3 Tips for Overcoming the fear of a Customer Conversation.
4.18pm.
I’d been there for an hour & a half & my numb, right gluteal muscle knew it. Neurosurgical outpatient clinics were never known for their ergonomic waiting chairs or cozy décor.
I’ve always found them a depressing shamble. Soulless & jam packed with anxious faces of broken people looking for solutions to their body’s neurosurgical problems. The complexity of the problem relative to the weight of the patient file sitting on their lap.
I always felt bad knowing I was taking the time of a masked spinal surgeon. Time that could be better spent connecting with or consoling a patient. But this was the time I had been given. 3pm. He was expecting me & I couldn’t back out now. I wanted to make a good first impression.
Slowly, the room emptied out. Patients with skulls bolted to stainless steel scaffolding supporting their broken necks were wheeled away as those whose chins balanced on hard cervical collars shuffled out behind them.
Then there was me. The last lone body amongst a sea of empty plastic seats & overflowing bins.
“Peta!” the nurse called. Startled, I bounced up towards the corridor doorway taking a quick glance at the clock hanging from the ceiling. 4.36pm.
“Room 4, on the left” I was told by the nurse at the desk, waving me through without looking up from her computer.
I always felt anxious in that moment. 10 paces until I meet another masked spinal surgeon for the first time.
I’d been in the role for less than 6 months & was green to the game.
My naivety was as clear as day to the surgeon who barked at me from across the table. I hadn’t even sat down. “I’ve got two minutes. What have you got?” he demanded, throwing the papers in his hands onto the floor.
I clumsily plonked myself on the seat opposite. My jittery hands fumbling as they unzipped my sample case in search of the tiny polyaxial screws. My brain was oblivious & ill prepared for the verbal assault that was about to slap me across the face. Fire! And one demanding question hit me between the eyes. Fire! Then out shot another about a complex C1-2 fusion technique. He knew full well I had no idea what he was talking about. Instantly, I became mentally paralysed, desperate to flee the confines of the tiny boxed room.
“I…I…I’m really sorry. I don’t know. I…I’ll get back to you.” I stuttered before I bolted out the door & the tears poured uncontrollably from my eyes. It was 4.41pm.
3 months later…..
I sat in the plush waiting room, admiring the view from the 6th floor across sunny Melbourne.
I could feel my armpits sticky with sweat as my mind vividly recalled my last memory with this masked spinal surgeon. “Would he remember?” I wondered.
“Peta!” His voice shattering my thoughts.
“Hello doctor.” I said firmly with a tinge of forced kindness.
“Now I wasn’t very nice to you last we met, was I?” he asked, a smirk on his face.
“No, you were horrid.” I replied without hesitation, knowing I had little to lose.
The smirk broadened into a smile as he declared we should start fresh. Outstretching his hand to make a warm introduction. I obliged. He was a different person. The pressure cooker of the public hospital outpatient clinic replaced by a pleasant ambience, smiling faces & the delicate aroma of a scented candle. Clearly, softening his temperament.
Within a few minutes we had established we were not only Brisbane expats, we had grown up in the same suburb. I could feel my fear melt away & left that appointment grateful I’d pushed my unpleasant memory to the side & taken a chance on the unknown.
Clutching onto fear like a security blanket is like chaining an iron ball to our leg. It holds us back, anchoring us to where we are. The weight of knowing that fear gradually eroding our resilience & stifling our progress.
On the surface, the decision to avoid fear appears safe. Familiarity & sameness offering comfort. But face value can be dangerous. Habitual avoidance delivering predictable patterns of results.
“The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over & over again & expecting different results” ~ Albert Einstein
Fearing a customer conversation for a sales professional is like signing up to be a life guard & hating the water.
The ultimate symbiotic relationship never possible if we don’t attempt to overcome what is holding us back. That is where the magic lies.
The most successful sales professionals I know are afraid of little. They live in their discomfort zone & constantly train their courage muscle. The possibility of unchartered waters propelling them forward.
Continually as a coach, I’m diagnosing hesitation or stagnation in the sales process due to an individual’s fear of a particular customer conversation.
Finding the courage to face that fear head on, the antidote.
How can we overcome the fear of approaching a Customer? Here are three strategies you might like to add to your toolbox;
1) Fear Setting
My process for overcoming fear has always been unpacking that fear, starting with imagining the worst-case scenario & planning contingencies.
Holly Ransom articulates this beautifully in her new book, The Leading Edge, as fear setting.
Write out in elaborate detail what you believe will happen if you do that “thing” you are afraid of. Let your imagination go wild. (My imagination is terrific at doing this for me at 3am!)
Devise strategies for reducing the likelihood that fear will come true. Role playing a conversation with a coach or colleague a great way of building the confidence required to step into your courage zone.
Be clear on what you will do if that “thing” you fear does happen.
This clear process helps us improves our preparedness & builds our confidence going into the courage process.
2) While you don’t need all of the answers, you do need the questions.
I’ve never met a customer who doesn’t value the preparedness of their sales professional. It’s a gesture that discretely whispers, “I respect you & the time you have generously offered.”
How do we define well prepared?
If we delay our actions until we know “everything”, we will be waiting a long time.
In a rapidly evolving world, we will never know everything!
While we must do our research & arm ourselves with baseline knowledge, going into a customer conversation wanting to have all of the answers is setting ourselves an impossible goal. We can never predict what questions they will ask.
Rather than waiting to have all of the answers, move forward by preparing with great questions.
Preparing with questions puts us in a learner’s mindset & prioritises customer airtime. (See my 3-step-prep for an effective customer conversation here) It signals our willingness to understand & enables us to tailor a response better aligned with the customers needs.
3) There is no such thing as perfect
Sales processes reliant on trusted relationships are a slow burn. To maintain our motivation, we must be aware of our motivators in the absence of numbers & turn our focus to the journey rather than the outcome.
While we can wish for the key to utopia before every conversation the reality is, we are better off adjusting our expectations to align with step by step progress.
Step by purposeful step, keeps us moving forward
Wanting perfection then being disappointed when it doesn’t happen, leads to stagnation & dampens our motivation.
If you are prone to perfectionism (I might be…. ahem…familiar with that) you will know whether you admit it or not, your perfectionism is driven by fear. I know mine is. Fear of disappointing others or myself. It’s a fear that writing my book helped me overcome through; patience, better managing the expectations of others & using incremental drafts rather than leaping straight to the final product.
Procrastination is the signature of perfectionism.
You might need to remind yourself from time to time that the only person judging you, is you.
So often, our fears are exorbitantly amplified by the creative gymnastics of our minds. Strategies such as fear setting, arming us with tools that bring us back to earthly reality.
As Rudyard Kipling said, “Of all the liars in the world, sometimes the worst are our own fears.”
What fear holds you back? I’d love to hear.
Oh & BTW, taking that chance with said masked spine surgeon paid off, he became my biggest customer.
Peta x
Sales & career performance coach, Consultant, Keynote Speaker
Author of My Beautiful Mess - Living through burnout & rediscovering me
Recommended reading,
The Leading Edge, by Holly Ransom