Today’s Rocket Fuel is about the importance of understanding and managing your mental real estate. In this excerpt Bob Stephens (alias Rocket-Man) is reminded of a lesson he learned from John Andrews, his old mentor:
John Andrews came into my office asking to look at my list of prospects. After studying it for a few moments he said, "Ah-ha, just what I thought." Then he dropped the list, which floated gently down and landed right in front of me. I grabbed it, looking for clues. "What are you talking about, John?" "Bob, I was looking at some of your old prospect lists from a few weeks ago and I noticed that the same names keep re-appearing." I studied the list more closely. "John, I keep those prospects on there because there is still a chance I can do business with them; it's not like they're taking up a bunch of time. Every couple of weeks or so, I pick up the phone and give them a call to see if they're any closer to making a decision… no big deal!" John leaned over with one hand on my desk, his finger pointing to the top of my head. "Bob, it's not the time they are taking… it's the mental real estate they occupy!" "Mental real estate? What's that?" I asked, confused. "Mental real estate represents the total mind space we have available. Those fool's gold prospects you talked about can consume a lot of mental real estate. The problem is, if you are thinking about them you can't be thinking about those prospects who really deserve your time and attention. I believe we need to learn to manage our mental real estate like we do our time.
And what exactly is mental real estate? It’s the brain time you are dedicating to figuring out how to turn a prospect into a bottom sale. That’s all fine and good with your fresh new prospects where there is good reason to believe your odds are reasonable to good that you will be able to land them. It’s a problem, however, when you’re chewing up mental real estate on prospects who have been on your short list for way too long. All the mental real estate you commit to them is mental real estate that could be dedicated to finding your next great opportunity.
So, ask yourself, how well are you doing at managing your mental real estate? If there’s room for improvement, go through your prospect list and ask yourself prospect by prospect, if they deserve your time and mental real estate. If they don’t, stroke their name off your list and open up that mental capacity for high quality prospects who really do deserve your brain time.
Onward and upward!
Brian Kjenner
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