Can we be honest in sales?
I’m technically the “salesman” at Sanctus, but I’d shy away from anyone ever calling me that.
I’ve been in my role for three months, and I honestly don’t feel like I’ve actively sold to anyone. Technically speaking, of course I have, but it doesn’t feel that way.
To a degree, I do feel that I’m talking from a position of privilege. I’ve got an incredible brand behind me at a time when people are beginning to realise that they need mental health services more than ever.
It’s meant that all of my calls & meetings have been with businesses who have contacted us, and who, most of the time, are already fans of what we’re doing.
In that regard, I don’t feel like my back has been against the wall where I’ve needed to sell heavily, or outreach and cold call to keep the business alive.
Maybe that day will come, and I appreciate that businesses in this position may have to scramble a little more.
But if I can put that to one side, I’m more interested in reflecting on the two types of sales jobs that I’ve had in my life.
To be completely blunt; the first approach, I hated. It was an approach that worked, but it was an approach that didn’t feel right. It didn’t feel genuine.
I was in an environment where you were only as good as your last day, where competitiveness was king, and where the job became all about the close of the sale.
For me, it felt like it was breeding a culture where sales became about quick wins, scoring the commission on the deal, and ringing the office bell to let everyone know you’ve closed a business.
Honestly, it was actually quite addictive. The dopamine rush that came with ringing that bell felt like a drug.
I’d come in every morning and see that shiny bell hanging there, desperate to get my short-lasting fix from ringing it.
It meant that I tried to push things over the line that shouldn’t have been pushed. It meant that I bent the truth, or left out the bits that didn’t look favourably on what I was offering. It meant I was even told by my leaders to straight up lie.
I was taught to use a fake name, fake company and fake email address so that I could pretend I was someone I wasn’t in order to get as much information from another company as possible.
I’d ring up businesses asking for help with my fake alias, and they’d be only too happy to offer whatever assistance they could.
All the while I’d be thinking about how I was getting one step closer to ringing that bell and scoring a bigger pay check.
I feel guilty looking back on that to be honest. I was young and naïve and told “this is how we do it”, so I want to excuse myself of some of the blame. Still, it didn’t sit right with me even back then.
But, as a fresh faced graduate new to the world of business, who was I to question those above me when they said “this is how we’ve always done it”?
I believe that this approach has a wider impact on business relationships too. When the culture becomes only about the close, the strength of the relationship is lessened. Businesses can easily be treated only as numbers, and the relationship kept purely transactional.
Of course, it goes without saying that for some businesses or some deals, this is completely necessary, and it doesn’t make sense to do it any other way. Sometimes a purely transactional approach is all that is needed for a certain business.
Sometimes closing deals is the job, and scoring commission is the biggest reward. And there’s nothing wrong with that.
But when we have to lie to get there, that’s what feels wrong.
I’ve said some things in my new “sales” role that I never thought I would. I’ve actively found myself saying “no” to some businesses, even after they’ve told me they want to go ahead. The timing wasn’t right and they were trying to rush things, and my gut said no.
I’m not claiming that I’ve discovered a new way of doing business. I get that this has probably been done a million times before.
But I know that three years previously, I would have just shoved the product into the business and leapt out of my desk to go and ring the bell.
I felt like a little puppy when I first started at Sanctus, desperate to get let off the lead so I could run off and make deals. The other George has reigned me in a couple of times and hammered home to me that we’re not about the close, we’re about the relationship.
We’re not about the short term win, we’re about the long term partnership.
It’s been an interesting learning curve. I’ve learnt not to get caught up in the name of the brand, the size of the organisation or the potential amount of the deal.
The only thing I’ve been taught to laser focus in on is “is it right?” and “does this business genuinely care about the mental health of their employees?”
Do they honestly both want and need our product? Are they doing it for a box ticking exercise, or are they doing it for their employees?
The conversations I have feel so pure. I hardly prepare anything. I don’t go to any meetings with pitch decks and slideshows of facts and figures. I don’t watch Jordan Belfort speeches to learn little psychological sales tricks so I can convince people that they need us. I’ve said no just as much as I’ve said yes.
I simply turn up, tell our story, listen to theirs, and then listen to my gut. We want to work with businesses for 10 years or more, so if I quick win & lie my way there, then already the relationship is built on rocky foundations. 10 years is a long time to try and last if you haven’t laid solid groundwork from the get go.
I’m splitting this article into two-parts as there’s quite a lot to cover — in the next piece I’m going to look more specifically at how my previous sales environment, and how my current one, has directly impacted my mental health.
-George
