Patience

I never had it and probably never will. I want and expect things to be accomplished quickly and efficiently.  I get frustrated when it is taking longer than I expect to handle almost any issue.  I've always thought that my urgency was a positive personal quality. Short cycle times means efficiency.  But does it?  Last year I had the opportunity to learn an important lesson about patience; one that I expect will change the way I look at the future.

One of our more experienced sales people, although only with us for just over a year, had come off of a very poor year of production - something like 30% of quota, which meant that they were costing us more than they were generating. The portion of the prior year they worked for us was equally disappointing.  Most sales organizations don't stand for that kind of poor production. I didn't think we should either. 

But their manager was supportive, expressing that the rep was "doing all the right things." Not wanting to take the baton from the manager's hands, I agreed to participate in some of their one on one meetings to learn for myself. I investigated their sales process - it looked surprisingly good.  I sat in on a pipeline review - it looked promising.  I decided to wait another quarter before forcing a decision.  Others in the organization told me I was getting soft.   

Another quarter came and went with no appreciable production. I revisted the conversation with their manager again.  And once again I was told that production was coming.  But my patience was wearning thin.  I heard echos of my critics calling me soft.  I was growing impatient.

We girded for what I expected to be another disappointing quarter.  To my surprise and great satisfaction, my patience was repaid, again and again and again.  Not only did the sales rep improve, but they ended up producing three times their annual quota during the remainder of the year.
 
Since then, I've probably not grown much in the patience department.  I still get frustrated when things don't happen quickly enough.  But now I religiously rely on my managers to "prove" out their points of view and suspend my impatience in anticipation of even greater future results.