Years ago, my very good friend Duane Stroman, Ph.D. wrote a book titled The Quick Knife: Unnecessary Surgery USA. Duane, a professor of sociology at Juniata College, matched neighboring counties on key demographics, like socioeconomic status, and found that elective surgeries varied significantly. They could be traced to surgeons’ wallets more closely than patient needs. I recall a surgeon in one of Duane’s presentations announcing that he planned to retaliate with a book he would title unnecessary sociology.

I was reminded of that sentiment when I stumbled upon a book at one of those roadside libraries titled The One Minute Sales Person by Spencer Johnson, M,D. As someone who has done sales training and consulting for decades, I thought I would counter with The One Minute Medical Doctor. After all, what could an M.D. know about selling?

With great skepticism, I picked up the book. I have to admit it is not too bad with its focus on finding solutions for the prospective buyer. The process begins with good questions and listening. We all know that a good M.D. would never prescribe without first diagnosing.

It turns out that the book was co-authored by Larry Wilson, the founder of Wilson Learning. Several times we offered SST: Successful Selling to Type, following Wilson’s Counselor Salesperson. Both are anchored in the principles of salespeople acting like counselors and follow the steps of 1 asking good questions, 2 listening actively; and 3 helping clients choose solutions. What SST adds is customizing solutions to the personality preferences of the buyer.

Wilson’s name appears in much smaller font than Johnson’s on the cover because I believe the publisher was banking on Johnson’s name recognition as co-author of The One Minute Manager. My guess is that Wilson wrote the chapters on selling and Johnson rehashed the material from his first book for the chapters on sales management.

Of course, if you are looking for books on selling, I would refer you to mine: SST: Successful Selling to Type and Rainmaker Closers and Other Sales Myths.

If The One Minute Sales Person was the shortest book I read this summer Mark Twain by Ron Chernow was the longest. The former comes in at just over 100 pages, while the latter is more than ten times longer.

While Twain was a brilliant humorist and author, his understanding of business and selling that accompanies it was, at best, short-sighted. Chernow’s intended audience had to be other historians because casual readers like myself are forced to wade through chapters we could never care about. For example, there is one on the death of Twain’s cat. The reward was always a funny Twain quip.
In Twain’s own words: “I am a pretty versatile fool when it comes to contracts and business and such things.” (p.957)