Wednesday, August 22, 2007

Meeting friends overseas

TAIPEI - As a regional traveller, we spend more time on the plane and in foreign countries than at home and sometimes it is great to meet your Singaporean comrades in these foreign lands. We seldom meet because of our busy travelling schedules and so if we meet in a foreign land is like a roll of a dice chance.

I met David at Taipei and we had been colleagues and now business friends for many years so it was good to catch up with one another. I hired him as my engineer in my previous company but now he is the chief honcho for the Greater China territory based out of Singapore working for another company. He has indeed honed his sales and inter-personally skills over the years.

Selling is an important skill that sadly enough is not taught in school - it is used by everyone that you meet. Taxi driver, Politican, even a doctor and even your child. I have met many taxi drivers - but only few catches my attention and it's because of the X factor, their sales skill - met one in Singapore who wears a cowboy hat (he claims to be the ONLY Singapore cowboy), one had a personality that you immediately want to take his name card. What differentiates one from another? and that is where the X factor comes in.

This can be trained and honed over the years but patience and humility is a requisite in this field.

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