Episode 675:“Can’t Do”or“Won’t Do”? (Classic Podcast) - a podcast by Dr. Ivan Misner

This is a rebroadcast of Episode 217.



SynopsisIf you’re part of the leadership team and a member isn’t participating in some way, approach them and say"How can we help you (give more referrals, bring in visitors, etc.)?"The person will respond with either a"can’t do"or a"won’t do"answer."Can’t do"answers come from people who want to participate, but don’t know how. The solution is to educate them."Won’t do"answers come from people who don’t want to participate. They want to receive referrals, but not to give them. Give these people the opportunity to step down.



If they want to stay because they’re getting referrals, then insist that they contribute.How has your BNI chapter handled the"can’t do"and"won’t do"members? How well did it work? Do you have suggestions for other listeners?



Brought to you by Networking Now.Complete Transcript of BNI Podcast Episode 675



Priscilla:Hello everyone and welcome back to The Official BNI Podcast brought to you by NetworkingNow.com, which is the leading site on the net for networking downloadables. I am Priscilla Rice, and I am coming to you from Live Oak Recording Studio in Berkeley, CA. I am joined on the phone today by the Founder and Chairman of BNI, Dr. Ivan Misner. Hello Ivan, how are you today and where are you?Ivan:I am doing great, Priscilla. Thank you very much. It is a nice summer day here in southern California. I know it is not a summer day in the southern hemisphere, but here in California, it is a nice summer day in August. I have a great topic today, one that I train on a lot with BNI leadership teams and directors, but I really haven't talked much about this on a podcast. It's the concept of members being a can't do or won't do. Let me explain what I mean about that.



Oftentimes, a leadership team or director might come up to me and say, “We've got a member that is just not participating.” Either they are not bringing in referrals or they are not bringing in visitors. They are just not actively engaged. One of the first things that I tell leadership teams is to sit down with the member and ask this question. It's my magic words for customer service: how can we help you?



It's really important that you do that because if you go up to a member and just start hammering them for not being engaged, they just get defensive. But instead, if you ask how you can help them do this, it's a very powerful technique. It's gold. It really is a very powerful technique because if you ask how you can help them, they will virtually always give you one of two answers. They will either give you one of two answers to that question. They will either give you a can't do answer or a won't do answer.



Let's say it's referrals. I'll give you a real life example. We had a printer in a chapter.  We asked how we could help him bring in referrals. He was dead last. He brought in the least number of referrals in the group. We asked how we could help him and his answer was, “You know, I am really struggling with this. I am having a hard time bringing in referrals because I don't really have much of a conversation with my clients because they don't tell me what they need. They slap something down on my desk and say,'I need 1000 copies a week from tomorrow. Any questions? Great.'  They're out the door. I don't know if they need a CPA. I don't know if they need a florist. I don't know what is going on in their lives. I don't have that kind of dialogue with them. I am struggling. I want to bring in referrals. I just don't know how to do it."That is a classic can't do answer. They want to help. They just don't know how to help. You know what, Priscilla? It is our responsibility to help those people. We have all been can't dos. I was a can't do. I didn't know how to network.



By the way, we came up with a great solution for this guy. We put up a board with everybody's business card. People would come up and they would pull a business card from one of...

Further episodes of The Official BNI Podcast

Further podcasts by Dr. Ivan Misner

Website of Dr. Ivan Misner