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The Five Fs

The Five Fs
Posted by in Sales & Service Training & Techniques
3 Comments

canstockphoto14308003I live my life by five Fs:

  • Faith
  • Family
  • Friends
  • Focus
  • Fun

And believe it or not, I place my job in the Fun category. Many of my friends laugh: “You’ve been a lifetime banker. Fun?!?!?” I tell them, “If you aren’t having fun, then you’d better find something else to do!” And I find banking fun.

Oh, I know that we are sometimes categorized as a boring, nerdy group that only cares about the bottom line. Maybe I have an odd sense of fun, but I LOVE to ask questions of people, finding out all about their lives—in particular their financial lives. In the technical, instructional sense….I LOVE TO PROFILE!

It is remarkable what I find out by simply saying, “Tell me what I would see if I looked at your current checking account statement. How is money being deposited, and how do you pay bills?” Direct deposit? Automatic payment of car loans? Mortgage payment? Retirement account? Life insurance?

These responses sound cut and dried, but each of them is connected to people’s hopes and dreams, their pursuit of happiness, and I try to guide them along the way.

Where would you go with what’s uncovered by a simple question like, “What does your bank statement say about you?” How many opportunities do you see in the responses?

Let’s discuss.

Cynthia Whitmer Griffith is a Performance Results Network Results Consultant for Community Banks and Credit Unions at Cohen Brown Management Group, Inc.

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Cohen Brown Management Group is the internally recognized leader in sales-and-service cultural and behavioral change, specializing in consulting and training processes for management, front-line, support/customer service units and call centers. Performance Grapevine provides thought leadership insights on sales training, sales management, leadership training, time management, consultative selling, behavior change, organization change, and culture change.

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3 Comments

  1. Larry Bauer 12 years ago

    Good thought. Fun is a state of mind. The whole Mini FiNAP can be looked at from a discovery standpoint..which can be fun and enjoyable. You’d talk to your friends about this stuff. Why not your banker. Learning more about your client – what they are doing to their house; buying that great new car or even finally paying it off…that’s fun!

  2. Khoo chock Seang 12 years ago

    It is fun to use miniFinap as a conversational piece with friends, prospects, strangers etc and yet they do not realize it.

  3. Cynthia Whitmer Griffith 12 years ago

    Larry, I love the comment “you’d talk to your friends about this stuff.” So true, we ask our friends questions to get to know them better because we care. So why not with our clients and prospects…because we care.

    Khoo, key point you have made, “they do not realize it” That is the art of a true consultative conversation.

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