Are You a Multiplier or Diminisher?

At a recent TAB Conference in Colorado, I had the pleasure of attending a fantastic presentation and spending some time with Liz Wiseman, author of Multipliers – How the Best Leaders Make Everyone Smarter.

Multipliers outlines the fundamental differences between two dramatically different types of leaders.  The first type of leader, referred to as a “Diminisher”, feels the need to always be the smartest person in the room.   These “leaders” are loaded with “brilliant” ideas and like to defend the reasons they are great.  As a consequence, they tend to drain intelligence, energy, talent and commitment from their employees.

The second group of leaders are “Multipliers”.  These leaders inspire the flow of ideas, create energy, and amplify the capabilities of the people on their team.   They get more done with fewer resources, attract better talent, solve the most difficult problems and create world class innovation and productivity.

In listening to Liz speak, I was struck by the incredible parallels between leaders who deploy the philosophies and principles of Multipliers and salespeople who deploy the philosophies and principles of UnCommon Sense^© Buyer Facilitation.

Here are just a few examples:

Diminishers and Traditional Salespeople:

• Believe they are the experts

• Spend the majority of their time talking, explaining and convincing

• Make lots of assumptions

• Squelch disagreement

• May win at the expense of others

• Often accept mediocre results/lost margins

Multiplier Leaders and UnCommon Sense^© Salespeople:

• Facilitate expertise and discovery

• Embrace healthy disagreement

• Unleash the genius of others

• Spend little time talking, but ask great, inspiring questions

• Understand Human Psychology and Principles of Communication

• Try to never make assumptions or convince

• Do not need to feel smart

• Inspire others to feel smarter, be experts and multiply results

If you have ever worked for a multiplier, they probably inspired you to produce much greater results than any diminisher.  Whether in business, in their community or in their home, Multiplier leaders consistently outperform their diminisher peers.  Similarly, UnCommon Sense salespeople consistently blow their traditional, expert, smooth-talking sales peers out of the water.

I encourage you to learn more about Liz and Multipliers at

http://thewisemangroup.com/research/book/

For more about how to Multiply your Sales, check out

http://zthree.com/blog/sales/your-salespeople’s-great-loves-why-premature-satisfaction-is-costing-you-a-fortune-2/

Copyright ©   Joe Zente 2010.   All Rights Reserved.

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About Jason Myers

Jason Myers is the editor-in-chief of the Texas Entrepreneur Network and can be reached at jason@txenetworks.com