Training VS. Culture

 After talking with one of my business partners last night I came to realize something, and that is,

Training is evil.

Or can be, when you over train.  Over training leads to complexity and complexity always leads to reduced duplication.
It starts with the best of intentions.  You want to nail things down, make them airtight, and cover all the bases.  But anything complex enough to cover every scenario is going to kill replication, because it gets away from the basic premise underlying all duplication.  The formula, if you will:
Get a large group of people to perform a few simple actions, for a sustained time.
The further you get away from this formula, the less duplicable results you’ll see down the group. Here’s what you have to watch out for…
Sales trainers who want to come in and teach a bunch of closing techniques to your team.   This is not a sales business; it’s a teaching and training one.
Delving too deep into the personality types.  Lost of systems on these: Carlson, colors, animals, or character traits.  Absolutely the profiles have validity.  But if your beginning people are trying to learn this and quantify prospects – many will die early.
NLP practitioners who want to train your team on neuro-linguistic programming.  NLP is an amazing technology that can help people with fears and phobias.  But when you start to prostitute it to manipulate people to do things against their will – you’re crossing an ethical line and killing duplication at the same time.
Creating manuals of scripts for every occasion.  Can you say “overkill” boys and girls?  If you have one script for people who work for you, another for people you work for, one for in-laws and one for outlaws, one for young people and one for old – the only people who sponsor on your team will be the salespeople.  And salespeople don’t duplicate.
There can be a place for training in these four areas.  (Although personally I’m against the NLP training.)  But take any of them too far and you become the hardest-working, lowest-paid grinder in your company.  I know – I was that guy for years.
What we’re really talking about here is the difference between selling tactics versus creating culture in your team.   The grinders has 3-ring binders filled with potential scripts, closes, and tactics.  The Rock Stars in the professional create culture that guides people how to respond in any situation.  If you learn nothing else, let me teach you your new mantra…
Grinders Fill Binders – Rock Stars Drive Bonus Cars.