I'm re-reading some classics and stumbled on The Little Prince. It's usually treated as a book for little kids but it hits way harder when you're an adult.
There's something really gentle and kind in the way the author (whose name I can never remember) describes adults. Adults like you - and like me.
You'd expect him to mock them. These grown ups obsessed with numbers and ties and authority. The businessman counting stars, the king giving orders to no one, the lamplighter following senseless rules.
But he doesn't.
Instead, he shows us how they got there. How life squeezed the imagination out of them one obligation at a time. How they ended up doing things that make no sense because they forgot how to question them.
I had a call with a potential client a while ago. He kept asking about ROI and how soon he could expect to start making sales and metrics. All the "grown up" questions that completely miss the point of what I was trying to offer.
My first instinct was to get frustrated. To explain that he's looking at it all wrong.
But then I remembered the little prince. How he didn't judge the grown ups. How he just wanted to understand them.
So I leaned in. Asked more questions. Found out he hired a consultant before that don't work out. Lost a bunch of money. Now he's trying to be more careful, more thorough.
He's not being difficult. He's being scared.
Just like those adults in the book aren't being silly. They're lost.
As the LinkedIn meme goes, the little prince taught me something about sales that no business book ever could. You don't have to agree with your customers' perspective to understand where it comes from.
And once you truly understand it, selling becomes a different game altogether.
It becomes a way to help them find their way back home.