Last Friday, I did a keynote at a firm-wide luncheon for a 250-attorney law firm with offices throughout Missouri, in Washington, D.C. and around the world. During the keynote, I framed this scenario:

The CEO of a Fortune 1000 company has invited you to “chat” about how your firm can supplement his company’s internal team, and the opportunity represents millions of dollars worth of business each year. You arrived for your meeting with the CEO but were instead shown into the boardroom, where 15 corporate executives were seated around the table. The CEO introduced you to the room and said, “You have 30 minutes to tell us why we should hire your firm.”

I then asked the audience, “How would you feel?” and responses ranged from “scared” to “excited.”

If a CEO invites you to his office for a “chat,” and then surprises you with a demand that you “dance,” that CEO is displaying a lack of respect. This happens quite often to salespeople, because most salespeople don’t respect the prospect’s right to say, “No,” which has set the expectation that it’s okay to show no respect to salespeople.

Your job, as a non-manipulative salesperson, is to change this perception. To do that, you must both give respect, and demand it.

In the presentation, I told the audience that when this situation happened to me, I looked the CEO in the eye and said, “I’m not prepared to conduct a sales call with a group this size, because I was expecting to meet with just you. So as I see it, you have three options: You can ask me to leave; you can ask everyone else to leave, and you and I can have the type of meeting I was expecting; or we can reschedule for a later date. What would you like to do?”

After my keynote, one of the attorneys approached me and said, “Are you serious? Would you really leave and pass up a multimillion-dollar opportunity?”

Would I pass up the opportunity? If asked to leave, not only would I pass it up, I’d run so fast I’d leave a Gill-shaped hole in the conference room door.

What it all boils down to is my philosophy that I work with only people I trust and respect, and who trust and respect me. The last client I want is one who treats me like a subordinate who can be bullied, because if the client bullies me in the sales process, he or she will be even worse during the engagement. And without mutual trust and respect, my long-term opportunities will be zero – no referrals, no testimonials and a client who would never agree to acting as a reference.

The first step to receiving respect is to give it. Saying, “You can ask me to leave,” tells the CEO that you respect his right to say, “Go away.” Refusing to “dance upon request,” tells the CEO that you aren’t willing to be forced into a corner, and that you demand relationships based on mutual respect.

Give respect, and you’ll not only position yourself to demand respect, you’ll receive it from those who feel the same about business relationships that you do.

Have a great week!

Gill