There are good and bad goals
This lesson isn't simply about goal setting, it's about proper goal setting. Did you know that more than 80% of companies set the wrong kinds of goals for their sales staff? Goals that you can't possibly meet? In a recent study, it was shown that setting results-oriented goals made achieving these goals nearly impossible.

Think about it, if a sales manager could directly manage revenue, then every sales person in the world would be filling their bathtubs with gold coins. Of course, this doesn't happen because the reality is, we can't control results, we can only manage our own actions.

The good news is you can achieve astounding sales results by setting activity goals. In fact, the results that come out of carefully planned and managed activities can far exceed any results-oriented goal you may have set in the past.

A personal example
Imagine a book seller who sets a goal to sell $1,000 in books each day. What if he sold nothing after talking to 17 people? What if number 17 was a very harsh rejection? It would get you down and make it harder to keep going. Take it from us, before we founded Pipedrive, we got our start in sales in exactly this way.

Now what if the same book seller has an activity goal of talking to 20 prospects each day. Even if 17 said no, it doesn't matter, because he only has three left to talk to.

Ironically, when you take your focus off of results and put it on activities, you feel better, and are more effective. Take Michael Phelps as an example. When he dives into the Olympic pool, his mind is not on the gold medal at the other end. His focus is on getting every move right - exactly like he's done it a thousand times before during training. If he gets every move right, only then will the gold be in his reach - and that much he knows.