Among the stickiest places for dealing with potential has been numbers – and particularly financial numbers.  Money has been a highly-charged topic for many of us.  As a culture, we’ve often been more open about our romantic lives than our financial lives.

It’s likely that a key reason for historic difficulty in relating with financial potential is that our culture teaches us that we are to be measured by our financial achievements.  If we’re earning under our potential, the tendency for many has been to experience that as some sort of failure as a person rather than simply a measure of relative performance.

What is your relationship to your financial potential?  Is it easier to explore your potential for financial mastery at work rather than in your own personal balance sheet?  Have you been among those persons who ignores your financial potential altogether? What is the optimal relationship to that potential for you?

There has been not inconsiderable resistance in our culture to identifying oneself as a salesperson.  Many consider selling to be “beneath” them or somehow inferior to holding a “professional” job.  Over 25  years ago, psychologists Dudley and Goodson created a test to measure the degree of “Sales Call Reluctance” which measured 12 different areas that are predictive of success as a salesperson.

Among the 12 categories is the general category of the willingness to be identified as a sales professional.  One’s score reveals the degree of embracing or rejection of a role as salesperson.  Obviously, if one rejects the role, she or he is going to have a hard time selling successfully.

Where do you fall in terms of willingness to identify yourself as a salesperson – either directly or in terms of functionalities within your job?  Where do you see salespeople within a socio-economic hierarchy?  How valuable or not valuable are salespeople in your opinion to the ultimate betterment of society?

Selling is a process of communicating sufficient value so that a buyer says “yes” and a sale is consummated. Many buyers perceive higher value if they feel they are being treated as special. Oftentimes, we feel special when offered a bargain, a sale or a premium — among many ways.

“Special offers” can be offered in refined and attractive ways or, at the opposite end of the continuum, “deals” can be crude and even consulting — sometimes even counterproductive for the salesperson. Kin Hubbard defines bargain as:  ”A bargain is anything a customer thinks a store is losing money on.”

Do you currently offer discounts and bargain pricing to your customers? What are your reasons either way?  Are customers more or less demanding for deals and discounts in our current economic environment? Are you a “deal shopper”?  What have been the best ways for you to offer deals to your customers?

Among the best ideas for business development and expanding sales is the practice of monthly “marketing touches” over at least a 12-month period. You benefit from regular, consistent visibility to clients and prospects. For example, you can establish a three-month rhythm of . . .

(1) a call

(2) article or general information

(3) an email

. . . for each of the three months of each quarter. Be creative and use any other combinations that you believe will be effective. You may choose to meet in person with some of the people with whom you are communicating.

Much of what has not worked about business development is that it has often been non-uniform. Making a commitment to being visible on a regular monthly basis demonstrates that you hold a person top of mind.

Have you ever tried an approach like this which is designed to build and enhance relationships? What objections, if any, come up for you about your ability to maintain this practice over a year’s time? How many people could you commit to reaching in this manner?

History was made last week with the appointment of Britain’s first woman Poet Laureate in the 341 years of the existence of the position. It’s telling that Carol Ann Duffy will receive an annual stipend equal to $8,500; yet, it’s a great milestone to have broken the gender barrier even if it did take three and a half centuries.

In the U.S., Louise Bogen was appointed its first woman Poet Laureate in 1945 (the fourth U.S. Poet Laureate overall). The current Poet Laureate, Kay Ryan, is charged with raising the national consciousness of poetry, and she’s paid $35,000 annually. Ryan writes in a poem called Hide and Seek:

“It’s hard not to jump out instead of waiting to be found. It’s hard to be alone so long and then hear someone come around. It’s like some form of skin’s developed in the air that, rather than have you torn, you tear.”

Some might consider poetry like this frivolous; others consider it essential. Where do you stand? Is there a practical role for poetry in our lives? How might you incorporate poetry into your life? If it were up to you, how valued or not valued would the Poet Laureate of a country be?

Perhaps, for purposes of this discussion, we can accept that absolute security does not exist . . . in order to allow a practical conversation about relative security. A very simplistic way to define SECURITY is FREEDOM FROM CONCERN OR WORRY.

Let’s take on financial security first. Do you consider yourself financially secure? Why or why not? Without violating any confidence about your personal financial situation, can you share with the group how you define financial security?

Again, ABSOLUTE SECURITY would mean that you had enough money for the rest of your life (unknown duration) and it was always going to be safe and liquid and available to you . . . in an economic climate that did not erode its purchasing power through either inflation or deflation . . . and on and on.

The point being . . . that we have to come to terms with relative financial security to achieve a certain comfort level. A certain amount of cash to last for a period of time that you decide is “sufficiently secure,” a livelihood, macro-economic conditions that allow you to maintain or expand your security.

It’s always interesting to challenge assumptions. In this time of an ailing economy, it’s useful to examine what we require to feel secure. What is it for you? How much are you concerned about financial security?

Copyright 2009. E. B. Hutt Bush and Coaching for Results, Inc.

There’s a line in “Cabaret”: “Money makes the world go ’round.” This is a prevalent . . . and potentially troublesome . . . belief.

Is it possible that we have it wrong in our culture when we act as though money can buy happiness?

Have love and money ever intersected in your life? I heard someone say recently, “I married her for her money,” and I was sad that anyone would ever do that. Has that ever happened to anyone you know . . . or even to you?

Richard Friedman said, “Money will buy you a fine dog, but only love will make it wag its tail.”

Have you seen or experienced evidence of money influencing affairs of the heart? What do you believe is the best attitude toward money within a romantic relationship?

Copyright 2009. E. B. Hutt Bush and Coaching for Results, Inc.

Money is a highly-charged topic. In our culture where people are often judged by their net worths and their possessions, it may been hard to keep a balanced, healthy perspective about money.

There is a tremendous belief system of money myths ranging from the old Puritan point of view that wealth was proof that God favored a person . . . to the view that one can’t be both wealthy and a good person . . . and that it’s easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than to enter heaven.

Do you believe that money can co-exist with goodness? Does money always corrupt? Is the love of money actually the root of all evil?

What have been your money myths? Are there aspects of your early training at an impressionable age that no longer serve you?

Money, like anything else can be used for good or ill. How have your myths about money had you use it in your personal and business lives?

Copyright 2009. E. B. Hutt Bush and Coaching for Results, Inc.