The talking machine world (Jan-June 1922)

February 15, 1922 THE TALKING MACHINE WORLD 15 \\\m The Importance of Proper Executive Supervision in the Developing of Salesmanship 1IHUII1IPIIIIIIIIIIIIIII1 At the close of an old year or the opening of a new one, business men often are to be found in a teachable mood. They realize the many sins of commission and of omission which have been justly laid to their charge during the twelve months gone by, and they are ready in most cases to think about reform. Here, then, is something to be thought about by 'gentlemen who are in such a chastened and generally admirable mood, following inventory. "Pep" and Practice There has been an enormous amount of writing, speaking and thinking about "salesmanship" during the last year, especially since business has been depressed. At the beginning of 1921 the grand cry was "More Pep." All would be well, it was freely said, if only the salesmen would buck up and fight harder. For a month or two, words of this sort managed to soothe or to encourage. Doubtless they had their value, but they did not last very long. It was soon found that salesmen were working as hard as they thought themselves capable of working, and were decidedly impatient of schemes for making them work harder, especially when very little difference appeared after all. It soon became evident that what was wanted was less noise and more thought. But since thinking is to most persons a very painful process, we shall here try to do some of it for the benefit of those who do not care to make the attempt for themselves. Our text is especially directed, not towards salesmen, but towards their bosses. Words and Things And what we would say is this: Salesmanship is a nice word which, like charity, covereth a multitude of sins. But unhappily there appears to be an incurable tendency on the part of the human mind to confuse words with things and to suppose that, because a given word is convenient, expressive and in common use, it necessarily corresponds with some tangible concept. Now of course this is all wrong. We have come, to take our present example concretely, to group certain widely scattered notions about thoughts, processes and activities directed along certain lines under a classification, to which we have applied a word as a name. We have applied in this case the word "Salesmanship." Having done this, we sup pose that we have erected a sort of geomancy around our selling activities and that it is only necessary to master some incantations called "rules of salesmanship" to find ourselves in the seller's heaven, where overhead does not exist, prices are always high, costs always low, and cash the invariable rule. As a matter of fact, nevertheless, no one has ever yet attained to this state of commercial bliss by mastering any "rules of salesmanship," simply because that sort of work cannot be reduced to rules. Salesmanship in the concrete is a matter of hard work, honesty, knowing the | It Frequently Happens | | That Faulty Executive ■ jj Guidance Is Respon jj ■ sible for Disappoint ■ M ing Sales Results ■ jjiilllllliiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii goods and obtaining the confidence of the buyers. If a salesman can obtain the buyer's confidence, by knowing his goods and talking honestly about them, then, barring any personal defects of a specially intractable kind, he is a good salesman and can sell talking machines, records, or other goods if anyone can. The Basic Factor But who is to see that salesmen work hard, talk honestly and know the goods? When all the rules have been digested, all the courses assimilated, all the conferences held, the final fact remains that hard work, by an honest man who knows his goods and can gain the buyer's confidence, is the basic factor in the entire progress. And how can the salesman be led to work hard, to be honest, to study'and know his goods, and to work to obtain the confidence of the buyer, if the executive, the man at the head, the boss himself, does not first set a good illillllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll example, and then make it his personal business to see that the same is followed by his subordinates? Bringing It Home This is bringing it home, indeed, and we intend just that. The fact is, as anyone can see for himself by personal investigation, that as a business grows there is more and more a tendency towards opening a gap between the heads and the manufacturing, accounting and sales forces. Of course, as a business increases in magnitude, the executive must be charged less and less with details. He .must have more time to think, to plan, to consider the application of the principles (if he has any) on which the business is conducted. But the selling of his goods is the aim and end of his business. It is for that his business was organized in the first place. It is for that the goods are manufactured. It is for that the elaborate departments of accounting, credits and collections are organized and sustained. In a word, the blood of the business is derived from its sales department. Accordingly, the duty of the executive is especially to nourish and sustain that department. The details of the accounting, of the credits and (in a healthy business) of the production, are rightly left to the work of the various minor executives charged with those departments; but no president ought to leave to a sales manager the direction of sales policy. That is an axiom. The Personal Touch The executive who has got into the habit of imagining that he can safely neglect his sales department, to any degree whatsoever, is almost sure to find himself imagining also (if and when he can be brought to an analytical state of mind) that if his salesmen only understand "salesmanship" better all will be well. But this is to rest one's confidence on a fallacy. In order to apply the rules of any system of salesmanship to one's own business, one must be ready as well as able to give one's time and attention personally to training, encouraging, directing the sales work. Here, though nowhere else, the president of a large corporation can best be his own departmental manager. It is necessary to success. (Continued on page 18) TELEPHONE NUMBER FITZROY 3271—3272—3273 PES. W.S.PATOFF " Hitch Your Wagon to a Star" was a suggestion we gave some time ago to the Victor retailers. We believe that the Victor retailer that put all his energy, capital, space and advertising into featuring Victor merchandise during the past year was well repaid. We prophesy that the wisdom of this maxim will be more and more apparent as the year progresses. ORMES, Inc. Wholesale Exclusively 15 West 37th Street New York