Tag Archives: Lifestyle

Customer satisfaction!

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Have you ever made one or more of your customers mad and didn’t even know it. Consider the following:

What is one of the worst things you can do to a customer — Cause opportunity for an RMA – Returned Material Authorization — something is wrong and the customer is not happy!

An RMA is the black mark of black marks.

I started my career of customer service in the world of RMA and Warranty.

It can be one of the most frustrating things you can do to a customer.

1.     The product was bought to use not send back.

2.     On-time, instant gratification, great product — gone.

3.     There is a tremendous need for a system, procedures, and people to handle the returns. 

4.     Both Sides are MAD – Customer returning product and the supplier trying to handle non-routine work.

From experience of owning a company I have witnessed the process of people in the organization knowingly shipping product, that was bad, to make the monthly numbers. 

When I discovered this several people were immediately removed from my organization. 

BUT

As I stopped and reflected on what happened, I decided I was probably part or all of the cause. 

I stopped cold — all managers were summoned and we decided this needed correction. Aanother moment of getting the Lean Journey started and not really being aware of it. The underlying cause was bad operating systems. We did not have good repeatable processes to ship material.

So began the journey. We did get better and improve. We began the real “Lean Journey”

I was amazed at the rate we lowered RMA’s at our company! — and — our growth took off.

 

Make 2018 your best year yet!

Comments welcome!

 

Proven – Sales/Selling system!

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I like the phrase “IF I can do it, anyone can do it.”

Many of us learn there are many things in life that are proven. It’s proven that many of us can learn to ride a bike. It’s proven that many of us can learn to speak in-front of others. It’s proven that most of us learn to talk. It’s proven …(for many, many things we can think of!). We all know that most proven things in life are taken for granted.

Why is it so hard for sales and non-sales people to believe there are proven sales systems that work.

Many people sales and non-sales people, think, act and talk about the mystique of selling. This often misconstrued belief of sales and selling leads to belief that sales is magic, a given to a few gifted people. Nothing could be further from the truth.

I’ve talked and written many times about the two proven items of sales and selling.

  1. Good sales training and continued coaching can produce quality sales people.
  2. A selling system or cookbook, followed daily can and will produce results.

Get the books, get the training, build a cookbook and see tremendous results.

Make 2018 your best year yet.

Want more information on cookbooks for selling let me know. Want more information on great sales training and system look up Sandler Selling.

 

Mentors!

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A mentor is an experienced and trusted advisor. Sometimes we have face-to-face mentors and mentoring. Sometimes we have indirect mentoring through reading books, watching videos, on-line, and possibly in passing with family and friends.

Not knowing it at the time, my dad was my first mentor in sales training. This is one of those things I realized later in life that the mentoring I received was tremendous. My sales career, once started, was greatly influenced by his methods and persistence in sales.

I read all kinds of books. Some novels for enjoyment. Self help books and many books related to sales, selling, running and operating a business.

However, I knew that there was a lot more to learn about sales and business operations. I studied and read many mentors. Zig Ziglar, Dr. Norman Vincent Peale, Jim Rohn, Earl Nightingale. Dr. Robert Schuller to name a just few. There are countless others in my library. I have had privilege to meet some of these people and have enjoyed reading and learning about their thoughts and ideas on life and business.

Do you have a mentoring program on-going for daily learning. There is so much material available today, it can be mind-boggling.

Start or really get going on a self-education program of your personal interests. I have created daily routines, daily rituals that ensure pathways for me to progress forward. I set goals and measure daily. You can too.  Find a mentor and never stop learning.

Let me know your thoughts.

Make 2018 your best year yet!

 

Make an appointment and get ready for 2018!

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Make an appointment and get ready for 2018!

I think about doing things and “sometimes” don’t get around to doing them. Actually, I have had to-do items on my list for years that I want to-do but never seem to complete, or get to.

Over the past years I finally found a way to get to those things that I feel are important. Make an appointment with myself. Write down a date and time and be ready to do nothing for that time period except work on the project or goal.

With the Holidays coming I am looking at and writing down time to think and work on “What 2018 will look like!”. I am making an appointment, actually several appointments with myself to dedicate time on working and setting my 2018 goals. I try to set these times at about 1-1/2 hours maximum.

Set your time and don’t miss it.

Try to think about and write down all things pertinent to having a successful 2018 year. YES, the first session will be messy. You will have random thoughts and non-organized thoughts.

BUT — you will have them written down. That’s way more than half the battle. You will be light-years ahead of others.

Then set your second session to go over and really think about the important items and organize these thoughts and have them ready to review as the year begins and moves forward.

Let me know your thoughts and how this works for you.

Good Luck!      Make 2018 your best year yet!

Third quarter — Are you making your sales or ready to make excuses?

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Excuses

Third quarter makes or breaks sales success. You as a sales person need to have the pipeline going with plenty of upcoming opportunities working. Many sales people have lead times of 9 to 15 weeks. If you aren’t booking orders this quarter you won’t be able to fill the last quarter of the year — Then out come the excuses.

Obviously if you haven’t completed booking all orders for the year by end of this quarter or early into next quarter sales for the year can’t happen.  Management questions of performance will begin.  What is happening?  Where are the sales?

The problem with sales that bothers me most follows:

I’ve read that more than 1/2 sales people do not have the right skills to be successful. Not because of lack of talent, but the inability of organizations to provide specific tools and training for sales success. Many companies do not have a defined sales process. Many companies don’t have a process to share best practices.  Sales managers don’t coach sales people. There is often no tracking system. 

With this being true, sales people have no choice but to become excuse making machines. 

Having defined processes based on success are imperative. Over the years from personal experience and really good sales training I have developed a program for sales success. Several sales people from other selling areas have taken this system and developed and adapted it to their specific situation and have attained really great selling success.

Let me know thoughts and/or if you want more information.

Make 2017 your best year yet?

Lean Manufacturing!

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I started on my Lean Journey in 2007. I joined a group of likeminded people wanting to improve Aerospace supply chain. After reading about Lean Manufacturing and hearing testimonials I took a complete leap into the world of Lean. I was producing approximately $10 million per year in sales, had good quality, very low (terrible) inventory turns with only reasonable on-time delivery.

I wanted my Company to be the best in class for our products. I hired two Lean managers, told one to start at the front end of our manufacturing process and the other to start at the end and eventually they would meet somewhere in the middle.

1st year I had no increase in costs. The lean initiatives paid for the two Lean managers. 2nd year my costs started dropping, profit improved and we began seeing improvement in quality and delivery. Inventory started dropping, inventory turns started an upward trend.

I was so naïve those years that I hadn’t realized I wasn’t even in the game for Lean — Yet. Gradually I began to see the benefit for my entire enterprise, from sales, order entry, engineering, and manufacturing through after delivery service.

Do you have a lean understanding or do you view it as a personnel and cost reduction opportunity?

Make 2017 your best year yet!

A good week!

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I have been learning the profession of selling for many years.  I have read and studied many books and articles, and attended quite a few courses and seminars on selling.  For many years, I had a company on retainer to provide continuous sales training for my sales staff.  I have continued using a sales “Cook Book” — a behavioral measurement system for staying in the selling game and meeting goals.

Last week was a good week, making sales goals for the company and continuing with behaviors to get future results.  

Earlier this month I was asked to form a weekly Accountability Group for several sales people.  We have had three sessions and already each of us, including myself, see better sales results.  Our objective is to make sure we are all following the behaviors needed for making sales goals weekly, monthly and for the year.  By leading the group I find myself becoming better focused on making my goals happen. I’ll describe more about our group and results in the future.

Are you measuring your daily behaviors to get desired results?  

If you have thoughts on this — Let me know.  If you would like a sample of our measurement planning “Cook Book” — Let me know.

Make 2017 your best year yet!

Give up? – Never!

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“Never, Never, Never, Never — Give up!” –  Winston Churchill

So drive by gyms on the way to work — What do you see? Parking lots with fewer and fewer cars.

Tiresome to write about goals when inside you know that you won’t or can’t keep them going.

End of first quarter is near. Are you feeling good about the accomplishments so far this year? Will you feel good about completing the first three months.

Interesting question — especially for me. I am pretty much meeting or exceeding my goals set for Q1 of 2017. I always look back and see that I could have done things differently, or better. However, I do feel good with progress made so.

Comments?

Make 2017 your best year yet!

Readers

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“Not all readers are leaders, but all leaders are readers.” ― Harry Truman

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Some years ago I was giving a toastmasters speech titled “All leaders are readers.” I felt something was missing from the title. This quote by Harry Truman sums it well.

I am an advocate of continuous reading. I started a reading program many years ago. As a slow reader, the idea of reading one book per week really was not viable in my life style. I decided to begin a practice of reading minimum 5 minutes per day. I read several books that first year and I tracked my reading habit. After several years I grew my goal to 20 minutes per day, and several years ago I switched to reading pages per day. This year 2017 I have a goal of reading minimum of 20 pages per day.  Does this mean I am diligent and read every day — No! But I do average 20 pages per day.

As I have discussed in the past I really look to Jim Rohn – Author, Entrepreneur, Speaker – as a mentor on business and living. He had a philosophy of reading that included all types of books. Get in the habit of reading for your profession, but also read books on opposite thinking and throw in a few good novels.

Harry Truman was right “Not all readers are leaders, but all leaders are readers.” Do some “Internet” research and you will find most leaders are readers.

Think about reading for your 2017 goals. Begin a reading program and track it.

Make 2017 your best year yet!

Easy or Difficult?

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Great potential!

Have you ever thought about how easy or difficult it is to do business with your company?

I look at other businesses and items of interest, especially on the internet. Many times I turn away and do not get any information about the company or its products. If before I see the product or service I have to give my contact information or worse, a credit card to see something free — I leave!

Having said that — I started looking at doing business with my company. Is it easy or difficult? My conclusion was that it was difficult. We didn’t really make things easy.

So now I am on a quest of making this business easy to get information and do business with us. Not an easy quick task. However, I am continually reviewing our practices and asking — “What makes doing business with us easier?”

Is it easy or difficult to do business with your company? Good luck — !

Make 2017 your best year yet!

I am going to make doing business with us easier – www.Poly-PMF.com