Written by: Shivanandan Pare
About the author: Harvard Business School Alumni | Entrepreneur | E-commerce | Consumer Internet | Corporate Strategy
We all are going through an unprecedent crisis there is no doubt about it and this one is going to stay here for a while. This crisis will also change a lot of things and ensure that most of the things are not going to be the same anymore.
The good part is that such crisis comes once or twice in 100 years, the best part is we may most likely not be facing this again in our life time.
As students our strengths are age, energy and being connected. That’s what we need to harp upon during these uncertain times. If you look at these three pillars individually and merge them together you would realize ways to not just navigate these times but also come out successful.
AGE: You are at that age were experimenting comes naturally and is still intact. Instinctively you would like to explore the lesser taken road to a destination. This gives all of you a great advantage when it comes to embracing new ways of doing things.
Energy: This one helps you to be at it (read experimenting) for a longer period and won’t let you drop things just because you took one wrong turn. You are used to going wrong, correcting the same quickly and getting back to exploration. In most cases this energy translates to positive outlook about future.
Connected: Every one of you belong to what I call the connected generation. Your ability to connect to people on activity or interests without really meeting them physically is far higher than say a 35+ age bracket individual.
Now let’s look at these three core attributes and see how you can apply them in pursuing a career in marketing & sales during these changing times. World is going to go digital and touchless interactions.
Sales is a function where you convert an interaction into commercial value. Marketing enables you to move the sales conversation towards an intangible attribute which the consumer values more than the functional performance of the product.
Now to deliver on sales and marketing in these changed times Age helps you to experiment and innovate, energy helps you in continuously experimenting despite of any initial setbacks and connected ensures that you are digitally savvy to reach out without physical movement.
Use these to your advantage and I am sure you will be able to come out successful. Would like to take questions and elaborate on all the three pillars with examples.
