Is a Positive Attitude a Predictor for Sales Success?

 So what exactly is a positive attitude? Attitude can be defined as a state of mind or a feeling. Positive is an antonym of negative. Antonym means a word of opposite meaning. So one word tends to be defined in terms of the other. There can be no "cold" without a "hot." There can only be a temperature, say 35F, which by itself is merely another number. Like a dog chasing his tail.... entertaining to watch but he nevers gets anywhere.

The supposition here is that there's a meaningful positive correlation between the nebulously defined "positive attitude" variable and the very concretely and easily measured "sales success."

I say SHOW ME THE RESEARCH. Show me the double-blind tests, subsequently repeated by other researchers. This is a little thing called the scientific method, that seems to work everywhere, but is rarely applied to sales.

The high school coaches and c-average mediocrities are running the show. Would you allow them to design a shuttle craft (maybe one did...). They may mean well but have no business teaching what they don't understand. What they guess and assume they know, that which they merely parrot from others that guessed or parroted before them, with nothing of substance to back it up.

I have not done such scientific research. But then, I am not claiming that the positive correlation above exists. Instead I will categorically state that I have trained and worked with thousands of sales reps, and that I see no correlation whatsoever.

In fact, I know many reps that are pessimistic, introverted, negative, social outcasts that can close deals all day long. And a lot that are miserable failures. I also know many reps that are optimistic, extroverted, positive, and popular that again, are top guns, and many that should shoot themselves.

I see no correlation because there is no correlation, at least not one so significant that it deserves it's own cliché.

I bet my reputation on my abilities and intuition to successfully build sales teams. If there were a shortcut, like just hiring those with positive attitudes, then I would do that. There isn't so I don't. I do however have better predictors and methodologies that work in the real world. I will discuss them in my next article.

About the Author: Paul Mush operates Sales Team 1, building sales teams for companies that prefer not to do so in-house. Specializing in commission-only professional-level reps operating virtually across the country and worldwide.