Go For No
Admittedly, most of us are not comfortable with the word “no”. Hearing a “no” may have been tolerable as a child when we were denied tidbits just before dinner. But as the years pass, it becomes difficult to face it. We begin to fear the word and tend to avoid situations where we anticipate encountering it. But what if you could reverse the programming so that you actually became tougher and spirited every time you heard “no”? You’d eventually be at ease with the word and even “go for no”.
In the movie “A League of their Own”, a fictional story based on the All American Girls Professional Baseball League, there’s a quote that coach Jimmy Dugan says to the icon player Dottie Hinson when she wants to quit because it’s too hard to play at this level. He says: “It's supposed to be hard. If it wasn't hard, everyone would do it. The hard ... is what makes it great.”
The same applies to sales. It’s hard, but you’ve got to go for it. You’ve got to go for no in order to get to yes, as explained in the book Go for No by Richard Fenton. What this means is all the “no’s” are in fact a stairway to “yes”. It’s easy to be comfortable with “yes”; it’s the “no” we need to be comfortable with as well.
We are scared of hearing “no”; we need to understand why. We have to learn how to respond to that fear. Whether you are an entrepreneur, an artist, a novelist, or a sales manager, you must know that “no” has value. Each “no” takes you closer to “yes”. Hence it is important to reprogram our mind with regard to the word “no”. “No” is not meant to be personal. You must learn to deal with it professionally in order to reach your destination—“yes”.
Just ask successful sellers how many “no’s” they needed to hear before achieving success (Richard Fenton actually did this in his Go for No movie), and you will understand that it needs dogged perseverance, which ultimately comes down to how you handle the word “no”.
You need courage to face rejection, and the great thing is you have it already. Just as your muscles grow stronger the more you use them, courage too gets bigger the more you use it. Soon enough, you will view the “no’s” as road signs to the destination—“yes”.
Once you get comfortable with “no” and then actually “go for no”, you will steamroll your way to success. You need not fear this emotion heavy two-letter word. Once you are convinced about this and activate your courage as soon as you hear the word, you will find out that when you go for no, you can aim higher than you could ever think of!
In the movie “A League of their Own”, a fictional story based on the All American Girls Professional Baseball League, there’s a quote that coach Jimmy Dugan says to the icon player Dottie Hinson when she wants to quit because it’s too hard to play at this level. He says: “It's supposed to be hard. If it wasn't hard, everyone would do it. The hard ... is what makes it great.”
The same applies to sales. It’s hard, but you’ve got to go for it. You’ve got to go for no in order to get to yes, as explained in the book Go for No by Richard Fenton. What this means is all the “no’s” are in fact a stairway to “yes”. It’s easy to be comfortable with “yes”; it’s the “no” we need to be comfortable with as well.
We are scared of hearing “no”; we need to understand why. We have to learn how to respond to that fear. Whether you are an entrepreneur, an artist, a novelist, or a sales manager, you must know that “no” has value. Each “no” takes you closer to “yes”. Hence it is important to reprogram our mind with regard to the word “no”. “No” is not meant to be personal. You must learn to deal with it professionally in order to reach your destination—“yes”.
Just ask successful sellers how many “no’s” they needed to hear before achieving success (Richard Fenton actually did this in his Go for No movie), and you will understand that it needs dogged perseverance, which ultimately comes down to how you handle the word “no”.
You need courage to face rejection, and the great thing is you have it already. Just as your muscles grow stronger the more you use them, courage too gets bigger the more you use it. Soon enough, you will view the “no’s” as road signs to the destination—“yes”.
Once you get comfortable with “no” and then actually “go for no”, you will steamroll your way to success. You need not fear this emotion heavy two-letter word. Once you are convinced about this and activate your courage as soon as you hear the word, you will find out that when you go for no, you can aim higher than you could ever think of!
