I love this smell as well

It’s this time of the year. One can smell it. If you remember Lieutenant Colonel Bill Kilgore’s statement ”I love the smell of napalm in the morning”, you know what I’m talking about. It’s the last uphill battle at the continuous war on business. Assaf calls this EQ. I call this the best time of the quarter.EQ – the End of the Quarter. Everyone is on the watch, alerted and ready. This is the time to separate between the boys and men.  Get the POs and meet your personal goals as well as the company numbers. All are reay to take a bite of the pie. 

It’s all about eve sales. The ability to answer the customer needs, create a solution, close a deal and get a PO. All are alerted, focusing on the goal. To be honest, I always thought that sales is an art, but then I’ve learned that it is actually a process.

Old school will use Og Mandino’s sales principles: 

• Don’t pity yourself
• Start each day with a target
• Be friendly always
• Always set an additional step then necessary
• Be alert for each opportunity
• Each problem has a positive side
• Laugh in moment of hatred and anger
• Concentrate on one thing
• Be proud and satisfied
• Examine the acts of the day at night

• Know the players. 
• Don’t blame others. 
• Salute your peers.
• Be a partner, not a pitchman

But the real rules, those that they will not tell you are more simple. Follow the ABC. 

exactly 12 years ago, I realized what the goal should be, but never knew, beyond the basic instinct, what should be done. Then, not so many years ago, Assaf introduced me to David Mamet’s Glengarry Glen Ross.

I admit that most of the movie was boring, but then the sales scene (see transcript here,) helped me to put the pieces together. 

For all of us out there, trying to get it done in such  troubling times, here’s the classic lesson of what should be done.