Engineers usually don’t understand sales. They see a sales person as a wizard. The concept of sales for an engineer is mathematical: you show a number to one person and this person will automatically decide to buy because the number you show is the demonstration that the object (or service) you are selling is the only solution for the need he or she has.
As you may know this is not sales in the 99% of the cases because a sales person (a good one) simply make you to take the decision to buy. He manipulates you to take this decision, no matter if it is sustainable or right for you. The only thing that matter is that he closes the deal.
This is because a sales person work hard to influence what Nobel Memorial Prize winner in Economics Daniel Kahneman defines “System 1″ that is (in a very simplistic definition) the fast, instinctive and emotional method of thinking and of making decision (1). Despite we think that we are taking decision, especially business decisions, based on analysis and logic conjectures, Kahneman demonstrated how the majority of us, including statisticians, make decisions based on instinctive impulses, so the “System 1″. That is the reason why a good sales person simply focus on the “feeling” of the other negotiator trying to lead him to the closure of the deal. And this is also the reason why an engineer is probably not a good sales person. An engineer, indeed, is trained to solve complex problem in which he has to evaluate all the variables in places and find a unique numerically perfect solution or a list of possible scenarios. He is focused on the wider analysis of the problem, completely freeze his “System 1″trying to not being influenced by any instinctive impulse and activate his “System 2″ that is (in a very simplistic definition) the slower, more deliberative, and more logical method of thinking. He is so concentrated in refusing any emotional influence that he can hardly create an emotional link with the other negotiator that, as a consequence, will probably start evaluating all variables and will postpone the choice or refuse the deal.
But what seems to be a weakness in the sales process is a strength in managing sales teams. A good sales person is so trained to use and manipulate the System 1 that he becomes slave of it. The instinctive and emotional way of thinking and making decision becomes the only way he get used to think and approach with all matters. A sales person that becomes a sales manager risks to adopt in the activity of managing people the same approach he used to close deals. He could reach good results (maybe very good results) in the short term, since he is able to convince the team to do what he asks but it is not enough. Managing a sales team requires a strong and stable long term strategy, based on facts and numbers that will allow the manager to be a landmark for the sales team that is daily fighting with clients on an emotional battlefield. Being a manager of a sales team is one of the most difficult managing job since you are dealing all the time with people that try to convince you that they are doing well and better that the other despite any numerical results you could bring… and, if they are good sales, they probably are very good at it! That is why the sales manager need to “freeze”the System 1 and to activate the “System 2″. As you maybe already understood here is where the engineer step in as the perfect sales manager.
(1) Daniel Kahneman defines in his 2011 masterpiece “Fast and Slow Thinking” two modes of thought : System 1 is fast, instinctive and emotional; System 2 is slower, more deliberative, and more logical. The book delineates cognitive biases associated with each type of thinking, starting with Kahneman’s own research on loss aversion. From framing choices to substitution, the book highlights several decades of academic research to suggest that people place too much confidence in human judgment.