This tidbit from AARP (no, it’s not just for retired persons anymore) recently caught my eye:
“Moving on to something new is the new normal. In an AARP report, about two-thirds of workers 51 and older who changed jobs ended up moving to different occupations entirely. Which may sound stressful until you actually do it and find that you have an exciting new career underway.”
No arguments about that from us here at Sales Xceleration. We see it happen all the time as accomplished sales leaders and sales management professionals make the jump to become a sales consultant. In the process, they use their sales leadership experience and wisdom to help businesses find their footing and grow.
What might be a less obvious notion, however, is the potential impact such a move can have on your health and your quality of life. The tip above is from an AARP article titled, “Your Guide to a Healthier, Happier, Longer Life”. The article, in fact, presents “99 ways to add healthy years to your life”. Other tips focused on healthy eating, exercise, relationships, environment, etc. Those might seem obvious for the topic…but changing jobs? Can this truly be a way of adding quality of life to your years that can also add years to your life? We’re not doctors, of course, but we think an argument can be made that making a career move into sales consulting can be a healthy decision. Here’s why:
Living with Purpose
I’ve noted before that, as sales professionals, we typically move through our careers by first taking a sales position to satisfy primal needs such as food, water, and shelter. From there we advance to more sophisticated needs of financial and career security. And that is where many sales executives stay. Nothing wrong with that IF these truly fulfill your life in sales and career goals. Oftentimes, however, even when you are surrounded by the symbols of success – big house, nice car, kids doing well in college – a creeping discontent sets in.
We want still more. We want to know that we matter. We want to live and work with purpose! This is a theme I explored in detail in my book, Beyond the Mountaintop: Observations on Selling, Living and Achieving, in the context of climbing Mount Kilimanjaro at age 50. For me, taking on such a challenge and stepping outside my comfort zone (in this case, 19,341 feet outside my comfort zone) was less risky than living with the regret of not having tried.
It was that same sense of passionately pursuing purpose when Chad Meyer and I founded Sales Xceleration. We felt the tug of knowing that not only could we help business owners succeed, but that we could help the helpers, too. We could make it easier for sales management consultants to live more fulfilling lives with more time for family and less stress than they commonly experienced in the corporate world. We could help them fulfill their purpose. And in the process, we could help them move from success to significance.
Serving Others
Another profound concept I cover in the book is something our dozens of licensed Sales Xceleration Advisors also have in common: the desire to be a “servant leader”. Taking this approach – leading by serving others and helping smaller companies survive and thrive – provides a deeply profound sense of purpose and satisfaction. Nothing makes it easier to get up in the morning than knowing you are going to make a difference in the lives of others that day – simply by sharing your professional sales expertise and wisdom.
And the pride and satisfaction you feel from accomplishing that, day in and day out, is surely a healthier state than frustration, disappointment and stress.
Bottom Line:
A career as a sales management consultant can be financially rewarding. It can empower you to work and live with a sense of purpose. It can help you help others as you serve businesses with fractional-time outsourced sales leadership. And if you follow the cue of that AARP article, “moving on to something new” could even be one factor in leading a “healthier, happier, longer life.” So, if you are feeling the frustration of a stalled or unfulfilling professional sales management career and you yearn for something more, click here, or contact us at 844.874.7253.
