By Neil Phillips.

Every spring, my team would sign up for lots of craft fairs and holiday events. I was always excited about the activity and had high hopes of the boost the events would create in business UNTIL I got the first call, “the one was a bust. I didn’t get anything. What a waste of time and money.”

Typically, I kept telling them how to succeed, yet they kept showing up with far different results than mine. Learning the very tried and true teaching method took me a long time. Here are the four steps.

  1. I do
  2. They watch me do
  3. They do, and I watch them do
  4. THEN They do it on their own

Four steps to success. These are the strategies I learned to use to go from “I do” to “they do on their own.”.

  • I would show up at the event they had scheduled and work with them for an hour. I would have them watch me engage people, have closing conversations and get results. Then I would watch them. If time permits, we will do a little debrief* between interactions. All the leads I acquired would be their leads; it is their event.
  • At the entrance to a team meeting, we would set up a craft show display, and as everyone entered the room, a consultant with a strong success record would engage them as if they were patrons at an event. [NOTE: This could also be done virtually.] When the meeting began, we would debrief *the activity and then let each team member practice hosting the table.
  • If a significant event were scheduled, such as a Home Show, with multiple days and shifts, we would set up the booth at someone’s house and have everyone who was to work the booth come over and practice as in the above example.

The more opportunities consultants had to observe and practice, the better the results. And I always reminded them of my mantra,

“You must learn to do something poorly before you can learn to do it well.”

Engaging in activity always trumped perfection. A safe place to learn is critical to growth.

*Debrief is to review what happened and point out what created and inhibited success. This is best done with lots of participation, not just the leader’s comments.

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