I just came from a workshop with a lot of pointed questions. There was tension, emotion, and a lot of sweaty palms.
There were conversations where you would think people were watching wimbledon, watching an imaginary ball being whacked back and forth.
But at its very heart, these situations are about figuring out what people really want.
What, then, do you figure out to get what people want?
What people are really trying to say
From my most previous experience, what my workshop participant was saying, wasn’t really what he was trying to say.
Let me explain.
Because of circumstances, situations, and relationships, people can be unclear with what they want to say.
I’m not clear all the time, with what I say, and with what I want to say.
And what people are really trying to say, may be different from how I might be understanding what they’re saying.
For some people, it seemed like my participant was challenging me and the applicability of the topic at hand. He was sharing with me how it differed from his own experience, and how using more traditional methods were still getting him results.
Again, a quiet hush descended upon the room.
Instead of going into details of how right I am, and how good what I was saying was, I asked questions first, and tried to figure out what he was really trying to say.
Turns out, he had a totally different agenda from what he initially wanted to find out. Had I went with judgement right away, I would have bombarded him with data, facts, figures, shoved my weight around, and probably would have found all means necessary to prove I’m right.
Nobody wants to be wrong, but then again, what was the right thing to do in that instance?
I asked him questions, and sought to understand where he was coming from, and what he was saying.
And found out that he wasn’t challenging my presentation, he merely wanted to make sense of it, in the terms that he himself understood and used.
Stating and figuring that out, diffused all the tension in the room, and the resulting clarity engaged him even further, and spurred everyone else into making their 2-day leadership retreat meaningful.
If you seek to understand what people are trying to say, you’ll go far.
What people want to buy
Because you don’t sell people what they don’t want to buy, but you sell that what they want, and are ready, to buy.
Sounds simple, right?
How then, do you find out?
What then, are people willing to buy?
From my experience, people are willing to buy those that will solve a problem of theirs.
My leather shoes for work are nearly done. It’s coming to a point where they will nearly give up, while I’m standing in front of a whole room of executives. Very painful thought, indeed.
Or what about medicines? To be able to save a life?
I pay my chiropractor good money, because it was his treatment and rehab plan that fixed the pain in my back and got me walking again.
People want to buy that which will not only solve a problem, but take away their pain. If something if painful for them, you can very well bet that they will pay good money to have the pain taken away.
And it doesn’t have to be physical. It can be emotional, spiritual pain, as well.
I’ve heard somewhere, that at its most basic form, people want to get laid, paid, or made.
Hence the biggest industries and commodities in the world today.
If you seek to find out what people are willing to buy, and to serve it to them, you’ll go far.
What people want to do
From my personal experience, humans are fickle beings. They also don’t tell you what they’re going to do, or they tell you one thing, but do another.
But if you know what a person wants to do, and is going to do, then it opens up so many opportunities for you.
Opportunities to support, encourage, strengthen, and help the person, and not the other way around.
How would you then find out what people want to do?
Or put another way, what do they want to be doing? What change do they want?
Seek to understand first
Because all knowledge, informed decisions, and effective actions, come from an understanding.
Understanding what other people want, what they are saying, and what they want to do.
As Dr. Covey shares in the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, if you seek to understand first, then it is easier to seek to be understood later.
Find out first, understand fully, only then, respond.
If you do so you will go far in this world.
What needs to be figured out if you are to go far in this world? Please share in the comments below!
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