Get Back to Where You Once Were Trained

Good morning!

It was 38 years ago this summer. I had just graduated from UMass/Amherst and was sent almost immediately to a week of sales training out in Chicago. I believe the phrase, “Drinking from a fire hose” applies here. We were flooded with an overwhelming number of hours of how-to and role-playing and if-they-say-this-you-say-that instruction. I vividly remember getting on the plane to fly back to Boston and being asleep before the wheels left the ground (okay, that last night when we snuck into the city and got back just before breakfast probably didn’t help, but still … ).

I spent that summer prospecting door-to-door through the streets of Worcester, Mass. On Labor Day of 1982, I was cleaning my office and came across a binder full of the training material from that class back in June. Two hours later, I was still deeply engrossed in those original lessons. They made far more sense to me now that I had some experience and while I understood them the first time, a second look brought a deeper understanding.

Such is life and such is sales. Whether you are learning to sell, play the guitar, speak a different language, juggle, whatever. A visit to those basics is worth the trip. We get so focused on moving forward that we sometimes don’t realize how messy the path that got us here was. Lessons don’t always make sense the first time around but we can’t stop to focus on them. There are calls to make and more lessons coming our way. We must move on.

My wife and I once gave a renowned architect a “Design For Dummies” book as a birthday gag gift. We thought her excitement was feigned until she said, “It’s been so long since I learned this stuff, it’s good to have something that I can rely on to go over the basics with people.”

And she was serious.

Backup a few months and go through the emails in your inbox. Reread a few past editions of Printing Impressions. If you still have them, open up those “how-to” books on sales and give them a fresh look. Armed with what you know now, you will pick up some new information and see the basics in a different light.

Get back. Get back. Get back to where you once belonged, Jojo.

Bill’s sales training is not cheap, just effective and guaranteed. Contact Bill Farquharson through his website, BillFarquharson.com or 781-934-7036.