Coop Harper - Adventures In Paradise

I made the unfortunate choice of watching quite a bit of news over the last two weeks. As the reports of economic, political, business and personal tragedy piled up I noticed something. What hit me square in the face was the negative tone in each story. Ingrained in the assessment of every situation we face today were the consequences of failure. I’m not talking about your run of the mill everyday failure. I’m referring to failure of the devastating and catastrophic variety. Armageddon, if you will. Before I felt an overwhelming desire to head to the knife drawer in the kitchen, I turned off the TV. I also started looking into TV news rehab. Since I’m afraid of knives and was unable to find a rehab focused on this particular malady, I decided on a little self-help. I’m an amateur therapist so I kept it simple. The obvious cure for pessimism must be optimism. The opposite of negative is positive. I set out to find examples that would prove my hypothesis. Some facts came to light quick...

I’ve been very fortunate in my business career. I worked with leaders who were excellent teachers. They understood the difference between a sales professional and a salesperson. They taught me the importance of becoming an expert on the products I sell and helped me become that expert. More importantly, they showed me what it meant to help customers. Not sell customers, but help customers. They invested the time to help me become a professional at helping people get what they need to accomplish their goals. Thank you Craig, Janet, Charlie, Kim, Bob, Russ, Doug, Steve, Augie and Todd. I’d like to especially thank my brothers Art and T.J. They’re also business coaches I’ve learned from and who have left a slew of talented, well trained sales professionals in their wake. I guess I’m lucky that way. When I became an executive, I believed it was my responsibility to share what I’d learned. Since a leader’s role is that of a guide and mentor, I used the excellent example I’d been given and...

Serendipity is defined as good fortune, luck, or an aptitude for making desirable discoveries by accident. I prefer “Serendipity Pitch” over “Elevator Pitch.” If you’re in sales, you know the drill. A hard to reach customer just happens to get on an elevator with you, alone. You both get on at the bottom floor and are headed to the top. It will give you a precious minute of uninterrupted one on one time with this impossible to reach customer. The clock’s ticking. What do you say that gets you the appointment, or better yet, a sale right on the spot? In many ways, I’m old school when it comes to what you need in your selling tool box. Skills like active listening, strong questioning techniques and efficient time management are timeless. Perhaps the most important of these fundamental skills is preparation. Being prepared frees up the mind. It allows us to process information we are getting from a customer, without having to think about facts we should already know. You’d think the...

Constantly changing technology has created a business world rife with ADD. Computers, smart phones and 15 second TV commercials have turned us all into chronically unfocused serial multi-taskers. Like bees flying from flower to flower in rapid succession, we move from task to task and interaction to interaction at blinding speed. Unlike bees, we rarely stop to “smell the roses.” To keep up with the demands on our time and attention, we sprint through our to-do lists. Each business day is a new battle in the war. Sales Managers bark out instructions to their troops while new opportunities explode all around them. What effect has this reality had on sales productivity and customer satisfaction? Let’s think about that for a moment. After thirty years in sales, management and leadership, I’ve come to regard professional salespeople much like I do thoroughbred horses. They are magnificent, powerful and live to win. They can also be temperamental, high-strung and behave like prima donnas. ...

Are you a boss, or a leader? I’m a huge fan of history. I’m also a student of leadership. I love history because it can teach us so much about business and how to avoid repeating the mistakes of the past. I learn all I can about leadership versus management. Why? Leadership is teaching and showing. Management is telling and watching. One of my favorite historical mentors is George Washington. It was no accident that the Continental Congress selected Washington to guide the Colonial Army against the British. Washington was a very accomplished civic and military leader long before The Revolutionary War. His accomplishments included: • Elected Surveyor of Culpepper County - 1749-1751 • Appointed Adjutant General of Virginia militia – 1752. (An adjutant general is the chief administrative officer of the militia. This made Washington a Major at the age of 20) • Appointed Lieutenant and Colonel of Virginia Regiment - 1754 • Commander of Virginia Military - 1755-1758 • Elected...

Greetings My Friends, Well, I haven’t posted anything since August 17 so I suppose it’s time to get back on the horse that threw me (or I threw myself from, I’m not quite sure). So here we go… I’d like to talk about gratitude. Not having it, finding it, having it, losing it, being unable to see it when it’s there. You know, LIFE. On its face, gratitude seems like a simple proposition. You either have it or you don’t. But is it OK to have gratitude for some things in your life, but not others? Does this “gray area” make us actually ungrateful in total? These questions pester my subconscious, and my serenity. I’m by nature a gray area person. Absolutes make me absolutely nuts. Most peoples’ absolutes, in my experience, are basically their opinions dressed up as facts. My father told me when I was a young man that opinions are like assholes. Everybody has one and they usually stink. I’ve found his choice wisdom on this subject to be true (this includes my opinions) about 99.99% of...

Hello Friends! Welcome to another wonderful week of love and discovery. I’ve been doing a lot of reading lately. A LOT. Normally I do a lot of talking sprinkled with a little of making sense, with any reading being confined to the library (translation: bathroom). But lately, people I love and respect have been recommending a number of books for me to read. I’m pretty sure their real motive was to shut me up for a while. Good luck with that. So I decided to take their learned advice and read the tomes they recommended, mostly out of fear of being quizzed on them later by those who recommended them. Turns out I’m glad I did. I learned a few things about the world and myself, and for some strange reason my throat feels better than it has in quite a while. During this reading/learning experience, I came to a personal epiphany. Words, it turns out, MATTER. Now I don’t mean words in general. I mean that the right word , at the right time and used in the right place can make a huge di...