Managing Sales Process

Conference-ese

“Hey, Rob! Are you receiving my Weekly Sales Thought every week?” One of six moments in my life I’d like to have back. (I’m not telling what the other five are. Don’t ask.) Sounds pretty benign EXCEPT (1) this was my opening question while meeting a prospective client in the hallway of a conference who … Read more »

When The Order Looks Too Small

8:30 pm Saturday night. With brief clatter, wine glass met table as our server, John, who only moments before had greeted us warmly at our table, expressed his irritation with our small dinner order, about half the ticket he might have expected from three adults.  We’d come in from a very full, long day, hungry, … Read more »

Pre-Meeting Jitters

Ever felt anxious  as you were  about to begin a sales conference or expo?  I don’t know anybody here? Our booth is too small? It’s not fancy enough?  Our products  aren’t fully  developed?  Message not completely clear?  Company uniforms not as sharp as the other guys’?  I’m not experienced enough? Read more »

Pulling The Trigger

I first met the woman who is now my wife on the red leather back seat of a white Cadillac Eldorado at Logan Airport in Boston. Blind date. Read more »

The Power of Observation

I think I was in the hall way somewhere between the “Dodos, Trilobites, and Meteroites” and the “Hall of Arthropods: Creatures that Rule” in the Harvard Museum of Natural History in Cambridge when I saw it. Read more »

Drift of Blab

Last night, about late:30, I asked my daughter the movie enthusiast a question about a movie she’d just seen.  Well, she was VERY excited to tell me about it.  The plot was a little complicated and the storyline emotionally upheaving. Read more »

The Magazine

The weekly mail pickup brought a bountiful harvest of bills, flyers, ads, magazines, and two 9 x 12 envelopes. In one, I knew, were tax documents. In the other…. well, well… from Boston Private Bank and Trust Company….. hmmmm….. I think that’s where John-the-guy-we-call-when-we-refinance-our-mortgages now works….. Ah, shoot, I’ll open it now. Read more »

Memorable

Back in the day, when giants walked the earth and hair covered my head, I was a guitar player and singer.  I started, self-taught, at age 12. By the age of 19, I was in college, playing out three to four nights a week, thinking I might go professional. Read more »

Space Between the Notes

One evening, I went to hear the Boston Pops orchestra, Keith Lockhart conducting, play a program drawn from “The Great American Songbook,” songs made famous by Glenn Miller’s orchestra, Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Fats Waller, and others. Read more »

Because

The magazine article, torn roughly from its binding, sits on the kitchen counter.  ‘Though unaddressed, its location on the counter indicates it’s for me. Its source and topic suggest whose hands left it there. At once, an invitation and a puzzle. Read more »

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