I hate watching professional basketball players miss free throws.  I understand that they won’t make every shot, but I don’t see any reason why every single one of them shouldn’t be over 85%.  The mechanics of free throws don’t change, just the mental component (pressure, fatigue, etc.)  To me, it just means they don’t practice enough before gametime.

Most business owners, entrepreneurs, and salespeople don’t practice enough either.  There are usually 3–5 activities in their roles that are important, but not regular, activities.  The success in these activities often determines their overall success.  While not as simple as practicing free throws because there are more variables involved, it is just as vital to practice these activities to achieve as high a level of mastery as possible.

Practice, in many ways, is as simple as repeating a task over and over.  The repetition is the key.  It’s how you create habit and how you create comfort.  The amount of fear or discomfort around a task tends to decrease in direct proportion to how often you’ve engaged in the activity.  For example, most people are scared of public speaking because they rarely speak in front of others.  Professional speakers, who regularly stand in front of a group of people, aren’t concerned because they have a deep resovoir of experiences from which to gain confidence.

It’s also important to practice in a way that will improve your skill level.  It is not just about performing the activity repetitively, but performing it repetitively in the correct manner.  As Rick Pitino wrote in Success is a Choice, “Practice does not make perfect.  Perfect practice make perfect.”

For professionals who have to create business opportunities (including both salespeople and business owners), there are three main activities that often suffer because of a lack of practice:

Prospecting Phone Calls

Asking for Referrals

Closing the Sale

How do you build up the number of repetitions needed for success?  Practice can be either in a “rehearsal-setting” or in a “game- setting”. 

• Initial training for salespeople usually involves guided role-playing, but almost everyone could benefit from reviewing and practicing what they are going to say with prospects and clients.  Spending time on a weekly basis with a manager or peer going through scripts is an incredibly valuable activity.
• Run through scenarios in your mind with the power of visualization.  See yourself speaking in a sales presentation or on the phone with a client.
• Activity, activity, activity.  The best way to practice in a prospecting or sales activity is to engage in it a lot.  If you want to get good at making cold calls, for example, make a lot of calls.

You’ll find that as you practice more, your results will improve as well.  Keep practicing!