Sales as a Career!! Are you Game ?

Although debatable, Sales is the single most critical function of an organization. Be it a fortune 500, Series funded or a startup. Sales guys are the front-runners who face clients head on. The heart & soul of a business entity lies with the Sales/marketing Team. In one liner - Sales is like oxygen without which a business entity suffocates and slowly fades away.

As much as we would like to think that we're living a the 4th revolution (Aka Digital World), one where all sales happen on line and there is no need for us to pick up the phone, but unfortunately that's not true.

Although sales does happen through the web, there are still many sales strategies that need us to pick up the phone, or have face to face meetings, where building relationships is still the key to closing the sale, especially if you're in a services business.

To me, job titles don't matter. Everyone is in sales. It's the only way we stay in business. - Harvey Mackay

Sales appears as the top line number of any financial document and usually gives an indication as to the health of the organization. Effective Sales people are truly entrepreneurs at heart. They do not have a script, modules, curriculum or a plan handy. They are always on their toes. They always create opportunities, they think like there is no box, they are thirst for closures, they value relationships and they most certainly know how to be a value creator.

Sales as a career is not for the faint hearted. It's highly challenging & rigorous. The health of the Sales Team has a ripple effect across roles and verticals in a company.

Hire sales people who are really smart problem solvers, but lack courage, hunger and competitiveness, and your company will go out of business. Ben Horowitz

Off late, a lot of buzz around the market is that individuals from Tier 1 colleges are the the most preferred for Sales/marketing roles. It's known across industries that prospective employees who graduate from hot shot colleges like IIM//FMS/XLRI/ISB are the one's who can outperform others. Unfortunately that's not even close to being the fact.

Employers look for specific personality traits for sales roles - strong communication and negotiation skills, aggression, go-getter attitude, among others. But apart from these criteria, they invariably add a layer of complexity by mentioning ‘MBA from Tier 1 university’ in a ‘must-have’ or a ‘good-to-have’ column while writing the JDs

 

Sad that our recruiters are still in the mythical world and are masked by illusions.

Let's back it up with data:

Here is a shocker: Only 3% of people working in sales in India are from Tier 1 MBA universities

As per a recent research, the team looked at the pedigree of 12,000 sales leaders (directors, VPs and AVPs level) and found that barely 8% of them went to Tier 1 MBA universities. In fact, they also found that as many as 62% of these sales leaders are actually just under-graduates.

This further corroborates that for sales roles, there’s no correlation between what universities candidates go to and how much they progress in their careers.

If you are Game On for a remarkable Sales Career then do watch this space for more updates 

**https://tinyurl.com/y7r59fyv

Identifying the core characteristics required for sales success can help you determine if you have what it takes for a career in sales. - See more at: http://www.businessnewsdaily.com/4173-personality-traits-successful-sales-people.html#sthash.Lbo8WdZv.dpuf

Identifying the core characteristics required for sales success can help you determine if you have what it takes for a career in sales. - See more at: http://www.businessnewsdaily.com/4173-personality-traits-successful-sales-people.html#sthash.Lbo8WdZv.dpu

Identifying the core characteristics required for sales success can help you determine if you have what it takes for a career in sales. - See more at: http://www.businessnewsdaily.com/4173-personality-traits-successful-sales-people.html#sthash.Lbo8WdZv.dpuf

Identifying the core characteristics required for sales success can help you determine if you have what it takes for a career in sales. - See more at: http://www.businessnewsdaily.com/4173-personality-traits-successful-sales-people.html#sthash.Lbo8WdZv.dpuf