Business experience has taught me that as we progress in our journey we should give due consideration to all opportunities and new ideas that come our way. I laugh upon reminiscing about the people telling me I will kill my business if I should choose to study social media.
While a particular choice may not be understood at the moment, it may be appropriate down the road. Should others be involved, ask if you may take time to consider their offer according to your time schedule. Only you know your calendar in detail and when a 100% commitment may be made. The 100% delivery is what will build your personal brand as credible and trustworthy. These two adjectives are what will deliver more frequent and larger sales.
Upon receiving an opportunity that requires postponement on your end, communicate sincere appreciation for the other party thinking of you. Generally speaking, when someone offers you an opportunity, they are willing to wait for you because they believe you are the best person. In alignment with modeling being a “best person”, let them know, in your words, you feel honored by their offer.
Usually, no one offer is perfect. There are always some drawbacks. It is up to you to define the positives and negatives attached with the offer at hand. If you are weighing in on multiple possibilities, line them up side by side to see which one has less of a negative effect as well as that one that offers the most positive upside. This is just the beginning of the analytic process.
Consider your ultimate vision for where you wish to be headed and your priorities to get you there. Which of the offers are in alignment with your priorities and vision? Will it help you get there more quickly or will it detract from your original vision of accomplishment?
If you believe by pursuing a new avenue you will be detracted from your intended goal, seriously consider whether there would be a plausible benefit to change direction. The upside and downside of any new project deserves your serious consideration. Will it be worthwhile to deviate or should you stick to a response of, “Thank you but I cannot accept at this time.”
It is well-worthwhile to fully contemplate the answers to all possibilities. Do you still have a question about an opportunity where the answer will sway your decision? Replay the conversation in your head to figure out if you can find the missing piece of information. If not, follow up the next day, with the other party, by saying, “I was giving your offer considerable thought but have one remaining question…” The other party will be impressed by how much thought you are giving the possibility and will want to work with you all the more.
Once you have given each new offer fair consideration, your subconscious will soon help you decide. The error many make is to ignore this phenomenon. In actuality, all of your thoughts combined go through a sieve-like process when you sleep. When you pay attention to this aspect of decision-making, the better decision most often will be awaiting you when you awake.
Giving due consideration to what is offered to you and reflecting this in how you express your decision, will serve to further build your good reputation and put you on the wave of the Smooth Sale!
Author:
Elinor Stutz, CEO of Smooth Sale, LLC, (800) 704-1499, was honored by Open View Labs with inclusion in their international list of “Top 25 Sales Influencers for 2012.” Elinor authored the International Best-Selling book, “Nice Girls DO Get the Sale: Relationship Building That Gets Results”, Sourcebooks and the best selling career book, “HIRED! How to Use Sales Techniques to Sell Yourself On Interviews”, Career Press. She provides team sales training, private coaching and highly acclaimed inspirational keynotes for conferences. Elinor is available for consultation.
Explains the key steps everyone should take in hunting for a job, but also how to then keep the search going, how to deal with those "blahs" that inevitably come, how to assess a job search and make changes to keep it going well This is more then how to job search, it is how to be a job hunter. Learn to think of your job search as a planned and focused campaign rather then a flurry of unplanned desperation and frustration. How to stay strong at the job search, adapting and learning as you go. Managing your job search means recognizing what is really involved and important such as how you think of and view yourself, which is what determines how you represent yourself. Fundamental advice on each step of your job search and the internal process of what it is like to a successful job seeker.
Explains the key steps everyone should take in hunting for a job, but also how to then keep the search going, how to deal with those "blahs" that inevitably come, how to assess a job search and make changes to keep it going well This is more then how to job search, it is how to be a job hunter. Learn to think of your job search as a planned and focused campaign rather then a flurry of unplanned desperation and frustration. How to stay strong at the job search, adapting and learning as you go. 
Ed. note: This belongs to a series of posts on how numerous websites and services are integrating LinkedIn functionality. This is a post from Amit Kulkarni, co-founder and CEO at Manymoon – a project collaboration application.