The recent Paris Olympics presented athletes who are marvels of physical excellence and mental fortitude.
Olympic and world records fell, and the gap between a gold medal and fourth place was often fractions of a second. I lost count of how many times the performances wowed me. Anyone who watched couldn’t help but be amazed.
But what can the Olympics teach us about business performance? This essay will focus on one of the most neglected but critical factors in business that leads to high-level performance: training.
What makes an athlete “world-class?’ American Simone Biles is the most decorated gymnast in history. She’s won six gold medals in three Olympics, 23 world championships, and six all-around world titles. Her training regimen includes:
- Cross-training in several sports
- Swims one mile 2x/week or bikes 10 miles 1x
- Sometimes, she runs one mile before her gymnastics routines
- 15-minute intensive abdominal sessions of 11 rounds
- Several sets of Superman holds, superman pulses, hollow holds, hollow pulses
- All this before practicing her actual gymnastic techniques
- Often trains 2x/day for a total of seven hours, six days a week
- Started gymnastics at six years old — got coaching early, at eight years old
- Forged by 13 years of elite-level competition
- Is now 27 years old, so has put in two decades of hard work.
Yes, Biles has preternatural talent, but she became a world-class performer only after spending time practicing, developing skills, and building her knowledge base.
Business Success Formula
What can we do as leaders and managers? Our formula is to look for talented people, develop and train them, and then let them loose! This was also the formula of former University of Alabama football coach Lou Saban, who won several national titles.
The renowned Gallup Organization (of Gallup Poll fame) says that the world’s greatest managers utilize four keys to produce top-level results:
- Hire for talent
- Define the right outcomes
- Focus on strengths (a strength is a "developed” talent) and
- Find the right fit.
These great managers know that you can’t change people very much, so they look for people with the striving, thinking, and relating talents needed for a position. Once they have talented people, they train them hard!
So, what about your training programs? Is training in your organization robust or neglected?
Start Here
A great place to start a training initiative with a high ROI is in the sales department. I’ve said before in this column that most businesses do not have defined sales processes. I mean a “systematic series of actions, or a series of defined, repeatable steps intended to achieve a result. When followed, these steps can consistently lead to expected outcomes.” (K. Eades)
I call these kinds of sub-optimal processes “hip shooting!”
Hip shooting is expensive and wasteful. And you don’t need to accept it.
What’s the alternative? Optimize your sales processes by analyzing what’s currently being done step-by-step. Here are some things to consider:
- Do your salespeople know how to do a call introduction and open conversations with prospects in a way that shows their sincerity and competence and establishes rapport so prospects talk to topic?
- Do they have a clearly defined roadmap that diagnoses prospects’ pain, explores the organizational impact of the problems, and shows how your offered capabilities can enable them to solve their business problems?
- Do your salespeople fully understand how people buy and, therefore, know how to align their sales process with prospects to avoid creating tension that leads to stall objections and control objections from prospects?
- Do they know how to justify value to prospects?
- Do they know how to deal with prospects who’ve been to “negotiation school”?
- Do they know how to control the sales process from start to finish AND allow prospects to stay in control of their buying process?
Here’s Another High ROI Area to Consider
Another high-return area to consider for training initiatives is your management team.
- Do your managers know how to select people for talent to avoid placing people in positions where they’ll perform poorly or fail
- Do they define what outcomes they want people to achieve and avoid micro-management
- Do they know how to develop talent with specific training programs
- Do they fully understand the power of motivation theory and reward systems
- Can they confront poor performance and hold people accountable
- Do your managers know how to counsel and improve employee performance
- Do they communicate clearly
- Can they solve business problems?
Training can dramatically enhance employee performance. Add the kind of “gulp factor” business goals that inspire your people and demand the best from them. You’re on your way to transforming your company, achieving your objectives, enhancing the value of your organization, reducing stress, and enjoying your work like never before.
Call or text me at 949.338.7141 or email me at jvcastiglia@icloud.com if you’d like to discuss your situation. I love helping companies prosper.
Jim Castiglia is the founder of Business Street Fighter Consulting and supports entrepreneurial business owners in their desire to grow and maximize the value of their business. He can be reached by email at JimC@BSF.consulting or by phone at 949-338-7141. Visit www.BSF.consulting
