Mike and I have coincidentally both taken on new jobs in the past 6 months and so the blog has taken a backseat while we both try to figure out a new industry, clients, acronyms, selling strategies, office politics and everything else that comes with a new job. For me, I like to express my thoughts visually and I created this diagram to relate Proficiency versus the Workload of a new Sales Job. (I’m sure this would be similar for most new jobs)
In sales Proficiency encompasses product knowledge, knowing your clients, new sales strategies and being as effective as possible in those areas, the sales person Workload would represent making the calls, travelling the territory, maintaining a client database, sales reports, business plans and daily customer contact.
In a perfect world your workload would only increase as your proficiency did… however we don’t live in a perfect world and it would seem to be taking a few steps back from a Utopia recently. For every new Professional Sales Person there is a period of time when your Workload is greater than your Proficiency and everything you do is more complicated than it should be. With this divide a new sales rep will have to work more hours and be outside of a comfort zone in front of clients sooner then they would like. Trial by fire is often the training method of a sales person… if you are starting a new sales position or thinking of a change get ready to be out of your comfort zone for a few months, but don’t worry… once you get some experience you will get back the idea of “working smart”.
Tags: new at sales, proficiency, sales, utopia, working smart, workload
