Try this! Another important objective of your initial training and development will be to quickly build proficiency with the skills associated with each step of the sales cycle. With your trainer's or agent's coaching and supervision, you will:

• Understand what skills or activities are to be performed - and see them performed the right way. You can do that by reading about them in this unit and other training materials, through skills-development audio or video programs, or through live role-play demonstrations.
• Practice the skills in a non-threatening, "coaching" environment where mistakes don't count. Videotaped role-plays are ideal learning tools, since you can play the tape back and critique your own performance.
• Perform them under supervision in the field, with real prospects, and with real payoffs. After each sales call, you and your trainer or manager should do a "curbside critique" to determine what you did right, and what you could do better next time.

Your sales training/development should first be conducted in a simulated sales environment. You'll quickly understand that selling is not a series of canned problems with a limited range of responses, but a human encounter where relationships are critical, where the unexpected always happens, and where flexibility, listening, and asking questions are key.