Maybe I should start a series on crazy things sales guys say. I'm working on a very large potential deal, and the sales guys have just been unbelievable. This particular team is the worst in the company. They try to steamroll you like crazy, then call you "buddy" every time you call. I want to tell them I'm not their buddy and don't even like them.
I had an IM that went like this:
Sales: "[My name spelled wrong] we OK to send to Acme tonight?"
Me: R is looking at it, and N said he's going to look at it today and let me know. I have left messages for K but I haven't heard anything from him yet. Have you or [your minion] called him?
Sales: (long pause) Yeah, I think C called him before lunch.
[I'd told them in writing several times that it was THEIR job to track down these approvals. I was just the gatekeeper for this]
Me: Other than that and the ones who have promised responses, we're good to go. I've chased down the rest. [doing their job for them]
Sales: so- we are good to send this evening to Acme?
Me: If R and N respond and depending on K's response. [What did I just say? Not yet.]
Sales: It MUST go this evening...
Me: Then you or [minion] should call N. [Like I've been saying all along].
...
(Later)
Sales: K he was supposed to review with the auditors-- HE HAS NOT DONE THAT??????
Me: Did you see RS's message? He and M can't agree on... How can we put this in front of Acme if we aren't agreed internally on what we're willing to give them??
Sales: We will work it out..the proposal goes out....
Me: I'm not putting something in front of TD that RS is unwilling to do.
Sales : RS is NOT a decision maker
Me: [Oh yes he is, and you know it]
Sales: this company has to many peple who can veto stuff- and add NO value- like RS- amazing.
And so it continued. They'll say anything to get me to believe everyone has signed off and we should send the contract to the customer, even when this is very clearly not the case, as demonstrated by multiple email messages that very day that he was copied on.
Family life in Texas, in-house practice, and snippets of LDS (Mormon) theology.
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About Me
- Himni
- Professionally, I'm a commercial/corporate lawyer at a large corporation. Personally, I'm a father of four, a political moderate, and an active Latter-day Saint (Mormon). I'm also a Westerner trying to adjust to the flatlands of Texas.
3 comments:
I'm guessing that you can explain most of this conflict (other than the large IQ differential) by the fact that once the papers are signed, sales guy gets his bonus, whereas you're on the hook for the lifetime of the contract. A screw up from your end could come back to bite you again and again and again.
That's certainly a huge part of it. We have a dual role of enabling sales and also serving as a gatekeeper. Sales guys hate the gatekeeper function. Their original proposal would have required us to defer some of the revenue until several years after the contract ended--but what do they care? They get compensated on gross invoice, after all. This guy is going to make a multiple of my salary off of this deal, while my reward is to move on to the next sales guy.
Mmmm...Sales people. Actually once I trained the sales people at my last job a little, they didn't sell things that didn't exist. Or they would come and ask, "Can you actually make this?" (Also, our sales people didn't get paid til the end of a project, and they had to interface between me and the client til the end. So I think that kept 'em more in line.)
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