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What
Makes Tiger Tick? What Golf Superstar Tiger Woods Can Teach Sales
Professionals About Winning.
Is Tiger Woods the greatest golfer
who ever lived? One thing's for sure. Tiger Woods' mental game is
absolutely the very best on the pro golf tour. Here are four peak
performance strategies sales professionals can learn from a mental
master like Tiger. Manage your mental game like Tiger Woods and
soon you'll be reaching more of your selling potential.
627
words.
What Makes Tiger Tick?
What Golf Superstar Tiger Woods Can Teach
Sales Professionals About Winning
Bill Cole, MS, MA
Founder and CEO
William B. Cole Consultants
Silicon Valley, California
Is Tiger Woods the greatest golfer who ever lived?
Jack Nicklaus might think so. Nicklaus, a living legend himself,
has said as much about Tiger, "He's playing a game I'm not familiar
with."
Tiger won the US Open as he was watched by over 9 million homes.
He's now won seven of the past eleven majors in golf.
One thing's for sure. Tiger Woods' mental game is absolutely the
very best on the pro golf tour. Here's what sales professionals
can learn from a mental master like Tiger.
1. Tiger Sets Very High Personal Standards And
Holds Himself Accountable.
Many tour pros set goals of trying to win a certain
number of events per year. Some set a goal of winning a particular
event. Tiger sets a goal of trying to win every event he enters.
He truly believes he has a chance to win each time he steps out
to play. When he falls short of a personal goal or objective, Tiger
blames no one or anything other than himself. He takes full responsibility
for his successes or failures.
As a sales professional you can set exciting, engaging goals that
create interest and logical, step-by-step objectives that take you
there. Take personal responsibility for everything in your selling.
You can make the commitment to practice a sales skill or presentation
until you get it, and the commitment that you will strive to succeed
in every sales transaction.
2. Tiger's Major Mental Tool Is His Unrelenting
Mental Discipline.
Tiger knows how to focus his mind on command.
He does this in practice and that here-and-now skill carries over
to competition. He intuitively sees how demanding continually sharp
focus relates directly to performance. He maintains personal rituals
before playing and practicing, and before each shot he takes. He
uses these routines as triggers to explode his energies and focus
onto what he is about to do.
Sales professional can use rituals before telephoning and presentations.
You can pride yourself on getting over errors quickly and getting
your mind back on task. You can notice when your mind begins to
wander and bring it back to the present.
3. Tiger Builds His Confidence By Endless And
Intense Practice.
Tiger knows that practice does not make perfect.
Practice makes permanent. Only perfect practice makes perfect. Tiger
uses the "over-kill method" when practicing. He repeats perfect
swings until he burns them into his mind and body. Then, even under
the most intense tournament pressure, those swings hold up. That's
how confidence is built, one practice swing at a time.
As a sales professional you can realize the critical connection
between what you are doing in practice, with sales performance in
front of a client. The two are directly linked. You won't allow
sloppy practice, lackadaisical mental discipline or random, aimless
training. You realize that you practice the way you perform.
4. Tiger Does NOT Keep His Eye On The Goal.
Instead, He Focuses On The Process. It is a myth
that, in a competition, great athletes focus on the goal of winning.
To be sure, winning is a goal, but it is a given. No focus need
go onto that goal. What excellent performers focus on is process.
Tiger is superb at keeping his mind in the here and now. As he does
that, with his well-honed practice habits underneath everything,
he allows the golf process to unfold in the moment.
Sales professionals need to be incredibly outcome-oriented. But
forget about thinking about winning and focus on the things you
can do that will take you closer to that goal. Do enough of those
things with excellence and you will win more often.
Manage your mental game like Tiger Woods and soon you'll be reaching
more of your selling potential.
To learn more about how sales coaching can help you become a better,
more confident sales professional, visit Bill Cole, MS, MA, the
Mental Game Coach™ at www.mentalgamecoach.com/Services/SalesCoaching.html.
Copyright © 2011-
Bill Cole, MS, MA. All rights reserved.
Bill Cole, MS, MA, a leading authority
on peak performance, mental toughness and coaching, is founder and
CEO of William B. Cole Consultants, a consulting firm that helps
organizations and professionals achieve more success in business,
life and sports. He is also the Founder and President of the International
Mental Game Coaching Association (www.mentalgamecoaching.com),
an organization dedicated to advancing the research, development,
professionalism and growth of mental game coaching worldwide. He
is a multiple Hall-Of-Fame honoree as an athlete, coach and school
alumnus, an award-winning scholar-athlete, published book author
and articles author, and has coached at the highest levels of major-league
pro sports, big-time college athletics and corporate America. For
a free, extensive article archive, or for questions and comments
visit him at www.MentalGameCoach.com.
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