It doesn’t matter how you earn your living. You have a business. You are your own business, whether you’ve decided to start a company or to work for someone else.
We’re all salespeople. The question is: “What are you selling, and who are you selling it to?” Even if you work for a company, you’re selling your time at a fixed price to a client, and in this case the client is your employer.
And as with any salesperson and any business, many sell quality at a good price, others sell mediocrity at a high price, and those who are great professionals but run a bad business sell quality at a low price.
Your business is you. You are the best product of your own company. Your work and your results are your hallmark, but as in any company, how your business looks to the end customer depends not only on your personal brand, but also on the people around you.
As a businessperson and a professional, you work for the customer, not for the company.
During my professional career I argued about this on several occasions, because I always made it very clear to the companies I worked for that my professional image is not for sale for a salary, and that ultimately, for the company in general and for me as a professional in particular, my job was to work for the customers. And my image and reputation, at least to me, are worth much more than the company, because the company may carry on, it may grow or it may go bust, but I’ll still be in the market whether the company does well or goes under (unless I die before the company does and get a visit from Mr R.I.P.).
If I have happy customers, the sales come in, and so the company is happy with me. It’s a circle in which we all win.
See also: The most profitable investment according to Warren Buffett is this asset anyone should invest in
What’s the problem with not understanding this?
I’ve seen great professionals ruin their reputation by staying at a bad company. Sometimes, depending on your profession, you’ll be the visible face of the company for your customers. Customers want you to treat them well. They want you to answer them properly and they want you to solve their problems quickly.
And because you’re the most visible face of the company, when your company fails, the customer not only stops buying from the company but also loses confidence in you as a professional, since after all you were the one who negotiated with the customer and won them over on the basis of certain promises.
When the customer is lost, your company loses a customer, but you don’t know when or under what circumstances you’ll run into that unhappy customer again, who unconsciously associates you with a breach of trust because you didn’t deliver what you promised.
And then it’s better to leave the company and save your reputation.
Over many years working in sales and sales management, I built up a portfolio of thousands of customers, many of whom became more than customers: good friends. Always without forgetting that business is business. I saw business relationships put at risk with customers who had even invited me to their daughter’s wedding, to the point of risking the friendship itself.
Because when your company lets a customer down and is about to cost them around 50,000 euros, they have every right to tell you to go to hell for failing them so spectacularly.
I also saw my own professional reputation tarnished when I lost the biggest customer I’d ever won in my whole career, through a series of continual mistakes, the result of working for a company whose basic principle was not to have competent people in key positions.
And willpower isn’t enough.
I may have the will to go to the moon, but if nobody lends me the rocket, my will alone won’t get me there.
So, as a professional, having a strong will to solve a customer’s problem can make you look like the motivated fool who, however hard he tries, will run into a wall of bureaucracy and bad company culture.
As well as willpower on the professional’s side, there has to be willpower on the company’s side to save its image, and yours, in front of the customers.
That’s why it’s not just the company that chooses you. You also choose the company you work for.
Most people are so obsessed with getting a job at a company that they forget to ask the company: “Why should I work here?”
Above all, when you work in sales, you should choose a company that not only gives your customers a good service but also protects your professional reputation: your own business.
As Warren Buffett put it, it can take years to build a good reputation, but only a few minutes to lose it. And that applies both to companies and to an individual’s personal and professional brand.
When you’re developing your career within a company where you are, in a way, the visible face to customers, you need to make sure the company will back your image, and that although the company may make mistakes, it will have the will to fix problems as soon as possible.
As a professional, you should work as in the army. Military squads are based on trust. You cover my weak flank and I’ll cover your back. But if you work for someone who leaves your back exposed, you’re making a bad deal for your career.
In short:
This article is my reply to a very friendly, attentive and professional young woman who has spent more than a month trying to solve a problem for me that is trivial in terms of money, but very important for the professionalism and credibility of her company, because, obviously, as a customer I’m not going to put larger sums of money at stake, when they’ve failed even during the trial period.
She is very willing to solve my problem, but unfortunately her company is one of those that prefer delay to an immediate solution.
And this is my way of telling her: “Leave that company before your professional reputation falls along with the company you work for. Look for a company with other, more effective policies, where you can focus on growing your customer portfolio, not on making excuses for the delays and incompetence of the people around you.”
Further reading
- The best way to show your boss he was wrong to let you go
- 3 pillars a business can’t do without when it comes to customers
- 5 things I learned in the world of direct selling
Featured image: NASA, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons.
