Rick Lester was depressed. He was cold and damp from the rain as he sat in his van in the parking… 1 answer below »

Rick Lester was depressed. He was cold and damp from the rain as he sat in his van in the parking lot of a Food World supermarket. He had just telephoned the Nabisco division sales office and talked with Helen, the office secretary. Rick had asked her, ?What are we supposed to do when it rains like this?? Rick could hear her repeat the question to Mr. Brown, the division sales manager, who just happened to be in the office. Rick could hear the reply in the background, ?Tell him to buy a raincoat? When Helen repeated the response, Rick replied to her, ?OK, have a nice day? with a slightly embarrassed tone in his voice. As he hung up the phone and sat back in his van he thought, ?What a heck of a way to make a living.? As a new salesman, it was clear that Rick had much to learn. He had only been on the job for one month, but he had about decided that it was no ?piece of cake ? It had all seemed so much easier when he watched Mr. Brown make calls during his two-week on-the-job training period. Now that he was making calls on his own, it was quite different and much more difficult. Interestingly, the sales class Rick had taken at the University of Alabama at Birmingham the previous year had covered many reasons to go into selling, but few disadvantages of pursuing a career in sales. Rick was now learning about these firsthand. Rick?s family?his parents and two younger sisters?had lived in Birmingham for many years. Mr. Lester was a salesman, and Mrs. Lester was a homemaker. Rick was an average student in high school, where he really majored in athletics and cheerleaders. After high school he accepted a partial athletic scholarship to Northwest Mississippi Junior College. His grades in college were about average overall but were low in basic math classes. The chief reason he selected business as his major was that it required no algebra. Following two years in Mississippi, Rick transferred to the University of Alabama at Birmingham and continued to work toward a B.S. degree in marketing. He met a nice girl there, and they later married when he graduated from UAB. There had been three specific job opportunities, all in sales, but he chose the job with Nabisco because it was a big company with many benefits. He also thought highly of Mr. Brown, the local recruiter and division sales manager. Rick started to work on September 1. The first week was spent reviewing sales training manuals and completing employment paperwork. He also stocked his new van with merchandise, advertising materials, and displays. The following two weeks were spent ?working the trade? with Mr. Brown, who made most of the calls while Rick learned by observing. Toward the end of the third week of employment, Rick was starting to make the sales presentations while Mr. Brown observed. They would discuss each call after they returned to the van. During the fourth week, Rick worked

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