Selling with the Exe’s

Selling is an important part of any business. Doesn’t matter if it is a product, service or even a meagre idea, if you know how to sell it then the job is done and if not then.  .  .  .  .  . [You know what I mean]

Selling as far as I can infer, is an art, which not everyone can do and only a few excel at it. At times something totally useless and pointless can spell wonders if the person is able to sell it [like Om Shanti Om. Need not to say what kind of movie it was, but still it sold like hot cake]. On the other hand more often than not something very useful and rare is a major flop because it was not sold properly. But unlike my two earlier posts which were related to management [looks like this whole MBA stuff is starting to affect me] this one is not about any management principal or funda [atleast this the initial plan].

Well as told earlier our orientation program was very long and lasted for almost 4 or 5 days. During the orientation we heard some very inspirational speeches, some very educative talks, some very words of wisdom and mostly stuff which didn’t made any sense [may be because everything continued so long that our brains became numb or may be it was actually pointless]. Frankly speaking if I had an option of running from there in the middle then after entering at 9:00 I would have been out by 10:00, but fortunately or unfortunately my means of transportation, a cab was available in the evening only [due to some stupid reasons].

As part of the speaking spree, in which almost everyone, whom college can lay their hands on, spoke, a session was addressed by few alumni. This session was supposed to be one of the most important one. These were the people who had already gone through the entire process of being transformed into managers. So nobody wanted to miss it. And hence the strength of the batch present there was actually appreciable. One by one these people came and spoke. They told us the same motivational stories which one can find in ‘n’ number of inspirational books available in the market or on net. They gave us the same pieces of advice which we have been receiving for the past 4 days, as a matter of fact for our entire life [you know parents, relatives, teachers, neighbours everyone who is older to you is more than game for giving advice. Remember that Reliance mobile ‘India mein mufat ki advice bahut milti hai’ campaign].

The business school had great plans for the orientation program. They had actually worked hard towards making an image of the college during these 4-5 days. But after the 1^st day the attendance continuously kept on declining. All the speakers had some different story to tell [although most of the story was same] and they were not any other guy from just around the corner organization. Still the session with the alumni stole the show. It was not because they had something extraordinary to offer, but just because it was with the exe’s.

The point which I am trying to make here is simple; exe’s make a strong statement. The college knew about it and they actually planned on selling with the exes. To tell you the truth these are the biggest brand ambassadors any college or even an organization has got and exe’s do sells [looks like the initial plan didn’t materialised].