By Linda Feinholz, “Your Success Catalyst”
Gary was Vice President in charge of his company’s marketing division. He worked for an enormous multi-national corporation that spent millions on marketing to other corporations. He had his Business Development style down pat. Big meals, in fancy restaurants, on the company tab.
Then he joined a much ‘smaller’ organization – only $400 million a year in sales but growing steadily. And his expense account was … let’s call it “reined in.” He was told to put his time into building relationships by phone and in meetings, with an occasional meal in a ‘normal’ restaurant.
Have you ever had the experience of being absolutely positively completely certain about something? Your idea, your opinion, your experience – all telling you that you ‘know’?
I mean so certain that no matter what other information was offered to you, you couldn’t conceive of any other perspective or position on the matter?
Well Gary went ballistic. He knew, for a fact, that “You can’t do business development that way!”
He spent then next three years constantly at odds with the rest of management, complaining about how ‘impossible’ the company was making for him to develop business. He didn’t grow the business at all in four years. And he finally left the organization.
His replacement, Dan, came in with less experience in the industry, a milder manner and a curiosity for what might work. And guess what? Dan brought in double the record in new business in half the time. The difference? Dan wondered how the company could accomplish its marketing more productively, and came up with new answers. And new results.
Sometimes we get stuck seeing a situation or event from a very narrow point of view. I know I get so intensely focused on how much has to be accomplished to bring all of you a valuable experience in the 2007 Success TeleConference that I spend hours trying to solve something that feels complex. Suggestions? I don’t want them! I’m already absorbed viewing it one way and really don’t have any desire to shift my perspective.
You could probably name some situation where you’re so immersed in a process that even when a friend or colleague tries to propose another approach to take they barely got the description out before you shut them down with “That won’t work!”
Your breath is short, your body is tense, your impatience and annoyance have you taut as a bowstring as you arm yourself against anyone arguing about or contradicting what you’re absolutely certain of.
How do I know that? I’ve been there too! Just reading all of that has my muscles tensing up.
Over the years I’ve found that EVERYONE is susceptible to being absolutely certain. That attitude blocks us from seeing the wealth of possible alternatives. We keep a solid wall in place that stops even the slightest of ‘different’ points of view from creeping in. We move our bodies around all day, but our attitudes are nailed down and unmoving.
The point is to not let your current point of view stop you. Many of the alternatives we refuse to see have a greater potential for creating our desired success than the one we’re holding onto for dear life. Sure enough, when I step back and get distance I discover that there’s a quick and simple solution or alternative I couldn’t see. And my clients discover the same thing for themselves. So here’s
Technique 4 – Shift Perspectives – “Widen Your View”
There are several techniques that I use with clients (and myself) when that self-created ‘stall out’ becomes apparent. One of my favorites is “Widen Your View.”
Imagine yourself in a movie theater, standing with your nose on the screen, thinking that the story you see in front of you is absolutely all there is to see. In fact you’re only ‘seeing’ perhaps ten square inches immediately before you, if your eyes can even focus at that point. By being so close to what you’re viewing you’re missing every other piece of information, in every direction.
The Widen Your View approach is used to shift your perspective about the situation much like taking steps back from the screen and getting a broader view of the movie you’re living. One step at a time, step ‘back’ from your view of the situation and deliberately use the phrase “I wonder…” For Dan the questions were:
“I wonder what it could be like to do business development without taking people out for meals?”
“I wonder what I could send to a client to interest them in a solution for their business?
“I wonder what 10 ideas I could come up with that no one else is doing for them?”
Step by step. One step back and one question. Then another and another. All the way back until you become an observer with a wide field of view and the ‘screen’ shrinks and ‘reality’ becomes a picture of a situation outside of yourself. The further you step, the less personal the ‘movie’ will feel. And a greater number of alternative ways you can consider it become available to you.
Now imagine what might be offered if you brought a team together and posed those questions to the entire group.
From this new attitude of wondering, interesting things begin to show up. When I use it, people around me ‘suddenly’ have all kinds of great ideas. Magazine articles have idea after idea that I can adapt to use in my own business. And for my clients? Well the results speak for themselves – new possibilities, new approaches, new accelerated results.
If you’ll Widen Your View you’ll notice new ways of approaching each of your current situations and of solving issues that seem like obstacles as well.
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