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Managing Distractions - A Key to Sales Success

Written by: Dave Kurlan

Article Overview: Distractions can take many forms, from the call that takes them off their game, to the illness or death of a loved one that stops their game cold. Distractions can last a few minutes or they can linger for months. You can even understand why some, especially the really bad distractions, can interfere for so long. Read this article for help on how to deal with distractions.

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Managing Distractions - A Key to Sales Success

These aren't generally discussed, written about or analyzed, but they are there, getting in the way, sometimes for months at a time. Most of your salespeople aren't very effective dealing with them. At the least they interfere with business and at their worst they dominate your salespeople's lives. I'm talking about distractions.

Distractions can take many forms, from the call that takes them off their game, to the illness or death of a loved one that stops their game cold. Distractions can last a few minutes or they can linger for months. You can even understand why some, especially the really bad distractions, can interfere for so long.

In the end, it's your salespeople's ability to cope and stay focused in the face of distractions that will determine what kind of year they have. Everyone, including you and me, has distracting events in their lives. When one event goes away you can be sure that another will follow. I know a salesperson who generates a year's worth of business in just 6-9 months, while he is distracted the other 3-6 months - every year! I know another salesperson who was distracted for two years.

You know they'll have distractions so it's your job to know your salespeople well enough to recognize when they are being affected. Helpd help them cope, focus and work through them in order to get from each as close to 12 months worth of effectiveness as you can.

Don't let this article distract you, go help somebody!

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Home > Sales > Dave Kurlan > Managing Distractions A Key to Sales Success
Article Tags: 12 months, 9 months, death of a loved one, distractions, few minutes, game, job, salespeople, salesperson

About the Author: Dave Kurlan
RSS for Dave's articles - Visit Dave's website

Dave Kurlan is a best-selling author, top-rated speaker and thought leader on sales development.  He is the founder and CEO of Objective Management Group, Inc., the industry leader in sales assessments and sales force evaluations, and the CEO of David Kurlan & Associates, Inc., a consulting firm specializing in sales force development. Dave has been a top rated speaker at Inc. Magazine's Conference on Growing the Company, the Sales & Marketing Management Conference and the Gazelles Sales & Marketing Summit. He has been featured on radio and TV, including World Business Review with General Norman Schwarzkopf, in Inc. Magazine, Selling Power Magazine, Sales & Marketing Management Magazine and Incentive Magazine. He is the author of Mindless Selling and Baseline Selling – How to Become a Sales Superstar by Using What You Already Know about the Game of Baseball. He created and wrote STAR, a proprietary recruiting process for hiring great salespeople, and he writes Understanding the Sales Force, a popular business Blog and is a contributing author to The Death of 20th Century Selling (Dan Seidman), Stepping Stones (Deepak Chopra and Brian Tracey) and 101 Great Ways to Improve Your Life, Volume 2 (David Riklan).

Click here to visit Dave's website
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