True North. For hundreds of years sailors have relied on the North Star as a celestial compass to guide their ships through the darkest of nights and the roughest of seas. Whatever the conditions, the North Star always showed the way to true north.

The Serving Salesperson also has their own True North—that combination of beliefs, purposes, and values that functions as their own internal compass to guide them on their journey to becoming a Serving Salesperson. True North for a Serving Salesperson is developing and maintaining a steadfast commitment to discovering their customers’ needs, understanding those needs, and then endeavoring to meet those needs to the best of their ability.

A Serving Salesperson does not have a selling strategy; they have a serving strategy. A Serving Salesperson does not make sales calls; they make serving calls. The Serving Salesperson employs an authentic, deliberate, interactive, and consultative approach with their customer throughout the purchase journey to reach a solution that seeks to benefit all the relevant stakeholders. The trust that is created by taking this approach allows the Serving Salesperson to go deeper—deeper in an understanding of their customers’ purchase journey, deeper in an understanding of the customers’ desires and concerns, and deeper in an understanding of what a successful conclusion to the purchase journey looks like.

Their own internal compass guides the Serving Salesperson through the inevitable twists and turns they encounter on the journey to serving their customer. The Serving Salesperson is guided on their journey by understanding and practicing the premises of the Seven Pillars of being a Serving Salesperson:

• Set Serving as Your True North

• Blend Passion and Perseverance

• Sharpen Your EQ

• Grow the Trust Through Human Touch

• Facilitate the Journey

• Practice Brain-Friendly Communication

• Create the Wins.

In the early 2000’s when I was a marketing professor at Butler University, I was having a conversation with the dean of the School of Business who then as well as now is also a dear friend.  Having stared my career in sales and having taught sales for many years, I was discussing with him my idea for a research project. He hesitated, leaned back in his chair, looked me straight in the eye, and said, “You need to do research on how someone becomes a serving salesperson.” While the seed was planted, it took a while to sprout and grow. I did some research off and on for a few years, but there was no concerted effort. 

When I had my first sabbatical a few years later I felt the call to once again begin a more disciplined research effort. I interviewed 33 salespeople who had been identified as ‘Serving Salespeople’ on what behaviors they engaged in to serve their customers. From those interviews, I was able to identify seven ‘practices’ of a Serving Salesperson. With that information, I published a couple of academic journal articles, made a few conference presentations, and even wrote the first draft of my book. However, the book generated no interest from any publishers, so it sat on the shelf for a few years.

The call to do this project was still there as I was nearing retirement from Butler, so in 2019 I resolved to tackle this project once again. I realized that while I had some information from salespeople as to what they did to serve their customers, I needed information from Business-to-Business buyers to gain their perspective on how they felt salespeople could serve them better. I was able to partner with two outstanding research methodologists from Butler and together we conducted an extensive research project to obtain the data we needed. We surveyed salespeople asking what behaviors they undertook to serve their customers and also surveyed B2B buyers to ask what serving behaviors salespeople engaged in to serve them.

After analyzing the data from the B2B buyers we identified the ‘Seven Pillars’ of a Serving Salesperson. I began writing a new draft of my book, combining the information from our research about those ‘Seven Pillars’ with stories that I gathered from the first round of salesperson interviews as well as stories that I had encountered during my 35-plus years of teaching sales, conducting sales training programs, and consulting with companies.  

The result is my book ‘The Serving Salesperson’. The book is a parable that chronicles the journey of a self-absorbed salesperson as he travels along the road to discovering how to evolve into becoming a Serving Salesperson. I hope you find it a worthwhile read as you are engaged in either your sales career or are simply trying to bring another person around to your way of thinking.