One of my goals in life is to strive for clarity. So let there be no doubt about the point I am trying to make. The most richly rewarded financial advisors in America invariably have the best selling skills! A career in sales will pay more than almost any career you can imagine. Highly successful salespeople are smarter than most others, are certainly more resourceful than most others and take more responsibility for their actions than anyone you can imagine. Independent, successful salespeople embody and personify accountability.
I am forced to ponder, therefore, why so much of Wall Street is in denial. "We are not well served being portrayed as salespeople. All we need to do is utilize and employ sound practice management skills and our products will jump off the shelves like boxes of Tide." Wrong.
What is it about a salesperson that is so disingenuous?
Well, goes the argument, salespeople lack sincerity. Everybody knows that. At least that's what Hollywood says. And rich people don't want to give their money to insincere people.
Since the day I started in this business, that notion has bothered me. It hasn't stopped me. It hasn't even slowed me down. It's just bothered me. It shouldn't bother me, but it does. It bothers me in the same way that stereotypical depictions of salesmen bother me. The confidence man has become a stock figure in American culture. The hapless Willy Loman has become synonymous with earning nothing, owning nothing and accomplishing nothing. In Willy's case, the value of hard work takes a back seat to appearance and popularity. "And when they start not smiling back-boy, that's an earthquake."
Why is it so tempting to portray the salesperson as a hustler? Why are salesmen so often depicted as wallowing in middle-class mediocrity? Why are we as an industry afraid to fess up that we're in the selling business? What is it that's not likable about a salesman? Apparently, logic has it that a salesman will do anything and say anything to make a sale. The product is inferior, so the prospect must be tricked into buying. Shake the salesman's hand, but count your fingers afterwards.
So goes the logic.
But I think there is something far deeper afoot. I believe people denigrate sales professionals out of jealousy and resentment. The woods are full of people who are dying for the chance to tell you that your dreams can't come true. They are jealous of your success and your attitude. And they are not just jealous. They are intimidated.
These people are jealous of self-starters. Nobody tells you what time to go to bed at night. Nobody tells you when to get up in the morning. You can do business with whom you choose. Nobody tells you how much money you can earn. You can make more than 99% of all Americans. Who else has a job like that? It's no coincidence that everybody likes winning, but nobody likes a winner.
So many people are resentful that salespeople have chosen to be optimistic. Enthusiasm is the most important ingredient in sales and great salespeople have chosen to be enthusiastic. But the world is overrun with people who have chosen to be unhappy. Being miserable seems to be a God-given right to these folks. When people are walking around feeling angry and negative, the last thing they want is someone telling them to smile. They think anyone who is happy or optimistic is faux friendly. The reality is quite the opposite.
Salespeople are among the highest paid and most diligent people in the world because they have the courage to make a living using their wits. They eat rejection for lunch. They take complete responsibility for their results, both good and bad. While others depend on merit raises, cost-of-living increases and tenure, the sales professional rolls the income odometer back to zero every morning. If you don't sell, you don't eat. How many people have the courage to strap that on?
Salespeople have a self-image and a sense of conviction that others can only dream about. Salespeople can cut it. And one doesn't forge a sales career that stands the test of time by being slick, insincere or dishonest.