I want to thank you for the many kind comments to last week’s Fourth of July newsletter titled Wondrous America, about my family and the country that we love. It was gratifying to read your responses, and I particularly enjoyed the stories of your own family histories and upbringings in our amazing country.

This week, I’d like to springboard off that topic to this one:

There is a strange ethos in America today. It is a story being told by business owners, hiring executives, and also by the media — odd bedfellows to be sure.

The story being told — and the reality being experienced — is that a surprising number of people don’t want to work. Owners and executives are having trouble filling positions. Many people who used to work are not interested in working at the moment. Further, there are young professionals openly declaring on social media that they don’t want to work very hard, and would much rather focus on the more enjoyable aspects of life. There’s a lot more depth and nuance to this subject, but this is the basic reality being experienced by people who hire people. And it’s the prevalent reality in pretty much every industry I help clients grow their sales in: manufacturing, distribution, and business-to-business services.

Of course, in sales, this “work” that’s being avoided is the very key to success.

The most accomplished salespeople, executives and owners are the ones who outwork the competition.

We out-grind the others.

We plan our calls, make our calls, and track our calls.

We follow up.

We ask for the business and offer additional products and services.

We show up, and we tell people we want to help them.

And we do this repeatedly and systematically, over time.

We do it consistently, in the face of rejection.

This is the grind.

Same as it has aways been. It’s the “secret” to success. It’s the “magic bullet,” isn’t it?

Which makes it no secret or magic at all.

It’s just the work.

It isn’t difficult. In fact, it’s quite simple. And it can be done quite quickly.

But it’s work.

Among working salespeople, these efforts are largely avoided. It’s much easier to simply answer the phone and take the orders that are incoming.

And the others, who aren’t interested in working, well, they’re no bother to us or our customers, and they’re not much help professionally to anyone at all really.

And so here is my overarching point today:, it’s easier than ever to succeed in sales. It’s easier than ever to stand out from the crowd. It’s easier than ever to help people more than our competition helps them. It’s easier than ever to be perceived as excellent.

We simply need to do the work.

Will you do it?