Technical or Business Focused? Which is Best?

Credit: Bill Gillespie

I think it’s safe to suggest that if you’ve raised kids you’ve enjoyed surprises. If you’ve had more than one they’ve been different. What you think you’ve learned from one can be almost useless with the other. Personally, I don’t know how anyone survives more than two. Those people are built differently.

I have two. My daughter, Tiffany, is a CMO for a company in Utah. She’s logical, sensitive, sees the big picture and knows how to work. I always say, “if you’re having a conversation with Tiffany it’s going better for her than it is you no matter how it might seem.”

My son, Jason, is very different. He is without a doubt the nicest person on the planet. He’s generous, compassionate and deceptively smart. He’s also one of those people that has to know how everything works. I don’t believe he ever received a gift that he didn’t disassemble. Our house was always full of parts and pieces of…stuff. There were also countless stories of generosity and kindness.

The photo with this article is Jason and yours truly. I came home (not in my pajamas) to find his jeep pulled apart. He removed the dash (ignore the jeep seat we’re sitting on) and disconnected every single wire. He purchased a retro dashboard, planned to install it and reconnect everything. He had a wiring diagram on his laptop and a TRILLION WIRES to sort out. It was not plug and play.

I’m no help when it comes to technical tasks so I lend encouragement. That’s what I’m doing in this photo. My assistance gave me an opportunity to enjoy a cigar too.

So why am I sharing this? What do my kids and their contrasting nature have to do with print?

I’m sharing because everyone is different. I managed people for most of my career. No two were the same. No two reps saw the same opportunity the same way. No two went about solving problems the same. No two managed prospecting, price, problems or collections the same.

Is one type better than another?

A year or two back I found myself in counsel with a small printer. He was trying to locate and hire salesreps. Specifically, he wanted people that were technical. He didn’t want to teach them the business. He wanted them to arrive with printing skills ready to go.

I cautioned him. I encouraged him to consider candidates that understood the business side of things. I offered that hiring from the ranks of his prospects had benefits. He was unmoved.

I went to LinkedIn and ran a survey. I asked followers what they preferred. Response was tepid so my audience sample was too small to argue either way. It did, however, point to my conclusions below.

Undaunted, I turned to my files. It won’t surprise any of my former employers that I’m a packrat. I have copies of memos dating back to 1975. I have most of the reports I prepared and virtually every presentation. It’s an illness, I’m sure.

So, I looked at my own data. This is what the data show:

Technology Focused Reps:

• Tend to be more transaction driven
• Do not sell as high into enterprise accounts
• Top line sales tend to fluctuate more dramatically
• Margins tend to be lower (price concessions)
• Earnings are lower (27%) than business focused reps
• Higher account turnover (average 36 months)

Business Objective Focused Reps:

• Enjoy higher prices
• Less transaction focused
• Sell more complex solutions (sticky biz)
• Longer account longevity (average 77 months)
• Sell upstream (deeper account penetration)
• Sell more (19% higher year over year numbers)
• Higher personal earnings

Sample Size:

• 126 reps
• 9 Printing companies
• Smallest firm $8,000,000
• Largest firm $70,000,000
• Time frame – 47 years

Footnote: The most successful reps, in my experience, understood technology from the perspective of its benefit to clients and were not focused on the step-by-step functions.

These are cumulative sales records collected over an extended period of time. Many of the selling paradigms that existed when these numbers were earned are different today. Please trust your own experience and confidence. Accounts (selling situations) deserve different solutions.

Back to my son, Jason. Would you believe he got that Jeep put back together? He took it with him to Utah. Later, he brought it back to Georgia.

Our brains aren’t chooseable. They’re different for a reason. Each one solves a different problem. Jason is who I always go to when I’m trying to make something work. He’s a magician.

Jason is also who Tiffany turns to for getting things printed. Jason makes sense out of billions of data bits and turns it all into actionable info. He works with the printer and makes sure promises are honored no matter how difficult they might be to keep.

Celebrate the different types in your organization.