{"id":11077,"date":"2014-03-31T16:48:42","date_gmt":"2014-03-31T16:48:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sandler.dsstaging2.com\/case-study\/point-thumb-point-finger-taking-responsibility-sales-performance\/"},"modified":"2022-10-18T16:03:17","modified_gmt":"2022-10-18T16:03:17","slug":"point-thumb-point-finger-taking-responsibility-sales-performance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sandler.com\/blog\/point-thumb-point-finger-taking-responsibility-sales-performance\/","title":{"rendered":"Point the thumb, before you point the finger: Taking responsibility for your sales performance"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>I had a position coach during my freshman year in college that made the comment, \u201cPoint the thumb, before you point the finger,\u201d and it has stuck with me ever since. Our football team was in a transition period, new coaches, new players, new strategies and we stunk pretty badly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>One week, we sat down before practice for our normal Monday meeting, after a particularly bad loss and team morale couldn\u2019t have been lower. People were yelling at each other on the sidelines, the finger-pointing ran rampant. We were turning on each other, and it was getting ugly. Our position coach came into the meeting and passionately yelled, \u201cPOINT THE THUMB, BEFORE YOU POINT THE FINGER!\u201d He was talking about taking responsibility for your own actions; stepping up and doing everything you can to do your job to the best of your ability. If someone slipped up, you pick them up, don\u2019t point the finger and pass the blame. Do your job better. I will never forget those words and that lesson.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Same \u201crule of thumb\u201d applies to the sales profession.&nbsp;<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.sandler.com\/blog\/video-sandler-rule-41-there-are-no-bad-prospects-only-bad-salespeople\/\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>Sandler Rule #41, \u201cThere are no bad prospects &#8211; only bad salespeople.\u201d<\/strong><\/a>&nbsp;It\u2019s easy to blame everything else. Salespeople will point the finger of blame at: the prospect, the customer, the economy, the competition, the pricing, their management and so on. Many salespeople have a tendency to externalize their problems, rather than accept the responsibility for what\u2019s going on in their base of business &#8211; and in their careers. Guess what? Whatever is happening in your relationship with a prospect or customer &#8211; whether it\u2019s success or failure &#8211; is YOUR RESPONSIBILITY!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Next time when things don\u2019t go your way, don\u2019t deprive yourself of the opportunity to learn from the mistake by pointing the finger. You will be destined to repeat it. Instead, point the thumb and ask yourself what you could have done differently? What will you do differently next time? What responsibility will you accept for what happened, or didn\u2019t happen? Comment below.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I had a position coach during my freshman year in college that made the comment, \u201cPoint the thumb, before you point the finger,\u201d and it has stuck with me ever since. Our football team was in a transition period, new coaches, new players, new strategies and we stunk pretty badly. One week, we sat down&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":31,"featured_media":11078,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"content-type":"","inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1120],"tags":[1289,1284,1111],"class_list":["post-11077","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog","tag-mindset","tag-motivation","tag-self-development"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Point the thumb, before you point the finger: Taking responsibility for your sales performance | Sandler Training<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"I had a position coach during my freshman year in college that made the comment, \u201cPoint the thumb, before you point the finger,\u201d and it has stuck with me ever since. Our football team was in a transition period, new coaches, new players, new strategies and we stunk pretty badly.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/sandler.com\/blog\/point-thumb-point-finger-taking-responsibility-sales-performance\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Point the thumb, before you point the finger: Taking responsibility for your sales performance | Sandler Training\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I had a position coach during my freshman year in college that made the comment, \u201cPoint the thumb, before you point the finger,\u201d and it has stuck with me ever since. Our football team was in a transition period, new coaches, new players, new strategies and we stunk pretty badly.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/sandler.com\/blog\/point-thumb-point-finger-taking-responsibility-sales-performance\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Sandler\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2014-03-31T16:48:42+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2022-10-18T16:03:17+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/sandler.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/Point-the-thumb-before-you-point-the-finger-Taking-responsibility-for-your-sales-performance.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"296\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"480\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Don Jones\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Don Jones\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sandler.com\/blog\/point-thumb-point-finger-taking-responsibility-sales-performance\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/sandler.com\/blog\/point-thumb-point-finger-taking-responsibility-sales-performance\/\",\"name\":\"Point the thumb, before you point the finger: Taking responsibility for your sales performance | Sandler Training\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sandler.com\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sandler.com\/blog\/point-thumb-point-finger-taking-responsibility-sales-performance\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sandler.com\/blog\/point-thumb-point-finger-taking-responsibility-sales-performance\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/sandler.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/Point-the-thumb-before-you-point-the-finger-Taking-responsibility-for-your-sales-performance.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2014-03-31T16:48:42+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2022-10-18T16:03:17+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sandler.com\/#\/schema\/person\/b95ebcde9c5cec6fd47caa83cd976297\"},\"description\":\"I had a position coach during my freshman year in college that made the comment, \u201cPoint the thumb, before you point the finger,\u201d and it has stuck with me ever since. 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