Best advice to salespeople

Straight to the point…I don’t like the tone of some (many indeed) posts on LinkedIn. It is the tone that tells you what to do and what not to do. The tone keeps giving you advice, quotes or books to read, or training or seminar videos to watch. And salespeople are a large target group for that kind of content. Truly speaking, I caught myself falling into the same trap in my posts.

 

I realized that the more I follow and consume that kind of content, the more I look for it. And the worst is that it leaves me no time to reflect, think deeply and understand what exactly I need and how to integrate those into my life. My pile of books kept growing, the number of articles that I clipped and saved as « to be read » increased, the file that keep « interesting » videos became heavy and none of those took me anywhere.

 

I brought this to my coach; I expressed this feeling as being disorganized and losing control of things. She helped me reflect and be aware of what I am doing in my life. While talking, I realized that I am very good at making planned progress in all the fields in which I work. My daily job, coaching practice, start-up projects, my investments in different businesses… It turns out that being exposed to so much advice about what to do or what not to do, created a feeling of not being good enough.

 

Here is what I decided.

• Go back to the books that influenced and inspired me the most and re-read them.
• Read slowly. Sometimes, after half-page reading, I see a sentence and take note of it. Then, think about how and when I can use it. Take note about that as well
• Skip the posts that give me advice I don’t look for.
• Contact directly to people (in person or through LinkedIn) when I need advice. It is so great to see how people are ready to share.
• I pay more attention to the language of my posts. I avoid giving advice and using the « do that, don’t do that » language. I instead prioritize sharing an experience or opinion.
• Constantly looking for the answers is exhausting; I am working on living with the questions while trusting that I will build the solutions gradually.

 

I know that many content creators share their experiences and knowledge with good intentions, and I greatly appreciate their generosity. However, advising somebody, you don’t know looks to me out of line.

 

Going back to the title…

 

I have no advice. The answer is in YOU.