"You're just having a conversation."
Never have five words been so simple and yet so effective.
At the beginning of January my calling had taken a turn for the worse. After calling better in November, the month of December ended with my performance down and down to the point where my lead director was concerned. Through nearly four and a half months on the job my overall performance was right at expectations. Again, as directors we are never in jeopardy of losing our jobs due to our calling performance but on the flip side the expectation is that we are among the top callers in the office. Being right at minimum expectation meant that I was not performing where I needed to be in terms of setting a good example for the office.
As disheartening as this was, I also knew that I was setting myself up for a disappointing performance review in just over two months. In discussing my performance with my lead director, we had set a goal of being 25% above expectations for the month of January. Seeing as the month of December I had been -15% below expectations, the task seemed daunting and unrealistic for me to turn my performance around in such a short amount of time.
Then I got those five simple words.
The words came from the other assistant director, a calling veteran of nearly seven years. She had seen me go through my initial ups-and-downs and told me that that was a phrase that had always helped her when she struggled in her calling. It was simple, yes, but it also entailed everything that I had learned about the job so far: Having a good greeting, being conversational, being persistent, and being a good active listener. All of these skills were essentially embedded into the idea of having a good conversation with people. If you're having a good conversation then you're going to have a good, pleasant greeting. If you're having a good conversation then you're going to be a good active listener. If you're having a good conversation then you should be able to ask the member to get involved at a financial level that he or she is comfortable with.
In short, if you're having good conversations then the rest will fall into place.
And fall it did. For the month of January I ended up being 29% above expectations. My lead director was so impressed that she set the goal for me to be 40% above expectations for the month of February. She encouraged me to continue to do whatever it was that was working and to continue to improve my performance so that not only would I be performing well as a director but also so that my tips and pep talks would be more powerful with our callers if they knew I was personally performing at a high level. It would give my own words of wisdom more legitimacy if the callers were able to see that was I was saying would lead to positive results.
Although the majority of success has stemmed from those simple five words, the success has also bred further success. My own expectations of my calling have increased so that I now hold myself to a higher standard because I know of what I am capable of. When I was struggling during my calling, there would be entire four-hour shifts where I would only get a couple of people involved. Now, I'm at a point where if I don't get at least six people involved during a calling session then I feel that I have not lived up to expectations. I also have set lofty goals in terms of how much money I am able to pledge each week. Three weeks ago, I pledge $980 which was my new personal best. However, it was tantalizingly close to $1000 so that amount has now become my new benchmark. Even if I am well above quota during a four-hour shift, if I only raise a couple hundred dollars I know that I am well off my goal. That is something that was unthinkable for me nearly a month ago.
All and all, I think my main takeaway from being a telemarketer is that the process is very counter-intuitive. For someone like myself that is very left-brained and needs things in a logical order, this has been a difficult transition. And yet, the results are there. The way to become successful? Keep it simple. Don't overthink it. Have good conversations. That's it, end of story. All of the other things will slide into place if you do these three simple things. If you can do them, then you can be a good caller.
And have those good conversations.
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