Do You Have Enough Sensing and Intuitive Types in Your Business to Succeed? An Important Question Every Business Leader Should be Asking Themselves as We Face Daunting Challenges in 2012

A very good writer, technologist and a real smart guy who I am just very lucky to call a friend wrote a very compelling blog titled, “What Happens When You Put 1 and 1 Together?”  

With his permission, I am reposting it below for your reading,  contemplation  and hopefully some assistance as you plan for the formidable issues facing our world, our country, our economy and our businesses as we have known them in the past.

Before and after you read his blog, ask yourself, “Do You Have Enough Sensing and Intuitive Types in Your Business to Succeed?”

Enjoy!

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 28, 2011

Q: What happens when you put 1 and 1 together?

A: Depends on the type of personality you ask.

To my observation there are two types of people in the world. The first type conceptualizes that when you put 1 and 1 together, you get 2. The second type accommodates the notion that put 1 and 1 together, you get 11.

If you bang around a Meyers-Briggs lexicon of psychological types, you'll find that the first type is called a Sensing type. These folks rely upon the concrete facts to understand the world. The second type is called an Intuitive personality. For them, reality is a Big Picture in which the given experience is but an episode in a larger story.

For Sensing folks the role of language is to describe the world. For Intuitive folks the role of language is to express the world. Sensing folks ask, "How does it work?" Intuitive folks ask "Does it work?" For the Sensing folks, the beauty is in the balance sheet. For the Intuitive type, the beauty is.

When it comes to commerce, the Sensing type understands a very important fact: A business that does not make money,  ain't. If the dollar amount attached to Accounts Receivable is not greater than the dollar amount of Accounts Payable, even the mightiest of businesses has a problem. And, if the problem goes on long enough, the business has a Big Problem. Profitability is acutely describable, always has been, always will be. As any Captain of Industry will tell you, profitability is best handled by Sensing folks.

Still, there is a whole world out there that cannot be described with words: explaining the color, red to a blind man or the sound of a chirping bird to one who is deaf. The only description is the experience itself. This is the world of the Intuitive. One just knows what it is.

Intuitive people experience a thing as part of a past, present and future whole. These are the people that see a ski and motorcycle and imagine a snowmobile. They see two cans tied together by a string and imagine computers talking to one another via an Ethernet cable. Give an Intuitive person a good cup of coffee, put him or her in front of sales force and you have a chain of Starbucks.

Businesses that last need both Sensing and Intuitive folks. Yet, it seems that as a business matures, the power bias moves to the Sensing. Profitability, while essential, becomes paramount. Success is known more as a measurable quantity rather than a state of experience. Creativity, the de-facto realm of the Intuitive folk and the indescribable soul of an enterprise, becomes a transient commodity purchased from Ad Agencies that have a proven track record of staying on budget while increasing sales and market share. The transformation is not one of nefarious premeditation intent on sucking the life blood of originality from the corporate environment. Rather, to paraphrase an often used term, "it's just Sensing being Sensing." 

So what's the point here? My point is this: If you are a reader that happens to have hire and fire power in your enterprise and also happens to be very good at understanding and defining profitability, when you look about your direct reports, how many people do you see that can accept that when you put 1 and 1 together, 11 is a plausible, if not useful result? If it's not half, you might be in some very real trouble.

Another Guest Post - Meet More People by Reno Levinson

All,

This is a real treat. Reno is sharing this blog with us as a teaser to his forthcoming book.

I think many small and large businesses have lost the importance of this business tactic.

Enjoy!

Mary

Meet More People 

Most small businesses derive the majority of their clients from within a 10 mile radius of their location. Even if you're an online business (with very few exceptions) there are prospects just outside your door. Face-to-face networking is the perfect way to build important relationships in a short period of time. You can build rapport and communicate more information in a 20 minute face-to-face contact then you could over a month's worth of emails and social networking with the same person.  The stumbling block with face-to-face networking is that it requires you to physically go someplace and present yourself to one or more people. For many people this is a great effort. Where do I go? Who should I talk to? Is it worth it?

Go to a chamber of commerce meeting, school event, sporting event or any place where people are gathering. If it is a big event don't try to meet everyone, pick out a few people and have a meaningful interaction. One thing I have found about networking is that it is almost always worth it, if you do it well, this typically entails being genuine. Be yourself. Be friendly and be helpful. Ask questions of people you meet and be sure to walk away with an idea of how you might help them. In the course of conversation when you have a chance to speak about your business try to tell a story or share an anecdote about how your product or service helped a client. You might say, "This week one of my clients asked me if I could help him with ... it was perfect because we do that sort of thing all the time." The facts of your business in the context of a story are easier to remember than a series of random facts.

When you conclude your visit, your final words should be, "I'll send you that article; I'll be sure to introduce you to him; or I'll forward that information". If this is your final comment it confirms you were asking questions; looking to be helpful and plan to follow up.  

Be sure to hand a business card to everyone you meet and with whom you have had some social interaction. This reinforces who you are, your name, your business name and your contact information. Never try to sell your product or service at a networking or social event. Certainly tell people what you do but save the sales presentation for another time.

A successful networking event is walking away having met one or more people you know something about who may be a good prospect or resource. They should know something about you, have your contact information, and be in a position to consider your service or recommend you to someone. This done, you have successfully expanded your network.

Reno Lovison has a marketing company specializing in the production of video for the web. He is the author of “Turn Your Business Card Into Business.”
www.businesscardtobusiness.com

The 12 Last Days of Business - Day 12

What you do on the last 12 days of business in a calendar year can dramatically affect your success in the following year. And, yes. This does apply to fiscal year financial businesses – the human thinks and works in a calendar year – they mentally re-set on January 1^st. So this either means it is their ½ year re-set for fiscal year businesses or New Year re-set for calendar year businesses. The important thing is that it is a re-set and with that comes huge opportunity as a leader – so buckle up and charge through to the end of the year!

#1 - Be courageous. Don’t be a lazy executive who takes the last two weeks of the year off and leaves the staff to hold down the fort 

For many businesses, it is either boom or bust this time of year. If you are in a bust situation, take this opportunity to MBWA (manage by walking around). Spend time with associates. Find out what they see as working and not working in the organization. Ask them, “what could we do to make things better in 2011?” You just might be amazed at how insightful, thoughtful and brilliant some of the solutions are that come from your staff. If you are in a boom situation, get out there and be the biggest cheerleader there ever was. Even though it is a boom time, it can be enhanced dramatically with daily sales contests and rewards. (And don’t go cheap on the rewards—after all, it is the holidays)! 

As an example of this, I took a Call Center Lead Gen group and cranked them up to 14 highly qualified leads per hour from 1 lead per hour by implementing a 15-20 minute morning meeting where I got the chance to praise employees’ work, announce winners and ask for any issues that came up so we could resolve them right then and there. So, if I can get results like that, imagine what you can do (especially with my help)! And, yes… I have been hired to design these contests and run them on behalf of management, but I ALWAYS insist that management/executives participate in every 15-20 minute meeting. Your presence is powerful and a simple ”great job” or “great meeting” from you means the world to the staff.

Check tomorrow for Day 11!

Mary