{"id":70,"date":"2011-12-08T02:45:19","date_gmt":"2011-12-08T02:45:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wensmedia.com\/\/salesarchive\/permalink\/2011\/12\/7\/214519.html"},"modified":"2011-12-08T02:45:19","modified_gmt":"2011-12-08T02:45:19","slug":"three-strikes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ensmediausa.com\/ens-on-sales\/uncategorized\/three-strikes\/","title":{"rendered":"Three Strikes"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: center\">&nbsp;<span style=\"font-size: larger\"><span style=\"font-family: Arial\"><b><u>Three Strikes<\/u><\/b><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify; margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><span style=\"font-family: Arial\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; I recently had a relatively new sales manager confide in me that she was wrestling with the internal discomfort of initiating her first firing.<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify; margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><span style=\"font-family: Arial\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; I recall the first time I had to terminate an employee. I was the ripe old age of 24, and found the task so distasteful that I had to pull off on the side of the road on the way home that evening and throw up.<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify; margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><span style=\"font-family: Arial\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; To this day, I feel that failure of a staff member is also partially failure on management&rsquo;s part. It&rsquo;s management&rsquo;s mandate to recruit and cultivate great people.<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify; margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><span style=\"font-family: Arial\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Having said that, management can lose the respect of the rest of the staff if they are perceived to be too weak to do what is in the company&rsquo;s best interest and tolerate an underper<span style=\"color: black\">forming employee.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify; margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><span style=\"font-family: Arial\"><span style=\"color: black; font-size: 12pt\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; And you can bet your underperformer doesn&rsquo;t feel very good about their career either.<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify; margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><span style=\"font-family: Arial\"><span style=\"color: black; font-size: 12pt\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Before dismissing a person for underperformance, however, I recommend you use my Three Strikes process.<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify; margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><span style=\"font-family: Arial\"><span style=\"color: black; font-size: 12pt\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; <u>Step one:<\/u> is to only manage what can be measured. &nbsp;Underperformance is the generic result of not doing certain things right or often enough. Identify exactly and precisely what steps the &lsquo;underperformer&rsquo; is missing or why they aren&rsquo;t performing to par.<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify; margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><span style=\"font-family: Arial\"><span style=\"color: black; font-size: 12pt\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Get them to agree to specific tactics or actions, complete with specific measureable goals and deadlines, to improve their results and document and confirm that agreement in writing. &lsquo;Attitude&rsquo; for example, can be subjective and hard to measure, but showing up on time every day or making &lsquo;x&rsquo; number of presentations is a measurable sign of a good attitude.<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify; margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><span style=\"font-family: Arial\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; <u>Step two<\/u>: &nbsp;give the person three opportunities to correct those specific causes. And during each of those opportunities, offer your assistance, training, coaching and<span style=\"color: black\"> whatever<\/span> resources you can bring to the table to help them achieve those goals.<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify; margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><span style=\"font-family: Arial\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Once you&rsquo;ve done your best three times and the individual has not progressed in those specific problem areas, you&rsquo;re doing them, yourself, your company, and the other people on staff a huge <span style=\"color: black\">favor<\/span> when you give them the opportunity to seek a new career. &nbsp;<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify; margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><span style=\"font-family: Arial\"><span style=\"font-size: 12pt\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Need a management or leadership coach and mentor? The best performers in sports, entertainment and business, have mentors and\/or coaches to help them improve their performance &nbsp;<u><span style=\"color: blue\">Contact me<\/span><\/u> in complete confidence to enquire about the ENS Media mentoring and coaching program.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n<div style=\"text-align: justify; margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><span style=\"font-family: Arial\">&nbsp;<\/span><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp;Three Strikes &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; I recently had a relatively new sales manager confide in me that she was wrestling with the internal discomfort of initiating her first firing. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; I recall the first time I had to terminate an employee. I was the ripe old age of 24, and found the task so distasteful that I [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":35,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-70","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Three Strikes - ENS on Sales<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ensmediausa.com\/ens-on-sales\/uncategorized\/three-strikes\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Three Strikes - ENS on Sales\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"&nbsp;Three Strikes &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; I recently had a relatively new sales manager confide in me that she was wrestling with the internal discomfort of initiating her first firing. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; I recall the first time I had to terminate an employee. 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