Are you “thinking about” advancing yourself with some additional training, personally or professionally? Maybe you’ve got something in mind, such as going to an event you heard about or investing in a training that entices you every time you think about it. You know you want to, you know that it would be valuable, which is why you haven’t said no to it, but you haven’t said yes, yet, either.
That’s an example of an “open loop.”
An open loop is anything where you don’t have a date, you don’t have a decision, or you don’t have a plan for how some kind of decision or choice is going to get tied down.
The problem is that nothing can happen until you make a decision yes or no. Until you close that loop, you can’t move forward, and you can’t move on either.
Open loops are huge drains on your energy. Our brains are wired to get things done and they love completion, so when something is hanging out there as a possibility, it’s going to keep recurring in your mind until you resolve it. That makes you tired, and can keep you up — or even wake you up — late at night.
Get the idea, talk about it, create the vision and a timeline to close the loop right away.
Sometimes the open loops only involve you and are only floating around in your head or on your desk, but sometimes they involve other people, such as your team or your family.
For instance, you may have said, “I’d like to have our new website designed and up by December 15,” and your team says, “Oh, that would be really cool.” But nothing happens.
That’s why we came up with a simple tool to close our open loops in team meetings, and it can help you close yours too.
“Who’s Doing What, By When?”
During a meeting we put an idea on the table, we talk about it, we create the vision for it, but then before the end of every meeting or call, we make sure to ask, “Okay, great, and who’s doing what by when?” Then we secure commitments to everything we are truly ready to advance.
That doesn’t mean the project is done, but, in your mind, you’ve got a person and a date, so you know who’s accountable for it and when to come back to it. That way, the issue isn’t going to keep coming up in your mind as something unfinished that you’ve got to take care of or, worse yet, remember.
Just make sure to allow enough time to get all the accountability squared away. You can’t do that in two or three minutes. You want to leave 10 to 15 minutes at the end of an hour-long meeting to close all of your loops or consciously let them go.
Speaking of closing open loops… Have you made your decision to come to Ultimate Sales Bootcamp? It’s only a few weeks away. If it’s been on your mind, it’s time to close that loop, do the fun and powerful pre-course accelerator assignments you get immediately upon registering, and start creating your on- and offline sales conversion machine today. Join us here.