Using Lean Thinking in the fields of sales and marketing and to some extent, the more softer-feely approach of Toyota Kata seems very mechanical. I was reviewing a video from Solution Tree and enjoyed the terminology of the cycle of learning they used especially the word dissonance.
It describes the area of tension that exists in the sales cycle so often. Wikipedia: Dissonance has several meanings related to conflict or incongruity: Cognitive dissonance is a state of mental conflict. Cultural dissonance is an uncomfortable sense experienced by people in the midst of a change in their cultural environment.
When we think of our approach in sales, often we do not address what we might see as a customer’s performance gap as dissonance. The un-comfortability of chance? Or do we just assume they don’t get it?