This article covers some methodologies highly specialized to work in specific situation. Many are so specific that it's a stretch to call them problem solving methodologies, but most are very helpful in their domains.

Human-Centric Problem Solving Methodologies

Have you noticed how few machine/technology repair methodologies take into account the person doing the repair? They consider him or her a robot. They focus exclusively on the system under repair, never on the person doing the repair.

Except for the Universal Troubleshooting Process. The UTP's Step 1 (Get the Attitude) and Step 9 (Take Pride) are inward focused.

Outside of Star Trek and Isaac Asimov novels, I've never met a Troubleshooting robot. What I have met are technicians angered to the point of throwing equipment across the room, and computer managers panicked to the point of paralysis. Frequent failure results from methodologies that doesn't at least consider the person doing the fixing. None of us is a robot, and if we haven't learned to control our emotions, those emotions can wash away all logic.

But the Universal Troubleshooting Process isn't human-centric. Only two of the ten steps are. The majority is procedural. In machine/technology repair, all you need to achieve is the as-designed state and behavior. Contrastingly, many methodologies are almost entirely focused on the person doing the problem solving. I call them human-centric methodologies.

And that's exactly what's needed when the system under repair is the problem solver himself. In such cases, the problem solver is troubleshooting himself, surrounded by an environment for which he has limited control. Personal problems are typically triggered (I didn't say caused, I said triggered) by either changes in the environment around the person, or a "bad break".

Note: Such "self help" can be propagated by trainers training others in these methodologies. They can even be extrapolated to solution by consultants using human-centric principles to fix business problems, but this runs the risk of the "program of the month" label if not done in a way that respects employees' intelligence, time and motivation.

Personal problem solving is complicated by several distinctions:

• It's incredibly difficult for a person to know what he or she wants (identify the solved state).
• By definition it's impossible to retain what the UTP calls "The Attitude", because without panic, fear, depression or anger there wouldn't be a personal problem in the first place.
• There is no clear documentation on how the human mind works, leaving the door open for numerous conflicting philosophies, religions and personalities to declare themselves "the one true way".

Step into the "Self-Help" section of your local bookstore and you'll see no end of human-centric problem solving methodologies. Many are self-serving fluff. Here's how I personally assign grades to human-centric problem solving methodologies:

1. A good methodology doesn't insult the intelligence of the reader.
2. A good methodology doesn't insult the intentions of the reader.
3. A good methodology is easy enough to follow that it will show some results even when tried by a skeptical reader.

Certainly those "believe it will happen, and it will" books insult the reader's intelligence. The intelligent reader knows that lying just under that heart warming story of the Olympic Champion are stories of 100 runners up and also-rans, all with huge beliefs and desires, who didn't make it. Most intelligent readers know that although faith is a necessity, so are hard work, planning, luck and inborn abilities. Most intelligent readers know that sometimes you aim for a goal and never get there. Intelligent readers know that often the true measure of success is recognizing another opportunity as you miss the goal of your dreams.

When it comes to insulting the intentions of the reader (or in this case listener), certainly radio's pop-psychologists corner the market. The listener calls in with a serious and complex problem, and the first thing the radio guy does is paints the listener as weak, stupid and unethical. Yeah, that's real productive!

A problem solving methodology is effective only if followed. It is followed by a reader only if the investment is justified by the expected return. The average reader has been unsuccessful with some human-centric methodologies in the past, and is thus skeptical, meaning the expected return is uncertain. Therefore, the book expounding an overly complex or demanding methodology is read but not followed. The methodology offering a quick and easy route to small benefits, followed by a staircase of additional investments with additional gains, is followed.

There are effective methods of "putting across" complex and difficult methodologies. One method is charging a lot of money, so it makes it worth the student's while to devote a month to learning and practicing the methodology. This is accompanied by live lectures, one on one consultation, tapes and exercises. This will work with methods that, once fully learned, are truly beneficial. But it requires extraordinary faith in the program. And unfortunately, some are in it just for the money. As the old saying goes, once bitten twice shy.

Another component of benefiting even the skeptical reader is use of plain language. Methodologies defining their own terms, and especially those engaging in psychobabble, are much less credible to the intelligent person.

Purveyors of human-centric methodologies would be wise to study the merits of the Universal Troubleshooting Process, which itself is not human-centric. The UTP requires very little buy-in -- merely hanging the list of steps on your wall produces improvement. A single day of studying step 6 produces another vast improvement. And as the reader gains confidence, there's a continuing stepwise route to study and improvement. And the reader can pretty much determine the order and pace of the steps.

The documentation of the Universal Troubleshooting Process is devoid of jargon. Extra effort has been taken to use plain language to define and discuss its concepts.

Human-centric problem solving methodologies are optimized to solve personal problems, but they can be helpful solving other problems. Consider that many highly paid technical Troubleshooters are limited by their emotions, especially in the face of extremely difficult problems. All other things being equal, including training in technical Troubleshooting Process, the technical Troubleshooter who has mastered an effective human-centric problem solving methodology will be more effective solving technical problems.

There are many outstanding human-centric methodologies out there. Following are discussions of these human-centric methodologies:

• The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
• Schuller's "Tough Times Never Last, But Tough People Do"
• NLP
• Affirmations
• Psycho Cybernetics

The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

Steven Covey wrote a national bestseller called "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People" in 1989, and changed the world. This seven habit method (or group of 7 tools, or steps, or however it's viewed) is exquisitely human-centric yet avoids the common pitfalls of psychobabble, religious indoctrination, insults, pollyannaism, and all the rest that robs many similar teachings of credibility. It's my favorite human-centric problem solving methodology. Here are the seven habits:

1. Be Proactive
2. Begin with the End in Mind
3. Put First things First
4. Think Win/Win
5. Seek First to Understand... Then to be Understood
6. Synergize
7. Sharpen the Saw

I guess #1 is pretty obvious. Unless one takes action, one cannot move toward a goal. To quote Intelliworxx's Jim Roach, "if you always do what you've always done.....you will always get what you always got!" And speaking of goals, that's #2, although Covey phrases it as "Begin with the End in Mind". Obviously, without a goal, reaching something good would depend on pure luck.

#3 deals with use of time and prioritization. If you're a regular reader of Troubleshooting Professional, you know I believe in easiest-first prioritization. But that's WITHIN the prioritization methodology Covey discusses in #3:

	Urgent	Not Urgent
Important	This is firefighting, and should be avoided	Spend your time here, so important stuff gets done before it's urgent
Not important	Waste of time	Waste of time

Blow off unimportant tasks. If a task doesn't help you reach your goal, and not doing it won't prevent you from reaching your goal, don't do it. Now of course, somebody else might consider it urgent that you do unimportant tasks. Try to work it out so you're not required to do them, because they're a waste of time. Or figure out a way to make them important in reaching your goal.

Note the similarity here to my admonition not to troubleshoot unprofitable work. This is discussed in the August 2000 issue of Troubleshooting Professional.

One might instinctively think important and urgent tasks are where we should spend our time. But in fact, that's not true. Tasks always take longer when they're urgent. Urgent tasks spawn the need for explanations, written reports and meetings. Many individuals you work with react to urgency with anger or panic, both of which lead to costly mistakes. And of course, if you go over the deadline and don't sell the product or get something to market, that's extremely costly.

So the object is to have all the important stuff done before it gets urgent, which is why once you've gotten your fires put out, spend all possible time on important tasks that are not yet urgent, and make every effort to prevent important tasks from becoming urgent.

Covey explains that the first three habits are done in isolation -- you don't need to collaborate to accomplish them. The next three are collaborative.

Thinking Win/Win usually promotes success, depending on the definition of success. We all have seen enough of the world to know it's not an absolute prerequisite for success. We all know of companies succeeding through playing dirty tricks on their competitors rather than making good product. But in the vast majority of cases, the win/lose crowd finally become losers themselves, either because the ethical emptiness of their lives leads to substance abuse or other problems, or because they run afoul of the law. Or both. The intelligent person knows that sometimes each of us must "go to war", but generally speaking, Win/Win is the best policy.

Most sales books I've read have a paraphrase of habit 5, "Seek First to Understand... Then to be Understood". Sales books typically mention you have 2 ears and one mouth, and to use them in proportion. In a technical Troubleshooting scenario, you'd never attempt a fix before knowing the root cause -- you need to understand first. But understanding is not always so easy. Psychology 101 teaches us there's a principle that most people attribute their own actions to their situation, but they attribute the the actions of others to the others' personalities. I drive 80 mph on the freeway because I'm late to my wedding. The guy in the red car drives 80mph because he's reckless. One cannot really deal with others until one understands their situation. You need to walk a mile in the other guys shoes.

Covey's habit #6 is "Synergize". Work with a group in such a way that the whole becomes greater than the sum of the parts. I've found that if you put 10 people in a room they can accomplish just about anything, because there's almost no piece of knowledge not possessed by at least one. If the people practice the first 5 habits, #6 can be correctly accomplished. Once one can work synergistically with a group, he or she can accomplish amazing things. So what's left? Why is there a habit #7? For exactly the same reason there's a step 9 (Take Pride) in the Universal Troubleshooting Process.

Consider this: If you saw wood for a living, you'd surely sharpen your saw when it got dull. Otherwise, your productivity would plunge. Sharpening the saw is Covey's 7th habit.

People get dull after protracted periods of hard and effective work. They must be sharpened. Covey lists four categories of such sharpening -- physical (exercise, nutrition, sleep), mental, spiritual, and social/emotional. I'd like to add a fifth -- savoring triumph, which definitely encompasses mental and social/emotional. If done during a walk, skating, bike ride etc., it encompasses the physical. And you know what? I've had cases where savoring triumph approached a spiritual activity.

Covey's 7 habits are my favorite human-centric problem solving methodology. It's common sense, without inordinate amounts of early 90's mission statement pabulum. And it's so simple that an average individual can read the book and begin to put it into practice. One thing I really like about the 7 habits is they avoid the "believe in it, and it will come" trap, instead portraying faith as one necessity among many.

Schuller's "Tough Times Never Last, But Tough People Do"

Doubledigit unemployment ruled the land when Robert H. Schuller wrote his classic "Tough Times Never Last, But Tough People Do". In hindsight the recession of 1982 was no big deal because it ended suddenly in the 1982 holiday season. It was a short recession. But in the fall of 82, with no end in sight and 10.8% peak unemployment, it was a time of dread and hopelessness.

Schuller wrote this book to help the fearful and hopeless in that dreadful year. Above all, this book is exquisitely inspirational. Read just the first chapter to see how Schuller weaves the present (in 1982) economic disaster with his own hard and poor childhood, working back forward to the present, ending with what all but the most hardcore Atheist would call a gift from God. Even the Atheist would call it a 9.2 on the Richter scale of lucky breaks. Armed with the "anything is possible" feeling the first chapter bestows, Schuller lays down several sound principles, tips and techniques for snatching victory from the jaws of defeat.

Schuller gives some great marketing advice. His "how do you catch a marlin" discussion details the need for access to a market for your product. His "possibility thinking" discussion with its 10 alternative method is the self-help equivalent of "how can I narrow it down just one more time?" question in technology Troubleshooting.

In every chapter, Schuller has lists to be followed, and examples of people succeeding by following those lists.

This book is a must-read for anyone facing seemingly insoluble problems. After all, it was written for just such an audience.

NLP

Neuro Linguistic Programming is a very powerful, and very complex method used by an individual to make himself or herself happier and more effective. What little knowledge I have of NLP comes from the writings of Tony Robbins. The discipline is huge and detailed. One of the keystones of NLP is reframing, where the individual chooses how to interpret events. For instance, if your wife of 30 years cleans out your bank account and runs off to the Riviera with the pool boy, you could see it as an opportunity to begin again. There are many, many tools one uses to reframe. One such tool is visualizing the "problem", and then envisioning it smaller and smaller so it loses importance.

The basic idea is that you're effective when you're in a good and creative mental state. Rather than waiting for external events to put you in that state, you can put yourself in that state and then reap the benefits. As Abraham Lincoln said, "a man is just about as happy as he decides to be". Of course, I understand Lincoln had a problem with depression :-)

I believe that the NLP techniques I've read in Anthony Robbins' books "Awaken the Giant Within" and "Unlimited Power" are excellent personal problem solving techniques that cannot be learned by skeptics, or even the unconvinced. They require a huge commitment, maybe a month or more, to practice and master the techniques. I see no "low hanging fruit" that can boost results in a day or two. Robbins includes many real-life exercises you need to do. If you don't do them, you'll get little from the books.

If you believe your problems can be helped by a better life outlook or a better use of your mental resources, and you're willing to invest a lot of time, I'd highly recommend getting these books, and taking the significant time it takes to work through and master their exercises. I cannot recommend these books, or the methods they espouse, to those unwilling to make a substantial commitment to mastering their techniques.

Note: There's a Tony Robbins book called "Notes from a Friend: A Quick and Simple Guide to Taking Control of Your Life". It's based on "Awaken the Giant Within" and "Unlimited Power". It may be a way to ease yourself into these techniques without big time prior commitment.

Affirmations

I see this as a tool rather than a human-centric problem solving methodology. If the bottleneck in your life seems to be lack of self confidence, or procrastination, or lack of a goal, affirmations can help boost your performance by boosting self confidence, reducing procrastination, and verbalizing a goal.

To solve this type of problem, Keith Ellis recommends, in his article titled "Affirmations", saying something like this:

"I choose to joyfully become a great Troubleshooter."

I choose	joyfully	become a great Troubleshooter
Mr. Ellis recommends we always recognize that every change we make in our life is a choice.	Mr. Ellis recommends we maximize the power of every affirmation by injecting positive emotion, such as the adverb "joyfully".	This is the actual goal of the affirmation.

Once again, this solves only problems whose root cause is attitude. But it's powerful, because a single destructive attitude leads to tunnel vision. If your goal requires $100,000 to start, and you've got only $859 in the bank, it's just possible that an affirmation like this could break the conflict:

I choose to joyfully find inexpensive ways to quickly reach my stated goal.

Psycho Cybernetics

This book by Maxwell Maltz has been around since at least the early 70's. I see some value in it, but remain skeptical after the author seriously says that closing your eyes and visualizing an athletic move can be as valuable as practice. However, he was one of the first modern authors to make the connection between visualization and execution.

Sales Optmized Problem Solving Methodologies

Sales and marketing are always a problem. After all, you always need more sales. Even if your factory is running full blast, you need the ability to sell at higher prices. As the first non-salesman in a long line of salesmen, I've read many sales books. A few were great, most were good, a few I felt were ridiculous. Below I review a few sales and marketing methodologies.

Attention, interest, desire and action

This is the old marketing and advertising model. Basically, you can't ask for action until there's desire, you can't get desire without interest, and you can't get interest without attention. Sometimes a fifth step, "conviction", is added between desire and action. That's more appropriate for sales, because mere desire isn't enough to close someone.

The attention and interest steps are done during prospecting, with desire split between prospecting and sales calls. Conviction and action are done during an actual face to face meeting (usually). This meshes very nicely with the sales funnel, described later in this article.

Steve Litt's Access to a Market for your Product

After reading many books, and observing the successes and failures of myself and others, I've reached the conclusion that sales and marketing boil down to having Access to a Market for your Product. It's the matchup of Access, Market and Product that IMHO is a prerequisite for good sales. You don't sell your acting skills in Wisconsin or your farming skills in Los Angeles. Because access is hardest to obtain, choice of new products should always favor the markets to whom you already have access. You can slowly grow the boundaries of your market access area, but don't make a product outside it.

Some people think they don't have access to any market. Not true. All one needs to do is look around at his friends. That's access. What kinds of people does one get along with well. Some of us get along with the upper crust, and some of us have friends in low places. We sell to the people we get along with.

Almost everyone gets requests for advice and help. Many of these requests are for favors that don't involve money, but make no mistake, if people are asking you for advice and help, you have something to offer. The trick is to expand your access outside your immediate group, because it's often hard to charge a fee to friends. Sometimes you can even sell your knowledge in the form of books.

Before you go out and base your entire sales strategy on my ideas, keep in mind that I'm just a middle class guy, and with my products, if I were a great salesman I'd be a multi-millionaire. But I think once I get the execution down correctly...

The Walter Litt Three Base Approach

Walter Litt is my dad, and I've seen him in action many times. He's retired now, but he was a very successful salesman. Unlike me, Dad can't easily describe his actions, tactics, and strategies, so I've had synthesize his techniques. I believe the key to his success is:

1. Gain access
2. Make it easy to buy
3. Bury the cost in the big picture

Gain access

My Dad is friendly and intelligent and has reasonable social graces, which means that buyers like to be around him. Like all other salespeople, he counters objections. But he doesn't argue. For the brief time I worked for him, he advised me never to win the argument but lose the sale. If you're pleasant to be around, you'll get another try. This, and the fact that he was fun to have at parties, got my Dad great access to buyers.

He also concentrated on getting more business from other departments in businesses he sold to. For instance, he was in the Sears Tower so much that he was able to expand from labels to tags, selling them to many different departments.

Make it easy to buy

Dad sold labels. You know, like what's on the inside back of your shirt. Doesn't sound like much until you consider that his #1 account in the 60's, 70's and 80's was Sears. He wanted to be an artist, but the Great Depression intervened. Instead, he used his art skills to create drawings of labels, so in one visit he and the buyer could design the label. His competitors had to phone the factory to make a drawing, and hope that their description of the customer needs would be reflected in the drawing. Walter Litt made the buyer's life easy by creating a good design immediately. This is just one example. My Dad made it easy to buy in every way. He had the paperwork drawn up by people good at that stuff, so there were no mistakes. And when there were mistakes, my Dad took complete responsibility. Yep, everyone wanted to buy from Walter Litt.

Bury the cost in the big picture

But of course, a buyer can't always buy from the guy who's easy to buy from. There's price pressure to consider. In the 1970's, Walter was selling labels made by Americans in North Carolina, for almost double the price of Japanese labels. He single-handedly kept over 100 American factory workers employed in the face of the Japanese competition that was cleaning our clocks in the automotive and electronic industries. How did he do that? Did he ask the government for tariffs?

Nope, he just made sure his quality was as good as the Japanese, and then buried the extra cost in the cost of the entire item. A $40.00 dress has a single label. A Japanese one might cost a penny, the American one two cents. That penny difference is 0.025% of the sales price. It's negligible, and Dad approached it that way. It was much easier to buy from him, and the cost was 0.025% of the dress. It's a no brainer.

It could be said that burying the cost in the big picture is practical only with very cheap items. But in fact it's simply easier to explain and understand with cheap items. If you program computers and charge $20.00 more per hour than the competition, but you can better demonstrate that you're likely to do it right, you're easy to buy from. Now multiply the $20.00 differential by 2500 hours for a one year project making a cost differential of $50,000. Now total the hardware and software costs of the project, training, administration, as well as the coding cost that is not differential. In many cases, your differential comes out to be peanuts. And for the icing on the cake, find some way you can save them more than that small percentage, making you cheaper.

Summary of Walter Litt's Method

Walter Litt has had much better success with his techniques than I have, so it's certainly not a guaranteed method. But it certainly bears further attention.

Ralph Desanto's Friendly Method

My buddy Ralph Desanto died a couple years ago, but not before I got to observe first hand the techniques he used to achieve excellent sales success. Ralph simply liked people, so people liked him back. So if there was any way they could buy from him, they did. Of course his prices and products were reasonable, and he was a very hard worker, but aren't we all. The distinction is that Ralph saw the best in everyone.

When Ralph complemented, he complemented the person. When he criticized, he criticized their action. I think he basically believed people are good.

Unfortunately, there's no way you can package Ralph's basic belief in the good of humanity. Few of us have that outlook. But to the extent possible, try to see your customers and prospects as cool people you might like to get friendly with some day. You'll be glad you did.

Mark Kassof's Marketing Tips

Radio researcher Mark Kassof has posted several articles on his website. He calls these articles "Research Insights". I call them the marketing system of Troubleshooters.Com, having used them since 4/1998. Troubleshooters.Com has received over 1000 distinct IP visitors per day during the last two months, and is currently receiving 2000 due to a recommendation from ZdNet. Troubleshooters.Com is rated in the upper 1.3% of sites most linked according to WebsMostLinked.com, who place T.C ranking #13595 out of 1044933 domains in their database.

Not too shabby for a site with no IPO and no venture capitalists. But I had great marketing advice from Kassof.Com. Basically, Mark emphasizes seeking an audience you can realistically attract, and super-serving them. Being a technology and Open Source kind of guy, I super-served the technologist and Linux audience.

Kassof emphasizes that with so much noise in the media, you need to be a little outrageous to be heard. So I did. I told my true feelings about Microsoft. Many friends told me I was doing the wrong thing. They told me I'd be closing doors on myself. They told me I'd blow off 95% of my potential audience. And they were right.

But that remaining 5% loved Troubleshooters.Com, just as Mark predicts in his insights. One of his quotes is that "These days, the 'middle of the road' is a good place to get run over".

I've just scratched the surface here, but it would take 10,000 words to fully explain Kassof's marketing strategies, and I don't have the bandwidth. So go to Kassof.Com, and study both his "Research Insights" and his "Quotations of Chairman Mark". Links to both, as well as to his main page, are in the URL's section of this magazine.

You might also wonder what marketing has to do with sales. In a big company maybe very little. But in a small company, prospecting begins with marketing and transitions to sales as the prospects become more interested.

Don't let it throw you that Mr. Kassof's tips are targeted at the radio industry. They work on the web too. Believe me :-) And for any of you out there who are involved with radio, use him. My reading of his website tells me that if I needed radio research, I'd go to him, because he's independent and not affiliated with a radio chain or consultant, he's unbiased, and he knows radio.

Strategic Selling (Miller and Heiman)

In my opinion this is the best of the Sales Book industry. Authors Robert B. Miller, Stephen E. Heiman (with Tad Tuleja) address the ongoing nature of sales, and manage to turn it into a process. They divide prospects into what they define as a "sales funnel" with the following four levels:

1. Above the funnel (uncontacted leads and research based hunches)
2. In the funnel (a lead who has been contacted and is listening)
3. The best few (an interested prospect who is probably a good fit)
4. Below the funnel (got the order)

This book rightly points out that your sales activities should be optimized to the level. You'd attempt to close the best few, not above the funnel. And of course, you really don't want to bore your best few with yet another description of all the merits of your offering.

This book makes the point that too many salespeople and organizations hammer the best few until they've sucked it dry, and then discover their abandonment of the upper levels means they need to wait months to refill that level. So they hammer the upper levels and finally get an influx of best few. This explains certain extreme cyclical sales events.

In many other ways, this book takes a systemic and scientific view of sales. I recommend it.

Tom Hopkins

I've read two books by Tom Hopkins, "Selling for Dummies" and "How to Master the Art of Selling". The former is a great book that I would recommend to anyone wanting to get into selling. The latter is not so simple.

First, be aware that my copy of "How to Master the Art of Selling" is the second edition, which appears to have been copyrighted in 1982. It's probable that Mr. Hopkins has changed the book a lot since then.

My second edition book gives many, many examples. That's a good thing. My wife's a Realtor^(R), and I just mentioned an example from this book that directly applied to a situation she was in. Especially refreshing is that Mr. Hopkins hasn't gone overboard on "consultative selling". Tom isn't afraid to admit that he likes to close, and likes to close hard. And he's not afraid to imply that not all prospective customers are peers of Einstein.

Which brings up the problem. Many of the techniques he espouses in my Second Edition book are insulting to an intelligent person. Anybody trying Hopkins' "Ben Franklin Balance Sheet Close" or the "Porcupine Test Close" on me would find themselves out the door (without an order) in a hurry.

"How to Master the Art of Selling" is a must-read for anyone in sales. The author has obviously been there and documented his strategies and tactics. Just carefully temper your adoption of those suggestions that seem to insult the buyer's intelligence. And if you're contemplating a sales career, or new to sales, be sure to pick up a copy of Selling for Dummies".

Non Manipulative Selling

I'm sorry, but I just don't find this book credible. The authors, Tony Alessandra, Phil Wexler and Rick Barrera have leaned so far overboard on consultative selling, that it doesn't match any of my experiences or selling situations I've seen and heard. In my experience, sooner or later many buyers need (and maybe even expect) a small nudge in the direction of purchase. On a positive note, this book shows the flaws of the hard sellers and the indiscriminate closers. This book is a classic, so you should check it out in the bookstore, and buy it if you believe it of value. My copy is second edition, copyright 1992. It may have changed significantly since then.

How I Raised Myself from Failure to Success in Selling

I bought "How I Raised Myself from Failure to Success in Selling" for a quarter at a garage sale. The cover price is $2.00, the picture of author Frank Bettger on the cover would fit in perfectly with 1950's black and white reruns, and the copyright date is 1949. And believe it or not, it was a pretty good book. Once again, it's obvious this guy's been in the trenches. Amazingly, the more things change, the more they stay the same. This book, from the first year of commercial television, is very applicable to our present day e world.

There's a myth that consultative selling started in the 1980's. Check out this line from the 1949 edition:

"I resolved right then to dedicate the rest of my selling career to this principle: Finding out what people want, and helping them get it."

Don't worry though, Bettger's not just a consulatively correct wet noodle -- he also suggests the "sign by the X assumptive close".

Unbelievably, this book is still in print, copyright 1992. It is 24 hours available at Amazon, where it's ranked #7,966 and has a five star review average. Frank Bettger looks about 35 years old on the 1949 copy cover, which would have made him 78 in 1992. To me, this book's staying power makes it not only a classic, but a tried and true resource.

The Greatest Sales Stories Ever Told

Upon reading this book you'll immediately see that author Robert L. Shook deeply loves sales and salespeople. In this book, whose complete title is "The Greatest Sales Stories Ever Told : From the World's Best Salespeople", Shook lets several topnotch sales people tell their favorite stories, and then Shook himself points out the crucial distinctions one can use to boost his or her own sales. Shook further enhances the value of the book by categorizing the stories into book parts, each describing a distinct component of sales.

This book is obviously not a complete sales problem solving methodology, but serves beautifully in the function of example. I believe the seasoned salesperson would profit from this book, right along with the newbie.

In a world where even we salespeople start to believe in the plaid sportcoat car salesman and Arthur Miller's Willy Loman, Shook's deep love and admiration for his profession makes the reader stand a bit taller. If you EVER contemplate selling anything, get this book.

One Business Optimized Methodology: Reengineering

My impression upon a casual reading of reading "Reengineering the Corporation : A Manifesto for Business Revolution", by Michael Hammer, James Champy, is that it throws the baby out with the bathwater. From my casual reading, the basic advice is to throw away the given system and all given policies (not just question them, but throw them away). Then there's the problem that the word "reengineering" has been used by carpetbaggers to distort Hammer and Champy's message into advocacy of slash and burn layoffs. Thus the word is almost without definition.

So from my understanding of Hammer and Champy's definition of reengineering, its optimized for those cases where the business is so out of touch with present day realities as to be "totalled", like a car hitting a bridge at 120mph or a house burned to the ground. If you'd like to "improve" your business while keeping its core advantages, my understanding is that reengineering is not the way to go.

Obviously, my understanding of the term is crude at best, so please don't take my word for it. Read the book for yourself, and see if I've been overly critical. I invite all more knowledgeable on reengineering to write letters to the editor (instructions near the bottom of this page) so that next month the truth about reengineering will surface.

Conclusion

This article touched briefly on methodologies highly optimized for self help, sales and business. Most are so specific as to belong in the tool realm rather than the methodology realm. This is not to say they are not valuable. The smart Troubleshooter follows a predefined diagnostic when one is available. The smart Troubleshooter follows in the footsteps of others. The smart Troubleshooter familiarizes himself with the optimization tools of his home domain. I believe that one of these tools, Covey's "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People", rises above the others to take its place among general problem solving methodologies. It's true you can't fix a car using his methodology, but you can sure use it to make yourself a better mechanic.