The Grind: An Excerpt From the New Book,”High!“

BY CHRISTINE BECKWITH

You must love the grind to enter an industry that requires difficult — at times almost impossible — conditions, incredible mental fortitude & the tenacity to stay calm while driving your race car at a high speed. This is where you are born as a sales guy or gal. This is where the rubber meets the proverbial road.

“Grind” is an endearing term great salespeople use, and one I have been saying & hearing throughout my many decades in the business. Urban Dictionary says “grind” is “when you work your ass off to get shit done.” I would say that sums it up. And, as far as I can see in my view, I’m surrounded by people who are doing just that.

I am, simply put, a grinder in sales. I am a person who will outwork you, outplay you, out-strategize you, and I will win. I will take the prize if you give me one step in front of you to do so, and if you look away, I will steal your lost ground in a moment with no notice. There are innate qualities top salespeople possess. Grinding is one of them.

The ability to lock yourself into the cockpit of selling, and sit there a good long time & grind, is an invaluable trait and the most prevalent characteristic I see in top achievers. To not quit the space when you are self-aware and are in the pocket takes commitment & tenacity.

When your tenacity & withstanding is HIGH, you will prevail against normal day-to-day barriers when most working professionals fall. To grind means not giving up when it’s hard, not walking away when you have only a small spark of momentum firing. To grind is to recognize your ability to pour gasoline onto that spark & create a blaze of sales in front of it. The inability to recognize when you are in the pocket has pushed many out of sales. But for those who know, it needs no explanation. For those who experience the elongation of time this e ect has, we recognize that the grind marks going the extra mile to success.

I’ve watched the best in my business grind it out daily. I’ve been near the excellence of millionaire salespeople. It is artful & scientific. These experiences caused me to examine & study the phenomenon so that I could replicate it in my hiring.

The grind has clear traits that stand out:

• a fine relationship with hard work

• a tolerance for aversion-like resistance from consumers,

• the ability to sit in their resistance & doubt to help patiently overcome their innate buying fears,

• to rejoice in a winning result when a person acts, commits & allows their life-changing experience to move forward.

It’s the Picasso of financial transactions, and it is not for the novice artist.

I remember thinking it could not be taught, and even this past year, I had someone tell me top performers don’t need coaching. I cannot disagree more!

Once a person reaches their mountain top, how they got there can be elusive, and staying on top requires help & accountability. Honing innate skills into locked & loaded pro-level athletics to ensure professional iteration & expert performance is a level the grinders reach for.

It’s the next level; it is the world beyond great. But many quit or go off track long before they reach it.

Christine Beckwith is a 35-plus year veteran of the mortgage industry, with positions from originations to Senior VP of sales. In 2018, she made the move to serving mortgage professionals in her “legacy years” by founding 20/20 Vision for Success Coaching, now the largest consulting firm in the American banking & brokering industry.

Click to order “High!” the award-winning, 5-time best-selling author’s brand new book!