Whether you are a fan of Tom Brady or not, you have to have respect for his consistent results. In the past 15 years, his team has only missed the playoffs two times. Of those playoff runs, his team went to the Super Bowl six times winning four of the six appearances. And in all of the other playoff runs that did not lead to the Super Bowl, the team was still competitive with 10 of the 13 playoff appearances going all the way to the conference championship round.

Every year since Brady took the job, the team has been competitive and a contender. Pretty consistent results, huh? Imagine performing that well as a sales professional. What that would look like for you from a commission and career growth standpoint?

Before we get to what you can do to improve your sales game, one last thing about Tom Brady. Did you know that Tom Brady may end up going down as one of the best quarterbacks of all time and he was not expected to be a good quarterback when scouted and entered into the NFL Draft? He was nowhere close to a top pick and if you have not seen it, this is a fascinating video on how there was a lack of respect for Tom Brady (see 8:41 in the video) and how he consistently fought to overachieve and win.

In order to start to think about what we can take from Tom Brady and apply it to the world of selling, let’s look at some of the things that help him to have consistent results and perform so well.

Level of Competitiveness
If you have ever watched a game that Tom Brady played in, you will be able to easily see an individual that operates with a high level of competitiveness. Watch how he enters the game, his demeanor on the sidelines, and how he acts and performs at the end of the game as he does everything he can to get the win, regardless of whether it is a playoff or regular season game.

Stop to think about what your internal level of competitiveness is. Even though this is something more tied to your personality and how you live your life, there are some things you can do to increase your level of competitiveness and the fight that you put in to succeed and win.

Confidence and Self-Belief
If you watch the video that we shared, at 20:49 there is a mention of how Tom Brady stated his internal belief that he is going to win the starting job. There was no internal doubt.

He not only had the clear goal of securing the starting quarterback position, he truly believed that he had everything he needed to achieve and deserve the job. You can assume that he has that same mindset when he enters every game with confidence and a belief that he is going to win.

There can be a lot of ups and downs in the world of selling. You might have to face more prospects telling you “no” than those that say “yes”. How does that impact your internal dialogue with yourself?

Do you truly believe that will meet and exceed your quota? Are you confident that you have what it takes to be successful? Being confident that you will be successful and that you have everything that you need can help you to head toward more consistent results.

Work Ethic
If you look at some of the NFL Combine footage from the video at 10:07, you notice that Tom Brady did not have all of the physical attributes that one would look for in an NFL quarterback. What Brady lacked in natural ability or physical characteristics, he made up for with hard work.

It is not a big surprise that your level of work ethic can determine how well and consistently you perform. If you have a gap in terms of experience, knowledge, natural ability, territory, bag of products, etc., you can apply a level of work ethic to close that gap and improve your performance and consistency.

Also, Read When to Perform the Sales Takeaway