Expertise is very important.

And it’s praiseworthy to hone your craft.

To constantly get better, and do better.

Learning is here to stay.

There’s infinite depth to your field.

As is the case with any subject.

But, be careful.

Not to do so, at the expense of your income.

You’re a business owner now!

That means, there are two skills to focus on:

The skill of delivering an amazing service,

And the skill of getting clients.

Both go hand in hand.

Focus on the former, and you’ll have lot’s to offer, but no-one to offer it to.

Focus on the latter, and you’ll have a waitlist of disappointment.

This isn’t either/ or,

You need both.

So if you’ve been neglecting “sales” in your pursuit of professional excellence,

Then, I invite you to the other half.

Where you can finally put theory to practice,

And start solving real problems for real people,

Starting with the consequences of them not hiring you.

One of my group coaching clients messaged me the other day.

It was an apology.

Followed by “one of those messages” no business owner wants to see.

No reason given, just a request for confirmation that their subscription had ended.

I must admit I wasn’t expecting this.

Because I’ve witnessed just how much he’s grown over the last few months of joining.

So what did I do?

Cancel everything begrudgingly and send a discourteous reply?

No. Might have been easier, but a terrible disservice from me.

I called him up.

That’s what I teach.

He spoke; I listened.

Over an hour passed.

And by the end of the call, he enrolled into one-on-one coaching with me.

Buying more of my attention, and investing several times more than he was.

How did that happen?

Well, I didn’t call him expecting to “upsell” anything.
I was curious.

And above all, I was committed to his success, even more than him.

And he could tell.

So he borrowed from my confidence, and decided to keep going.

Even though he was doubtful he could “do it”.

Because that’s what it takes to build something that lasts.

A few decisions made on a tether of possibility over doubt.

And someone you can turn to who says “I see that for you, don’t give up!”

I was in a queue at the checkout.

I politely asked the customer in front whether I could skip ahead.

And they graciously agreed.

So far nothing special?

Well, aside from the fact that this simple request saved me more than ten minutes of wait time.

I gained much more from the lesson.

This simple event sparked fresh insight.

In a moment of introspection, I asked:

“How many other ways am I ‘waiting around’ in life?”

The more I thought about it, the more I realised.

How much I, and all of us, fail to “ask”, even when people will gladly respond.

We convince ourselves that it’s better to avoid asking than to risk the disappointment of “no”.

We do it in our personal lives, and we carry it over into business.

That prospect who says “thank you for the information, I’ll think about it…”

Parting ways with their problem still unsolved, might otherwise have bought with a polite request.