Years ago, a financial advisor called concerned about his business saying, “I read all of the books I can, put them back on the shelf but nothing happens”. When I asked why he thought this occurred, he quickly admitted it was because he did not have a plan to apply anything he read about; thus he wasn’t taking action!
Dale Carnegie said it best when he said, “Learning is an active process. We learn by doing…Only knowledge that is used sticks in your mind.” Unfortunately, the aforementioned advisor didn’t use the knowledge that he learned. Instead, he merely brushed it off and went on with business as usual.
So you can you apply what you learn? Use the following steps to just get out there and do it!
Creating Your Action Step Process
One of the saddest things I hear advisors say is, “I know what I need to do, I just need to do it”. The reason being is because they haven’t created a process for taking action and unless they do no real change will take place. That’s why it is important to apply the following steps to get lasting results!
Let’s take a look at a step-by-step approach for creating your action step process.
Step 1: Understand the New Process
You need understand any new process thoroughly so you know exactly what you need to do to implement it.
Take Robert T. for example-a veteran financial advisor with twenty years of experience who unfortunately had got complacent in his business and needed to start prospecting again. As I coached him though a step-by-step process for turning strangers into clients we realized that he had a clog in his pipeline-he wasn’t closing the sale. So, we worked on a sub-step that I refer to as The Psychology of Closing the 2nd Appointment and I introduced him to a tool known as The 2nd Appointment Templet Worksheet so he could fully understand how to help prospects what to buy instead of trying to sell to them.
Step 2: Create a Deadline Driven Time Horizon to Begin
The next step is to make sure that you quickly take action by giving yourself a time horizon so that you have a deadline to begin and an approximate due date in mind to finish.
For Robert that due date was immediate since he had a big appointment coming up in which he could be gathering a million in new assets if all went as planned. Thus, I had him fill out the worksheet before our next session and we role played it before his meeting.
Step 3: Put Your Plan into Action
Once you have understood the process and created a deadline the next step is to put your plan into action!
Since Robert knew when his appointment was and had already role played it with me, he felt confident about the process. However, he wanted to make sure so he contacted one of his peers in our group coaching program and role played the appointment again. The extra preparation paid off because he effortlessly helped the prospect understand what he needed and why he should buy; thus, turning the prospect into a client and gathering a million in new assets!
Step 4: Evaluate Your Process to Learn from It
One of the most difficult things for any advisor to do is to admit that they have challenges. However, once they do and are open to learning as well as implementing solutions all that is left is to learn from successes as well as failures.
Robert learned that the process works. So-much-so that he used the tools mentioned above and duplicated his success four times in row!
The Right Action Alleviates Anxiety:
If you can relate to the anxiety that Robert was feeling when he realized that he was having a challenge with closing the prospect, know that you are not alone. Most advisors experience anxiety at some point in their business. The best solution is to take the previous aforementioned steps to determine what to do, do it and evaluate how you did. Taking the right action will alleviate anxiety and soon you will be on your way to success!