This video lasts just under 15 minutes…

You can get Martin Grunburg’s Habit Factor book from Amazon.

Sajjad was born and raised in Al Ain, then went to college in Waterloo, Canada. While he was there he helped organise 2 TEDx conferences, and 2 other conferences. He flew back to Al Ain at the end of 2010 with the express intent to run the first TEDxAlAin conference.

He found my Al Ain Enthusiast website while googling Al Ain, rang me up, we got together, and he asked me to be his co-host.

Together we made presentations to various local government bodies and funding organisations, and created this event. We had some terrific helpers, we brought in some great speakers, and our sponsors and partners included Mubadala Aerospace, Al Ain Municipality, Etihad Airways and Oasis Living Magazine.

Various people didn’t think we’d be able to get sponsors. They thought that, if we did get sponsors we’d never get 200 or more people to attend. And, if we did get 200 or more people to attend, 90% of them would be ex-pats, and very few would be local Emiratis.

In the end, a total of 850 people came on Saturday, May 7, 2011, and we had to turn away more than 300 last-minute applicants. As many as 100 people were watching the LiveStream broadcast of the talks during the day. And 34% of the attendees were Emirati.

There were 10 speakers on the day, each presenting for no more than 18 minutes as per the TED guideline.

Go to this page to see a video of my 15-minute talk. Other talks are starting to appear on YouTube. I’ll link to these when they’ve all been uploaded.

He said it was important to really listen to what a client is saying to you.

He suggested you do this using this technique…

When your prospect is talking about the challenges he (or she) was facing, which you believe your product/service will help him with, repeat back to yourself, in your mind, the words that he is saying.

Now this is an interesting tip.

And I’m sure many salespeople thought this was a great idea, used it, and found it helped.

But really…

Is this ‘subvocalising’ technique really getting to the heart of the issue?

And isn’t it easy to forget to do it in the middle of a meeting?

For me, this technique is flawed. It’s a technique that’s rather like this: “Do you have a crack in your wall? Here’s how to solve that problem in minutes… Dig out some wallpaper, add some paste and stick it over the cracks. Done!”

It’s the same with dating: you’re single and want a new partner, so you buy a book or ebook and it gives you a list of very clever things you can say or questions you can ask when you’re next in front of someone you fancy.

Doesn’t that seem artificial?

For me, the key is to get to the heart of the matter…

Back to our sales person – and some of the following will apply to the dating example…

If you find you’re not listening, or you’re missing bits of what the other person is saying, or you’re find it difficult to concentrate, what is really going on with you?

Are you afraid? Does a lot hang on you getting this sale? Do you have a boss breathing down your neck? Does this person intimidate you? In other words, do you feel less than him?

Are you being driven by ego? In other words, are you trying to beat the sales you did last? Or do you feel bigger/better than him so you’re mind is ignoring some of the ‘claptrap’ he is saying?

Are you running behind schedule? Are you rushing to get the meeting over with so you’re racing to get to the sales close?

…and there are more questions like this we could ask.

Here’s the thing…

Some people would rather not answer these. There’s too much thinking involved. They haven’t got the patience to answer them. There’s rather too much soul searching too: and that’s a bit too close to the bone. They’d rather stick with a simple technique like subvocalising.

If you, though, really want to get ahead, the questions above are a good start. If you answer them you can email your answers to me and I’ll comment on them, and point a few things out which may be helpful.

Or you can try one of my ebooks, or book a call which will really help you address your challenge.

It’s one of the biggest-selling toys ever: 400 million of them have been bought.

Here’s me with my Cube which is jumbled up…

Imagine you had a really jumbled up cube that you had twisted for many minutes. What is the minimum number of twists to get all the sides back to their original ordered state?

Click here to reveal/hide the answer

You can solve the puzzle and get all the sides to be the right colour again within 15 to 19 moves.

Rarely does it take 20 moves.

According to John Dethridge, an engineer at Google, Herbert Kociemba, a maths teacher, and Tomas Rokicki, a programmer from California, they have not been able to find one starting position, no matter how ‘messed up’ which takes more than 20 moves. So 20 is the maximum number of twists to get to a ‘solved cube’.

(This research was reported around the world in August 2010, including this story on the BBC site.)

So what?

Well, what if… no matter what challenges you may have right now – no matter how ‘messed up’ your situation is – you can get to a resolution far faster than you may think…

…if you have the right support.

Give me a call, or try my ebooks, to help you get where you’d love to be… fast.