The Path to Victory: How Top Performers Transform Trials into Triumphs

How do top performers respond to trials?  This question determines if an agent becomes a victim of their circumstances or a victor of their opportunities. Individuals go down one or two paths, the road of complacency or the road of top performance.  When you endure trials there is a choice that must be made. Do you choose to become a victor? Or do you succumb to being a victim?

When I owned an insurance agency, I faced several trials early in my career. As I was starting out, I saw early success, close several accounts very quickly, and then the unthinkable happened… I got an objection! My first insurance objection was, “your price was too high” and I didn't close the account. I had a trial which was followed by other trials, and I started going down the road of complacency. I started being a victim to all the trials I was facing. One day I had a realization, my wife set up our own insurance policy when we got married! What am I doing in the insurance industry?  My wife helped me get out of the rut of being trapped as a victim.  She sweetly said, “Sweetheart you're going to be ok.” Those simple words and the act of somebody providing support to say, “You can do this, you can be a victor of these opportunities that you have.”  Was all I need to change. From that moment I realized a change needed to take place.

Often insurance agents fall down the road of complacency where they start viewing trials and setbacks as failures.  When you receive a trial or you receive a cancellation or you don't handle objection or you don't close an account, you view all of these as failures.  This problem is rooted in our subconscious. Human nature has what is called a negativity bias. A negativity bias is where negative experiences have a greater impact on our psychological state than positive experiences. During our workday we may have one bad experience compared to two or three positive experiences, but our mind focuses on that one negative.  We are negative by nature, your negativity bias hinders your decision making, and your ability to progress.  As you view setbacks as failures it leads you to fear. You fear doing the task you need to do. You fear making the phone call because you’ve been rejected before. You fear talking about life insurance because you don't think the client is going to need it. You fear talking about better coverage because you think the client is going to be focused on price.  Fear leads us to complacency and complacency keeps agents from progressing. When you stop progressing, you resort back to doing what's safe, and you do what you've always done. If you stop learning, you stop growing, when you stop growing, you stop changing and learning from trials.  You become complacent.  

A top performer is an optimist, who views things with a positive light. Top Performers don't view trials as a failure, they don't view setbacks as a failure, they don't view not closing an account as a failure, they view those as an opportunity to learn and change. It is only a true failure if nothing was learned. If you can make that switch and create a culture in your agency where you and your employees can stop viewing the negatives and start viewing positive experiences, it will greatly impact your culture and profitability.  Start seeing more positives throughout the day and make that switch to seeing things as opportunities to learn.  Not closing an account was the best thing for me because I learned from that experience. I learned from the setback of not overcoming an objection. This process is how you can be a victor of your opportunities.  You become a better agent as you apply those things you learn back into your systems which is where you will start seeing more successes.  

A top performer is not a victim, they are victors. The next time you have a trial, are you going to become a victim to your circumstance or a victor of your opportunity?  A top performer becomes a victor and learn to overcome those trials and elevate themselves. If you would like a free top performance call to discuss how we can help you change and help you create that culture of success, comment the word change and we will connect for a top performance call to help your agency hit new heights.