During a recent sales meeting I posed the question to our team, “Are you picking your customers or are they picking us?”

The point that I was trying to make to them was that being the result of someone else’s decision rather the cause of it, is a precarious position to be in. It can lead to inconsistency, to a loss of confidence, and most assuredly lower levels of production. As a salesperson, having a high level of responsibility for ALL results can be one of the most empowering skills that you can develop… and yes, it is a skill that is developed.

The natural inclination of people is to assign blame elsewhere. It’s so easy to get caught up in the blame game and create excuses for missing a deal, coming up short on your quota, or not getting the promotion that you know you deserved. The truth is, the second you put blame elsewhere you relinquish control and subject yourself to the mercy of things outside of your influence.

So next time you find yourself saying “It was out of their budget” remember, if you built enough value in your offer, your company and yourself, they would find a way around their budget. If a prospect “Needs to think about it”, where did you fall short in creating urgency? If a business owner “needs to get buy-in” what could you have done differently to create enough desire that he/she would handle the “buy-in” issue on their own after they become your client?

Be unreasonable with this folks, be obsessed with this… like my man Grant Cardone say “Success doesn’t happen to you, it happens because of you.”