If you’ve followed me for a while, you may have heard me talk about a man named Spencer Hays. Spencer was the legendary majority shareholder of the Southwestern family of companies. When I was in college I worked for the Southwestern Advantage program. I made a lot of money and learned a lot of skills selling educational children’s reference materials […]
You’ve heard people called big dreamers before. I’m one of them – I’ve always had big dreams. And maybe you have a personal and professional dream right now, too. Sadly though, many of us, including me, never reach some of those big dreams, or fall far short of them. About a decade ago, I had a realization about what worked […]
Amanda Johns Vaden is a Founding Partner at Southwestern Consulting ™, which is an international, multi-million dollar sales consulting organization, which focuses on creating systems to increase performance. Amanda and Southwestern Consulting work with companies such as Wells Fargo, Keller Williams, DIRECTV and AFLAC just to name a few. Amanda is a million dollar producer, Senior Consultant, Executive Coach and […]
So often busy sales professionals know they need a rock star professional office assistant, but because of bad experiences in the past, they often decide it is just easier to do it all themselves than to hire and train someone who may, once again, disappoint them. But can there be hope? Absolutely! Let’s face it, most top producers can’t work any more hours […]
Around Southwestern Consulting, we’ve developed a term over the last several years that we often use called Servant Selling. Recently, one of our groups took the time to codify many of the things that we believe in and mean when we use the term Servant Selling. We call it our Servant Selling Concepts. Take a read… Servant Selling is not […]
A week ago, none of the trees were blooming. Nothing outside was green. All of it was barren and not growing. But that’s what happens, right? Every single year, in certain seasons things stop growing and sometimes they die. But then they start growing again. Chances are that you’re part of an organization or a company that desires growth. You’re […]
Effective self-management begins with a well-planned schedule. The strategy is to create a schedule for the entire week which includes both professional and personal activities from the time you wake up until the time you go to bed. The idea is to treat this like you’re back in high school and schedule your activities in blocks of time. I understand […]
When responding to a presentation script from one of my amazing clients, I am reminded that often, to the sales person’s detriment, not every sales presentation is written around the time-tested idea of remembering to “sell the sizzle, not the steak.” In other words, people buy benefits. Think of it like this: A car salesman wants to promote the great […]
Speed to market is a huge consideration for companies looking to invest in digital marketing, and that’s completely understandable. No one wants (or can afford!) to wait months and months to get a return on their investment. That’s why we’ve created three fast paths to cash!
Last weekend, my wife Amanda and I and were very fortunate to attend a conference led by Ken Blanchard. Condoleezza Rice, the former U.S. Secretary of State, was just one of the compelling speakers. We were there to learn about leadership. A really powerful idea hit me while I was listening to the different speakers. While this idea might not […]
What makes someone the best leader possible? I just finished speaking in Phoenix at one of the largest associations in the world, the International Franchise Association. Leaders from a lot of different franchise groups attend, so I spent lots of time talking to them. I really clarified in my own mind what a great leader is and how to become […]
l One of the great challenges for any leader is motivating his or her team. That’s what being a leader is: It’s motivating other people to take action, achieve and accomplish. There’s something I haven’t really understood and haven’t had 100% clarity on until recently. I learned that motivation is an external concept. Motivation is something you offer people. Or […]
There’s a huge emergence of entrepreneurship in this country right now – you can see it on social media and TV shows like Shark Tank and The Profit. There are lots of ways to run your business and work from home, and I’m a fan of the idea of being an entrepreneur. At Southwestern Consulting, we’re not 100% entrepreneurs, but […]
What’s leadership? The word leadership gets thrown around a lot, right? Have you ever taken a class on leadership? Probably not. My minor from the University of Denver was actually in leadership, but I attended a very new, unique program. That’s not the case for most people. The thing about leadership in the real world is that you learn how […]
It’s possible that you think of leadership completely wrong. It’s possible that you don’t even accurately understand what leadership really is. Because for whatever reason, we often think of the leader as the person who is elevated. We think of the leader as the boss who should be feared and respected. We think of the leader as the person in […]
Ken Blanchard is a prominent, sought-after author, speaker, and business consultant. He is respected for his lifetime of groundbreaking research and thought leadership that has influenced the day-to-day management and leadership of people and companies throughout the world. With a passion to turn every leader into a servant leader, Ken shares his insightful and powerful message with audiences around the […]
Your level of influence as a leader is directly limited by the size of your ego. The larger your ego, the less your chance to reach your leadership potential. The smaller your ego, the greater your chance to reach your leadership potential. Ego is a conundrum that many leaders will eventually have to face. Overcome it, and there is no […]
Dr. Gary Chapman has degrees from some of the most respected colleges and seminaries. He’s written some of the best-selling books of the past decade and appeared on thousands of radio and television programs across the country. But Dr. Gary Chapman knows more than just a lot of scholarly theories and practical advice—he knows people. He knows how to relate to people, how to have […]
A leader’s job is not to create followers. A leader’s job is to create other leaders. And it’s a frustrating place when an organization is stuck, stagnant, and not growing. But often time a core cause of that is because the leader isn’t engaging in practices that develop other leaders. How do you do that? Here’s 5 simple ideas: 1.Teach […]
Dianna Booher is the bestselling author of 47 books, published in 60 foreign-language editions, with nearly 4 million copies sold. Her personal development topics include leadership communication, executive presence, writing, and life balance. Her most popular titles include: Creating Personal Presence: Look, Talk, Think, and Act Like a Leader • What MORE Can I Say? Why Communication Fails and What to […]
Job #1 of a leader is to A.B.R. – always be recruiting. After all, how can you be a leader if there is no one to follow you? And when it comes to recruiting, the best type of recruiting is personal recruiting- recruiting people who you already know and who know you. We know that statistically, in almost every group, […]
