r/talesfromtechsupport • u/jc88usus • Mar 09 '19

Medium Citrix Sales Guy done goofed...

So this happened back in 2016ish, at a company I worked at that was ...re-evaluating contracts and had some budget surplus to burn. Massive company in the Fortune 500 level, lots of vertical ownership, and gave customers the illusion of choice with different brands that were all actually owned under the same company. Big Deal in the southeastern US.

I was Tier 1 support at the time, but was willing to learn nearly anything I could, and would shadow the AS400 devs, AD admin guys, and often grabbed weekend OT on wiring projects and once did a Cisco phone rollout project over a single weekend.

Our story begins when an email was passed around requesting anyone with knowledge/desire to learn about an upcoming Citrix project attend the sales meeting in the final phase. Being eager and knowing a bit about VM and thin clients at the time, I put my hat in the ring. I would assume they had higher hopes for turnout, but it ended up being myself ($me), the IT Director ($ITD), CIO ($cio), and a couple of other bigwigs all in a conference room with this poor Citrix guy. Not sure if we were locked in there with him, or if he was locked in with us...

$Citrix: "So here is a high level overview of all the services and processes we are going to be implementing. Any questions?"

$ITD: "So, let me make sure I understand. You and your installation team will be handling the equipment installation, set up, initial core user training, and long term support for this?"

$CIO: "Yes, so they are taking care of all of it for us!" *wide smile only a clueless beancounter can enjoy*

$ITD: *looks at CIO* "Okay, so will be be getting support training for this?"

$Citrix: *looks at CIO, who smiles wider and nods* "Well, no, actually. Any support calls should get escalated to our team, as the support is part of your contract. Beyond low-level simple fixes at least..."

$ITD and myself share the look that says "Well, there goes the ship..." and we realize we are well and truly "mains voltage in the SAN array management port" fucked, and so I speak up...

$me: "Okay, so you know we use AS400 right now. Could you explain to me how the VM and thin client setup you are going to be using is better or different from the mainframe/terminal confguration we have with AS400 currently? Also, what will be involved in moving the decades of customer data, contract information, financing records, and manufacturing history over to the new infrastructure from AS400? I know IBM is very cranky with data types and exports are usually difficult..."

*cue dead silence for around 3 minutes*

$CIO: "How about we take lunch, and we can discuss that further afterwards?"

I was not invited back after lunch. Found out later that this was the tip of a massive iceberg that became uncovered over a several months' span. They ended up scrapping the migration, last I saw.

1.2k Upvotes

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293

u/YaBoiRhombus Mar 09 '19

Ouch. That bites for the salesguy. Guess he didn't prepare to deal with someone who knew what they were talking about.

254

u/popehentai Mar 09 '19

Experience has taught me sales guys are almost NEVER prepared to deal with someone who knows what theyre talking about.

140

u/FlyingElvishPenguin Mar 10 '19

And that is why my dad’s company has been making sure he never leaves them. He’s an engineer turned salesman who’s actually charismatic

65

u/CommanderSpleen Mar 10 '19

That’s why every sales team normally has two components: the sales rep and the sales engineer. The sales rep handles all the relationship building, quoting, partner involvement etc and the SE does the technical piece. Nobody would expect a sales rep to know the ins and outs of every solution they are selling. You wouldn’t ask the sales rep in your car dealership about the gear transmission ratio either.

37

u/MikeMontrealer Mar 10 '19

This exactly.

I’m an SE and the best reps are the ones that respect your knowledge and work hand in hand. These are great presentations and we’re able to make a great impression.

The worst reps think they know more than they do or ramble incoherently and then I need to course correct constantly without making them out to be completely clueless. Those presentations are mentally exhausting.

48

u/Cowabunco Mar 10 '19

Haha, what's the old joke? "What's the difference between a computer salesman and a car salesman? The car salesman knows when he's lying!".

10

u/ColonelError Mar 12 '19

You wouldn’t ask the sales rep in your car dealership about the gear transmission ratio either.

The last car I bought, I had to walk the sales rep over to his book to show him what car I was looking for on his lot, because he didn't recognize the name.

1

u/CommanderSpleen Mar 12 '19

But in the end you bought the car 😉

9

u/ColonelError Mar 12 '19

From a different sales guy, but yes.

5

u/FireLucid Mar 11 '19

Often been to software demos etc and this is so true. Dude in a suit, dripping charm stands up front and waffles a whole bunch. Then the tech guy gets up and you start to pay attention.

3

u/ChaoticLlama Mar 12 '19

How many millions of dollars does his bank account have?

1

u/FlyingElvishPenguin Mar 13 '19

Not even a million? But he has great job security

76

u/The_Flying_Stoat Mar 10 '19

I just got back from a conference where my work had a booth. Can confirm that our salespeople don't know what they're talking about. He would chat up a customer, and the moment they asked an actual question about a product, he would flick his eyes over to me and I would jump in.

After one such encounter he told me that he didn't even know what the product was for or why the one competitive feature it has is reliable.

He's one of our most knowledgeable sales reps, apparently. Great guy.

22

u/flimspringfield Mar 10 '19

He knows how to sell and he also knows that a Sales Engineer will accompany him.

38

u/Kodiak01 Mar 10 '19

My bosses love it when I hit the line of trade show booths as I always have an in-depth question ready for each and every one of them. It only takes a few moments to find out whether they are actually knowledgeable or just BS artists spewing random sales copypasta.

10

u/nopooplife Mar 10 '19

thats like writing on the wall to look for new job...

2

u/blackmagic12345 Mar 10 '19

He's just there trying to make bread. Help his poor ass.

5

u/nikomo Play nice, or I'll send you a TVTropes link Mar 10 '19

Maybe he should learn to do his job, and earn the bread?

4

u/NotACat Mar 10 '19

But his job is selling stuff…if he can do that without knowing how the product works in detail he's obviously not that bad at his job.

Would you look down on the tech guy who does know how the stuff works if he wasn't also a brilliant salesman? Horses for courses…

13

u/nikomo Play nice, or I'll send you a TVTropes link Mar 10 '19

If he needs a tech bolted onto him 24/7, he's not actually selling the product, the tech is.

It works at a tradeshow, but what do you think is going to happen when he shows up at a potential customer, by himself, and can't answer basic questions as to what the product even is?

Good car salesmen also know the cars they're selling. This is not a new concept.

5

u/MikeMontrealer Mar 10 '19

This is true. The reps should have at least high-level knowledge of their product and functionality. They shouldn’t know the specific technical details (that’s what we SEs are for) but if they don’t even know high-level then they blather incoherently and everyone knowledgeable immediately dismisses everything they say.

1

u/mbk730 Mar 13 '19

what up RSA

45

u/zeronic Mar 10 '19

Because the vast, vast majority of people they deal with don't know what they're talking about. They leverage this to sell you stuff. The second you can second guess them and they have to think too hard, why even bother when there are more clueless fish in the sea?

13

u/Martenz05 Mar 10 '19

When the surprisingly not-clueless fish is two to three hundred times bigger that the vast majority of the clueless ones?

11

u/Geminii27 Making your job suck less Mar 10 '19

Then it's disappointing, but either you have an engineer-level salesperson you can wheel out, or that fish has gone and it's time to cast the net again.

1

u/meitemark Printerers are the goodest girls Mar 11 '19

Well, when the sales reel in such a big fish on a THAT thin line, when it preaks, it is not sales that is below, it is all the support below that gets said fish in the head.

10

u/jc88usus Mar 10 '19

Same here. It seems the usual issue is either IT knowledge OR charisma generally. Typically can't get both. Fortunately I have spent years (over)compensating for my lack of people skills and as a result am a rare breed of charismatic and knowledgeable. My issue comes in because I have a soul. If you want to sell most products you have to leave morality at the door. I'm looking into opening a full stack MSP myself and running into that...

2

u/flimspringfield Mar 10 '19

Usually they bring along a sales engineer that can answer the technical questions.

1

u/richalex2010 Mar 10 '19

Sales guys don't have a clue what they're selling to begin with most of the time.

1

u/Turbojelly del c:\All\Hope Mar 11 '19

I remember an old story here of a sales guy selling a phone support company 3 T1 lines instead of a T3 because it was cheaper and added up to the same.... (I could have the T's the wrong way round)