Be Persistent and Pleasantly Skeptical
What I like to communicate to you through my blogs, articles and columns are real world principles that work. They can work for you too.
We’ve all heard how important it is to be persistent. Whether it’s getting our business to where we want it to be or taking the steps to live our ideal life. “Keeping at it” is so important. So what I want to do is give you some simple “persistence” lessons that I just learned through practical experience. I have to leave out some little details to protect the innocent and keep things confidential. It’s important to understand that in both these true stories I was NOT selling anything, I was not making cold calls and I was not soliciting business. But I will fill you in when the last story has its happy ending. Hopefully that’ll be soon.
It’s sad but true. Some “switchboard” operators don’t have their acts together. In my persistent effort to make something happen for one of my many projects I made a call and was told by the switchboard person who I had to speak with. I got through to this person and they simply instructed me to send an email a particular address. “That’s the way it works,” he said. So I sent the email. After a couple of days I followed up. He again told me to send the email. Not wanting to just keep sending my email into a black hole I decided to dig a little deeper and get his clarification. When he clarified I realized that he was giving me the wrong instructions for who I needed to get in touch with. Then I clarified further and that’s when he said; “Hold on, let me put you through to…”
And voila, within a week the result I was looking for became reality.
On another occasion I was taught the lesson of persistence and how important it is to “dig a little deeper.” A switchboard type person told me who I needed to contact. I really was aware of how clear I was when I made my request. I think I was pretty clear. So for a couple of months I reached out to this person. A couple of times him and I actually spoke. He sort of gave me the “oh sure, but not now” act. Which is fine. On one occasion when I called him back he seemed very annoyed. No big deal, I’m a big boy I can handle rejection. On a hunch I called the switchboard again. I stated clearly who I was looking for and what I needed and they told me who I needed to speak with. The person was totally different from the other gentleman I was first directed to. Then, I asked a question about the other guy I was originally directed to and the switchboard operator said to me; “What? He doesn’t do that, he works in….” and they filled me in on the fact that he was in a completely different department. Which explains why he was so annoyed with me! The truth was he couldn’t help me. And don’t ask me why he just didn’t come out and tell me that himself??
Of course, the persistence certainly is illustrated in these stories. But you can also take away another lesson…
Be pleasantly skeptical about the people you are dealing with. That’s not being negative, but a fair assumption that you’re the one who needs to gather the facts and make things happen is a safer bet than betting on someone else.
What I hope to do real soon is to fill in the complete details of these two stories. I am just waiting for the second one to have it’s happy ending. It will, real soon I’m sure.
And don’t forget- On November 10th we’ll be doing the “official” amazon launch of Motion Before Motivation, The Success Secret That Never Fails. When you get the book that day you’ll be privy to a whole lot of awesome and complimentary bonuses.
So stay tuned for that email!
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