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Business Relationships That Last: Five Steps To Transform Contacts into High Performing Relationships
Everyone knows that relationships are critical to business success, but no one has provided a simple system to turn contacts and acquaintances into valuable assets--until now. Business Relationships That Last provides the first systematic program for advancing business relationships. In five easy-to-follow steps, the book shows how to transform any casual business relationship into a valuable source for revenue, leads, and advice. Ed Wallace combines memorable anecdotes with a clear theoretical framework that shows individuals how to leverage their hard business skills with the often-overlooked soft skills of relationship building. Surveyed executives say they need this book. In a recent survey, 88 percent of executives indicated that the strength of their client, customer, and referral relationships was critical to achieving their goals each year. But only 25 percent of those same executives said they had a formal process for planning, managing, and growing business relationships and 73 percent of the group surveyed said they would be very interested in reading a book on this topic. This book delivers the process that so many people and organizations need. Praise for Business Relationships That Last : ''Ed Wallace captures the immediate need for organizations and individuals to build relationships of integrity and confidence.''
-- Stephen Covey , author of the New York Times bestseller The Speed of Trust ''The more people who use the principles and practices in this book to deepen their relationships, the richer we'll all be--and happier!''
-- Keith Ferrazzi , bestselling author of Never Eat Alone and Who's Got Your Back? ''We all know that businesses grow through outstanding relationships. Ed Wallace provides an elegantly simple yet very powerful way to think about and build relationships that last.''
-- Ivan R. Misner, PhD , bestselling author of The 29% Solution
-- Stephen Covey , author of the New York Times bestseller The Speed of Trust ''The more people who use the principles and practices in this book to deepen their relationships, the richer we'll all be--and happier!''
-- Keith Ferrazzi , bestselling author of Never Eat Alone and Who's Got Your Back? ''We all know that businesses grow through outstanding relationships. Ed Wallace provides an elegantly simple yet very powerful way to think about and build relationships that last.''
-- Ivan R. Misner, PhD , bestselling author of The 29% Solution
197 pages, Paperback
First published October 1, 2009
8 people are currently reading
55 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
April 29, 2018
Rich capitalist steals ideas for building better business relationships from humble and honest taxi driver who is now deceased.
August 27, 2024
We all need the human touch...
I found "Business Relationships That Last" to be well thought out and structured in an easy-to-follow and easy-to-learn-from style. Wallace's style of speaking to the reader was comfortable and conversational, yet authoritative and confident.
The text/book focused on helping a salesperson or sales team take business relationships from business acquaintance to professional peer to respected advisor, but the tips and tools can be applied to non-sales relationships as well. Nurturing human relationships through common sense "tactics" of putting down the phone to be present and make intentional use of your time is just fantastic advice for any interaction!
I appreciated the "relational insights" listed at the end of each chapter--the use of these bullet-point lists reminded me of our public speaking training. We're taught to tell the audience what we're going to tell them, then tell them, then tell them what we've told them. Wallace does this in each chapter and by doing this, he almost forces you to learn. Nicely done.
I would be remiss if I didn't point out: Max the taxi driver and my high school band director are probably having coffee in Heaven, sharing philosophy...
I found "Business Relationships That Last" to be well thought out and structured in an easy-to-follow and easy-to-learn-from style. Wallace's style of speaking to the reader was comfortable and conversational, yet authoritative and confident.
The text/book focused on helping a salesperson or sales team take business relationships from business acquaintance to professional peer to respected advisor, but the tips and tools can be applied to non-sales relationships as well. Nurturing human relationships through common sense "tactics" of putting down the phone to be present and make intentional use of your time is just fantastic advice for any interaction!
I appreciated the "relational insights" listed at the end of each chapter--the use of these bullet-point lists reminded me of our public speaking training. We're taught to tell the audience what we're going to tell them, then tell them, then tell them what we've told them. Wallace does this in each chapter and by doing this, he almost forces you to learn. Nicely done.
I would be remiss if I didn't point out: Max the taxi driver and my high school band director are probably having coffee in Heaven, sharing philosophy...
April 23, 2022
Not much nee in this if you have been around the block.
March 3, 2010
Background:
Ed Wallace is the Chief Relationship Officer of The Relationship Capital Group. He has many years of experience in sales and business development.
Business Relationships That Last – 5 Steps to Transform Contacts into High Performing Relationships is quite a timely book in this age of social media, networking, trust agents, and generally behaving like a decent human being.
This book focuses on a key concept called relationship capital, which resembles the concepts of the emotional bank account (as per Stephen Covey) or the Whuffie Factor (as per Tara Hunt via Cory Doctorow).
This book is divided into three main parts:
Part I: What is Relationship Capital?
Part II: The 5 Steps to Transform Contacts into High-Performing Relationships
Part III: Action Planning
The strengths:
This is a decent, but somewhat narrowly focused, book. Wallace uses the character of Max, a taxi cab driver who is much more than he seems, as a means to illustrate the power of relationship capital. There’s a good section on relational blockers, which are reasons why you might not be developing good business relationships. The Relational Ladder, a diagram used throughout the book, emphasizes the importance of soft and hard skills. It also shows the stages of building a business relationship where, believe or not, the sign of a highest level performing relationship is your ability (and comfort) with asking your customer for help. There’s also a section on a Relationship Quotient and some exercises that help you figure that out and apply it to your business relationships.
There’s no question that this is important stuff – it’s getting easier to do things on your own on the Web, but it’s getting harder to do them in an excellent or remarkable way without developing relationships with other talented folks. Chris Brogan and Julien Smith talked about the power of relationships within Trust Agents and this book focuses on that piece of the puzzle in much more detail, although slanted towards sales.
The areas for improvement:
The main suggestion that I have for improvement is that this book would have been more useful by looking beyond relationships with the ulterior motive of making your monthly sales quota. I think the concepts beyond this book should go beyond filling your month end sales order form: maybe that’s an idea for a follow-up book.
Also, I was turned off by the Action Planning section. I felt I like I was getting account management training which, while it’s not a bad thing in and of itself, was a bit too focused on that kind of thing. Might be great if you sell widgets, but that’s not my interest.
Finally, there was a very overt plug for the author’s company, website and services. I think the first hit is free, so to speak, but I’m sure that this book is a “funnel” to bring in additional business. And that’s fair game, no question: every author has their own reasons for publishing a book. From my vantage point, however, it soured the book for me.
Other points of interest:
I really do enjoy the character of Max, the Jedi Master cab driver. Well, he’s not really a Jedi. But still…
Verdict (out of 10): 7 (worth getting from the library; good ideas about how to build better professional relationships, but seems to be focused towards the widget salesperson.)
Ed Wallace is the Chief Relationship Officer of The Relationship Capital Group. He has many years of experience in sales and business development.
Business Relationships That Last – 5 Steps to Transform Contacts into High Performing Relationships is quite a timely book in this age of social media, networking, trust agents, and generally behaving like a decent human being.
This book focuses on a key concept called relationship capital, which resembles the concepts of the emotional bank account (as per Stephen Covey) or the Whuffie Factor (as per Tara Hunt via Cory Doctorow).
This book is divided into three main parts:
Part I: What is Relationship Capital?
Part II: The 5 Steps to Transform Contacts into High-Performing Relationships
Part III: Action Planning
The strengths:
This is a decent, but somewhat narrowly focused, book. Wallace uses the character of Max, a taxi cab driver who is much more than he seems, as a means to illustrate the power of relationship capital. There’s a good section on relational blockers, which are reasons why you might not be developing good business relationships. The Relational Ladder, a diagram used throughout the book, emphasizes the importance of soft and hard skills. It also shows the stages of building a business relationship where, believe or not, the sign of a highest level performing relationship is your ability (and comfort) with asking your customer for help. There’s also a section on a Relationship Quotient and some exercises that help you figure that out and apply it to your business relationships.
There’s no question that this is important stuff – it’s getting easier to do things on your own on the Web, but it’s getting harder to do them in an excellent or remarkable way without developing relationships with other talented folks. Chris Brogan and Julien Smith talked about the power of relationships within Trust Agents and this book focuses on that piece of the puzzle in much more detail, although slanted towards sales.
The areas for improvement:
The main suggestion that I have for improvement is that this book would have been more useful by looking beyond relationships with the ulterior motive of making your monthly sales quota. I think the concepts beyond this book should go beyond filling your month end sales order form: maybe that’s an idea for a follow-up book.
Also, I was turned off by the Action Planning section. I felt I like I was getting account management training which, while it’s not a bad thing in and of itself, was a bit too focused on that kind of thing. Might be great if you sell widgets, but that’s not my interest.
Finally, there was a very overt plug for the author’s company, website and services. I think the first hit is free, so to speak, but I’m sure that this book is a “funnel” to bring in additional business. And that’s fair game, no question: every author has their own reasons for publishing a book. From my vantage point, however, it soured the book for me.
Other points of interest:
I really do enjoy the character of Max, the Jedi Master cab driver. Well, he’s not really a Jedi. But still…
Verdict (out of 10): 7 (worth getting from the library; good ideas about how to build better professional relationships, but seems to be focused towards the widget salesperson.)
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews