‘Time Management’ Archive
WOW! What a Difference Getting in the Pool Makes – Part 2 of 2
How about…
- Making more calls to Referrals and Clients?
- Risking rejection or failure?
- Hiring another staff person?
- Asking for Referrals?
- Working on your Client interview skills?
- Converting a transaction-oriented business into full- service financial planning?
- Making the transition from commissions to fees?
- Investing more money in marketing?
- Becoming a more competent financial professional?
Consider yourself lucky if you have people in your life who point out when you are behaving ineffectively – especially when your rationalizing mind is at its creative best, letting you off the hook in whatever area(s) are challenging for you. Fortunate for me, I have this kind of friend in Mark Allen, the six-time Hawaii Ironman champion. In the first week of March, I was helping him work on his presentation skills for his motivational speaking career when he asked about my training. I gave him the full report about my running progress, cycling development, and weight training regimen. I rambled on about my diet and tried to distract him with a few questions, hoping he wouldn’t notice I’d left out the swimming part.
But his question was inevitable: “So, how’s the swimming going?” So much for my fancy footwork.
“Uh, well … I’ve been reading this book and, uh, watching this video about proper technique. And I’m signed up for a swim clinic.” I smiled weakly.
“Great. How’s it going in the pool?”
Caught, I gave it up. “I haven’t actually been in the pool yet.”
“You know, Bill,” Mark said slowly and pointedly, “you really should get in the pool.” Duh! The simple truth has amazing power. Just hearing Mark utter those words shattered my avoidance behavior pattern. Mark was right. I had to get in the pool. Not in March. Not next week. Now. Today.
Ultimately, learning better technique and attending the swim clinic did make me a better swimmer. But they could not replace the lost workouts in the pool. Likewise, you are successful now and have an even higher level of success to achieve. And you probably already know exactly what you need to do to achieve your next level. But you may be putting yourself through mental gymnastics to avoid the very things that will take you where you want to go. The sooner you get in the pool, the sooner you will be on your way to your next level of success.
Surely you recognize that fighting nature is futile. You’re not going to receive a special exemption, nor will the success gods reveal a secret shortcut. Just get in the pool. Come on in! The water’s fine.
©2013 by Bill Bachrach, Bachrach & Associates, Inc. All rights reserved.
Bill Bachrach is the author of several books, including the best-selling Values-Based Financial Planning™. He has delivered approximately 2,000 keynote speeches and presentations teaching financial professionals to build high-trust client relationships. For 22 years he and his team have trained successful advisors and planners to dramatically improve their client loyalty, build their business by referral only, and live a very high quality of life.
WOW! What a Difference Getting in the Pool Makes – Part 1 of 2
If you would like to get Part 2 of this article immediately, please send a request to info@billbachrach.com.
Have you ever noticed how easy it is to avoid doing the very things we know will get us the results we say we want? Have you ever avoided doing something you knew was absolutely necessary, but had no idea why you were avoiding it? Me too.
In every endeavor, there are certain immutable requirements or “natural laws” of success. Yet sometimes, in attempts to avoid discomfort or achieve our goals with less effort or anxiety, we spend too much time and energy hoping to flout those laws. But it can’t, won’t, simply doesn’t work. That’s why they’re called laws. Break them and you lose.
You might know that in December of 1997 I began training for the 1998 Hawaii Ironman Triathlon, which was held on October 3, 1998. Nine to 10 months is not a long time to prepare for a 2.4-mile swim, 112-mile bike ride, and 26.2- mile marathon run. But it’s achievable if you create a good plan and stick to it.
Swimming has never been my strength, and I hadn’t been in the pool in a decade. The rest of my training program started out pretty well. I began running again by steadily building up my mileage. I pulled my bike off the hooks in the garage where it had been hanging upside down for a long time, dusted it off, got it tuned up, and began riding. I even started pumping iron twice a week to build my strength. But the swimming…
December passed, then January, and by February, I knew I was behind in my swimming program. I’d heard that 70% of being a good swimmer is technique, so I bought a swimming technique book. Next I bought the swimming video. (Could I really have been foolish enough to think I could read and watch my way through the Ironman swim? Or was my judgment clouded by pure and simple denial?) By the end of February, I had still managed to avoid getting wet. I then enrolled in a swim clinic being held the last weekend in March. No point getting in the water until I learned the proper technique!
With this twisted logic, we could say it’s too bad the clinic wasn’t even further off – or even after Ironman – maybe I could have gotten by with no swimming at all. Yeah, right! Are there activities you don’t enjoy or aren’t the best at, yet which are absolutely required for you to excel at a higher level? And which you delude yourself into thinking you could put off altogether?
If you would like to get Part 2 of this article immediately, please send a request to info@billbachrach.com.
©2013 by Bill Bachrach, Bachrach & Associates, Inc. All rights reserved.
Bill Bachrach is the author of several books, including the best-selling Values-Based Financial Planning™. He has delivered approximately 2,000 keynote speeches and presentations teaching financial professionals to build high-trust client relationships. For 22 years he and his team have trained successful advisors and planners to dramatically improve their client loyalty, build their business by referral only, and live a very high quality of life.
Watch the Replay of ’5 Ways Financial Advisors Leave Money on the Table, Under-Serve Their Clients, and What to do About It’
If you missed the webinar, ‘5 Ways Financial Advisors Leave Money on the Table, Under-Serve Their Clients, and What to do About It,’ watch the replay by CLICKING HERE.
What the Top 1% of Advisors Do That Others Don’t – Part 2 of 2
If you would like to get Part 1 of this article immediately, please send a request to info@billbachrach.com.
Forget it! Who would invest in anyone with this attitude? You would buy stock in the advisor who’s willing to go out of his or her way, make an effort to secure success and, as a result of doing what few others will, acquires a competitive advantage.
There’s a great scene in the movie A League of Their Own in which one of the baseball players cries, saying, “This is hard!” Her coach, played by Tom Hanks, tells her to pull herself together: “It’s supposed to be hard. If it was easy, everyone would be doing it.”
To reach the heights of success, you must do something different from everyone else. Olympic gymnastics medalist Peter Vidmar has made this observation that applies to our business: In the upper echelons of his sport, you get an edge on the competition not by working harder, but by doing something different. At that level, everyone is in the gym about the same amount of time every day-there are only so many hours of physical exertion a body can take. But the winners had a different regimen, which gave them their competitive edge.
Likewise, if you are working 55 hours a week, those top producers making three times the money you are can’t be working three times as hard-there aren’t 165 hours in a week. They are achieving far greater results than you are but applying the same amount of time and energy as you (or less). They just have a better system-one you can be sure they acquired by doing something uncomfortable, inconvenient and expensive.
What’s more, top advisors don’t just attend a variety of workshops, seminars and programs: They implement what they learn, which is where the results truly come from. (Attending a seminar is easy, inexpensive and comfortable compared with actually implementing what you learn!) Not surprisingly, people with athletic or military backgrounds tend to be better at making the necessary adjustments and remaining extremely disciplined-they don’t mind the uncomfortable and inconvenient part. They have already seen the results you get from simply doing whatever your commanding officer or coach tells you, even though the last thing your coach or c.o. is concerned with is your comfort or convenience. It’s not about you. It’s about the results you get, not how you feel along the way.
You know now what it takes to become someone who can attract what seems like a disproportionate share. There are people out there attracting that share right now. They almost seem to become happy with discomfort and doing what’s difficult. What’s their secret? They know that the distinction between those who produce significant results and those who don’t is simple: It’s supposed to be hard. It’s supposed to be inconvenient, uncomfortable and expensive, or else everyone would be doing it. Are you willing to do something different, something others aren’t willing to do, to get where you really want to be and deserve to be?
If you would like to get Part 1 of this article immediately, please send a request to info@billbachrach.com.
©2013 by Bill Bachrach, Bachrach & Associates, Inc. All rights reserved.
Bill Bachrach is the author of several books, including the best-selling Values-Based Financial Planning™. He has delivered approximately 2,000 keynote speeches and presentations teaching financial professionals to build high-trust client relationships. For 22 years he and his team have trained successful advisors and planners to dramatically improve their client loyalty, build their business by referral only, and live a very high quality of life. www.billbachrach.com
What the Top 1% of Advisors Do That Others Don’t – Part 1 of 2
They take steps that are inconvenient, uncomfortable and expensive.
Not long ago, a friend asked my advice about a program she was thinking of attending. She wanted to go, but it would be costly. She felt somewhat unprepared, and she wasn’t sure she could afford to take the time away from work. When she told me her reservations, I said emphatically, “This sounds like a really good idea.” She was surprised at my reaction and asked me, “How do you know?” I told her, “I have a really simple way of determining whether something is good for me or not: It’ll be good if it’s inconvenient, uncomfortable and expensive.”
My friend laughed because she knows it’s true. The seminar would be good for her, not in spite of these obstacles but because of them. Although there are exceptions, most anything that is going to make you more successful will by definition cause you to stretch and grow and therefore have these three characteristics-otherwise it wouldn’t have much impact.
Think of the inconvenience, discomfort and expense you encounter every time you take an important step toward your own growth, whether personal or professional. (Remember your first love? Your first home away from the parents? Your first steps into the financial profession?) The things that are going to take you to the next level or make you great will be difficult, and they won’t arrive on your schedule; they’ll appear when they appear, however seemingly inopportune. But there’s the trick: to see them, however ill timed, awkward and high-priced, as the golden opportunities for tremendous growth that they really are.
Who are the most successful individuals in the financial services industry? They are the men and women who seize these veiled opportunities, learn from them and implement them. I learned this from my clients: Advisors who enroll in my company’s programs to grow their practices are willing to do what others aren’t-pay a lot of money for our coaching, spend time with our training and put themselves through the pain of watching themselves on videotape-and the results are proportional to these sacrifices.
If you were buying stock in financial advisors, in whom would you invest? You wouldn’t choose the one who says, “I want to be successful, but a lot of this stuff I’m supposed to do is a pain in the neck. I know this seminar will make me more effective at my job, but I’m going to wait until it’s held in my town, at the hotel next to my office, offered for free. Then I’ll go. Meanwhile, I’ll just keep on doing what I’ve always done. Isn’t that good enough?”
If you would like to get Part 2 of this article immediately, please send a request to info@billbachrach.com.
©2013 by Bill Bachrach, Bachrach & Associates, Inc. All rights reserved.
Bill Bachrach is the author of several books, including the best-selling Values-Based Financial Planning™. He has delivered approximately 2,000 keynote speeches and presentations teaching financial professionals to build high-trust client relationships. For 22 years he and his team have trained successful advisors and planners to dramatically improve their client loyalty, build their business by referral only, and live a very high quality of life. www.billbachrach.com
My Advice: Do Less Therapy and Less Selling. Be a Trusted Advisor
My Advice: Do less therapy and less selling. Be your clients Trusted Advisor.
Over the years, I have written a number of industry-specific articles, conducted thousands of presentations that have been audio and video recorded, and participated in numerous content-rich webinars. To learn how to get access to all of these resources and be on your way to becoming a Trusted Advisor, please click here: www.billbachrach.com/members-area/
What Kind of Business Are You Running?
One of my favorite clients here at Bachrach & Associates, Inc. at one time was serving 1,243 customers. His business generated $388,382 in gross production, which sounds pretty good. It took him about two and a half years and he now has 91 Ideal Clients that generate $1.6 million in recurring gross revenue. Let me repeat that. His $1.6 million is not commission oriented; it recurs every year. He works three days a week and has a smaller staff than before (He went from 11 to 4 staffers). His life is simpler, his income is higher, his clients are better served and they’re happier.
So with that in mind, what kind of business are you running? What kind of business would you like to be running?
Three ways to tell if you’re running a smart business:
1. How full is your appointment calendar?
2. Are you comfortable asking for referrals?
3. Do your clients give you all of their financial business? In other words, do you have all the money?
If you would like to learn more, please visit www.billbachrach.com or call (858)558-3200.
Pour the Foundation For Your Business!
Financial Advisors: Do you have 60 minutes to build your Ideal Business? Click here to start pouring the foundation.
Special Message for Financial Advisors – Make 2013 Your Best Year Ever!
Special Message for Financial Advisors: Spend 60 minutes and learn how Bachrach & Associates, Inc. can help make 2013 your best year ever! Click here to learn more and to schedule your free qualifying appointment today!
Survival Clients vs. Ideal Clients
Survival vs. Ideal Clients – Define them, sort them, work with them. Click here to see how Bachrach & Associates, Inc. can help develop your plan.
