Rat Race Running

Do you think you have what it takes to be a salesperson to start selling something? Because whether you like it or not, you are already one.

Let me tell you a story. A few years ago, when I was a fresh board passer and looking for a job, I would avoid job postings for sales engineers.

Being young and full of pride, I thought it was below my standards and qualifications or that it was not “technical” enough for engineers to venture into that industry.

However, I soon realized that jobs in sales are very challenging. Still, it offers unique opportunities like commissions, travels, and networking for professional growth.

Years later, I soon understood the value of sales and marketing and how almost everyone is in this industry – even if they are unaware of it.

Fast forward to the present. The world is in the middle of a health and economic crisis producing much uncertainty. Many businesses had to close down, and more people lost their jobs following the national government’s directives regarding community quarantines.

As a result, people had to find other means to survive since government subsidies are not for everyone and insufficient to sustain larger families. Filipinos, being known for their resiliency, had to adapt. Soon, people drew into their untapped potential to utilize social media to sell.

Whenever I browse Facebook or MyDay stories, it’s common to see people selling stuff. From a wide selection of foods, from milk tea to veggie burgers, to meat, fruits, vegetables, and pastry. To resellers marketing disinfectants, face masks, and alcohol. Also to people selling books, cosmetic products, and many more.

But selling is not entirely limited to products and goods. Many people sell services. We have logo designers and content writers, bloggers, vloggers and videographers, engineers and architects drawing plans, doctors giving checkups, lawyers advising clients, etc. You get the idea.

With everything mentioned above, we often forget the most valuable resource we often sell – time.

Time is non-renewable and is, therefore, holds absolute importance. Unfortunately, it is often misused, mismanaged, and wasted.

Employees may not recognize it, but we sell all the time. We sell our talents, skills, and particularly our time to the best bidders in the form of salary. That’s why we prepare resumes, practice answering interview questions, and even dress-to-impress. As a result, employers would buy our offer and give us a job.

We also sell in the form of ideas, from as basic as the best restaurant in town or which school is best to enroll in, and into more complex topics like philosophy, religion, science, and the nitty-gritty of right- and left-wing politics.

It is best said by the Americal steel magnate Charles M. Schwab, “We are all salesmen every day of our lives. We are selling our ideas, our plans, our enthusiasm to those with whom we come in contact”.

With this in mind, I hope we soon appreciate the art of making the sale and realize that we are continuously selling, in one way or another – whether we like it or not.