Chili, Steak and Ale
What do chili, steak and ale have in common? When Norman Brinker takes an
interest they all get much, much better. Norman Brinker, currently the
Chairman of the Board of Brinker International, once was one of the
highest paid food industry executives when he was President of the
Pillsbury Restaurant Group. He risked it all to see if his successful management principles for
large businesses applied to a small business. In 1983 he bought the small
Chili's restaurant chain (28 restaurants) and turned it into a $2.3
billion international business. This included eight
additional chains employing 99,000 people. His management principles were an
overwhelming success at a small business. They're also great principles to
apply to selling.
Surround yourself with people who know more than you
do. Brinker attributed his success
to knowing what he didn't know. He then chose to work with people who were knowledgeable in areas
where he lacked expertise. He
surrounded himself with those types of people. His comment about the staff he
chose supports this principle. He says, "Sinners can repent, stupidity is forever."
In selling we've got to keep learning about business,
our products and our customers. We can choose to surround ourselves with people who can add to our
education or diminish our progress. We can look to salespeople and others who know more than we do and
ask for their input on our selling strategies. Listen to the customers you admire
who describe what worked for them and also what procedures were less
successful. By looking to
someone smarter, we can increase our probability of success in
selling. Selling is
challenging enough. Let's
make it easier by surrounding ourselves with smarter people and learning
from them. We can learn from
their successes and failures. Groucho Marx was right when he said, "We can learn from the
mistakes of others. We don't
have time to make them all ourselves."
Take risks. Brinker recommends taking risks, but not
wild ones. He described his
business career which started at Jack in the Box. He left to start Steak and Ale in
1965 and also developed the Bennigan's restaurant concept. He then renamed his company
S&A Restaurant Corp. and merged it with Pillsbury. He became an executive with
Pillsbury and was one of the industry's highest paid executive. His decision to leave Pillsbury
was risky. He wanted to see
if his management principles would work in a smaller business. In order to buy Chili's he would
have to sign a $12 million note. He did. Of course he
would be able to tap into his years of experience, contacts and skills he
had acquired.
In sales we can take risks by creating new ideas for
our customers' businesses, trying new sales techniques or doing something
different than we've always done. Some of our ideas will succeed and some will fail. With our experience and skill
behind us more of our ideas will succeed than fail. Our customers will appreciate the
input and we will become more valuable to them. It might even make selling better
for us. When Brinker took the
risk of leaving and discussed his resignation with Pillsbury's CEO after
deciding to go to Chili's he heard, "Norman, how come you always get to
have the fun?"
Find out what your customers
think. How do you know what your customers think about your products and
services? Brinker would stand
outside his restaurants and talk with his customers. He might say, "What kind of joint
is this?" Or he'd ask a
customer, "How's the value of this restaurant? I don't have a big
budget." He never had a
clipboard. He talked with his
customers, listened and got honest feedback. He was more successful in the
smaller towns of Texas. When
he was in Dallas some of his customers would say, "Well Norman, why do you want to
know?"
You may think Norman Brinker has done it all. He was asked what he'd do
differently in his life if he could. He responded, "I'd do more." That's another principle for selling. He made a wonderful difference in
so many people's lives and knew he had so much more to do. What a great salesman.
Maura Schreier-Fleming is president of
Best@Selling (http://www.bestatselling.com/).
She works with business and sales professionals at company and trade
association meetings to make selling easier and more productive. She is
the author of the book Real-World
Selling for Out-of-this-World Results. She can be reached at 972
380 0200 or info@BestatSelling.com.
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