Upselling & Cross-Selling for Service Reps

Although upselling and cross-selling are two very simple sales techniques that can effectively increase your bottom line, many sales and service reps are hesitant to use them.

Many reps are comfortable with their service jobs and they just don’t want to sell.  They dislike being perceived as ‘pushy’.  Others fear rejection.  If the customer rejects their offer, they feel rejected personally.  And still others simply believe that the customers know best and that they have no business suggesting anything additional to them.

If this is the way your reps feel, I’ve got two scenarios here for you to introduce to them that may change their minds.  Number one.  You rep goes to a sporting goods store and purchases a pair of the latest running shoes for RM399.  At the end of the day, she meets a friend who’s just purchased an identical pair of shoes from the same shop for RM299.  Now, is your rep upset?  Probably.  So she goes back to the shop to complain only to find that if she had purchased two pairs of shoes, like her friend did, she would have paid only RM299 a pair.  So is she still upset?  Probably.  Why?  Because the salesperson should have told her about this and left it up to her to decide whether she wanted to increase the purchase.

It usually doesn’t take long after this for her to realize that if she’d been the salesperson, making the offer would have been providing a service.

Here’s another scenario.  Suppose your rep is invited by a friend to attend a weekend camping trip with a group of people in Johor.  The friend tells your rep what he has to bring along, but he neglects to tell him to bring a swimsuit.  As it turns out, the camping area has a large swimming pool and a nearby waterfall where everybody spends most of their time during the weekend.  Now, is your rep upset?  Probably.  Why?  Because his friend should have told him to bring a swimsuit.  It was wrong for the friend to assume that he should know what to bring.  By not telling him, he did him a disservice.

Again, it shouldn’t take long for your rep to realize that he is the one who knows your products, he’s the one who knows what goes with what, and he’s the one who knows how the customers can save money.  By not sharing this information with customers, he’s doing them an equal disservice.

If your sales and service reps aren’t upselling and cross-selling, find out why and get to work on changing those results.  Upselling and cross-selling not only increase business on your calls, but also keep your customers happy.

Upselling is Upservicing!

It’s lunch time, so you step into your favorite fast-food joint for a quick meal.  You place your order at the counter – double burger and a large Coke – and as the girl keys it into the register she asks you with a smile, “Do you want fries with that?”  Well… yeah.  Now that you mention it.  Who wouldn’t?

You know this scenario and we joke about it.  But pay attention to what the food chains like McDonald’s, Starbucks, and Subway are all doing.  Almost every time you place an order at one of these places, the service people behind the counter offer you something else.  Cheesecake with your coffee?  Why not?  And just because she asked, not only do you enjoy a satisfyingly rich dessert with your caramel macchiato, but she also increased the value of her sale by more than 100%. 

If she cross-sells to every customer, and even if only 5% say yes, what would that mean to her bottom line at the end of every day?  Here’s another thought.  If your sales and service reps were successful at up-selling and cross-selling at 5% of the time or more, what would that mean to your bottom line?

Upselling and cross-selling create superior value for your customers.  And although your reps may hesitate to upsell for fear of sounding ‘pushy’, research shows that most customers appreciate upselling and cross-selling when they feel they are offered additional benefits relevant to their needs.  In fact, since upselling and cross-selling service customer needs, we could think of it as upservicing.

When it’s done right, upselling is no more than a suggestion to an already receptive buyer to enhance the value of the purchase.  Did that cheesecake enhance your Strabucks caramel macchiato experience?  Well then, the girl’s offer to you was great service.

If the suggestion is in line with the customer’s needs, the customer will be receptive.  No guarantee that they’ll buy of course, but they will turn down the offer with a smile.  Of course, there’s still that 5% that will accept and smile even bigger.

Ensure that your reps are more interested in delivering quality service than they are in making an additional sale.  If the focus remains on enhancing customer experience, upselling and cross-selling will be much easier.

Upselling and cross-selling increase your customers’ satisfaction.  Just a small proactive effort on your part conclusively leads to customer loyalty and grows your revenue at the same time.

Upselling and Cross-selling to Your Cutomer Base

A few years back, I conducted a training program in sales presentations for a Japanese manufacturer of digital copiers based here in Kuala Lumpur.  The program was requested by a woman I’ll call Ivy, who had started with the company as a sales rep and worked her way up to regional sales manager in just seven years.

This impressed me, so I asked for her story.  Here’s how she did it. 

Ivy had a sales portfolio of 280 different customers ranging from ground-floor stationery shophouses to multinational corporations.  She had a database filled with details on every one.  In the morning when she arrived at work, she’d check her e-mail, follow up on sales requests and then she’d go through her database and search for customer needs.

For example, she’d calculate how long it would be before one customer started running out of toner and would need another order.  She’d notice that another customer was due for routine service.  She’d locate another customer whose warranty and service agreement were about to expire and she’d find one customer who was probably due for a new machine.  Then she’d call these customers on the phone and visit them in the afternoon.

 “I made it my business to make a sale every day,” she told me.  “Whether it was for something simple like toner, or a big sale like a complete office solution, I was always selling something.”

 And the one thing that enabled her to do that?

 “I knew every customer,” she told me.  “I knew their names, I knew their machines, I knew their dates, and I knew their needs.”  Then she laughed and told me, “I knew their needs before they did.”

Ivy was a master upseller and cross-seller to her existing customer base because she anticipated her customer’s needs.  She knew their businesses and how her products would help them.  She had solutions ready before problems had a chance to surface.

You can leverage your existing customer base, too.  Upselling and cross-selling are valuable sales tools that can make you and your customer happy to be in business together.

Transforming Service Channels into Sales Channels

Your sales have been sluggish.  Optimistic targets you set at the beginning of the year are already looking out of range.  Sales staff have been returning from visits with long faces, and customers are still blaming the recent economic crisis.

Hopefully I’m not describing your situation.  But if this sounds familiar, or even remotely close, now is the time for you to start thinking about alternative channels for getting your products into your customers’ hands where they belong. 

You’ve heard the phrase, “Everybody sells”, and this should be true for your organization.  So let’s think for a moment.  Who else in your organization knows your customers as well as your sales people do?  How about customer service?  Are your customer service people taking an active part in growing revenues by upselling and cross-selling during customer interactions?

Transforming your service channels into sales channels is not an easy task, and can be quite sensitive – especially for service people who believe that they weren’t hired to sell.  However, with a few tactful adjustments, you can help your service people understand why “Everybody sells” is important to your organization.

One of the first issues you may need to address is changing the mindset of your service staff.  Service people thrive on resolving problems and making customers happy.  You can maximize this by helping them understand that upselling and cross-selling are also ways of providing solutions.  Their ability to get another product into your customers’ hands helps them achieve even higher levels of customer satisfaction.

As you develop your new cross-selling strategy, encourage service people to contribute ideas.  This is not just a sales or marketing initiative; it’s company-wide and service people have unique insight with customers, often being able to tell you what will work and what won’t.  Giving service their say will give them self-worth, incentive and, most importantly, ownership in your initiative. 

Selling may be new for many of your service staff, so provide them with the tools that they’ll need to be effective.  Product and skills training will be necessary.  Incentive programs will also be useful.

To ensure success, make your organization’s commitment to this initiative obvious.  An internal campaign elevating the program will make company goals clear to everyone.  Special recognition of outstanding service-turned-salespeople will demonstrate your backing.  The extent of your visible commitment will determine the initiative’s success.

Once your service people realize that they’re reaching out to your customer base in a personal, cost-effective way, you’ll see how “Everybody sells” can have a positive effect on your revenues.

Upselling & Cross-Selling for Everyone

Upselling and cross-selling are the most cost effective, customer friendly sales techniques that you can put to use – not just with your sales team, but with every employee in your organization.  In today’s business climate where every sale makes a difference, everybody sells. 

Put simply, upselling is a sales technique your people can use to lead your customers towards an upline product that will better meet their needs.  “Yes sir, we can certainly repair your home entertainment system, but for the cost involved and with the new technology available, can I show you the new models we just got in this week?”

Cross-selling is a sales technique your people can use to lead your customers towards additional purchases related to the one they’ve already made.  “This is an excellent hi-fi system and it should last you for years.  A little maintenance on your part, though, would make it last even longer.  Can I add on this cleaning kit?  I’ll show you how to use it.”

It’s easy to promote upselling and cross-selling throughout your organization, and it all begins with product knowledge.  If everyone in your organization knows your product line well, it will be easy for them to talk about it.  They need to know associations between your products as well, so that cross-selling is automatic.  Burgers with fries, printers with ink cartridges, business suits with ties, air tickets with hotel bookings.  The offer for an associated product should come without hesitation.

Drill your staff on your pricing structures and keep price lists close by them at all times.  Show them how to bundle products together so your customers get a complete package at a better price.  “The washer is RM1,299, but if you buy it with the dryer I can give you both for RM1,999.  That will save you RM300, and I’ll give you the drying rack for free.”  If your people can do this on their own, they won’t have to check with you for prices all the time.

Of course, your people will also need to know upselling and cross-selling techniques.  Get them some training if necessary.  You’ll see your products moving out your door and a return on your investment in no time.

Leadership and Credibility

To learn some fundamental truths about leadership communications, we need to go all the way back to about 350BCE and sit in on a lecture by a Greek philosopher named Aristotle.

According to Aristotle, you can present a persuasive appeal to an audience three different ways – through logic, through emotion and through credibility.  Credibility is based on your knowledge, confidence, integrity and believability.  Without this, logic or emotion alone have little persuasive force.

Credibility in your leadership communications is more than just ‘image’.  When we hear the word ‘image’, we often associate it with illusion.  ‘Image’, may be what we see projected, but reality may be something else entirely.  Credibility, on the other hand, ties more directly to your character.

‘Charisma’ is another term we often hear when describing influential leaders.  However, when we think of the most charismatic leaders, we can see how their appeal is more in emotion than in reason.  Credibility, on the other hand, is grounded in fact and objectivity.

‘Image’ and ‘charisma’ are good to hear when people describe your leadership style, but credibility ties more into the positive qualities that you as a leader must possess.  Projecting credibility defines the goal in mastering your leadership communications.

For your followers to see you as credible, they must see you as being knowledgeable, authoritative, confident, honest and trustworthy.  Some of this comes through hard work and position.  If, for example, you are asked to speak on the positive effects of constructing a new coal-fired power plant in Sabah, knowing the industry, the market and the facts will help you to appear knowledgeable.

Other aspects of credibility, however, can only be developed when you can see yourself as others see you.  You need to find someone who can give you open, honest feedback and for someone in your position, this may be hard to do.  You’ve heard the saying before, I’m sure, “It’s lonely at the top.”  Yet, seeking out honest feedback and using it for critical self-assessment will help create the self-awareness you need to judge yourself as a leader more accurately.

It’s not easy to develop and maintain credibility, particularly in today’s scandal-prone business world.  Establishing yourself as credible, however, is the only way to cultivate and maintain followers who are also believers.

Complex Communication Skills for Managers

As you move upwards in your organization, your communications become more complex, thereby putting greater demands on your communication skills.  Effective leadership communication, therefore, calls for an array of specific skills that you can apply when necessary.  These skills are divided into three levels – core skills, managerial skills, and corporate skills – which correspond to your level of leadership.

Core skills include writing, speaking and strategizing, and these will be applied continuously and with increasing importance as you move upwards.  Now that you‘ve moved into management, however, a new list of additional communication skills comes into play, and your successful performance as a manager depends on the effective application of these skills.  To ensure that your management communication skills are in place, let’s briefly review them.

First, as a manager, you’re making key decisions to make sure your targets and KPIs are met.  You’re anticipating problems before they arise and solving them when they do.  To do this, you rely on consistent sources of upline and downline information.  That’s why listening is now your most important communication skill.

Second, as a manager, you’re working not only to get the best from your staff, but to challenge and develop them so they can contribute to your organization with greater value.  In this way, you contribute towards developing a pool of readily available talent that’s there when your organization needs it.  That’s why coaching and mentoring are also key communication skills. 

Third, as a manager, you supervise teams working on specific projects and aiming for specific targets.  Ensuring that they meet their objectives requires that you are constantly updated on their progress so that you can strategize and delegate accordingly.  That’s why running an effective business meeting is another important management communication skill.

Fourth, as a manager, you realize that your corporate environment affects how work is accomplished.  When productivity slows, you need to press the correct buttons to motivate or discipline as necessary within the context of a diverse workforce.  That’s why cultural intelligence is a critical communication skill for you.

Finally, as a manager, you are a role model and you need to recognize and manage your own emotions on the job.  Additionally, you need to recognize and manage the emotions of others to control on-the-job conflict.  Your conduct will affect how your staff conducts themselves.  That’s why emotional intelligence is another key management communication skill.

Effective communicators make better leaders.  Knowing the leadership communication skills you need leads to using them successfully.

Core Skills for Leadership Communication

Your ability to lead is directly related to your ability to communicate.  Leaders who have strong communication skills find it easier to inspire and influence people than those who do not.  And further, the communication style that you exhibit and use in your organization will shape how the entire organization communicates.

Communication skills for you as a leader are more elaborate than those of the rank and file.  Although they begin with similar core abilities, leadership communication skills spiral outwards to the application of these skills in more complex organizational situations.  Skills areas are divided into three levels which we call core skills, managerial skills and corporate skills.  The higher up you move in the organization, the more complex your communications skills become. 

Let’s examine the skills necessary at each level, beginning with the three core skills.

The first core skill is writing.  Although it may seem that you write less as you move up in the organization, the writing you do becomes more important.  E-mail and memos that you write carry weight.  Reports that you compile have importance.  Even the periodic column that you write for your company’s quarterly newsletter has impact.  That’s why your ability to plan and write both simple and complex documents – from e-mail to annual reports – is critical to your success as a leader. 

The second core skill is speaking.  You may be writing less, but you’re probably being called upon to speak more as you move up in your organization.  This may include business presentations at management meetings, speeches at company functions, and even appearances before the press.  Whatever the situation, members of your audience must always detect confidence in your delivery.  Content must be lucid and relevant.  Your voice must be clear and resonant.  Body language must be controlled and eye contact consistent.  As you speak, your message and your image must both project leadership.

Finally, the last core communication skill is strategy.  Writing and speaking are important skills, but how you write and how you speak affect how your audience will receive your message.  That’s why before sending a message out, it’s good to do a complete assessment of your message, your audience, and the channels available to you.  Communication strategy means planning to say the right thing at the right time to the right people over the right channel. 

It's said that leaders are made, not born, and you never know where a strong leader will come from.  Regardless of their origins, however, emerging leaders with strong core communication skills have got a head start.

Leadership: What's Your Working Climate?

The ability to communicate effectively is the foundation for every leadership skill.  As a leader in your organization, strong communication skills will make it easier for you to connect with others, build morale, manage conflict and maintain a steady course through difficult times.

Likewise, the quality of communications throughout your organization will depend largely on the working climate that you set.  What do we mean by a ‘working climate’ and how does it affect your organizational communications?  Let’s find out.

On one extreme, you have the Dehumanized Climate.  Here, the value of human relations in the workplace is minimized.  The basic assumptions creating this climate are that subordinates prefer to be led by others and rarely make their own decisions.  They also put their own needs before those of the organization and, as a result, lack the initiative to achieve significant results on their own.  Management confirms these assumptions by withholding information and communicating to subordinates in the form of directives.  As a result of all this, rumors are frequent, exclusive cliques are common, and very little is done by staff or by management for the real betterment of the organization.

On the other end of the continuum, you have the Overhumanized Climate.  Here, organizational objectives are second to human relations.  Groups and teams are formed for participative decision making whenever possible and self-directed motivation is encouraged.  Conflict and tension are managed and prevented.  Management in this climate is likely to emphasize individual over organizational needs.  While this all seems pleasant, the organization may suffer.  The warm social atmosphere may actually be covering up unresolved interpersonal conflict and periodic decisions by management not made in groups may be unpopular.

Between the dehumanized and overhumanized climates you have the Situational Climate.  Here, organizational and individual needs are compatible.  Whether the situation calls for a crackdown to increase productivity or a structure to enhance staff development, either can be done.  In this climate, because staff feels respected, they may develop a greater sense of self-worth and respect for others.  This, in turn, may increase intrinsic motivation and a greater sense of responsibility.  As a result, personal and organizational objectives become similar.

As a corporate leader, you model the communication style that everyone in your organization will follow.  Therefore, open, effective communication throughout your organization depends on the working climate that you set. 

Managing the Mentoring Fear Factor

If you’ve decided to take on the role of a mentoring manager and develop a protégé from your staff in a one-on-one relationship, the first step you need to take is to find out what that person wants to achieve as a result of the mentoring process.  This is relatively easy to do.  In a mentoring relationship, learners are usually straightforward in telling you want they want.

What they don’t tell you, however, is what they fear.

Mentoring is a learner-focused process.  You want to do the best you can in bringing out the best in your learners.  Sensitivity towards some of the apprehensions they might have about this process can make you more effective.  Let’s examine what some of those learner fears might be.

Like most of us, learners may fear the unknown.  Coming into a mentoring relationship presents new situations and circumstances which may cause nervousness and discomfort.  You can mitigate this, of course, with a warm and welcoming approach.  And, you can also take advantage of this.  Fear of the unknown is often accompanied by anticipation, which can be functional in helping your learners raise their performance.

In addition, your learners may fear an early sense of failure.  The outcome of a successful mentoring process is improvement in performance, and many learners begin with anxiety about not coping.  Where learners feel their abilities are poor, they may feel vulnerable.  If you can anticipate this, you can be more sensitive in assuring your learners that your role is to encourage them rather than to judge or evaluate them.

This leads us to the fear your learners may have of being scrutinized.  They may feel that their performance is constantly under a microscope with you and everyone else looking in.  They may receive a good deal of feedback from you about how others see them.  To relieve this, always evaluate your learners fairly.  A heavy, judgmental approach can cause more harm than good.

Finally, your learners may fear the relationship itself.  Until you’ve established trust and openness, a mentoring relationship between a senior manager and a subordinate can be intimidating.  Soon after the ice is broken, however, this fear recedes.

Anticipate these fears in your learners.  Acknowledge them and provide assurance.  Make adjustments in your style if necessary.  The sooner you help your learners overcome their fears, the sooner you can guide them towards self-development.

Five Steps for the Mentoring Manager

An effective method of knowledge transfer that works as an alternative to traditional training is mentoring.  When you take on the role of a mentoring manager, you develop a one-on-one relationship with a protégé from your staff and facilitate his or her development.  This means that you’re helping that person maximize their own potentials and find solutions on their own while giving them just minimal input.

Mentoring can be accomplished using a five-step facilitation process that you can remember easily as 5Ds: Define, Describe, Decide, Do and Debrief.  Here’s how you can apply it with the learners you’re mentoring.

Step One: Define.  At this stage you are encouraging your learner to set specific outcomes that they would like to achieve as a result of the mentoring process.  You can help by challenging them to state positive, agenda-oriented outcomes.  If, for example, your learner presents a problem saying, “I’m too shy to be working in sales,” you can challenge immediately by asking, “How would you like it to be?”, which may be answered as, “I’d like to be more confident in the way I approach people.”  Already, you’ve made considerable progress.

Step Two: Describe.  The objective of this step is for you and your learner to become aware of the dimensions of the problem.  Your role, therefore, is to listen while your learner talks.  Ask open-ended questions to keep your learner talking while you check for emotions, feelings, and facts.  The information you’re provided with will help you formulate an approach suitable to your learner’s development.

Step Three: Decide.  The key here is to guide your learner towards deciding which solutions will work best.  Be patient at this stage, because the temptation will be for you to jump in and offer the solutions you may think are best.  Remember, however, that as a mentor you are facilitating a process rather than imposing your own agenda.

Step Four: Do.  This is the implementation step where your learner will go out and apply the agenda that they’ve developed with your guidance.  Your learner will operate independently at this stage, while your role may be to check in periodically and assess how things are going.

Step Five: Debrief.  When your learner has made significant progress, it’s time for you to step back in to evaluate the process with them.  What worked?  What didn’t?  What did you do well?  What could have been done better?  This is your learner’s opportunity to reflect on the learning process they have been through and your opportunity to set the stage for the next phase of development.

Galileo once said, “You can’t teach a person anything.  You can only help them find it within themselves.”  In other words, everyone already has what they need to learn and develop already.  As a mentoring manager, it’s your job to bring it out.

Replace Yourself!

Here’s a story my mentor told me about his mentor.

My mentor is a master facilitator.  Previously, he worked with corporate communities empowering them and helping them to be the best they could be.  He was good at this, and very successful.  One day his mentor came to him and asked, “What’s next?” which took my mentor by surprise.  What could possibly come next now that he had reached the pinnacle of success? 

“What happens when you’re gone?” his mentor continued.  “Who’s going to be there to take over what you can do?  What you must do next is replace yourself.”  And now this is what my mentor does for a living, training people around the world to do what he does and replacing himself in every continent on the globe.

It sounds like an unusual job description, but as a mentoring manager, replacing yourself is exactly what you need to be doing for your organization.  What you have learned over the years in your position and what you have contributed to your organization’s growth and success is what your organization needs for continuity.  Who’s going to be there to take over what you can do? 

Let’s discuss some of the important experience you’re bringing to a mentoring relationship.

First is your management perspective.  You’ve acquired this through years of experience working in various positions, and now you know the ropes more than most do.  You have cross-functional experience, so you understand how the different parts of your organization and others work together.  This enables you to share how things get done and help learners understand how their activities contribute to the organization as a whole.

Second is your influence.  Having been around for a while, you are fluent in your organization’s culture and understand how to work with existing power structures.  This makes you a powerful advocate for your learners.  In addition to creating the right atmosphere to develop them and showing the rest of the organization that what they are doing is important, you are also providing opportunities for your learners to develop.

Third is your personal style.  Having been successful in your position for a number of years, you’ve obtained a fair amount of respect or even admiration for who you are and what you’ve done.  This makes you a role model for your learners.  You have a set of habits, approaches, tools and skills and they can see see first hand how you use them.

Your organization and the individuals within it need what you know.  To ensure the continuity of your contributions, replace yourself.

Five Qualities for the Mentoring Manager

Two years ago, I attended a mentor training program.  Along with my fellow trainees, our upcoming assignment was to mentor a group of new facilitators that would be attending a training program the following week.

Although I expected that the content of the program would focus on mentoring techniques, the program facilitator began by spending the first two days getting us to probe deep within ourselves to determine what it was that we were bringing to the mentor experience.  “Part of your job as a mentor,” he told us, “is to be a role model for others.  And the only way to really understand that role is to understand yourself.”

Are you interested in mentoring individuals for your company?  Do you have what’s necessary for success in developing someone is a one-on-one relationship?  Let’s discuss some of the qualities for successful mentoring and see how you manage.

Obviously, the first quality of the mentoring manager is management experience.  Your experience should provide a window to the world outside for those you mentor so they can get out of their own corners and begin looking outwards.  In addition, through their relationship with you, they should be able to get some second-hand management experience in your business.

Second, mentoring managers need organizational insight.  Your knowledge about how your organization behaves should enable your learners to navigate it on their own.  Your leverage within your organization will also be useful for supporting your learners during negotiations and providing opportunities for further learning.

The third quality mentoring mangers need is credibility.  As a mentor you become a role model to your learners and the extent to which they look up to you will be defined by your own personal and professional credibility within your organization.

"Know thyself."  -  Socrates

A fourth quality valued highly by learners is accessibility.  The success of your mentor relationship begins with making yourself available, especially during the early stages when your learners may require more time and attention than you can give.  Discuss, agree to and honor the terms you establish with your learners so that you can provide what they need.

Fifth, mentoring managers need excellent communication skills.  Your learners will run up against walls that you need to talk them over.  They’ll need correction and critique.  They’ll also need to be verbally rewarded for a job well done.  Your ability to listen and respond in these situations will make all the difference in your relationship.

These five qualities are the foundation of what a successful mentoring manager needs.  If you possess them, someone is waiting for your help.

The Value of Mentoring

“People who grew up in difficult circumstances and yet are successful have one thing in common; at a critical juncture in their adolescence, they had a positive relationship with a caring adult.”  Former US President Clinton said this.

If you’ve read Bill Clinton’s memoirs, you know about his difficult circumstances – the early death of his father, the turbulent relationship between his mother and abusive stepfather – and yet, because he was given proper instruction by the right mentor at the right time in his life, Bill Clinton went on to serve for two terms as President of the United States.

Can you remember a significant mentor in your life?  Someone who set you straight or helped you develop your potential?  I can.  I remember three.  One helped me understand the value of teamwork and mutual support, one motivated me to begin my career overseas, and one rearranged my paradigm for how I work to develop others.  My life, and probably yours as well, would have been much different had it not been for these caring, influential mentors.

The need for mentoring is not limited to adults working with adolescents.  There is also a need for mentoring as a manager within your organization.  In addition to managing your staff, your role is also to mentor and develop them as individuals for their benefit, for yours, and for your company’s.

Mentoring adds new dimensions to your role as a manager.  You also become a facilitator, a developer and an empowerer.  You work with individuals to bring out the best in them as you, in turn, become their role model.

Mentoring is a useful alternative to training for many reasons.  For one, it’s flexible and can be accomplished in many different ways requiring only time and two people.  Also, it’s an off-line activity, so it needn’t interfere with normal operations.  Unlike training, mentoring is individual and can meet individual needs as group development activities cannot.  It’s also all-encompassing in its focus, while training tends to be on specific technical or functional skill areas.

Finally, mentoring requires no outside resources or expenditures.  Your expertise and your willingness to devote your time to developing others is all you need.

The success of your organization depends, to a large extent, on continuity.  This means that you always have a large pool of talent within your organization to fill critical positions when necessary.  To help ensure this, a successful mentoring program may be just what you need.

Coming Up with Answers

Here’s a question for you.  Is it reasonable to expect that you should be able to answer every question that your audience asks at the end of your business presentations?

Well, no.  It’s not.  As much as you prepare, the questions your audience asks are unpredictable and, as a result, if you miss one or two, your audience will generally be forgiving.  They do expect, however, that one or two will be your limit and that when you do respond it will be more than just a simple shrug of your shoulders accompanied by a dopey, “I don’t know.”

So what do you do?  If you don’t know the answer to a particular question your audience asks, how do you answer?  Let me offer you five techniques for evasive action.

The first is Repetition.  Most of the questions that your audience asks will be for clarification, so if someone asks you a question and you’re not sure of the answer, treat it as a clarification question.  Go back to one of your slides that comes close to what your questioner has asked for and explain it a second time in a different way.  Very often this will be what they need and when you ask, “Does this clarify things for you?” they’ll often answer with a ‘yes’.

The second technique is Responsibility.  If you don’t know the answer, refer your questioner to someone in your office or on your team who does know.  You may be delivering a sales presentation, for example, and someone may ask you a technical question.  It would be nice if you could answer, but it will be understood if you explain that your company has expert technicians who can answer that question much better than you can.

The third technique for sidestepping a question is Delay.  You hear this one all the time expressed in five words: “I’ll get back to you.”  This answer, however, suggests that you do not know the answer, and you have to do additional research.  Delay can be more effective if you explain to your questioner that you can answer the question, but the information you need isn’t with you; it’s back in your office on your desk.  As soon as you get back, you’ll send whatever your questioner has asked for.

Throwback is a fourth useful technique.  If you don’t know the answer, find someone in the audience who does.  Turn the question into a discussion and get as much information from your audience as possible.  Then go back to your questioner and ask whether he or she needs more information.

Finally, a fifth technique you can use when you don’t know the answer is Reference.  You might not know the answer, but you do know where it can be found.  Refer the questioner to a book, a magazine article or a website that you’re familiar with. 

Not all of these techniques will work in every situation.  However, if you use them wisely, you can still wind up looking good even when you don’t have all the answers.

Running a Smooth Q&A Session

When you deliver a business presentation, you are in complete control of the content you include, the slides you design and the amount of preparation and practice you put in. The only section of the presentation you don’t control is the question and answer session. You can prepare all you want, but you can never fully anticipate exactly which questions you audience will ask. As a result, the Q&A session can be intimidating.

Even so, your audience still expects that you will handle your Q&A session professionally and it’s your job to meet those expectations. To help you maintain control and manage your Q&A session with confidence, here are five easy guidelines that you can follow.

#1. To help you and your audience relax, begin the Q&A session with a question of your own. This will break the ice, get your audience talking and create an atmosphere for discussion. Once you’ve created safe space, your audience will be more likely to ask questions of their own.

#2. Make questions and answers an interactive dialog. If someone in the audience asks you something clever, respond by saying “Good question” before you answer. When you’re through, go back to that person and ask, “Does that answer your question?” and then thank them for asking. Everyone (especially you) will feel more relaxed if Q&A is conversational.

#3. Clarify questions to ensure that you understand. Repeat them back to the person asking. This is useful not only for your understanding, but for everyone else in the room as well.

#4. Answer the questions you receive. Many speakers are skilled at talking back to questions in circles and moving on without providing an answer. This may be allowable in politics, but not in business. Your audience is asking questions to obtain information necessary for important decisions. They rely on your expertise and on your answers.

Finally, #5. If you don’t know an answer, don’t fake it. A non-answer may do more harm than good, and there may be someone in the audience who calls you on your bluff. Professional presenters know how to use techniques that help them to maintain credibility even when they don’t know the answer to a question.

Good presentations can be impressive, but the question and answer session is what’s going to make it or break it for you. Managing a good Q&A session professionally will convince your audience of your confidence and your credibility.

Standing Up to a Challenge

An engineer from Penang told me his story about an IT marketing presentation he was doing for his company in Europe. He had done the presentation several times before and knew his stuff in and out, so his audience of about 25 people listened politely and received him well. When he finished he opened the floor for questions, but before anyone had a chance to ask, someone from the back of the room, without standing or raising his hand, shouted out, “That’ll never work.”

Not knowing how to deal with this sudden challenge, the engineer lost his nerve. He mumbled a few words, and realizing that he needed to clear his head, he called for a quick break, leaving the audience somewhat puzzled.

He received a challenge that knocked him off of his feet, dissolved his confidence and left his professional credibility damaged. What could he have done better? How would you handle a challenge like this? Let’s examine a few options together.

You could ask the challenger to elaborate. Doing so will help you determine whether he has a legitimate point or not and will allow you some time to get your thoughts together. On the other hand, he may raise a point that takes your audience away from you. You’ve got 24 others on your side. Do you really want to jeopardize your hard work by allowing someone else to take over?

Alternatively, you could throw the question back to the audience. This will take the pressure off of you and turn the challenge into an open discussion. Be careful, however, to throw the question back to someone whom you know is on your side. Otherwise you might single out someone who has no opinion, or worse, someone who agrees with your challenger.

If you would like to discuss your challenger’s position but not in front of the audience, another option is to take the challenge offline. Acknowledge his position and invite him to chat during the break. After all, you tell him, several people in the audience have questions, and you’d like to allow your challenger as much time as he needs.

A final option, and probably your best, is to stand your ground, keep the floor and meet the challenge. He has told you that your idea won’t work. Smile back at him, acknowledge his point of view, and then go ahead and explain why it will work. Give examples of where it has worked before. When you’re through, go back to your challenger and ask him, “Does that clarify things for you?” In nine out of ten cases, he’ll say yes. If he comes back with another challenge, take it offline.

Remember, a challenge can be as easy to handle as any other question -- just as long as you’re prepared to meet it.

Three Types of Questions to Expect During Q&A

You’ve come to the end of your business presentation and your audience gives you a round of warm applause. You smile, nod, open your body language and oozing with obvious confidence you ask them, “Do you have any questions?” But, in your mind you’re thinking, “I hope not, I hope not.”

Because you never really know what’s coming, the Q&A session at the end of your presentation can be the most difficult part to handle. However, it can be easier for you if you know and anticipate the three different types of questions that your audience is most likely to ask you.

The first type of question is for clarification. These are by far the most common questions that you’ll receive, and fortunately, they’re the easiest to answer. Your audience will ask for clarification when they need further explanation of an item you’ve delivered. All you’ve got to do, therefore, is go back, display the slide they have in question, and re-explain yourself a different way. Answering clarification questions is pretty straightforward and usually requires no additional knowledge on your part.

The second type of question is for additional information. Receiving questions like this is a good indication that your audience liked what you had to say, and now they want to hear more. They may ask for more detail, for specifications, for alternatives, and so on. Like clarification, these questions are common and easy to answer – IF you know your stuff. Prepare for these questions in advance. If your audience asks you for additional information, make sure you can provide it. "I'll get back to you" is an answer you'll be luck to get away with just once.

The last type of question your audience may ask is the most difficult to answer. This happens when they ask a question meant to challenge you. Your audience may challenge you for three different reasons. First, they might need absolute confirmation that the information you’re delivering is accurate. Important business decisions may depend on your presentation, so decision makers need to be certain. Expect to be challenged by senior management attending your presentation and be confident. This is what they want to see.

Second, they might disbelieve or find fault with an item you’ve presented. Be careful here, because they may be right and you may be wrong. If you realize your mistake, apologize and acknowledge the correction. If you are uncertain, commit to rechecking and getting back to the questioner. But, if you know you are right, stand and hold your ground. Accuracy must be defended.

The third reason your audience may challenge you is just to give you a hard time. Fortunately, these are few and far between so you may never have to deal with this type of challenge. However, if you do, these are the challenges that are most likely to put your professional credibility on line.

How do you deal with a tough challenge? Check in next week and read on...

Are You Prepared for Q&A?

Has this ever happened to you? You spent the last week preparing for an important business presentation. You did your research and you designed beautiful, high-impact slides. You practiced the night before and now you think you know your stuff. Your delivery is excellent and the audience pays attention. They give you an appreciative round of applause. Then, during the question and answer session, your audience asks you challenging questions. Your confidence cracks, you stammer through your answers, and you leave your audience with the impression that you don’t know very much after all.

If this has never happened to you, congratulations. You’re doing something right. But you’ve probably seen it happen to someone else. It’s not uncommon to see someone deliver a beautiful presentation only to have everything fall apart in the Q&A session. Why does this happen and how can you prevent it from happening to you?

Preparing for your delivery is easy and straightforward, but you never really know what questions your audience may ask you afterwards. You can prepare yourself better for your Q&A session, however, by following just two simple guidelines.

First, really know your stuff. This is rule number one when it comes to delivering presentations. When you stand up in front of an audience, their immediate perception is that you are the expert. Why? Because they’re sitting down, and you’re standing up. Now it’s your job to fulfill their expectations. Learn your content backward and forward. Know which slide comes next before you project it on the screen. Learn relationships between your key points. Just like acting on stage, it’s more than just learning your lines. You’ve got to become the part.

Second, anticipate questions. Once you’ve mastered your content, make a list of the questions that your think your audience might ask you. If you have a partner who can help you rehearse, ask him or her to watch your presentation and ask you some questions afterwards. Practice answering them. Even if your audience asks you questions different from those you’ve rehearsed, you’ll feel more confident about fielding questions and project more credibility as a result.

Your question and answer session is as important as the content of your presentation. That’s why it’s useful for you to be as prepared for questions as you are with your information.