It all started when my friend’s son wanted to come by my house to give me a Cutco knife demonstration.

  Cutco is a knife company that has been around for the past 60 years and still maintains their old-fashioned sales philosophy. Their sales model is to hire college kids for the summer, give them a set up knives and have them sell door-to-door providing demos and asking for referrals from friends. No catalog, no web site, no web conferencing demo.

I agreed to sit through a long presentation and watched my friend’s son read his script, cut through leather and cut through a penny. Very impressive product but the presentation was weak.  I can’t help it, I couldn’t contain myself from wanting to help him with his demo or at least take a stab at cutting up his generic and impersonal script.

The next day, I decided to carefully craft a detailed email to my friend suggesting some areas her son could improve upon in his demo. I didn’t do this to show off but because I wanted him to have more respect for the sales profession and to understand sales is about relationship building and having fun. I wanted him to understand that although companies like Cutco believe sales is like the old Glenngary Glenn Ross days, that doesn’t have to be the case. Customers just don’t appreciate going for the jugular when closing the sale anymore.  Certainly, if this was my daughter, I would be happy to receive such detailed feedback from a pro.

Well it backfired, my friend thought my feedback was insulting, inappropriate and unrealistic for a young kid who just needs a summer job. I guess the superstition of knives breaking friendships might be true after all.

There’s nothing more frustrating than being misunderstood. When the message you intended to send is not received the same way. Instead it is decoded with lots of false assumptions and you get blamed for something you never intended to do. So frustrating.

I wanted to scream out, “no, that’s not what I meant” or “no, listen, let me make this clear” or “did you really hear what I have been trying to say.” But it was too late, I was already misunderstood.

In sales, there are common misunderstandings between the salesperson and their manager. Here’s a typical converation:

Salesperson- “I put some new numbers together on how I can best develop my territory this quarter.”

Manager- “So when can I expect to receive this?”

Salesperson- “I’m unsure how it will really happen without a few things in place.”

Manager- “What is holding you back? I need someone who will make things happen and not wait.”

Salesperson- “I’m not waiting, I am determining a strategy and want to check things out with you first.”

Manager- “I hired you to take things on and run with them and not wait.”

Sound familiar?

Most misunderstanding about performance expectations, new business expectations, compensation, iniatives and strategies are common. Unfortunately, they begin a long chain of turmoil and grief. It’s much better to air out any complaints or misunderstanding early and take the time to check things out before they escalate.

I’m working on my Time Management chapter and feel as though I’ve wasted the entire morning on new research on this valuable topic. It continues to be the popular topic everyone wants to receive training on.

I discovered a great blog, LifeHacker. These guys are working really hard and put up multiple posts and very relevant information on becoming more productive and getting things done. Especially their What Productivity Studies Really Show post.  The paragraph that reads:

Over the years this site’s been in existance, studies have shown that email kills concentration more than smoking pot does, that you’ve got 11 minutes before the next interruption, that dual monitors increase productivity, that no one understands the intended tone of your email, that email overload costs the American economy more than $700 billion a year, and that multitasking kills your ability to focus and get things done.

Wow, I didn’t realize getting two monitors increased productivity. I’ve written about “skill shifting” before- it’s the time and momentum it takes to shift from one task to another. And somewhere in all my reading today I read that it takes an average of 25 minutes to get back on track.

Yes, I believe most of us are wasting time or making bad decisions on our time. My solution: Time Out.

I’m writing on my new WordPress version and it’s pretty nice. I think I’ve accidently erased all comments so please don’t take it personally. I promise from now on, I will not only respond to your comments but I will also approve them for publication. That is if they are nice comments, of course. Any rants, thoughts, opinions, feelings and general conversation is very welcome. Bring it on, please even my sister who reads my blog all the time and wonders when I will write a post about her. I’m already threatening her with my new t-shirt that I just got from the BlogHer conference that says “be nice to me or I’ll blog about you.”

On July 29th, Genius is partnering with NetProspex on a great webinar titled Sales and Marketing Align to Optimize B2b Lead Generation and they will discuss this the essential components such as strategy, tactics and tools. Don’t worry, it won’t be some boring yawnfest webinar on data cleansing but instead what happens when sales and marketing are incapable of efficiently leading a successful lead generation program.

If we just take it to the sales level, I think there’s a lot of digging that needs to happen on the salesperson’s side that isn’t happening. It’s summer so time to take out your buckets and shovels and start digging. Remember when connect rates are dropping, this impacts your call activity in general. Take advantage of each call with stronger and deeper qualilfication questions.

Just imagine how we hang up and know so little from each call. Set an ambitious call objective to get more from each call and check out my 8-step qualification criteria I call the TeleSmart Qualification Criteria that works will help you dig deeper and deeper.

I decided to change my ring tone last week and have been feeling pretty disoriented.   I find everyone staring at me when my phone rings and seem to jump when to others’ rings but mine.  I can’t even anticipate a call from someone because I don’t remember what it will sound like when it comes through. This is so disorienting and yet I push myself to move into a different zone that slices life from a new template.

Isn’t that what happens to us? If there is a new SFDC plug-in that changes the UI, we freak. Or a bunch of dirty data gets dumped into our CRM and we lose sight on who to prioritize our call backs. Or a new version of the software no longer does what it used to so we keep selling and talking about the old version?

We attach meaning to something out of habit and get comfortable with that. Rearranging our tools holds new meaning as we have to create a new relationship and do some skill shifting around how we approach things.  

I went to the BlogHer 2008 conference this weekend and got energized about blogging and walked away with lots of new ideas and insights. This conference has grown in the last several years and still remains full of women. Smart, savvy, socially networked, women of all sorts.

Most of the workshops I attended this year, the conversation kept coming back to Twitter and how important it is in creating a community and following conversations. Hmmm, not sure about that and not sure my inside sales warriors want to follow my Tweets but it’s certainly something I’ll check out.

There’s a few bloggers that seem to have it all together, they have published books from their blogs and have a distinct voice and following. They complain about managing 600 some comments, tough life. Some noteworthy and cool bloggers:

Heather Armstrong’s blog, Dooce is so well written with a dry wit and lots of conversation. She key noted yesterday and she is larger than life.

Stephanie Klein’s blog, Greek Tragedy  is a blog dedicated to rejection, how to move on from it and inspired how she never got into any Sorority’s in college. She is a hysterical writer with a huge future ahead of her.  She also key-noted yesterday and is adorable.

Amy Gahran blog, Contentious is all about how we communite on this online age. She held a writng workshop and it was my favorite.

The conference attracts lots of mommy bloggers and if you are in this category, you’ve got to check out the Mommy Needs a Cocktail blog- especially watch the video of her son who has chocolate all over his body and the interview with the two kids on what they did with the toothpaste.

And then it hit me…….I have to write a book this year. So here I am on a Sunday afternoon spending 5 hours updating and revising my marketing plan around this book. Build your on-line, media, social networking, blogging, YouTube, Facebook, LinkedIn, articles, footprint. That’s the advise I got from everyone.

I need friends and have decided to build an Advice Council for Smart Selling from the Inside Out. It will be a team of inside sales champions who are commited to the success of my book. This hand-picked group will help me learn how to best reach and write for my audience.

I have some fantastic news to announce today, my book Smart Selling from the Inside Out has just been purchased by AMACOM and will be released in the Fall of 2009. This will be the sourcebook for inside sales skills based on my TeleSmart 10 system. For everyone who has asked me, “where’s the book” it’s finally coming.

It’s been a very long road filled with rejections and revisions and more rejections and more revisions.

Don’t give up on your dreams. Don’t ever let anyone tell you it can’t be done. Don’t put something away that moves you.

Join me in celebrating the good news with this uplifting dance video

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I didn’t feel much like watching fireworks this weekend- mainly because I’ve been so bummed out with the real fires throughout the California coast.  Statewide, Calfire reports that 558,788 acres have been scorched since fires started on June 20th. Although some have been contained, there are still major threats.

One of my favorite restaurants in Big Sur, Nepenthe is still fighting for it’s life. Besides losing revenues of $60,000 per day, they are holding out on evacuating and taking matters into their own hands.

When I was asked why I didn’t want to watch fireworks as this was my patriotic duty, I realized as an American living in this country at this time of upheaval and change, I feel a sense of pride to be an American. Sure the political and economic landscape looks a bit shaky these days but there isn’t any other place I would rather live.

I’m a first generation immigrant- growing up in Italy, we wished for the day when we would move to America. Everytime I walked by fountains in Italy, I threw a coin after making my wish. Finally one spring afternoon, I walked into the livingroom to hear the great news we were moving to California.

For the next few months, we packed and stocked up on the finest Italian furniture and said our good-byes to our Italian friends. By summer, we landed in some hotel on Ventura Blvd in Studio City. I sat in the hotel room for days watching colored TV and eating popsicles while my parents searched for apartments and schools to settle us into.  

I still feel the same way I did back them, a sense of wonder and pride of being part of a system that works. This weekend I celebrate that.