So your are an engineer wondering why “selling” is important to me or my team? After all, you’re thinking, engineering is about architectures, designs, solving problems, building it better, and supporting your solutions. You are correct in your logic and reason, but there is one simple catch – you need to sell your plans, ideas, designs, and solutions, to management (purse strings), in order for their benefits to be reaped. Therefore, sales training for engineers is an essential enabler that allows you to achieve your engineering and personal advancement goals.
Having spent the first 13 years or so in various engineering positions, ranging from software development to systems engineering, it is easy for an engineer to neglect the business side of the job. Why, because many times it is viewed as a waste of time and non essential to completing the task at hand. But, in retrospect, the primary reason that most engineering projects receive approval and funding is that someone sold it internally – i.e., they justified the operational and capital budgets required to senior management.
Again, sales training for engineers should be viewed as an essential educational component to all engineering careers. After all it will always be about generating enough profits to sustain and grow the company.