Defcon 1 Direct Selling

CHAPTER 7Dangerous Field Dynamics and How to Solve Them

I warned you that you’re going to have to overcome many difficulties—the kind created by egoists, toxic people, crossline cancers, and just all-around negative and disruptive people. Some of these people will be on your team, some will be crossline, others will be in corporate, and yet others will be competitors. Some of this behavior will be people practicing self-sabotage, some of it will be well meaning but harmful, and some of it will be consciously directed to cause you to fail. Our business is driven by people. And people are sometimes kind, thoughtful, and gracious, and sometimes petty, jealous, and nasty. As a result, these people create situations that require DEFCON 1 preparedness on your part. Your job as a leader involves many ways in which you will interact with those people and situations.

Some of the objectives great leaders strive to accomplish are:

• Helping people overcome their own limiting beliefs and self-destructive behavior
• Challenging their people to become the highest possible version of themselves
• Resolving conflicts created by jealousy, ego, and “sibling rivalry” between lines
• Protecting the team from dinosaurs, zombies, parasites, and terrorists
• Keeping communication and partnership open between corporate and the field
• Enforcing the death penalty to remove dangerous people who threaten the golden goose

In this chapter, we’ll explore how you handle difficulties that occur in the field from your ...