Don't be Emotional about Business Relationships

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M.,- Professionals work to make a living, and it's a mistake to get emotional about business relationships, says Lenann McGookey Gardner, international expert on sales success. In sales, where friendly relationships are often key to successful selling, businesspeople can stumble by bringing their emotions to the workplace.

"This is really an issue of professionalism. You can like what you do and the people that you work with, but beware of crossing the line emotionally," says Gardner. "We go to work to get our financial needs met, so we can enjoy the rest of our lives, where we get our emotional needs met. Don't expect business contacts to meet your emotional needs, and don't get hurt or get even - they're both success-killers."

Gardner, the author of Got Sales? The Complete Guide to Today's Proven Methods for Selling Services, offers these tips to focus work/selling efforts away from emotions.

Recognize prospects' fear

"Otherwise kindhearted people are afraid of being backed into corners by aggressive salespeople. They may not want to have a substantive conversation that looks squarely at their Pain - what's going wrong for them - and makes it clear that they need to take action," explains Gardner. "When selling, you help people bring their Pain to the surface, understand its implications, and decide whether to deal with it or ignore it. If you are uncomfortable dealing with negative, painful stuff, you'll avoid the things that have the greatest power to encourage someone to hire or buy from you!"

Rejection is not personal

"Most rejection you experience when trying to grow sales is not personal. People reject the interruption of your call, the potential expense of your service or product, or just the idea that they need more help. But it isn't possible they're rejecting you personally when they don't even know you," says Gardner. "Rejection is just something that happens, and will undoubtedly happen to us many times in life. We'll live through it. Keep going!"

Minimize workplace drama

"Human beings seem to like drama, and change - even buying a new service or product - is drama. To do a job as a professional, minimize the drama," says Gardner. "We each decide what we want for ourselves, and how we want to conduct ourselves, whether we want to complain and moan or just make things work."

Lenann McGookey Gardner, a Harvard MBA and a past #1 worldwide sales rep at Xerox, offers keynote speeches on state-of-the-art selling and closing skills, executive and sales coaching for business success, and workshops. Her book Got Sales? The Complete Guide to Today's Proven Methods for Selling Services is the one guidebook highlighting all the recent research and data on what's working now in contemporary selling. She was named Professional Services "Marketer of the Year" by her state's chapter of the American Marketing Association. More information is available at www.YouCanSell.com.