My past experience as a Salesperson

Am I only a techie? No. If you scroll down and check my resume, you will realize that I have several graduate certifications in accounting, finance, supply chain management, and marketing. 

Do I have business work experience? Of course, I do. Today I would like to share one of my experiences as a Salesperson.

I used to be a beauty advisor at Walgreens, meaning selling skincare and cosmetics, in downtown Ann Arbor, Michigan. There was one big problem with the location I worked for back then. Cosmetic sales were the lowest compared to the other four stores in the same region. The associate manager asked me if I had any ideas to improve the sales. I asked her if I could visit the other four stores. She gave the addresses to me. When I was off work, I drove to the other four locations to see if I could learn something from them to improve the sales. 

 

I remember the No. 1 sales Walgreens is a rural store. The first impression was when you were in nature without pressure, you felt happier. When I parked at the parking lot, I could see a big pond surrounded by trees. That means when a colleague was taking a break, he or she could always go outside walking around the pond relaxing. After I entered, I realized the whole design was quite different from the other locations. 

For example, (1) the shelves are lower than average Walgreens: that means I can grab anything I want easily. That means children can get stuff easily too. (2) at the pharmacy, instead of the chairs, there were two big sofas for the patients (3) through the window, the pharmacists could view the outside, the pond, the trees, ducks, and the birds. After the pharmacists have a tough time with the customers (if you know what I mean, pharmacists have to deal with medical insurance problems all the time), they can look outside with natural healing. (3) Do you know that Kylie Jenner once launched affordable nail polish at Walgreens? I was surprised to see her products in that specific location which I didn't see in other locations. Probably this could attract to the young generation.

Then I talked to the manager in the No. 1 sales location. I introduced myself as a beauty advisor in the Ann Arbor location. I shared my observation about the whole difference from the other locations in the city with the manager. He laughed and he added more. He said, "we know all the customers, we're friends and neighbors". For example, my friend stopped by and grabbed a box of beer for the barbecue tonight. In the evening, all the neighbors would be together enjoying the party. 

I enjoyed the whole exploring process comparing the different locations. What I have learned from the No 1 Sales was 

1. good geography: nature, trees, plants, pond, ducks
2. relationship: everybody knows each other, the customers and workers are like a big family
3. reachable and comfortable design: lower shelves and sofa
4. follow the trend: the only location selling Kylie Jenner Nail Polish

When I came back to my location, I reported to the associate manager. What we could do was to order Kylie Jenner Nail Posh, the list 4. What could we do to change lists 1 to 3?

I realize that we need to observe the needs of our regular customers coming to our location. What do they need? After talking to many customers buying skincare and cosmetics, I realized that the majority of our location customers came to shop dermatologist recommended skin products. There is a popular dermatologist around my location, so usually, the customers could stop by with that dermatologist prescription looking for the specific products. Once realizing this, I started to explore the ingredients of different skin products for different skin problems. For example, the sunscreen with Oxybenzone has the risk of entering the bloodstream extend beyond just the sunscreen wearer. One time, I even started a discussion with a professor from the University of Michigan because he was looking for sunscreen without Oxybenzone.

After several months, the Sales in my location came to No. 2. The associate manager and manager were quite happy about this. They asked me how I achieved this. I believe the keys are: 

1. Observe more
2. Know what your customers needs 
3. Learn from others who have already done well in that field
4. Care more about the details
5. Applying the best solution to suit your situation

Exploring my Perseverance in Power BI

For the past 6 months, I have been working on a Power BI project which requires a full premium capacity. I started self-learning Power BI in March, after two months, I realized that I need to get more professional. So my company paid me to get professional training with certified tutors. It is very necessary to get professional training to not only learn from the professional tutors but also build connections with your professional classmates due to their years of work experience.

I have had a very pleasant study journey gaining much knowledge in Power BI, but unfortunately, the certified tutor is not familiar with how to accomplish the specific layout or design I want to create. So she referred me to other certified professionals. After discussing with other certified professionals, without working on practical projects with this specific layout, they couldn't give me a solid solution about how to accomplish this design.

I posted two questions in the Power BI community and have patiently waited for a long time: 

1. The reply to the first question from the support team: this function is not supported by Power BI yet

2. The reply to the second question from the support team: simply repeat my question

How should I feel at this point? Should I give up? As a newbie in Power BI, I have been told by several certified professionals with over 10 years of work experience that this function is not supported by Power BI yet, it is impossible to create the design I want. I appreciate the discussion with the professionals and their ideas and suggestions are priceless in inspiring me.

At one point, I did want to give up lacking confidence and practical experience. But I know I cannot give up, it's not because this is my job, it is my personality. I always want to make something impossible to be possible with my perseverance. 

Fortunately, I shared my concerns with one of my classmates during the training. He coincidentally has worked on the same project before. Both of us are aware that Power BI doesn't support this function yet, so we decided to install a third-party tool to Power BI and then change the settings. God bless, the first big problem is solved and I consider this is the first milestone of the whole project. No words can express how much I appreciate that college's help and we are friends now. He mentioned that this solution does not come from study, this comes from real practical work experience. As the Power BI project will go live shortly within his company, I might be helpful in giving him ideas and suggestions.

There is still another big problem, what should I do? This project can only be done by Power BI paginated reports using reports builder. Power BI online service and desktop are not enough. Paginated reports previously are called SSRS. I have done for months is to explore the resources as much as I can, there are youtube tutorials for Paganiated reports or SSRS, then watch them one by one, day and night, weekends, trying to get inspiration to fit into my project. I believe once you have pushed yourself to some point, you will get some breakthroughs, just don't give up.

Now the project is going live with many people's help within my company and other companies. I'm sure there will still be this or that issue. What I need to tell myself is, be confident, be strong, trust myself and have faith that I will solve all the upcoming problems.