There’s No Downside to Intentionality…Right?

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March 14, 2022 | Mark Altman & Megan Fine


Intentional (adjective): done on purpose; deliberate


As a leader, you’re likely onboard with the idea of thinking and acting intentionally. You set goals, OKRs, and KPIs thoughtfully, considering the needs and objectives of your organization, and making data-driven decisions for optimal outcomes and success. 

As coaches, we also counsel our clients to behave intentionally – to think through their goals, motivating factors, and consequences of inaction – and execute their action plans with mindfulness and focus. 

So, when then does intentionality become a problem? When can intentionality be taken too far? 

When we are outcome and data-driven, we often achieve our objectives – but the question is, at what cost? What do we miss when we are laser-focused on hitting our targets and optimizing time and productivity? 

We miss people. When we are so focused on end results, we can forget that people – human beings – are driving and producing those results. We miss the thoughts, feelings, and experiences of the individuals who help us achieve our success. 

MIT Sloan recently released a study on the drivers of the Great Resignation, and fascinatingly, high levels of innovation at an organization was a strong predictor of attrition: “The more positively employees talked about innovation at their company, the more likely they were to quit.” Innovation is fantastic – until it comes at a cost to your people. 

The same goes for productivity. Take meetings as a prime example. We’ve all been in meetings that aren’t intentional – disorganized, lacking clear next steps, or the “this could have been an email” type. On the other hand, meetings led with the intention of making every second count can sometimes leave us feeling out of breath, like we didn’t have time or space to voice concerns, share ideas, or thoughtfully consider the work at hand.

Leading in a way that takes people’s experiences into consideration starts with self-awareness. Do you authentically check-in with your team at the beginning of your meetings before diving into the work? Do you allow time for people to share ideas, discuss, and collaborate? Do you ask for feedback rather than assuming you know how people are experiencing your meetings? 

If you don’t, that’s okay – you now have the self-awareness to start building these habits. Keep noticing where you might be prioritizing outcomes and efficiency at the expense of your people, and make sure intentionality isn’t working against you by ensuring their thoughts, feelings, and experiences are part of the equation. 

For support with meeting facilitation and employee engagement, CONTACT US at MindsetGo. We empower your leaders and teams to build the confidence, develop the skills, and embrace the mindset to create lasting habit and behavior change. 

What to Do When You’re Not Motivated

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February 1, 2022 | Megan Fine 

How often have you wanted to do something, but when the time comes, you’re simply not motivated? 

Why do we struggle to follow through on the things we say want to do? Why is it so hard to change even one small habit? 

If I told you there was a tool that could double or triple your likelihood of following through on a new habit, would you be willing to try it? 

The secret to change is so simple, most people will disregard it as too easy and basic to be effective. Studies show that using an implementation intention can increase likelihood of follow through from 35% up to 91%. 

What is an implementation intention? An implementation intention is an action plan that articulates when and where we will perform a new habit. Use the following formula to create an implementation intention: 

  • When situation X arises, I will perform response Y.

For example, if your resolution this year was to be more focused and productive at work, here are a couple ways you might translate that goal into an implementation intention: 

  • When I open my computer at the beginning of the day, I will work for 1 hour before checking my email. 
  • When I go to lunch, I will silence my phone so I can return to work refreshed.

You can also try formulating your implementation intention as an if/then statement to overcome any anticipated obstacles. (If situation X arises, I will perform response Y.) 

  • If I am tempted to go on Facebook during the workday, I will stretch for 5 minutes and then refocus on my priorities. 

So why do implementation intentions work? Planning out your behavior in advance means that you don’t have to rely on motivation to inspire you to act. You simply follow your predetermined plan when the appropriate situation arises. 

Implementation intentions also help us overcome habituated resistance, as they allow the brain to form new neural pathways by mentally rehearsing new behaviors before doing them. 

Still not convinced that this simple tool could be the difference-maker for you? Then don’t take my word for it – try it yourself.

Enjoy this post? Contact us to empower your leaders and teams to build the confidence, develop the skills, and embrace the mindset to create lasting habit and behavior change.

Proactive Change: “If It Ain’t Broke, Don’t Fix It” is Bad Advice. Here’s Why

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January 24, 2022 | Mark Altman & Megan Fine 

Pause for a moment and tell me: how do you start your workday?

Do you sit down and open your inbox to 37 new emails…amidst the other 2,347 sitting there unfiled? Do you dig through the piles of paper on your desk to find that to-do list you started a couple days ago? Do you dive into one project, only to jump to another, and then forget where you were when you hear the chime of your Slack notifications?

It’s not so bad though, right? Your disorganization is costing you, what, maybe 10 minutes a day sorting through things to find what you really need or get focused. 

But if you think about it…if you’re working 250 days of the year, you’re actually losing 2,500 minutes. 42 hours. An entire work week of productivity. Ouch.

Most people don’t bother changing until their situation gets bad – until they get the poor performance review, or their spouse says, “We need to talk,” or their doctor sits them down for the test results no one wants to get back. 

This way of being is reactive, but there is a better way. It’s being proactive and acting before the situation escalates out of control and hands you consequences that you’d rather not experience. 

But being proactive is challenging, which is why so many of us don’t bother to do it. Everything’s fine, good enough, right? To work towards being more proactive, you must first be reflective and consider what changes might be worth making. To do that, consider these questions: 

If I don’t bother changing: 

  • What opportunities might I miss out on? 
  • What kind of problems might arise? 
  • What is the ultimate cost of doing nothing? 
  • Where will I be in 6 months, 1 year, 10 years? 

If I do bother changing: 

  • What good things might become possible? 
  • What might I be able to do that I can’t do now? 
  • What would be the best part of that? 
  • Where could I be in 6 months, 1 year, 10 years? 

As a leader, helping your team move from acting reactively, to being reflective, to acting proactively is an excellent ROI on your time. By walking people through the consequences of inaction and the benefits of making positive changes, you can motivate them to take action they otherwise wouldn’t have to optimize their personal and professional lives. 

10 minutes a day is 42 hours a year. What better things could you do with all that time? If you have a team of 10, what could you do with 10 extra work weeks each year? 

It’s time to retire, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” and lean into, “If it ain’t broke yet, it’s a great time to optimize!” 

Enjoy this post? Contact us to empower your leaders and teams to build the confidence, develop the skills, and embrace the mindset to create lasting habit and behavior change. 

Why Your Team Isn’t Following Through – And What to Do About It

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January 10, 2022 | Mark Altman

Picture this: it’s January, and you’re working on building a more effective social media marketing strategy this year. So you call up your marketing guy – let’s call him Steve – and you say, “Steve, we need a content calendar. Can you pull that together for next week?”

“Sure thing, no problem,” he tells you.

It’s a week later, and you follow up: “Hey Steve, how’s the content calendar coming?”

Silence, and then, “Uhh, the content calendar. Right. I didn’t have time to get to it this week…”

Cue the frustration. Why bother having a team if you can’t rely on them to follow through?

Yikes. Time for a reframe.

When a team member tells you they forgot or didn’t have time to do something, do you believe they’re actively trying to disappoint or frustrate you?

Life would be a lot easier if we could simply control other people. Unfortunately, that’s not the case; however, as leaders, we can influence their behavior and better set them up for success.

How do we do that? We ensure that we are getting commitment, not simply agreement, from our team.

  • Agreement = yes, in principal, I agree with what you’re saying
  • Commitment = I agree and I am set up to follow through

When motivating your team to act – to get commitment – you must help them articulate tangible and specific benefits of following through. Knowing what they need to do is not enough; they must understand why they need to do it.

Often, leaders have a top-down approach when articulating their why’s, i.e., they share their own reasoning with their team, but the most powerful motivation comes from team members articulating the why’s themselves.

I was recently coaching a client to take a 20-minute walk in the middle of his day, and he asked me, “Okay Mark, but what’s the return on investment?” For me, the answer was easy. I get six major benefits from taking a walk during my workday:

  • I get a break from screen time to clear my head.
  • I get fresh ideas about things I’m problem-solving.
  • Being outside in the fresh air is invigorating.
  • My stress levels drop by virtue of stepping away from work.
  • Things I may have forgotten pop into my head.
  • I plan for how I’m going to spend more time with my loved ones.

All great reasons for me to take a walk, but even more powerful is drawing out the client’s own specific and tangible benefits of building this new habit.

So let’s rethink that conversation with Steve. Next time, you might try: “Hey Steve, I feel like we need a content calendar. What do you think?”

“Okay, yeah, a content calendar. That could be useful.”

“How do you think having a content calendar might be helpful?”

“Hmm, well sometimes we miscommunicate about when we agreed to post things. And I know we talked about creating more coherent themes for our newsletters and social media pages. So that might help us plan a little better. And if we had a content calendar, we might be able to better align our posts with events we have going on.”

“Awesome, you think you can have that pulled together for our touch base next week?”

“You got it!”

Next time you meet with your team, focus on helping them articulate the benefits of the work they do, or the habits they’re trying to change, and let us know how it goes.

And stay tuned for our next post, where we’ll discuss the most effective tool for translating motivation into action.

Enjoy this post? Contact us to empower your leaders and teams to build the confidence, develop the skills, and embrace the mindset to create lasting habit and behavior change.

MindsetGo Acquires Whole Health Co, LLC to Address the Great Resignation and Build Engaged and Effective Workforces

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Boston, MA – January 6, 2022 | MindsetGo announced today the acquisition of Whole Health Co, LLC, a corporate wellness company offering custom services for businesses and schools. Whole Health Co-founder Patty Burke, CHC, CLC, joins MindsetGo as Director of Wellness, bringing her expertise in lifestyle habit change and an experienced team of health coaches and wellness experts to MindsetGo.

The acquisition expands MindsetGo’s existing organizational development services to also include mental, physical, and emotional support. These expanded offerings will in turn foster happy, productive, and resilient employees both in and out of the workplace.

U.S. employees are resigning in record-breaking numbers (one in four workers quit their jobs in 2021). This phenomenon, dubbed by economists as the Great Resignation, immediately presents employers with challenges including a depleted workforce, employee engagement, and retention. Organizations are seeing their leadership burn out while experiencing higher levels of anxiety and stress due to increased workloads and the additional challenges of remote work.

“When organizations evaluate their biggest challenges, mental and emotional wellness are typically not on the top of the list,” said Mark Altman, Founder of MindsetGo. “In fact, emotional intelligence and resiliency directly support people’s ability to manage themselves, cope with difficult people, navigate conflict, and adapt to change.” Whereas companies once invested in employee wellness simply to help lower health insurance costs, they are now prioritizing it to retain and support their talent. With the high cost of turnover (in some cases, one to two times an employee’s salary), they can’t afford not to invest in their employees’ well-being and success.

“More than ever, companies need support for attracting and retaining top talent as well as overcoming the challenges of an unstable labor market,” said Burke. “Providing support, resources, training, and personalized coaching for valued leaders and staff is critical for boosting employee productivity and ultimately, enhancing bottom lines.”

Survey data from Ginger’s “Third Annual Workforce Attitudes Toward Mental Health Report” revealed that a stunning 96% of CEOs consider their employee mental health efforts adequate, while only 69% of employees agree, revealing a gap between policy and initiative. What differentiates MindsetGo from other training and coaching organizations is a philosophy that focuses on habit change. Both Altman and Burke believe in going beyond simply educating clients, to helping people translate knowledge into action. They provide proven strategies, guidance, and encouragement that motivate people to take the steps they need to thrive, and not just survive, in both their personal and professional lives.

For more information, please contact MindsetGo.

 

About MindsetGo

MindsetGo empowers leaders, teams, and individuals to build the confidence, develop the skills, and embrace the mindset to create lasting habit and behavior change. Our methodology to support people in becoming more confident and effective communicators is based on helping them develop and use three communication components: emotional, multi-generational, and conversational intelligence. Being a confident communicator is not just the way you act, talk, and look; it’s a habitual way of thinking and reacting to various life situations.

Contact Mark Altman at 978-793-1159 or maltman@mindsetgo.com

 

Overcome the Loyalty Objection

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Loyalty isn’t deserved, it needs to be earned. How to overcome a prospect’s guilt regarding staying with an existing service provider.

If a prospect truly believes your service is better and would prefer working with you, then it would be a no-brainer for them to move forward right? The problem is, even when people know the right decision to make, they are conflicted by being disloyal to their current provider. The following is a good approach on how to overcome that obstacle.

  1. Be empathetic. This is where Emotional Intelligence comes in and why I prioritize this set of competencies above all else in sales and leadership. Validate their concerns and be curious to why they value the existing relationship as it will give you a perspective on what they fear they would lose in addition to qualities they would want to maintain in their next relationship.
  2. Let them know an authentic story where you were faced with the same challenge and how you overcame it.
  3. Share a story about a previous prospect and how they were able to move forward and overcome this fear of disloyalty. There are three types of stories that may apply:
    • If it’s not allegedly broken, don’t fix it story – a former prospect who several months later recognized specific benefits despite having a fabulous relationship with their previous supplier. If your prospect talked to his client, they would say “Thank Goodness I made this change.”
    • I didn’t know what I was missing story – because people fear change, they don’t actually take the time to assess or evaluate their current service provider instead they make choices based on emotion. This would be a story of how you came in and did a diagnostic, assessment, or consult to show the benefits of change and why despite their loyalty to their current provider, the prospect should have made this change a long time ago.
    • Proactive vs Reactive story – A prospect who kept postponing because of their guilt over being disloyal and then had to change reactively because their current provider couldn’t deliver, didn’t have the knowledge or experience, or didn’t have the resources to solve their newfound problems.
  4. Don’t Defend and Justify – whenever salespeople are faced with an objection there is a tendency to want to defend it or justify why you/your company approaches it the way they do. I coach the opposite. Instead of wanting to prove the prospect wrong, use discovery and inquiry methods to find out what is really going on. When a prospect says they are conflicted about changing vendors and they are going to stand pat, you can ask the following questions to gauge what level of dissatisfaction they actually feel. *Remember tone is very important when conveying these questions.
    • If you are feeling conflicted about changing, what prompted you to bring us in here in the first place? (Remind them why they asked you to come in as their guilt might have distracted them)
    • When is the last time you tried an alternative or did an apples to apples comparison to ensure you are getting the best solution?
    • If you were to make a change, are there specific aspects of service, quality, performance, etc. you feel like you would be losing?
    • If you had a magic wand and your current provider could improve on a few things, what would you tell them?

Often prospects need an alternate perspective because it is an innate human quality for many people to anticipate or fear the worst. Remember, if you are dealing with someone who is conflict-avoidant, their fears might be irrational, but without an alternate perspective they will never know.

To address this, I ask “If you told your contact you had found a better solution, what would you be worried that they would say? Once the prospect articulates their concern, I turn the tables and ask “If the roles were reversed, what would your expectation be? In other words, if someone you had a solid relationship with came to you and said they were switching from using your product or service and had practical and tangible reasons to do it, would you hold that against them? The answer would typically be no. Unless you have a signed contract, there is no obligation to stay with a vendor purely out of loyalty. It’s your job to help your prospect identify what really matters in choosing a service provider and recognize that loyalty only goes so far.

As a final thought, I close this technique by acknowledging to the prospect a core value of mine to reinforce that I would expect and hope to be held to the same standard if I was the vendor and a competitor attempted to replace me.

To learn more about our Sales Emotional Intelligence program, or to learn more about the various MindsetGo offerings, please visit MindsetGo.

Thinking vs Feeling

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Have you ever thought about the difference between the words think vs feel?

When you think something, it could imply you don’t actually know it. For example, if you were to walk into a store and ask one of their employees where you could find a certain item you were looking for, and they said “I think” it’s in aisle 8, then they aren’t really sure. As a leader, when you say I think you are also in problem-solving mode as opposed to asking questions and listening mode which often conveys an intellectual or analytical response.

As an alternative, get in the habit of saying “I feel” so you are speaking from the heart. How do another person’s actions make you feel? How will it help a person change their behavior or habits if that person knew how they made you feel? As we discussed in the last training, most often people don’t do things maliciously and sometimes they need a reminder on why and how to do things differently.

Always, Never or Perhaps Something Different

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As a leader who is managing multiple generations, personalities and workplace challenges, it can be easy to lose faith in your team. When people fail to meet our expectations regarding delegation, problem-solving, decision-making, or follow through you can start to develop a discouraged and impatient mindset. This often results in among other things, starting to do everything yourself. Here are three elements of self-awareness when you start feeling like you are experiencing disappointment or resistance.

Three Step Process When Feeling Frustrated With People

Inner Voice: Everything I do is met with resistance – creating fear and anxiety

Self-Awareness: Is it truly everything or just with certain people and situations?

Inner Voice: Why are some things I do met with fear and resistance?

Self-Awareness: People don’t want to be held accountable or perhaps they are dealing with their own challenges they don’t know how to effectively articulate.

Inner Voice: On top of everything else, nobody is responding to the emails I send

Self-Awareness: A lot of factors contribute to why people don’t respond to messages so I won’t assume this reflects on me or this person’s perception of me or the message.

 

Make Rejection Comfortable

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Remember that motto we were taught growing up… “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”? Well, for those of us who have been rejected at one time or another, which is all of us, you wouldn’t wish that feeling on your worst enemy. Rejection is painful on a number of fronts. Aside from how it makes us feel emotionally, it often can cause a downward spiral in our self-confidence and self-esteem that can last for varying lengths of times. That downward spiral often seeps into other aspects of our lives causing us a variety of ways to second-guess ourselves. This can be devastating for salespeople who live and die by their commission checks.

 

So why do sales prospects and customers drag out sales cycles, not respond to emails and phone messages, and tell us what we want to hear? It’s never easy to give bad news, especially when you are affecting someone’s livelihood and delivering a message that says you’re not good enough. When a prospect declines to purchase your product or services, it isn’t necessarily an indictment of you, but the question is, do you see it that way? Frankly, many salespeople get angry and feel led on or that the prospect was disingenuous. They become further upset because they start to perceive the experience as time wasted.

 

Here are the multitude of reasons why you may be ghosted, temporarily ignored or pacified by a prospective customer:

 

  1. The contact person feels guilty based on how much time you have spent
  2. The person may feel you are going to become angry and they are conflict avoidant
  3. They don’t feel like they need to justify why they are not responding
  4. If they ignore this problem, long enough – you will go away
  5. They will lose face if they tell you the reason
  6. They view a sales transaction as having a winner and loser

 

Damn, those are a lot of motivating factors for prospects to avoid you! To protect your mental and emotional health and not pin your confidence to outcomes that are beyond your control, sales emotional intelligence (Self-awareness, Self-Control, Motivation, Empathy) will allow you to better navigate people’s fears. By being self-aware and empathetic to what may really be going on, you give yourself clarity and resiliency while allowing others to be themselves and share their true feelings without repercussion.

 

I often talk about how leaders and parents need to create a culture for safe, open, and honest communication to learn the truth. Salespeople need to do the same with their customers. Here are some proven MindsetGo coaching methods that have worked consistently. 

 

  1. Give People an Out – Quite frequently, I tell prospects early in a sales call that I have a thick skin and am okay if at any time they determine they aren’t interested, they can please let me know. Then I say, “I know your time is valuable and so is mine.” This allows me to advocate for myself and my time as a salesperson and sends the message we are in this together. 
  2. Share Your Process – When is decision time? – what are steps that clients typically follow when signing up with you? What do you provide so people involved in the decision-making process can feel like they can make a diligent and informed decision? 
  3. No Decision – Not the MLB pitcher version..the version where prospects say they are happy with status quo or current providers and even though it doesn’t make sense – you respect it and keep the door open for future business.

 

Sales Emotional Intelligence is a skill set that allows you to accurately recognize why someone may be acting the way they are, respond in a productive and effective way without overreacting, be motivated to treat each relationship separately, and empathize with why someone is withholding info and know how to influence them to do something differently. So the next time you feel rejected, realize that you can do something about it and truly understand how to learn from it.

Bouncing Forward

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Pivot don’t panic. Just work from home. It all seems so easy, but this pandemic has made nothing easy. There are so many core competencies professionals need to be successful, but this crisis is proving that resiliency may be the most important for all levels of an organization.

Most everyone is struggling to keep their eye on the ball as worries about family, friends, and colleagues are triggering emotions that many have never experienced. It’s okay to feel distracted, unmotivated or overwhelmed, but not at the expense of feeling happy and fulfilled. Now more than ever, emotional intelligence and mindfulness are being coming to the rescue. Follow these simple tips to disrupt your thought process and use self-knowledge to support your ability to cope and stay resilient.

  1. Determine what triggered your current thought process. Which of your needs are not being met? What do you need more of? Less of? How can I take action?
  2. Become self-aware of your negative self-talk and limiting beliefs and switch to empowering thoughts and empowering beliefs
  3. Be specific about what you need and want to accomplish. Ask for help and advocate for yourself because we are all in this together.

Be curious and start an internal dialogue that focuses on motivation and clarity. You can transfer your mental state from dwelling on your inability to act, to determining what actions to take to move forward.

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