Puppy Sales

After years of talking about it, my Wife and I got a puppy. We knew we would really like one, but we just didn’t have the time to spend with one. Both of us working outside of the house, it just wouldn’t be fair, for any of us. Now that I am working at home and my wife has some work at home flexibility, it seemed the perfect time.

We had been Puppy sitting for a friend and the experience was all we needed to get pushed over the edge. We both have had dogs before so we had our likes and dislikes. We knew more what we didn’t want than what we did want.

I saw some pictures of some puppies on a rescue site that seemed like good candidates for us. We went to take a look with the expectation that we wouldn’t find one that we could agree on, we were wrong. You can see Ben’s Blog here.

As I was trying to get Ben to sleep last night my thoughts turned to new sales people. How many of you treat a salesperson like a new puppy?

Do you make time for him?

Do you set firm boundaries?

Do you set a schedule?

Do you have checkups?

My guess is you don’t. You hire your new “puppy” based on pedigree alone, looking at their resume. You show them where the old used toys are, (software, hardware, etc.) your last dog used. You have no time to spend with them and get upset when they whine to get attention. You give them the run of the house and can’t believe they aren’t housebroken and makes messes you have to cleanup.

Just as this is unreasonable with a new puppy, it is unreasonable with a new salesperson. Just like the checklist you use to make sure you do everything for your new puppy, you need a checklist for what you need to do with your new salesperson.

If you want them to grow up happy and healthy, you have to start them out right as a pup.