Message of hope to our industry CEOs

Leaders: I may be wrong, but please read on. Right now, I know each of you are taking the actions-hour by hour - that are necessary for the survival of your businesses.

After 27 years of getting to know many of you, whether retailer, manufacturer or supplier- I know you are a group of people who care deeply about the impact your decisions on the lives of each of your stakeholders. I believe you have, at your core, a desire to bring beauty and comfort into other’s people’s lives through what you do for a living while, at the same time, building a viable financial future for your own families.
And now, so much of what you’ve worked so hard for is -or seems to be- crumbling. It’s such a tough time and I am writing this today to share with you the one free action I see that you could incorporate in order to bring your companies a renewed sense of hope.

This post is directed to the CEO’s of our industry because one of your key priorities right now is likely to be aggressively speeding up the VELOCITY OF your (profitable) SALES. If that’s true, please read this through to the very end.

I believe, by implementing this idea, you have the power to deliver a message of hope so tangible and real that actionable opportunities you’ve never heard or thought of will pour forth-empowering you to lead your employees through these perilous times with a renewed sense of passion and commitment from them that you never thought possible.

Here it is:
Issue invitations to all sales people who have a new idea/product/technology to show you to come and see you PERSONALLY-at market or elsewhere. I know-time is the issue, BUT: Right now, your whole team-no matter how senior they are-needs TO KNOW YOU ARE OPEN TO NEW IDEAS.

There is no better way for them to see this than for you to extend an open invitation for all salespeople to visit you-the CEO. Why? Your employees, for the most part, will NOT , in this current climate, put their jobs on the line to bring you a new idea or technology if they think it will make them look bad in front of you, damage your ego because you don’t understand it, get them known as a “thought leader” but not focused on the here and now, etc. They will bring you only those ideas that they know will ingratiate themselves to you.

As a result, you are NOT SEEING the ideas that might be the difference between staying in and going out of business because it might cost someone their job if you think it is a silly or bad idea because you don’t understand it. Maybe your CMO/CIO doesn’t understand the idea themselves, but it really IS a brilliant idea and, if you saw it, you would recognize it. I see this happening a lot, sorry to say, at the CMO/CIO levels. Everyone is just so busy, so panicked and the technology so new and confusing that the great ideas that can save your business and propel it forward are just not getting through- TO YOU, THE LEADER.

By letting it be known that you are INVITING sales people with new ideas into YOUR inner sanctum, you are sure to unleash a rush within your own teams to find and present to you the best ideas out there. It is my hope that by letting your employees know you don’t have all the answers and are searching for creative and innovative ways to conduct your business-even if it means personally visiting with all the sales people yourself - it will send such a strong message to them re: your willingness to conduct your business in totally new ways that it will give them the faith they need to bring you new ideas-even if the idea does not make sense and they are afraid of presenting it to you because it is so “out there.” Many of the best ones don’t make sense-at first. Like why consumers would ever use their mobile phones to surf the web. People thought it would be too hard to see the screen or type on it. Today , according to Nielsen, 3.1 billion people in the world use their mobile phones to surf the net-one half of the world’s population- 264 million here in the US alone.

Did you know that? Maybe, armed with that knowledge, you’ve just read a message of hope? Has your company met with a mobile ad sales rep yet? Do you have your own mobile social networking site yet? Do you text message your customers yet? Hope? YES. Just be OPEN to it..it’s all around you.