solve problems with the same level of consciousness that created them.”

Coaching is built upon relationship. Relationship emerges when we first connect cognitively (as I did when I was drawn to this coach’s discussion thread). Then we engage emotionally (which I couldn’t do because I felt a sense of coercion…I was offered a transactional deal for knowledge…I had to give something first, before I could receive the original offer…prior to seeing the actual value proposition).  Finally, we inspire and motivate others by touching the human spirit. With authenticity and transformational intention.

We all must make a living in this material world, I do not provide all of my business coaching services for free. But I do share my knowledge for free. This resonates with people, they feel my intention. If we look to the lessons from Applied Behavioral Economics we can fully appreciate that 70% of economic decision making is emotionally-driven, often unknowingly.  Intention truly matters.

I ask, as you head out into your business landscape to step away from business as usual, for just a moment and ask yourself how is my intention resonating with my prospects, associates, and colleagues?  It may open a door for a fresh approach that can truly drive sustainable, meaningful success!

© 2012, Terry Murray.

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January 19, 2012 · 3:00 am

Interview with Larry Whitler and Robin MacBlane on the AM Ocala Show

Key Concept ~ I was invited back to speak with Larry Whitler and Robin MacBlane on the radio program AM Ocala earlier this week.  Here’s a podcast of the interview.  

Larry and Robin are remarkably conscious and generous hosts.  They’ve been great advocates of my book and my philosophy towards creating a mindful approach for entrepreneurial success in the 21st century.

We explored the critical drivers of entrepreneurial success including:

~ Leading with positive intention.

~ Leading from a perspective of being of service; to your clients, prospects, and community.

~ The resonate value of embracing a mindful strategic planning process.

~ Value-based pricing strategies.

~ How one’s perspective towards their value proposition can redefine their entire market.

~  The critical nature of emotional and cognitive engagement in driving entrepreneurial success.

~ How we can define success on our own terms.

~ How the human spirit is the source of courage and resiliency with successful entrepreneurs.

~ The interplay between entrepreneurs and investors.

~ How we can all succeed in launching our own business…regardless of our age.

It’s a lively and fun discussion and I hope you’ll find some value in listening in!

You can listen to to interview by clicking the play button below:

© 2012, WOCA-AM Ocala.

© 2012, Terry Murray.

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January 16, 2012 · 3:56 pm

How Engagement and Detachment Combine to Create Breakthrough Success

Key Concept ~ On the surface it may sound like an oxymoron, but these two behaviors walk hand-in-hand along every successful journey.  

I frequently speak and write about the critical nature of engagement.  Of our associates as well as our prospects and customers.  Of cognitive and emotional engagement and the lessons we can take into our businesses from the field of Applied Behavioral Economics to accelerate our success.  Nothing is perhaps more important, yet to be truly successful (on your own terms) one must also practice detachment.

I learned the first part of this lesson during the early years of my career.  My formative, professional years coincided with the formative years of the biotechnology industry.  My territory was Cambridge, Massachusetts, and I split my days calling on the laboratories at Harvard, M.I.T., and the tiny startup biotech companies that these two institutions began spinning off.  I quickly realized that behaving like a typical salesman would quickly pave a roadway to failure.  You simply don’t play manipulative sales games with Nobel laureates.  Instead, I decided to become a differentiated resource.  Working for a small distributor, we often brought new research technologies to market first.  The big distributors, who still actually placed stocking orders with manufacturers back in those days, would wait to see what products gained traction through small independents before picking up a line.

In order to engage these brilliant scientists, I dedicated myself to being of service.  First, I took the time to learn their language.  I bought and studied introductory textbooks from the M.I.T. bookstore on everything from molecular biology to immunology.  I wasn’t looking for answers in these books, but learning how to ask intelligent questions about their research.  In doing so, I unwittingly engaged my prospects on both a cognitive (which was my intent) and emotional level (which some 25 years later would be proven as a critical driver for success through the research of people like Dr. Dan Ariely, now teaching and conducting research at Duke).  These researchers were passionate about their endeavors; seeking a cure for cancer, trying to unravel the mystery of HIV and AIDS, or attempting to decode the sequence of DNA.  By taking the time to ask an intelligent question, they would light up and walk me about their lab, discussing their recent discoveries and challenges.  With these insights in hand, I could then bring the rapidly emerging, innovative research tools to their attention, doing my small part in contributing to their success.  I didn’t attempt to be a peer, but I had succeeded in becoming a resource.

The lesson of detachment was also shown to me at the time, but I couldn’t see it.  Like every sales representative, I was too focused on hitting my numbers.  What was so fascinating in those early days of research on the molecular level was many new research tools were used in ways the manufacturers never could have contemplated or forecasted.  These researchers were innovators and tinkerers, there simply wasn’t any dogma to cling to yet, so they tried everything.  Products targeted for one use would find traction in an entirely different application.  Back then, there was no way to anticipate the outcomes because almost every new technology was a disruptive technology.

Now I have a much better understanding of how these two concepts, applied through out behaviors, go hand-in-hand.  In order to engage others, you must first engage with your authentic self.  I did so by diving into the research driven by my own curiosity and a sense of purposefulness.  In my own, tiny way, I was contributing to the good fight of discovering cures for horrible diseases that plagued our society.  The researchers sensed my dedication to their endeavors and, unlike many of my competitors at the time, I never walked into their laboratory with commission breath*.  Authentic engagement keeps us present, in the moment, focused on active listening, enabling us to respond appropriately in the only time we can…now.  We cannot change what we did yesterday, and we cannot do anything about tomorrow until it arrives.

That’s the lesson.  Stay engaged in the moment, with your prospects and customers while detaching yourself from the eventual outcomes.  If we focus too much on fixed expectations we’re bound to miss even greater opportunities that will unfold before us.  The author Don Miguel Ruiz points to this in his book, “The Four Agreements” when he suggests we shouldn’t take anything personally.  When people reject you (I’m assuming you’re acting ethically and honestly) it isn’t necessarily about you.  It is about them…their projections, perceptions, social conditioning, and individual mindset is always at play, often unconsciously.  Don’t take it personally because there’s nothing we can do about it and we cannot fix anyone other than ourselves.

Today, I am authentically engaged with my message and my mission of helping my clients succeed in the ever changing business climate of the 21st century.  At the same time, I recognize that my message will not resonate with everybody.  I must practice detachment and trust that, through my daily practice of authentic engagement, my value proposition will gain traction with prospects capable of embracing what we offer in the marketplace.  This isn’t to say we don’t conduct strategic planning, targeting, and such; we do.  It sets us upon our trajectory, focuses our resources, and accelerates our mission.  But it isn’t carved in stone, either.  We’re open to adjust, calibrate, and respond to new opportunities along our journey.  By having structure, we enable flexibility.  We know where we are at any given moment and have a clear orientation and understanding of the direction in which we are moving.  Without this foundation, flexibility becomes floundering.

Try this out for yourself on a small initiative and see where it takes you.  I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised!

*The term commission breath is attributed to Jamie Kane, President of Sandler Training® of Sarasota, FL.

© 2012, Terry Murray.

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January 8, 2012 · 6:47 pm

Why eLearning and CBT are a Waste of Time and Money for Small Businesses

Key Concept ~ Developing the professional skills and adaptive capabilities of your associates is mission critical in today’s hyper-competitive markets.  The expense of traditional and innovative learning solutions is driving the emergence of elearning and Computer-Based Training as a seemingly cost-effective alternative.  Yet this is proving to be a false perception.  A body of research is emerging that demonstrates traditional, passive learning methodologies are highly ineffective.  Changing the delivery mechanism from a traditional classroom setting to computer based training may save money, but it still isn’t money well spent.

I came across a fascinating report by Emily Hanford earlier this week that reveals some startling findings regarding traditional educational methodologies.  Some twenty years ago, a professor at Arizona State University, Dr. David Hestenes, published a series of articles revealing that his first year physics students’ test scores were endemically stuck at an average of 40%, semester after semester.  When Professor Eric Mazur, a physicist at Harvard came across these articles, he saw a correlation to his own students.  It wasn’t his teaching style that was lacking, as he consistently scored very high in student feedback.  It was the traditional approach to learning, the classical classroom lecture, that was falling short.  What he realized was while his students may be memorizing formulas, they were not creating the active neural networks necessary to apply the concepts in the real world.

Fellow physicist Joe Reddish at the University of Maryland noticed the same low ability to apply the lectured information conceptually.  In Ms. Hanford’s article, Reddish pointed to a basic test question regarding Newtonian Physics that was consistently on his exams:

“Two balls are the same size but one weighs twice as much as the other. The balls are dropped from the top of a two-story building at the same instant of time. The time it takes the ball to reach the ground will be…”

a.) about half as long for the heavier ball

b.) about half as long for the lighter ball

c.) the same amount of time for both

Rather than simply tell them the answer, he took them out for a bit of experiential learning.  Going to the second story of the physics building, he dropped two balls of identical size, but with different weights, with his students watching from ground level.  The students observed that both balls hit the ground at the same time.  Why?  This phenomena is explained by Newton’s Second Law of Motion and his discovery of terminal velocity (due to the interplay of air resistance and gravity, objects in free fall on Earth accelerate to a constant rate of descent of 128 feet per second squared).  Take away the force of air friction, by placing the same two balls in a vacuum, and the one of greater mass will reach the ground first.

Now, nearly every physics student is familiar with Newton’s Second Law of Motion.  It is taught in High School.  In the article, Professor Mazur observes the test results of physics students at the end of a semester demonstrates their conceptual application and understanding of these fundamental concepts only improves by an average of 14%.  This has now been demonstrated through the testing of tens of thousands of students for conceptual application.

Hestenes also observed that the traditional classroom lecture approach is effective for about 10% of students; those that are capable of independent learning.  He is quoted as saying, “Students have to be active in developing their knowledge.  They can’t passively assimilate it.”

If you’re familiar with the research of Dr. David Kolb on adult learning styles, this comes as no surprise.  While conducting research at M.I.T., Dr. Kolb discovered and demonstrated the Learning Style Inventory. Adults learn using two or three of four fundamental learning modalities: Experiential Learning, Reflective Learning, Modeling & Correlation, and Trial & Error.  It’s not an accident that passive assimilation isn’t included in his work…because it doesn’t work.

I’ve been around long enough to have been an executive during the first wave of automating business processes with technology in order to cut costs.  We quickly learned that automating bad process doesn’t improve the process.  It only accelerates it, often accelerating poor performance outcomes as a result.  We’re witnessing a similar rush to automation in the professional development and corporate training sector today.  Anyone that attended the most recent national conference for the American Society for Training and Development (ASTD) experienced this firsthand.  The technology prophets were everywhere, attempting to demonstrate how their software and their cloud were the cost-effective solution to every learning challenge companies are experiencing today.

Automating a failed approach to learning to computer-based platforms does cut costs.  But at what price?  In today’s economy, the commercialization of intellectual property, kindled by human creativity and cohesive team work, is the driver of value creation and competitive differentiation.  I’m willing to bet we’ll see the same results I lived through in the early 1990s.  Accelerating passive learning through automation will likely accelerate passive results.  Ironically, Newton’s Law of Inertia may metaphorically apply to the conventional wisdom in many organizations.  Inertia is defined as the tendency of objects to resist change in their state of motion.  This seems to apply to the long-held ideas surrounding professional learning as well.

To paraphrase Albert Einstein, the level of thinking that created a problem is not the level of thinking necessary to solve it.  When we examine the evidence, it becomes painfully clear the time is long overdue for a new level of thinking about business training and professional development.

© 2012, Terry Murray.

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December 20, 2011 · 8:42 pm

Understanding The Real Cost of Launching a Field Sales Team

Key Concept ~ Launching a field sales team is a key investment in driving sustainable growth.  But it is expensive.  Here’s some compelling research on just how expensive it can be.

You’re finally ready.  You’ve worked diligently for years leading your company to this point.  The time has come to launch the field sales team.  It is the inflection point for growing startups.  How you plan, target, validate, train, and execute the launch will be the single most important driver for success.  This is especially true if you’re an investor-driven startup.  As you ramp into your launch you’ll be burning time and other people’s money until you achieve sufficient market traction to break even.  Speed to traction is mission-critical due to the high cost of field sales professionals.  How expensive are they?  Here’s some interesting research from the book, “Outsourcing the Sales Function, The Real Cost of Field Sales”, by Erin Anderson and Ph.D. and Bob Trinkle (The Thomas Corporation, 2005).

The authors took a hard look at sales productivity, defined as face-to-face selling time.  What they found was rather astounding.  Out of a 365 day calendar, a typical, business-to-business sales representative will spend 132 days in the field.  Here’s the breakdown of their days not in the field; Weekends -104, Holidays -8, Vacation Days -10, Sick Days -5, Sales Meetings -20, Trade Shows -8, Office Days -78.  The second thing they examined was the effect of windshield time.  Their research demonstrated the typical sales rep spends between 2 to 3 hours per day actually selling to prospects when in the field.  Boil this down and you quickly realize a typical, b-to-b sales representative is contributing somewhere between 33 and 50 actual face-to-face selling days per year.

Let’s say your fully burdened, average cost per sales rep is $100,000 per year (this figure can easily run $120,000 to $180,000 per year, depending on the industry and geography).  At $100K, your company’s cost per hour of actual, face-to-face selling time will run somewhere between $250 and $378 per hour, per representative.  At this very real, hourly rate, you’ll want your sales representatives firing on all cylinders.  That’s part of why your pre-launch planning, targeting, validating, and training is so crucial when it comes to time to traction.  Investing in a highly engaged, performing sales professional is expensive; but not as expensive as a poorly performing one.

The other challenge to achieving time to traction is the natural lag built in to creating a traditional sales organization.  Once you have the capital to move forward, you’re ready to find your sales leader.  Depending on the scope of the launch and particular industry, this could take months, involve recruiters, relocation expenses, etc.  Then there’s a bit of acclimation time before your new executive or manager is ready to build his or her team.  Then there’s the sales/customer support interface that needs to be addressed, the collaterals need to be created, targets should be set and databased, and a training program needs to be developed.  Now you’re ready to hire your sales reps.  And of course, they will have a learning curve in the marketplace as well.  Depending on your sales cycle, this can easily add five to six months of lag time and expenses prior to initiating sales traction from the time you were financially ready to launch.

For many firms, crossing this threshold is the single most important initiative they will undertake.  It is the sales engine that will drive the company to success or sputter out along the road to market.  Plan for it like the company’s life depends upon it…it does.

© 2011, Terry Murray.

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