Why rely only on rainmakers when you can install a reliable sprinkler system?

Professional service firms such as those involved in the architecture, engineering and construction (A/E/C) industry and companies that sell high-tech systems, will always have more “non-sales” people interacting on a daily basis with their customers than their own formal sales force.These technical staff are often physically located in the client’s location and work closely with users and influencers every single day.

When they do their jobs right, they develop strong relationships, deep credibility, and intimate knowledge of their clients’ goals, their operations and decision processes, and their problems and opportunities and risks, often in advance of anyone else from the outside knowing these things. In fact, some companies even dispense with salespeople and rely entirely on their engineers to serve clients and generate additional  revenue. They have mastered the trick of turning doers into doer-sellers.

Relationships, credibility and knowledge are priceless assets that any salesperson would kill to have, because they are the foundation of stellar sales success. Time after time in my training sessions where the client includes technical staff as part of the sales team in the class, I’ve seen non-sales staff come up with some of the best inside information, insights and ideas to advance the sales strategy or opportunity. The really smart and successful salespeople and business development specialists aren’t too proud to use their technical staff as force multipliers for their own efforts.

Engineers and other technical staff can also be your advance scouts into potential opportunities. Most sales opportunities form long before they are visible to the outside world—the Corporate Executive Board tells us that buyers are about 60 percent of the way through their buying process  before they contact potential suppliers.  These opportunities take shape within daily processes and operations, when things don’t work as well as they should, when things change and companies need to adapt and respond. Anyone who is present while all this is happening has a huge advantage over a salesperson who is only contacted after the client has figured out a lot of what they want.

Yet these valuable assets of relationships, credibility, and knowledge often go untapped and quite frankly, wasted, because the people who have them don’t use them to advance the revenue goals of their employers. How many times do you think your engineers stumble across sales opportunities only to them pick themselves up, dust themselves off, and continue on as if nothing has happened?

Why is this so? There are three main reasons. Engineers either:

• Don’t want to do it because they see it as distasteful. So you have to make selling acceptable.

• Don’t want to do it because they see it as difficult or specialized. So you have to make selling accessible.

• Don’t see the need to do it. So you have to make selling appealing.

Each of these issues is covered in a separate post, starting with making selling acceptable.

Make selling acceptable

The first hurdle to get over is the negative perception of selling that the typical engineer has. If you asked your engineers the following question directly, which do you think they might check? 

What is selling?

• A sleazy activity that tricks people to buy things they don’t want or need.

• Two parties agreeing to exchange resources in order to leave each party better off.

Nothing you do will have much effect until you can reframe their view of selling to something approaching the second option. Very few people will wholeheartedly pursue an activity that contradicts the way they see themselves, regardless of how many carrots or sticks you use. You have to convince them that selling is a perfectly acceptable and even admirable activity. Better yet, you have to help them convince themselves.

I’ve found that the best way to help engineers convince themselves is to get them to think about what engineers do, and then steer that to a discussion about what responsible sales professionals do. When the connections become obvious, you see figurative lightbulbs lighting up around the room.

So, how do most engineers see themselves?

• Engineers solve problems.

• Engineers make the world a better place.

• Engineers are objective, honest and direct.

• Engineers are smart.

How does this self-image jibe with the ideal view of selling?

Engineers solve problems. Solution and consultative selling are both about solving problems for customers. Solution selling solves known problems, and consultative uncovers and addresses hidden problems. Learn how customers do things, find ways to improve them, and make the suggestion—that’s real selling!

Engineers make the world a better place. Selling is about making the world a better place. When two parties agree to exchange resources, it is because each intends to benefit from the transaction. While this is no guarantee that things will work, it’s an honest effort to make things better. As long as the discussion and the transaction are conducted honestly and with good intentions, both sides win, the relationship is strengthened, and the world is a better place. Plus, for those who would rather work on important problems and not trivial ones, trying to sell the solution is the most brutally clear way of finding out its true value.

Engineers are objective, honest, and direct. So are the salespeople who are most successful in the long run. They know that the only way to develop long-term, trust-based relationships is to deliver on their promises, and they can only do this when their promises are based in reality. When they can’t do something, they will tell the client. They may lose business by telling the client that there is a better alternative for them, but then this is business that they probably should not pursue anyway, and they will get other chances. Salespeople who are not afraid to (tactfully) challenge their customers’ view of the world will earn their respect and their attention.

Engineers are smart. This is definitely true for most of the ones I’ve met, but technical brilliance alone won’t make the world beat a path to your door. To paraphrase what Plato said about politics: “Those who refuse to engage in sales are destined to be ruled by those who are dumber.” Besides, the ability to deal with the complexities of personal perception and decision-making, at the pace of human conversation, is not trivial.

About the Author:  Jack Malcolm is a nationally recognized speaker, trainer and sales consultant. He is President of Falcon Performance Group, an organization dedicated to improving the professionalism, preparation, productivity, and effectiveness of sales professionals through training and consulting in sales, influencing, and communication skills. His expertise includes sales, finance and the psychology of personal communication and persuasion.