Sellers often face obstacles in their sales process, and the need to remove them is sometimes referred to as the need to “Shoot the donkey.” Will Batista has worked on several presidential campaigns and other political campaigns throughout the country. He recently led a state ballot initiative to change Nevada’s constitution and now he is now working in the energy sector, particularly in the communications and investor relations of the company. Jonathan Diaz works in the university setting where he serves as an adviser and he also teaches classes. Shoot the donkey This phrase originates from an article that Will discovered while he was looking at political media companies. Shooting the donkey means removing obstacles in your course. In the movie Patton, based on true events, the characters were heading up a mountain but there was a donkey in the way. Failure to get the donkey out of the way would put them in a dire situation resulting in casualties, so they sent out some of the guys to move the donkey. Nothing worked so the general said, ‘Shoot the donkey!’ Sometimes we have to remove obstacles in our way by whatever means necessary, especially in the sales industry, where you eat or you don’t eat based on the sales you make. #ShootTheDonkey Remove the obstacles When we were in college, our obstacles were our beliefs. We didn’t believe in ourselves as much as we should have. There are times that we don’t give ourselves credit when we should. This is true in sales as well. You might not trust your sales ability and you keep telling yourself that you’re no good at it. This idea is difficult to overcome but it’s imperative that you get through it because it’s the only way for you to become successful. For example, back in college when we were selling water, the first obstacle that we had was that we spent a lot of money to get a booth and to get all the water. In order to do that business at a bigger scale, we needed more people, so we went to Idaho Falls and that’s when we did a better job. The third time, we ran out of water and we could have given up, but we didn’t. Will went to Sam’s club and got ice and made it happen. We succeeded on a small scale. We didn’t make hundreds and thousands of dollars but it was proof that when you put a desire into action, you can make it happen. Fear of obstacles Sometimes we fear obstacles and see them as a negative thing because they do have a negative impact at that moment. There is, however, an opportunity for growth and change in every obstacle, and the ability to tackle problems in a different way. It is a great time for a change and to challenge your ability to think differently. The water selling was very basic but year after year, we saw that we’re not doing so great and that became an opportunity to improve the process. Obstacles are typically not good things, but they are opportunities for us to grow and to think critically so that when we are faced with another problem in the future, we will be able to overcome the challenge. In politics A lot of times when you are trying to get something done, there are always goals that you need to meet. Will was thrown into the fire in his first year working as field staff in Reno because he had no experience recruiting volunteers or meeting metrics. He had to learn the ropes quickly and the obstacles he faced were the goals that were being imposed on him. He had to find ways to meet the goals regardless of whether he had volunteers or not. Will needed to get into these gated communities but he couldn’t get in. Sometimes, they’d follow another car and find a way to get to...

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