motivational Archives

The Magical Disney Moment That Wasn’t Even Mine

February 3, 2017 By Arnold Tijerina

I’ve visited Disneyland many times. As an Annual Passholder, it was close to my house and a great place to get my (at the time) two-year old, out of the house for a spell. Even if we didn’t go on any rides, the ambience, energy and magic that attracts and maintains brand loyalty and excitement for Disney captured her mind and heart. Even to this day, now as an almost 11-year old, when asked what she wants to do in the future, her answer is to work for Disney. She literally studies, consumes and wants to be knowledgeable in everything Disney. In her words, if she wants to work there, she needs to know everything about Disney, all the movies and everything.

In 2008, we visited Disneyland. On that visit, I captured a magical moment. And it didn’t belong to me.

As I took this picture, I started making up stories in my head. This young boy had probably been sitting for upwards of almost 2 hours with his family in order to get that front row spot for the parade. It was probably hot (it was SoCal in June). And he was probably bored out of his mind wishing that he was on a ride rather than sitting on concrete.

Being a little older now since that picture was taken (by 9 years) and a little wiser to the fact that everything at Disney is by design, the picture has morphed in my mind into a Disney success story. I’ve read the book “Disney U” by Doug Lipp (which I recommend) and I also attended the first Disney Institute Customer Experience Summit in 2016 (which I also recommend). As I now reflect on the things I have learned from both Lipp’s book and the Disney Institute, I believe this Cast Member recognized the same things I did and, in his own way, attempted to bring happiness, joy, some personalization and what I would like to think is a smile beginning to form on that young boy’s face during that parade.

And while I have no photographic evidence of that smile, I can tell you that this Cast Member’s actions did, indeed, produce a smile… my own.

I have hundreds, if not thousands, of pictures at Disney properties including Disneyland, Disney World, Disney Cruise Lines and the Disney Institute Customer Experience Summit. This, however, will always be my favorite, as I believe it encapsulates all the “keys” that Disney trains its employees to embrace and it illustrates action on those philosophies making them more than just words… gives them life, if you will… and shows that it’s not just about teaching employees your business beliefs but having them also embrace and act upon them.

I have to admit, however, that I lied in the title. Even though this moment didn’t happen to me, it was my magical Disney moment. And that’s why I will always be a Disney fan.

A Lesson In Leadership from An Unlikely Source

September 11, 2013 By Arnold Tijerina

“While everyone ran in panic, Roselle remained totally focused on her job.”

Sometimes life gets hectic. We try to focus on and accomplish too many things at the same time. We have deadlines to meet, customers vying for our attention, fires to put out and countless voicemails and e-mails to respond to. In a world where employers consider multi-tasking a desirable trait, we’re taught from a very young age that this is a necessary skill. Sometimes, by focusing on too many things at once, we end up not focusing on anything at all.

A customer’s experience in your dealership is completely dependent on your focus. They can’t multi-task their way to a solution. Only you have that. I realize that on a busy weekend at a dealership there are times when you’re being pulled in multiple directions. To a customer, however, they are the sun that everything revolves around.

“While debris fell around us, and even hit us, Roselle stayed calm.”

The most successful business people know that you must treat each customer as if they are your only one. Customers intuitively know when chaos is present – whether by observation or intuition. No matter how busy you are, by stopping and giving a customer… any customer… your undivided attention, not only will you be more effective in resolving their problem but you will also instill in them a feeling of gratitude and, if you’re lucky, loyalty.

“We were forced to stop often and we took those opportunities to encourage each other with a quiet word, a joke, or a gentle pat on the back.”

Don’t forget that you have a team. Teamwork is crucial in these moments of chaos. The ultimate goal is to provide a solution that is satisfactory to the customer. Maybe you aren’t the right person to efficiently guide the customer down the path to a resolution. In these times, what typically happens is that you’re forced to get someone else involved. A great team knows each other’s strengths and weaknesses. Each member knows the best player for every situation and gets them involved immediately.

“…we must choose to trust those leaders who must also work hard to earn our trust through wise and timely decision making.”

As a manager, sometimes you are the one being asked to resolve problems. You are the ones being asked to multi-task. You are the one who is focusing on so many things at once that you lose focus. Your team looks to you to guide them in these moments of chaos. You must be able to focus on the single most important task you have: the customer standing in front of you. If you’re trying to desk and close deals while answering the phone and helping customers, you’ll accomplish a little bit of everything but a lot of nothing. Be a leader who shows customers that they are the most important task at that moment and follow through with that promise. Not only will you end up with a happy customer, you will also become a role model for the future managers on your team.

“Don’t stop until the work is over; sometimes being a hero is just doing your job.”

Be a hero to your customers and your team. That’s what great leaders are. Every one of us has someone in our lives that we consider our mentor in life. Be that mentor to your team and guide them through the chaos by remaining calm despite it. Teach them that the customer in front of you is the only one that matters. Reinforce it by following your own advice. They will notice and they will buy in.

These lessons originated from an unlikely source. Roselle, you see, is a dog. Her owner is blind. He also happened to work in the World Trade Center and was on the 78^th floor when planes flew into the building. There were an estimated 17,400 people in the Twin Towers when this horrible event occurred. Not only did Roselle guide her owner down 1,463 flights of stairs to safety but she was also “giving doggie kisses to each and every firefighter who climbed past us up the stairs.”

“While debris fell around us, and even hit us, Roselle stayed calm.”

In the midst of all of this chaos, Roselle focused on a single task. She led her owner outside and, despite the chaos and falling debris, found the nearest subway station and led her owner underground.

Roselle was honored as the American Hero Dog of the Year. While she isn’t with us anymore physically, her memory and lessons stay with us to this day. Roselle wasn’t just any dog. Roselle was a highly trained guide dog that had a single job to do for a single customer – her owner. Had she not been trained, she couldn’t accomplish this task with the laser focus that she must have had to navigate down one of only three stairwells along with 17,000 other people for 78 floors to achieve her goal.

“Sometimes the way is hard, but if we work together, we will make it down the stairs.”

Never forget.

Roselle

[Credits: The Today Show, Fox News and Wikipedia]

Is Underachieving A Disease?

June 17, 2011 By Arnold Tijerina

(Originally published on Dealer magazine)

A friend of mine shared via Facebook an organization that has completely blown my mind.

Underearners Anonymous

I absolutely had to read more about this organization. What exactly are they about?

Well, this is what they define as an “underearner”:

“UA is a Twelve Step Fellowship of men and women who have come together to help themselves and one another recover from underearning.
Underearning is many things, not all of which are about money. While the most visible consequence is the inability to provide for one’s needs, including future needs, underearning is also about the inability to fully acknowledge and express our capabilities and competencies. It is about underachieving, or under-being, no matter how much money we make.”

The “symptoms” of underearning are (copied from their website):

1. Time Indifference – We put off what must be done and do not use our time to support our own vision and further our own goals.

2. Idea Deflection –We compulsively reject ideas that could expand our lives or careers, and increase our profitability.

3. Compulsive Need to Prove – Although we have demonstrated competence in our jobs or business, we are driven by a need to re-prove our worth and value.

4. Clinging to Useless Possessions – We hold onto possessions that no longer serve our needs, such as threadbare clothing or broken appliances.

5. Exertion/Exhaustion – We habitually overwork, become exhausted, then under-work or cease work completely.

6. Giving Away Our Time – We compulsively volunteer for various causes, or give away our services without charge, when there is no clear benefit.

7. Undervaluing and Under-pricing – We undervalue our abilities and services and fear asking for increases in compensation or for what the market will bear.

8. Isolation – We choose to work alone when it might serve us much better to have co-workers, associates, or employees.

9. Physical Ailments – Sometimes, out of fear of being larger or exposed, we experience physical ailments.

10. Misplaced Guilt or Shame – We feel uneasy when asking for or being given what we need or what we are owed.

11. Not Following Up – We do not follow up on opportunities, leads, or jobs that could be profitable. We begin many projects and tasks but often do not complete them.

12. Stability Boredom – We create unnecessary conflict with co-workers, supervisors and clients, generating problems that result in financial distress.

I was completely blown away by the fact that this organization existed at all. Don’t get me wrong. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to improve yourself and/or turn your professional life around as the multi-million dollar self-help and motivational industry can attest to.

However, are we really in need of a 12-step program that likens underachieving to a disease?

I would argue that professional success originates from how you run your life. If you strive to live a good life, be a good person and do the things needed to succeed – you will. In the past, these ideals were instilled in us through our social interactions – whether through school, church, or work. My guess is that there aren’t many 18 year olds in this group and that the demographic consists of working age adults well within their careers. Sitting in a group consisting of other underachievers is not, in my opinion, a best practice.

In fact, many would argue that the best way to turn yourself around in business success would be to distance yourself from these people.

How many sales managers advise new salespeople not to hang out with the negative slackers on the Salesforce (not that they should be there in the first place)?

There’s absolutely nothing wrong with wanting to better yourself whether that’s professionally or personally, but don’t fall into the trap believing that your failure to succeed has anything whatsoever to do with anything other than being anybody’s fault but your own. Don’t blame society. Don’t blame your teachers. Don’t blame your parents. Blame yourself. Most importantly, if you have this “problem,”,please don’t go hang out and collectively whine to a roomful of other people who share it.

Being unsuccessful is not a disease. It’s a culmination of poor decisions. If you want to change and don’t know how, there’s an unlimited amount of material and programs you can use to do so. If you need some personal help, find someone who is successful and ask them to help you. Don’t ask other unsuccessful people for their help.

If you’re in the middle of your career and you’re still a procrastinator, afraid of change with the need to prove yourself, are unwilling to let go, overwork yourself to the point of burnout, who volunteers their time rather than gets paid for it (and I’m not talking about charitable volunteering), who undervalues yourself, isn’t a team player, is not assertive, doesn’t follow up and creates conflict then you are probably, and rightfully so, unemployed.

Stop blaming the world, take ownership of your situation and change your life.

How To Be (And Make Others) Successful Selling Cars

June 17, 2011 By Arnold Tijerina

The other day, I started thinking about all the friends I’ve made that I met because they bought a car from me. I’m not talking about acquaintance-type friends, I’m talking about people that are involved in my life, and have been for a long time.

I’ve been out of retail for about 2 years now. When I was in retail, I made a lot of money. As a commissioned salesperson, to make a lot of money you have to make profit on cars. Many people think that “making a profit” and “giving a good deal” can’t co-exist. There were times that I even felt guilty getting a hefty commission voucher. I was averaging 30 cars per month while maintaining a CSI score of 98% (and I had a high return rate on surveys).

So what was I doing right?

I always treated everyone like they had 800 credit scores. I made sure that all of my customers were happy and, if they weren’t, did everything within my power to make them so. I helped solve problems for any customer at my dealership, whether they were mine or not. I made sure that I respected all the parties involved and thanked them for their business sincerely. I followed up with them religiously to insure that they were satisfied and to recognize important occasions in their lives. I made sure my customers got not only the car they needed, but one they wanted, not necessarily the one I wanted to sell them. I truly cared about my customers and treated them all like they were my personal friends… and, guess what, many of them became just that.

While I enjoy money as much as the next person, I was never really “money-motivated.” A “good job” and recognition went farther for me. It wasn’t until I went to work for a particular manager that many of these ideals were instilled in me. He truly cares about his employees and took me under his wing. His leadership and personal attention truly made me want to work harder, sell more, and make the dealership successful. By doing that, not only did I care more about my job, the dealership and its customers, but I made more money. He inspired me to want to do a good job for him, not just for the money. Don’t get me wrong, he held you accountable. He just didn’t do it through fear as I see many retail managers do. He empowered his employees and trusted them to do their jobs. His favorite saying is “I’ll give you all the rope you need and you can either hang yourself with it or make a basket to carry all of your money.” I attribute my success in this industry to him. Without the culture and leadership he provided, I wouldn’t have achieved what I have.

Leaders can motivate in many ways. Sadly, many think the only way to motivate is through either fear, money or a combination of the two. By choosing the leadership style that he did and helping mentor me into the sales style and ideals that I adopted as a salesperson, I became successful, not only professionally, but personally. Too many salespeople (and managers) are looking for the next big voucher and not paying attention to their customers’ needs. Take care of your customers and do business right and the money will come.

So, thinking back on my retail career, as I recognized how many people I have in my life that are my friends simply because fate brought them into my dealership and I happened to assist them with their vehicle purchase, I realized that this provided me far more of an indication that I did things right than any “good job” could have and it was all possible because I had a great leader.

Take Me Out To The Ball Game (Customers Are Not Your Competition!)

March 25, 2010 By Arnold Tijerina

Most dealerships view their business as a competition.

I’m not talking about a competition against the car dealer down the street vying for the same customers. I’m talking about a competition with customers themselves.

Why do dealers feel that their customers are the competition?

We may not do it consciously but we do it.

How many times have you heard in the sales office or between salespeople that they “hit a homerun”?

In this analogy, you are in competition with your customers. I believe that every customer would agree that if you “hit a homerun” off of them, that would be a bad thing. So what this phrase is saying is that you are on one team and the customer is on the other team and that you just did something bad to their team.

If you sell a car with zero gross or lose some money just to move a unit, does that mean the customer “hit a homerun”?

Why is there a need to make a customer feel like he “won”? What does it take for you to feel like you “won”?

There are many analogies similar to this one that we use in regards to customers and deals and almost all of them pit dealers and customers in adversarial positions.

The mere use of the analogies reinforce their message.

Why not change your thought process and put the customers on your team instead?

If you and your customers are on the same team, there is a mutual benefit and interest in scoring. This way when a car is sold (and bought), everyone feels like they won.

In Major League Baseball, competition is intense. Players are hyper-competitive not just with their opponents but amongst themselves. (ie. “My stats need to be as good as possible.”, “I need more playing time than that guy.”, etc)

BUT, one day a year, the best players in the game get together and play on the same team. They throw aside their competitive nature against their normal opponents and work towards a common goal. Even the fans who would normally “boo” a player cheer him on.

Your dealership’s success and survival are dependent not only on your employees, but also on your customers.

Change your perception. Play the game with your customers as your
teammates instead of as your opponents.

Make every day an All-Star Game and everybody will cheer for your dealership.

A Dream Is A Wish Your Heart Makes

March 16, 2010 By Arnold Tijerina

I have a wish.

I contact the people, companies and resources that I believe will help make my wish come true. They, in turn, tell me all the tools they have that can assist me in my quest of wish-fulfillment. They tell me that this will work and that will work. They offer training and support and say you can call me anytime.

Then, they give me the blueprint. They give me the manuals and instructions. They give me the hammer. They give me the nails. They give me the lumber and all the necessary tools needed to fulfill my wish.

I take their blueprint and instructions and I start building. I follow the instructions. I end up with a house.

I wished for a car.

This is what I see happening all the time in the automotive industry. Vendors call upon dealers to “pitch” a piece (or all of the pieces) of the puzzle. They say this is what you should do. This is how you should do it. These are the tools that you need. This is why you should buy them from us.

What they fail to find out is what your wish is.

Make your wish first.

Then find the right tools, companies and resources to make your wish come true.

If you’re doing it the first way, you’re doing it backwards and you will fail.

Failure in this fashion is the easiest option. If you fail, you can blame someone else (ie. Their instructions were bad. Their tools don’t work. etc.)

The solution I inevitably see involves some sort of phrase similar to this.

“Hey boss, let’s just get some different tools!’

Then you fail again.

“Insanity: doing the same thing, over and over again, but expecting different results.” – Albert Einstein.

Make your wish, then make it come true.

If the tools don’t exist, create them.

If nobody else knows the instructions, write them.

If you don’t have the tools, get them.

If your boss(es) or company won’t let you fulfill your wish, find a company that will.

Define your wish, then make it happen.

Don’t wait for someone else to do it for you.

Don’t let other people tell you what your wish is.

If you don’t know what you are wishing for, nobody, not even yourself, can make your wish come true.

Not even the Blue Fairy.