If you have been in sales for any length of time, you would have come across the slick sales person and sales leader – constantly operating with a sense of urgency and focusing on closing, closing, closing. Whilst they are hungry to get the deals done, they also have more of a short term focus, almost instant gratification. If the deal can’t be closed today, it won’t be closed at all – move onto the next deal. And how does this make the potential customer feel? Potentially like a pawn in the salesperson’s game, and unlikely to seek to engage in the future.

We see this everywhere in society today – buy now, pay later, don’t wait, get it now, whatever it takes. And we certainly see it in organisations where the senior leaders drive unrelenting focus on short term results, whether that be month to month or quarter to quarter. Why? In many cases, it is because their short term bonuses are linked to the short term results. Hence this drives behaviour.

There is a different way and there is a better way.