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THE 100% SWISS STORY

The best part of it (working in tele sales), is that, some clients will blow your mind with their strange stories and strange logic.

By Annaelle ArtsyPublished 3 years ago 5 min read
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THE 100% SWISS STORY
Photo by Mateus Campos Felipe on Unsplash

I used to work a lot in Telesales.

The best part of it (working in tele sales), is that, some clients will blow your mind with their strange stories and strange logic. I, on behalf of my company’s name, offer to different businesses across Europe, packaging solutions.

One day, I called a Swiss company that makes chocolate. The manager that I was talking to, from the very beginning, kept on arguing on why they do not need new suppliers or, in short, why he is frustrated with my disturbing phone call and he kept on having what I like to call a “prepared sweet saying NO answer”. Destiny made it such way, that previously with one day, I had read a serious information about our minds. That it is flat, in the sense, that when we are asked certain questions, to which we do not know the answers, we create the answers, we manipulate certain bits of information gathered in time, stuff that we recall, and based on this amalgam of non-sense, we create a logical answer to offer. The trick is that we believe it is true, even though it isn’t. We have a memory and we probe with what we see and we get a mismatch. Then, our minds try to overcome the limitations, by creating a sense in the mismatch, by adding something up, by making it up to have a sense.

The mind is an improviser. It’s faced with a problem and it figures out a solution. It is not actually looking inside itself. It’s cooking up a reason, an answer, it improvises. Having had that in mind, I asked my client a question that annoyed him so much that he ended up the conversation with a visible heard irritation in his voice, as if, he got caught.

What happened? His first reason to make me hung up the phone, was that they work with suppliers that are very close to them as it is good for having the packaging quickly made. I took the time to ask him what is their production time, and he replied something between 6 and 8 weeks. Then, I said:

-We can manufacture your packaging in 3 weeks (for the first order) and in 2 weeks (for repeat orders) and we have a one-week delivery time. You can have it faster than your current supplier and with no obligations to buy a certain amount of packaging, as most packaging companies do

-No, no, you see… We want to work with local suppliers, we have good relationships and we have been doing business for a long time, you know? my client mumbled

-We have very good relationships with our clients too, and would like to be long term with you also.

Then, he interrupted my “sale speech” and stated very proud of himself, as if this is the ultimate characteristic that my company could not offer him.

-We only work with Swiss suppliers. We have the ingredients and materials for packaging, everything from Swiss companies. We want the product to be totally Swiss, I mean 100% Swiss, because we have standards.

And I started my quest to find that “logical” answer he was going to offer to me. I asked him in a certain naïve way, very curious and as if, I did not understand:

-But the Swiss suppliers for ingredients … I mean, they cannot produce cocoa in Switzerland. They buy the ingredients from Switzerland, all the ingredients, and materials?

The thing is, that he did not see it coming, because, he was focused on saying NO to me.

-No, no, of course not, they buy it from all over the world, from where they get the best prices, as you think you are offering me now, you see, they buy from the best parts of the world for the best ingredients.

-Ok, so you buy the ingredients and probably the materials from packaging from all over the world?

-Yes, well not us personally, our suppliers, of course, and we only work with these Swiss suppliers, I told you.

-But then it is not 100% Swiss chocolate, as you want it to appear for people or for your distributors.

-So, that is our supplier’s thing, we have a standard to work with Swiss companies and make it 100% Swiss, he answered to me quite irritated that I dared to say that.

-But that it is not 100% Swiss! I replied smiling.

-Well, miss … he was trying to mumble something. And

HE HUNG ME UP. OBVIOUSLY.

A lot of the pictures we have in mind is not a perfect picture of what we actually see. We construct a lot on what we see, we are putting up together information to make it logic, to overcome the limitations we encounter in our way. My client had seen me as a limitation, as an obstacle to his perfect ending day probably. His mind wanted out, I wanted to keep him in with job matters. He would not listen, so his mind was doing everything that it could to deny everything and help him get out. It became logical to him to explain his reasons, as if it was clear that I do not represent a Swiss company, so I will leave the spot. And I didn’t. Instead, I told him through my questions, that his reasoning is twisted and I implied to him, it is a stupid thing to say No.

I am wondering how many times, haven’t we invented reasons, logical answers to different situations life put us, and we answered the same way: denial, NO, hung up, shut the door. How many times had we reasoned ourselves about our jobs? About our paths? About our 100% story.

It makes me wonder about the many 100%, that it appears in different areas of our lives, how much of it is really what it is told to be?

How much of your 100% is committed, is loyal, is creative, is serious, is everything else that we state about ourselves? And if it is not 100%, what is the rest of it made of?

What is it that you are 100% and what is it that you are not? Do you think it impacts in any way, your present life, or had impacted you so far, to get to where you are or where you want to go?

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About the Creator

Annaelle Artsy

Me, myself & I

Slow living in the reading

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