While touring a remote and habitable Island in the South Atlantic, we took a tour to observe the Penguins there.
Our driver was a young lady; full of vigor with a delightfully independent attitude of not necessarily believing everything she was told.
She had tasted life in another country, and revealed that she preferred life on the island primarily because of the freedom and the relatively easy life style.
Jobs however, were hard to get.
I asked her what she wanted to do and she gave what appeared to be an un-ambitious answer about being a driver with one of the tour companies.
So I gently pressed and asked what would she do if she could anything, and failure was not an option… in other words, what was her passion if she had any.
She replied she would love to be a mechanic and lit up as she talked about it.
It appeared she needed to spend a vocational year off the island to go to college and after that go into an apprenticeship. She had the time and resources to do this.
Her light started dimming and almost went out when I asked her a powerful Solution Question which was simply, “What have you done or what are you doing to achieve this dream?” She shrugged and started making a series of excuses about not taking action.
At that point I backed away and changed the conversation.
Why? Because sadly, the long and short of it is, she is likely to do nothing to change her present circumstances… not in the foreseeable future anyway. And the last thing she needed was for me to badger her or offer her advice or make suggestions.
The need was there – however… the desire to satisfy the need wasn’t!
Without desire there is no action and without action there is no change.
The Clue Was In The Answer To The Solution Question
You'll note that I picked up on this lady's lack of desire as the result of the Solution Question that I asked.
Solution Questions are part of the Discovering Stage in the Natural Selling Conversation Framework (I talk more about these areas in Chapters 6 and 12 of my book "How To Sell Network Marketing Without Fear, Anxiety or Losing Your Friends!").
I designed the Conversation Framework very carefully. If you follow the map that it provides, it will help you discover…
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What someone wants;
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Why they want it; and
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Are they prepared to do something about it?
And if someone isn’t prepared to change, you simply bow out gracefully and move on to find someone who is!
So if you want to…
Eliminate the frustration of following up on the wrong people
Decrease or eliminate your attrition rate
Create a powerful and action oriented downline
…it’s vital to establish and cement a persons desire to change their present circumstances after you have heard the need and before you present your solution. Look and listen for this vital piece of information.
Have a peaceful and prosperous week…
Best Selling Author of "How
to Sell Network Marketing Without Fear, Anxiety or Losing Your
Friends!" - Selling from the Soul. Ancient Wisdoms.
Modern Practice.
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Great post. The solution question is such a great tool to use and get informations you wouldnt get with any other methode.
Posted by: Christian Sandfeld | February 25, 2007 at 04:52 AM
Absolutely would agree with this sentiment; however I'd go one further. We live in an age where many people have lost their desire through sheer pressures of life. If we are going to make a fundamental difference in peoples' lives then we should take time to help develop and cultivate peoples' desires and dreams rather than walk away. Of course, there is a cost to this; but isn't the long term opportunity cost likely to be far greater once that wider opportunity awareness is re-kindled?
Posted by: Bob Thompson | February 26, 2007 at 02:20 AM