Why I dislike salespeople...
It has been a long time since I last posted so clearly it is time for another rant.
Salespeople!
Aargh!
Now I realize that there are some lovely and extremely helpful sales people out there. In fact I have had wonderful working relationships with some of them. One in particular helped me put together several orders that would have been significantly less successful without her assistance. Unfortunately, I have not worked with her or her ilk recently.
I have come to the realization that there are two theories of sales:
Theory #1: The sales person and the customer are on the same side and the mission is to identify the customer's goal and help them reach that goal.
Theory #2: The sales person and the customer are in competition for the customer's money: the customer wants to keep it and the sales person wants to get it.
With this second theory at work, there is no end of trickery or manipulation in order to get the customer in the position they want. And there is the tendency for the sales people who follow this theory to look at the sales people who follow the first theory with a certain amount of disdain and wonder "what's the benefit to me to help the customer?"
I am currently in a summer internship gaining marketing experience surrounding by people who--while all very nice personally--have a significantly different philosophy of correct behavior from me. I'm fairly sure it is just as frustrating for them as it is for me, but...
Sigh.
Helping the world be a better place is intrinsically valuable for everybody. The whole "better to reign in hell than serve in heaven" is simply false. I'm sure I could write a better essay on exactly why this is a problem and I probably should at some point, but at this point I mostly want to pull my hair out and/or go home and read "Cowboys and Aliens". (I was delighted by the movie (and was surprised by the poor reviews it got) and put a hold on the graphic novel from the library.)
Salespeople!
Aargh!
Now I realize that there are some lovely and extremely helpful sales people out there. In fact I have had wonderful working relationships with some of them. One in particular helped me put together several orders that would have been significantly less successful without her assistance. Unfortunately, I have not worked with her or her ilk recently.
I have come to the realization that there are two theories of sales:
Theory #1: The sales person and the customer are on the same side and the mission is to identify the customer's goal and help them reach that goal.
Theory #2: The sales person and the customer are in competition for the customer's money: the customer wants to keep it and the sales person wants to get it.
With this second theory at work, there is no end of trickery or manipulation in order to get the customer in the position they want. And there is the tendency for the sales people who follow this theory to look at the sales people who follow the first theory with a certain amount of disdain and wonder "what's the benefit to me to help the customer?"
I am currently in a summer internship gaining marketing experience surrounding by people who--while all very nice personally--have a significantly different philosophy of correct behavior from me. I'm fairly sure it is just as frustrating for them as it is for me, but...
Sigh.
Helping the world be a better place is intrinsically valuable for everybody. The whole "better to reign in hell than serve in heaven" is simply false. I'm sure I could write a better essay on exactly why this is a problem and I probably should at some point, but at this point I mostly want to pull my hair out and/or go home and read "Cowboys and Aliens". (I was delighted by the movie (and was surprised by the poor reviews it got) and put a hold on the graphic novel from the library.)