Where are You on the Mastery Learning Curve?

The news that Bethany College, USA, had added a Network Marketing and Servant Leadership degree to its curriculum intrigued me. Needless to say the usual nay-sayers are out in force, lambasting the college board for their insanity in trying to "legitimise" network marketing and pointing out their negative statistics about the industry.

Yet, despite the prolific output of those who feel "it's all just a pyramid scheme", the statistics on the US DSA website give a better picture. Over $28 billion sales in 2009, in the height of a recession, with 16 million distributors of whom 84% are female, 92.5% work part-time and 77% are married.

Of those 16 million distributors, just under 5 million are inactive, and just over 4 million distributors only buy products for personal use. That leaves 3.7 million distributors and 3.2 million team/group leaders to retail the lion's share of those $28 billion sales.

The question is, how many of those buying products for personal use would at least retail properly if they got the right coaching? Maybe a degree course isn't such a bad idea after all?

Take a look at the mastery learning curve chart below. This pattern plays out repeatedly in our industry; the timeline can be from 3 months to 10 years, depending on the company and the distributor involved:

Superstars (those with unstoppable focus, limitless cash and a really strong family support network) will go onwards and upwards. Those are the ones we all look at on stage in conferences, applaud like mad, then go home and think, "I'm never going to be able to do the business like that." They get there through a lot of hard work and make sacrifices that many of us cannot, or choose not to, do.

Mastery Apprentices are those of us who stick with it, but spend a long time being disorganised and not "getting out of our comfort zone". When we finally find out what works, usually through trial, error, and a lot of Life getting in the way, we can catch up with the Superstars amazingly quickly. We relate better to a lot of new starters in the industry, and we have personal testimonials of earning realistic amounts whilst still juggling home, work, family and social activities.

The rest? Well, they're the ones who aren't supported properly, for whatever reason. That may be because they are genuinely uncoachable - coaching is a two-way process; one-way coaching is lecturing and extremely enervating for the coach. Or, they have personal issues that cause them to feel unloved and unwanted despite their best efforts and those of their sponsor - those personal issues can include very negative family members. Of course, there are poorly trained sponsors as well, who perpetuate a cycle of poor training in their turn. The Unsupported will quit once they perceive the work to be too hard, too difficult, or taking up too much of their time, unless their sponsors can help them move out of their motivational trough and find their resolve.

Where are you on the chart?

Never Let Action Become Inertia

I'm as guilty of this as the next person - it's the Holiday Season, so I deserve a holiday. I take a few days off, so what happens to my business?

That really depends on whether you're an Apprentice, a Journeyman or a Master.

Apprentice - "It's only a few days, I'll start up again after the break." The danger here is that the break stretches into a few weeks, a few months, and before you know it, the Apprentice has left the business completely.

Journeyman - "It's only a few days, I'll contact my customers in the week beforehand, let them know I'll get back to them in a couple of weeks." Much better, the Journeyman has communicated the action plan to the customers, and now has a psychological imperative for when he needs to get back to work.

Master - "It's only a few days. My customers know exactly which day I'll be seeing them next, and my automated lead generation tools are prompting me with a steady trickle of interested prospects. I'll talk to those as their details arrive in my inbox".

None of these phases is completely set in stone; Masters can act like Journeymen sometimes, but so can Apprentices. The key factor, as always, is consistent action aimed at SMART goals.

If you're a team leader with a number of apprentices in your team, how do you deal with them? Do you let them forget their focus, or do you manage them until they've learnt how to manage themselves?

The Get Rich Quick Mentality Sucks!

It came as no surprise to me to find that if you type the word Kleeneze into Google, the second suggested option in their drop-down list is Kleeneze scam.

Why?

Because, as my first business lecturer told us, a satisfied customer will tell a couple of people, a dissatisfied customer will tell a dozen. Upgrade that to the Internet version and it's closer to a satisfied customer will tell their social network, a dissastified customer will tell their social network and then go on to conduct flame wars on every forum and review site that dares to mention the product.

The amount of hatred and bile directed at Kleeneze, Avon etc. is truly disheartening; you'd think people were nicer than their internet personae indicate.

But note:

This bile isn't spewing from dissatisfied Kleeneze customers. The pyroclastic flow ready to engulf the wary new distributor erupts from ex-distributors, many of whom appear to have distinctly distorted views of how to run their own business. There are complaints about fees needing to be paid to use various services, shipping costs needing to be paid if orders are under a certain amount, admin charges being applied in some cases. All of which, it has to be said, are covered in the manuals you get in your starter pack as well as online on the distributor site. Do these people not read any small print?

Part of the reason for the "bitter ex-distributor syndrome" has to be due to poorly-trained apprentice distributors not winnowing out applicants who are either tyre-kickers, lazy or who really just want an employer prepared to pay them better than minimum wage for no real effort. Those applicants would not make it in their own business; heck, they couldn't cope with fixed-price leaflet delivery work either.

In my previous network marketing company, my sponsor was a lovely lady who should never have been recruited into the industry. She would spend a fortune to avoid going out and talking to others about her own business opportunity, and then complained when she wasn't getting value for money for the few leads that came her way. All she really wanted was a work-from-home job from a "real" employer, who paid her PAYE.

Kleeneze is a business first and foremost. A Kleeneze distributorship is also a business, first and foremost. Sure, it's an opportunity. But opportunities are not treasure troves waiting for the taking. First you mine the gold ore, then you refine it, then you wear it or sell it on. Treasure troves only exist in fairy tales.

Let's face reality. According to US statistics, 30% of small businesses fail in the first 2 years; by the 5th year only 50% have survived. According to UK reports at least 33% of startups fail within 2 years; one BBC report had it closer to 80% since the credit crunch hit.

The most common reasons for business failure include poor planning, lack of customers, poor market research, rising fixed costs (overheads, employee costs, fuel, etc.) and failure to obtain sufficient financing to grow the business.

The initial startup costs for a business should not be underestimated either. As well as whatever is required in the way of business setup costs (IT, tools, vehicles, office/workshop rental), a new startup owner needs to consider how they are going to cover their own basic costs (food, clothing, bills, personal expenditure etc.) until the business makes a profit. When I attended a business startup course, the advice was to pare down my personal outgoings to a bare minimum, and then calculate the costs for 3 years to see how much I needed in reserve before I started my own full-time enterprise. As a single parent with a mortgage and no other financial support, I needed a minimum of £60,000! Couples need to ensure that they can survive on one income for 3 years before both work in the business full-time.

Take a look at the available opportunities out there. Be sceptical, do your due diligence and do your own calculations regarding projected income and expenditure. Then make a decision. But don't whinge if you don't make that million in the first few years.

Apprenticeship and Leadership

I got a mention in my upline's newsletter today, congratulating me on reaching my first bonus level.

Thanks, Amanda!

I'm not resting on my laurels yet; I have more bonus levels to reach for personal retail, the top one being 24%. That may have to wait a bit, but it's still a goal.

My next goal is two active distributors by the end of 2010. With less than 2 months to go, I can either get panicked, or get moving. Guess which I've gone for?

So far this month, I've had 3 enquiries and I've shown the opportunity video provided by Kleeneze to all 3 people. No feedback so far. That's typical and I'm not fussed about the lack of uptake. Proverbs about "leading horses to water" are there for a reason, after all.

The problem many new entrants into network marketing have with building a team is not a lack of detail on what to do, it's a combination of information overload and lack of confidence. Dealing with that killer combo takes time and experience.

That's where being a leader comes in.

To lead properly, you need to learn how to serve first.

Traditionally, people were apprenticed for 4 to 7 years before they were deemed capable of working on their own. During that time, they were taught all the details of how to be a competent member of their work community. They weren't paid, but the master craftsman who taught them would house, feed and clothe them during their apprenticeship.

Once they had completed their apprenticeship, they were entitled to charge for a day's work; they were now called journeymen. Some journeymen travelled all over the country, learning new skills from other masters in the appropriate guild. Many were effectively full-time employees.

To be accepted as a master and thus have apprentices of their own, they had to produce a piece of work known as a masterpiece. If that was accepted by their guild, they could join and call themselves a master craftsman.

This is exactly what we go through as team leaders and team builders within network marketing.

The problem is, many newcomers expect to go from application form to mastery within weeks or months. They don't realise that they are apprentices, that they will need to spend time as an apprentice before they move on to the next stage and that their outgoings may well match the income from their new business for a year or two. They don't listen to advice, think they know better and re-invent wheels faster than you can count the cliches in this paragraph.

Worse, they apprentice themselves to people who are still apprentices or journeymen. You now have the classic downhill spiral - demoralised wannabe masters leave in a huff, claiming that their upline is rubbish and thus demoralising the upline team.

I was "lucky" with Kleeneze (in that "the harder I work, the luckier I get" way). I'm in Gavin Scott's downline. Gavin has been Distributor of the Year twice and his group has the highest turnover in Kleeneze. I've apprenticed myself to a master craftsman who has been doing this for 18 years.

I'm still an apprentice. Still learning my trade. The difference is, my trade is leadership. I will be successful, and I will be a master. This is not about attitude, positive or otherwise. It's about making changes to my whole way of life.