Help Wanted: Will Work for Resumé

Make a list of the ongoing tasks that you despise but are necessary in order to sell effectively.

A typical print rep’s or selling owner’s list would include:

• Find good companies to call on.
• Identify hot markets.
• Do the pre-call research so that I have something powerful to say.
• Follow up on accounts I have not heard from in a while.

Prospecting, filing, phone follow up. These and many other tasks generally get done last, if at all. I’ve often wished I could clone myself (though I am certain there’d be a lot of people who would fight to keep this from happening) so that part of me could do the monkey work while the other part went bananas selling or did guerrilla marketing (running joke in there somewhere).

Enter the Intern.

By employing an Intern for either the summer or year-round, you get an extra pair of hands to attack the tasks that otherwise would not get done. The Intern earns a little cash and gets some business experience. Sweet!

An added bonus is that you get to try out a potential future employee!

Look around. Surely there is a school in your area with whom you can establish a relationship. Throw some scholarship money their way and you might even get dibs on those students that professors and deans see as the pick of the litter.

At your local college or university awaits a student looking for some resumé assistance. Sure, he/she needs money for tuition (read: beer and pizza), but another need is for something on the resumé that provides a leg up on the others looking for work upon graduation.

Talk about a win-win!

Bill Farquharson is a Vice President at NAPL. His training programs can drive the sales of print reps and selling owners. Check out his Sales Resources page and contact him at (781) 934-7036 or bfarquharson@napl.org.