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Use Elevator Pitch to Improve Your Relations!

It happens to all of us; our boss doesn’t understand that we are doing our best for the company, our wife or husband doesn’t get the brilliant idea behind our decision, the corporate doesn’t care with our great idea, and too many other similar situations. What is the reason for that and what would be the solution?

We are living a life full of new information coming to us every second. We don’t have an hour to sit and chat about another person’s thoughts and ideas. Lack of communication between people in this condition creates a high potential of misunderstanding. Your boss doesn’t value what you are doing because you are not given a chance to sit and explain for him/her the reason behind our actions. We get into argument with our spouse, because we don’t have a chance to talk enough about ourselves with one another. It happens always, whether it is in our office or at home.

What can we do?

You may have heard about elevator pitch: brief explanations of our product, service or our experience that we tell someone in less than one minute (sometimes 30 seconds) to give him/her the best understanding of what we offer. The idea behind elevator pitch is that you have to be ready to sell yourself, your product or service to a prospect while you are with him/her in an elevator going from ground floor of the building to the top managerial floor in approximately 30 seconds. As a sales person you always should be ready to capture such opportunity.

What I want to suggest is to use the same concept and give short reports of what you are doing or what you have in your mind to your spouse, your boss and generally everyone that needs to be informed about or engaged in what you are doing. Prepare several 30 second pitches to sell your ideas, your works and most importantly yourself. Use every short opportunity to communicate those pitches with the person who is somehow related to you or to what you are doing. By doing so, you will have yourself always in their minds. It becomes clear for them that you are doing what you should do.

For example, usually your boss is not aware of what you are doing in your project. Don’t wait for the works to get finished. Have 30 seconds elevator pitchs ready to report him whenever you get that chance of an elevator ride. Update him/her about your daily works. Don’t forget! Your report must be genuine and should not to be seemed that you want to complain. So if you talk about any problem you have in your works, talk also about your approach for solving the problem. In this way, he or she always knows what you are doing your best and not just hanging out in the company!

The same concept can be used in dealing with every other person that you want to have a good relation with.

Always have your short elevators pitches ready and customized for all the stakeholders in life. Use every elevator like situation to communicate them. After getting use to do that regularly, you will find out how these short pitches help you to improve your relations and to make your communications effective.

 

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The Power of Goal Setting

In Mark McCormack’s book, “What they Don’t Teach You at Harvard Business School” he discusses a study conducted of Harvard MBA grads between 1979 and 1989. Graduates were asked if they had set clear, written goals for their future. 84% had not, 13% said they did have goals but surprisingly only 3% had actually written them down. Ten years later in 1989 they went back to these grads and found that the 13% with non-written goals were earning on average twice as much as those who had no goals at all. The amazing part is that the 3% that had true written goals were earning on average 10 times as much as the average from the entire remaining 97%! Obviously Harvard does not graduate dummies so it’s pretty clear that goal setting made the difference, not intelligence.

Here is a system and some tips for writing, tracking and achieving your goals:

Write down your goals! This is critical – and when I say “write” I don’t mean take mental notes nor do I mean typing in on your computer or smart phone. I mean the good old fashioned way with pen and paper. When setting your goals always follow the S.M.A.R.T. system. Here’s an explanation…

S for Specific
Your goals need to be specific. “Make a ton of money” or “have more free time” are not specific goals and won’t push you into action. Specific goals are “Make $250,000 this year” and “attend 10 of my son’s little league games this season”.

M for Measurable
No point in setting goals if you can’t measure them. If your goal is to make $250,000 in 2010 then you know that by July 1 you should have made $125,000 or you could be off track and need to kick it into high gear. If you can’t measure your progress with your goals then success or failure may be open to speculation. We either hit or miss our goals – no in between.

A for Attainable
Your goals need to be worthwhile and possible otherwise you won’t be motivated to pursue them. I’d love to make a billion dollars a year but despite being a fairly confident and optimistic guy I know that’s hardly an attainable goal. Set ambitious goals but always remember it’s a whole lot more motivating and gratifying to over perform on your goals than it is to fall short.

R T for Realistic Timetable
Goals have to have a deadline otherwise they won’t motivate or inspire commitment. It’s hard to really be motivated to take action on something we want to achieve someday. It’s much easier to take action on something we want to achieve by the end of the month or year. Give yourself a fair time frame to achieve your goals otherwise you will set yourself up to fail but also remember that most humans are not wired to think more than a few years out. 1, 3 and 5 year goals are what I generally try to set.

End Goals vs Means Goals

There are basically two types of goals… end goals and means goals. End goals are your ultimate goals, for example, earn $250,000 in 2010. That goal should be set but to really kick yourself into action you will also want to create means goals. (as in a means to an end). What goals will you need to set on a daily – weekly and monthly basis to achieve that $250,000 in 2010? How many leads, sales calls, candidate introductions, etc. will it take to achieve my ends goal? In addition to writing out these goals, take an extra few minutes to also write down how it will make you feel when you achieve your end goal. How will it make you feel if you don’t achieve it. Leverage your fear of failure to motivate you and visualize your success.

In my 20 or so years of striving to be a successful entrepreneur I have read books, attended seminars and sought advice from so many of the greats including Anthony Robbins, Zig Ziglar, Steven Covey, Brian Tracey, Chet Holmes and more. While the general styles and focus of these people may vary I have never read one of their books or attended one of their seminars where true goal setting was not a key focus. If you have not already done so – go get yourself a plain spiral notebook and a pen and get busy setting your goals. I guarantee it will change your life.

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