The keys to being successful in sales
A few days ago, I rediscovered an article I wrote many years ago on LinkedIn about sales and business development.
Reading it again today honestly made me smile.
At the time, I was mainly sharing what I had learned during the first part of my career, after working across different countries, industries and organisations.
Since then, I have moved into broader leadership and P&L management responsibilities, managed larger teams, larger projects and more complex organisations.
But interestingly, I still agree today with almost everything I wrote back then.
Maybe experience changes the scale of what you manage, but some fundamentals never really change.
And just to prove that I am not rewriting history today, here is the original article published years ago on LinkedIn:
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/keys-being-successful-sales-samuel-fourneaux
It has been 19 years since I started working as a salesman. Since my debut in this world, I've changed companies, industries, organisations, and managements several times. I have worked in many countries which are completely different between one another : China, Russia, Brazil, USA, Ukraine, Romania, Croatia... Thus that posed many difficulties. However, every time I succeeded in obtaining a contract, it was a victory for me but also my team. No salesman is successful without his team who is by his sides at all times.
Additionally a salesman must be able to not only sell to your client but also to your company. Somebody told me 19 years ago, 50% of your time must be spent internally. That stuck with me ever since as it is very true in the world in which we work in. You must be able to sell to your client, as that is your job. Plus, you must explain what your are doing, convince your management that it is the right project to take.
After 13 years of working under someone, I became sales director. It was a new step in my career as I had to lead a team. A key component of being a team leader is to listen everyday to your team no matter the subject or the importance of their inquiry and figure out a solution and then lead them to success. I empower my team because I believe that being a good manager means to be able to obtain the best of each and everyone of my team members. Many people ask me, "What happens if one of your team members is on the road to being better or is better than you?" This does not bother me at all as my job is to obtain the best traits within them and teach them how to use their skills. They are an asset for the company and my task is to get the best of them for the good of the organisation.
Failure, is a fear that all salesman and, even more, sales director fears. We must learn to cope with this constantly present reality. Today, it is still taboo in our job to talk about failure even though each and every person knows that victory is not always a forceable end game. Losing is a part of our job and I always say,"We win as a team and we loose as a team." I never blame a specific person because I know, deep down, that we are all responsible when we loose. I have written down a list which hopefully will aid a person who is dealing with failure to overcome it.
Never think that you were the best and it was not your fault that you or your team failed.
Never get depressed because it is part of the job and you must be able to handle it.
Never try to find excuses on why failure was the result.
Never blame your colleagues, the organisation or management.
Accept that losing is part of the game.
Losing is an opportunity for a new start.
Try to understand why you failed and learn from your mistakes.
Be always positive and never lose your self confidence.
I deeply think that to be a good salesman, you must loose. The only thing is that you must win more that you loose as my first sales director taught me 17 years ago.
Looking back today, I realize that sales and business development taught me much more than how to sell.
It taught me how organisations work, how decisions are made, how teams succeed, how clients think, how risks are evaluated and why execution matters so much.
It also helped me later to better understand what it means to manage a business and a P&L.
Sales people are sometimes caricatured in companies.
But in reality, good business developers often carry a very deep understanding of customers, operations, risks, teamwork and human relationships.
And after all these years, one sentence from this old article is probably still the most important lesson of all:
We never win alone.
