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Once there was a very successful sales person.He felt more than successful. He felt prosperous!He enjoyed peace of mind, financial independence, security, good health, and an enjoyable social life. He had the respect and admiration of all who knew him.

Many people wanted to do business with him. And even more people wanted him as a friend.However, he hadn't always been so successful.

He could remember the many years when he tried harder but did no better than most people. Now he was glad that he knew what he knew. And, more important, that he put it to use.

The man smiled as he thought about how easily he had finally learned to prosper.

He realized early in life that almost everyone who succeeded was really an effective sales person, whether he or she realized it or not.

"Successful business people," he observed, "sell others on the value of their services. Successful parents sell their children on leading happy and productive lives. Successful leaders sell their abilities to bring people what they want. Even successful scientists sell their ideas to those who provide the research funds which enable them to do their work."

The man remembered thinking when he was still in college, "Perhaps if I can learn to sell well, then I will do well in whatever I undertake."

And so the man had tried his hand at different sales jobs while he was still in school.,

The few times he succeeded, it was exhilarating. He thought, "It's like they're buying me!" However, when he tried to sell but failed, he felt rejected. He told himself, "I'm just not cut out to sell."

After he graduated with a degree in marketing,he realized he had learned very little about sales.

Marketing, he learned, was about doing research to learn what people wanted, creating the products and services that people wanted, pricing them competitively, and then making it easy for people to buy.

But marketing and sales sometimes seemed at odds.

In his first real sales job for a major firm, he learned about the importance, of product knowledge and about how to "pitch it to the prospects"-- to getappointments, to answer objections, and to close a sale.

But the more he was involved in sales, the more he got the impression that the underlying presumption was that the customer did not want to buy the product.

It was as though a sales person's job was to be smart enough and tough enough to get people to do what they didn't really want to do-to buy. And the, best salesmen, it seemed, found a way to do it.

It didn't make sense to him.

For a while he enjoyed the challenge. The tougher it got, the more he called on his selfdiscipline and persistence. He forced himself, for instance, to go out and make one more call each day than he really wanted to. It added up: He made over two hundred more sales calls each year. And it had paid off. He made more sales than most. And more money.

So he decided to add another one hundred calls a year. But a strange thing occurred. His sales did not increase much. And he wasn't having fun. He pushed himself even harder. And then he began to feel the stress.

It came from many sources. He had to close so many sales each month-his quota. And it was easy to measure his performance. At times, he wished that he had a job like other folks where it wasn't so easy to tell how well or how poorly -- he was doing.

Often he wasn't treated well by the people he called on. Many acted as if he were out to get them.

He felt there was too much to do and too little time to do it in. Sometimes he felt unprepared.

He had great expectations for his increasing income, but he had doubts sometimes about making it.

Ironically, he knew that if his sales manager didn't put the pressure on him, he would put it on himself.

Selling was going to become more enjoyable soon, but the man did not know it yet.

Like other sales people, the man often felt the quiet fear of rejection. Some people would inevitably turn him down. He did not look forward to such times.

To make matters worse, as much as he wanted to deny it, he saw how increasingly complicated the selling process seemed to be in today's changing world. He had been repeating the same words that had given him his sales for years. Why weren't they working now?

Then he remembered an unusual story.

From time to time, he had heard the name of a legendary salesman-one who made more sales than anyone else and yet apparently had more leisure time than most people to enjoy his extraordinary success.

Someone said he was called The One minute Salesman-although the man did not know why.

The man thought there must be a better way -- a way to restore the sense of fun and success in selling he occasionally had.

So he decided to be bold enough to find out for himself. He decided to ask.

The voice at the other end of the telephone took him by surprise. The wealthy and respected "salesman" he'd expected turned out to be the chairman of the board of a major corporation.

"I would be very happy to meet with you," said the CEO, "and from the tone of your voice I think I know just what you'd like to talk about."

The caller felt a little naked. "Do I sound that desperate?"

"No," replied the CEO. "You sound like a man who has taken the traditional approach to selling about as far as it can go."

"I'm not the first, I take it?"

"That's right. And, like others before you, you sound like you're open and ready to learn. That's why I've agreed to meet with you. Drop by anytime tomorrow."