All kinds of organisations and companies either develop or wind down. We need growth, because stagnation is the first sign of death. When you look into an organisation from the outside it's easy to think you understand the structure, while if you're inside it you understand that nobody on the outside fully grasps how it works.
Let's make it concrete and look at a direct selling organisation in any company you like. Once you have a number of customers and partners you've helped in meetings to get more customers and partners, you move more and more into a teaching role. You don't just teach the presentation. You teach all the basic training, the follow ups, the system. You step into leadership. It varies from person to person, and that's exactly what makes the team so strong, because we complement each other. Not everyone is a salesperson, not everyone is a speaker, not everyone is everything.
I recently had a conversation with someone about this very thing. I said that everyone on the outside thinks we sell health products and that nobody has any other task. If you recruit someone, that new salesperson is supposed to sell products. Some people also believe that's when they can lean back…
What I don't understand is who, in their world, trains the new people, who shows them the material, the approach, the plan, who helps them with goal setting, who teaches them presentation skills, who books the venues for the trainings and who trains everybody. I also don't understand who coaches, solves conflicts and develops the organisation if everyone just earns money without doing anything.
No, the truth is that in a growing organisation we need all of these people, not to mention everyone who helps set up the room, prepare the tech, the slides, build bigger training events with a DJ and light effects. On top of that we work on getting customers and recruiting more partners.
The ones who were there earlier built the foundation of the infrastructure, and those of us who came in later have simply been able to join in and develop the existing system further. The leaders are the ones who put in the most time and also do everything above, sit in the most meetings and therefore also earn the most money. It doesn't matter when you start, because you have a top position in your own network and what you make of it is up to you.
Sometimes I get asked if I want to look at something else, something brand new that's coming to Sweden, and my answer is always the same: ”If I have time and you want feedback or input on your role in it, I can look at it for your sake, but it would never occur to me to start over.”
Why? You say I get to ”be first”? Why would I want to be first? ”Then you're at the very top with everything underneath you!” That's exactly why I couldn't start working with people who have that attitude, because it shows me how little field experience they have. If you've been at it for a few years and built something successful, you know what it takes and you won't want to be first, because that position comes with a lot of responsibility. Everyone will ask you, about everything. If you join an organisation where the infrastructure and everything else is in place, you can focus on learning the basics and get help from the leaders who have done the work and know exactly what needs to be done for you to succeed.
The top of a network is rarely at the very top. The distributor who earns the most in my company today started three years ago, even though the company has been around for 15 years. I have a top position in my network and since I've built a large organisation I have a big customer base, so why would I want to start over from zero? Residual income is about not starting over… The hype about ”You're first and you get everything underneath you!” becomes so absurd, because… There's nothing there! I'm the one who gets to build it, and I've already built my organisation!
Your role changes in a growing organisation, because there's so much to work with around it, just like in any organisation. All you need to learn is how to get customers and partners, and after that you'll find your role. My partner in life and business, Sofie, often says: ”You can't expect to be able to lead other people if you haven't gone through the steps you're going to lead them through.”
I sat down with a newly appointed sales manager who said: ”I don't take a percentage of my salespeople's sales, because I think it's wrong that I should earn money from them…”
So he'd rather have a fixed salary. Who brings in the money for that? The salespeople…
What he was indirectly saying was simply that he didn't believe in his own ability to teach communication in order to raise sales, so he expected the others to take the risk of backing him up.
He had become a teacher, but he didn't want to take responsibility for delivering the product called training.
There are so many people who want to be coaches in one way or another, but they don't know the basics. Why should you coach someone if you haven't been through it yourself? There's an expression about having ”earned the right to lead…” I've seen so many people grow from the start into becoming great leaders, regardless of background, by first mastering the basics. The role changes from being the one who opens the dialogue and invites people to meetings, to being the one who presents, to being the one who coaches. Until you become the one who coaches leaders to take the next step, and you become a business mentor.
You grow into the roles. You can't be a leader if you don't have an organisation. You have to start from zero. That's where the fairness comes in. Anyone can earn more money than everybody else. If they learn. If they do the pipeline. The ones who say it doesn't work simply haven't learned yet, or haven't done the work.
I've invested 15 years of my life in studying, doing and teaching. I'm passionate about helping people understand. Educating people further in this business model is what I do. It's my mission. I'll be working with it for the rest of my life, because there's no fairer business model.
My vision is that in 50 or 60 years my grandchildren will say ”My grandad is a networker. He helped build the world's largest direct selling organisation.”
