The reward/punishment mindset works as intended when humans have to perform a simple mechanical task. Move bricks from A to B as fast as you can and get a reward, do it too slowly and get a penalty. It works even better if the reward increases the faster you can do it, and the punishment gets more severe the slower you do it. This is why piecework works on manual work tasks.

We have taken the correct experience of what motivates in terms of mechanical tasks and assumed that it also motivates when it comes to mental tasks. Mental tasks include anything that requires thinking. It takes very little thinking to move bricks from A to B, so little that you can turn off your brain and let your body repeat the movement over and over again. It is immediately something else if you have to put together a puzzle or solve sudoku. Mental tasks require you to be able to see connections and think abstractly. The effect of reward/punishment motivation drops drastically when it comes to mental processes. Commission and large bonus schemes for tasks that require cognitive processes only provide short-term efficiency. After a short time, the effect on the result does not appear. The reward can be quite motivating, but the quality of the work decreases because, among other things, tunnel vision occurs. People find it difficult to think in larger contexts and abstractly when there are rewards waiting. What is the advantage in mechanical work, namely full focus on the task itself – moving bricks from A to B, becomes the very problem in the mental work processes. Salespeople who are on 100% commission are so caught up in getting the sale and the reward that they forget their function is to help the customer. They fall into negative manipulation, and often become overbearing because they never listen. They have tunnel vision when it comes to getting the sale and their rewards.

Selling is a creative process where you must continuously adapt to the information you receive, the experience you have of yourself and the experience the customer has. To be creative, you must think abstractly and assemble elements from the whole. It is impossible to do effectively if you only focus on the reward. From now on, let's deal exclusively with motivation in relation to complicated process-demanding tasks.

Money is of course a motivating factor. It's just reverse motivation. If you pay the person too little, their motivation will decrease. People will tell themselves that their effort is worth more than what is paid for and thus, consciously or subconsciously, reduce their work effort. If you pay too much, you get the same effect. You get used to the high salary very quickly, and if the salary is independent of the results, why should you make an effort. In order to be motivated, there must therefore be money, also so much that you avoid having to skimp and save the last two weeks of the month. It is a mistaken assumption that motivation will increase with pay. It only does so briefly. In the long term, money is never enough, and the result of the work effort will be worse. What you get in salary must be enough for you to maintain a material minimum. Once in place, these are three main factors that will influence your motivation, lead you to good results and personal satisfaction. Satisfied people think and work better (and sell better) than unhappy people.

The 3 motivation factors

Daniel Pink has written an excellent book "Motivation - The surprising truth about what motivates us". A book I can only recommend if you want to know more about the subject. In the book, he compares the latest research in human behavior and motivation with the generally accepted attitude to motivation. It turns out that what we think motivates us and what actually motivates us are very different things when it comes to cognitive (thinking) processes. Daniel Pink describes three main motivational factors:

Autonomy

The first factor is what Daniel Pink calls autonomy or independence. Traditional management involves managing one's employees to ensure that they actually do what management thinks needs to be done. This is excellent if management always knows better. It just rarely – if ever – does. If management and you want to motivate commitment, there must be a degree of autonomy and independence. People who feel that they have a direct influence on how they work create faster and better results than they do under strict management. The individual is motivated to do more and better if they can control how and with what means. Self-management is a fantastic motivation booster, especially when it takes place within a clear and defined framework from the management side. In relation to your work as a mediator of help, you must earn as much self-management as possible. You will find that you become more motivated. Demand from your management that they chart a course for you, within which you can manage your daily life yourself. It is never the same as your management not being allowed to measure your efforts. They are welcome to do so, as long as you have an influence on how you make the effort they measure. Control and management are independent of each other. Something many managers unfortunately forget.

To master

Something else the researchers talk about is motivation through doing something you are good at and developing your abilities. When you experience that you are good at something and thereby develop your skills, you become motivated. Man will experience mastering something as fun. It motivates us to become better at something. It is closely related to practicing and training. The more you practice selling, the better you'll get and the more motivated (and fun) you'll be. You just have to get it done. Now we are back to the hard, targeted work. Make sure that you have the opportunity to improve your skills in your job. There must be room for you to develop more skills than those the job immediately requires. Decide which skills you want to master and convince yourself that you can develop them in the job you have now.

Purpose

The final motivational factor is purpose. When people experience that what they do has a purpose and that there is a result of the effort, they become motivated. This is why I insist that you believe in your product, your company, and yourself. You must have a clear, unconditional experience that what you do has a good purpose. You must experience that you are doing something good and be able to see the results of your work. Now there is no product in the world that is perfect. I have met sellers who only focused on what their product lacked and had of defects. Do not do that. Instead, focus on the results your help provides for the customer (you always remember "selling is helping"). Then you will also experience that your efforts have a purpose and produce a result. It will motivate you.

What will motivate you, your customers and everyone else is:

• Autonomy – self-management
• To master – to be good at something and develop this ability
• Purpose – purpose and results must be experienced

Your numbers

Being highly motivated can seem abstract and be awkward to deal with when you have to call or visit customers in the real world of sales. You will inevitably find that no matter how motivated you are, you will get far more "no" than "yes". The number is astonishingly high. When we measure salespeople doing outreach, a super salesperson can close three to three and a half orders out of ten customer contacts. A good salesperson closes one and a half to two orders out of ten contacts, but most people are satisfied if they close one order out of ten customer contacts. The way to keep yourself motivated, through countless rejections, is to use "your numbers" as motivation. The idea behind "your numbers" is the mathematical principle behind the Law of Large Numbers. Ultra briefly, it is the law that describes that if you do something over and over again, under the same conditions, it will produce a result that is constant. If you roll a die with the numbers one through six enough times, you will get an average of three and a half. The more times you roll the dice, the more the average will approach three and a half. The average three and a half stays the same no matter how many times you roll the die. You can use this law as motivation when you measure your efforts and know your numbers.

When I call potential clients for a meeting, I use "my numbers". My personal numbers are 100-25-12-10-3.

• I know that in order to get in touch with 25 people who can make a decision about what I want to sell, I have to call 100 companies.
• In 75 of my calls, the person is absent, it is difficult to find out who I should speak to, or the phone is never answered.
• Of the 25 contacts I actually talk to, I manage to set up a meeting with twelve of them.
• Of the twelve I have agreed to meet with, only ten come to fruition.
• The two have either forgotten about the meeting, are ill or something completely different gets in the way.
• Of the ten I actually get a meeting with, three will place an order.

So my numbers are: 100-25-12-10-3

• 100 calls leading to
• 25 conversations with the right person who gives
• 12 agreed meetings, of which
• 10 meetings are held and I get
• 3 sales

I know that when I call up, 75% of my calls will be in vain.

When I have called three and failed to get the right one, there is a high probability that it will succeed on the next call. I also know that if I get the right one the first time I call that day, the probability that the next three calls will fail increases. The more unsuccessful calls I make, the more likely the next call will be successful.

When I finally have contact with the right person, I know in advance that I will only manage to arrange a meeting with twelve out of 25. The others (52%) will refuse a meeting. When I expect the rejection, I can deal with it much better and motivate myself, knowing that after six rejections, the probability of arranging a meeting with the next one is very high.

Of the twelve meetings I have arranged, only ten (83%) will actually be completed. The contact gets blocked, forgets the meeting, I get blocked, or I failed to complete my presentation for some reason. This means that when I get a meeting cancelled, or that the meeting never comes to fruition for other reasons, I focus on the ten that I know will be carried out.

The two failed meetings only negatively affect my motivation to a lesser extent because they were expected. If all twelve meetings actually come to fruition, I know I can expect two additional canceled meetings in the future. If they never come, I'll have to adjust my numbers.

In the ten meetings that actually take place, I will get three orders right away. So when I have held seven meetings and received no orders, I keep my motivation up in the knowledge that there is a high probability that the next meeting will result in an order.

The more "no" I get on calls, meetings, and orders, the closer I am to the next "yes". I use "no" as motivation because I know "my numbers" and the Law of Large Numbers. Every time you get a no, you are closer to your next yes!

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