Training

My new gig provides a ton of training. That's good! Instills a sense of culture, you learn things, meet new people. Tons of good things in exchange for a tiny dose of institutional boredom.

All of today comprised day one of three of sales training. (Stay with me here. There's a point about this. I'm not just going to kill you with stuff about sales.)

Most selling systems have at their core, a diagnostic orientation. The idea is to use questions to understand the business thoroughly before you can think about selling products or solutions to problems. Thoughts about sales technique, of course, weren't what was on my mind at the end of the day. It was that the interviewing techniques seemed completely adaptable to everyday life.

The overall inquiry, questions and conversational techniques presented accomplish a kind of understand that I'd like to have with my friends and family. The unspoken bonds are a gift but I want to offer more of myself when I can. I found myself discouraged that I've not been very able to use language to build a bridge to others. So many years, so many reasons.

Certainly I'm improving this. Mundane or not, the sales training stuff is a useful reminder of what I think I value in relationships.

These training systems always have different names for the evolving character of sales professionals. To my relief, I can say that I've moved out of the "Opportunistic Traveler" stage in both settings.