Can you sell?
One of the most underrated – and misunderstood – skills in business is the ability to sell. A product, a service, a solution, a process. Everyone talks about it. Few master it. It takes more than arguments, charts, and strategy. More than a polished sales deck. It takes courage. It takes timing. And it takes a deep understanding of people. The ability to read both the individual and the room. To know when to push forward – and when to hold back
Because the truth is this: You can be brilliant at PowerPoint, razor-sharp in analysis, but if you can’t sell – you won’t create real change (or value).
And no – you don’t learn that at business school. CBS and its peers produce world-class thinkers, strategists, and theorists. But put a freshly minted MBA on the street with a box of ice cream, and the ice often melts faster than the sales happen. Selling isn’t just a technique. It’s a mindset. A willingness to connect, to understand needs, and to take the shot. I’ve seen some exceptional salespeople over the past 20 years. Most of them learned it the hard way.
Who outperforms the market?
A couple of years ago, McKinsey published a report confirming what many of us had already seen in practice:
Companies whose leadership understands and prioritizes commercial capacity – the actual ability to sell and deliver value to the market – significantly outperform their competitors. Not because of smarter products, but because they know how to create and sustain strong customer relationships.
Sales is still underestimated
And yet, we still see many organizations underestimate the role of sales in the strategic conversation. Sales is treated as something that comes after product development, after strategy, after branding. As if selling is just tactical execution rather than a core, value-creating discipline.
That’s a huge mistake.
Because sales is strategic. It’s where the market meets the company. It’s where vision becomes reality – or nothing at all.
So ask yourself – and your leadership team:
📌 Do you have people who can actually close the deal – not just present the solution?
📌 Do you have the culture and systems that reward sales as a core competence – or is it something you awkwardly leave to “the sales team”?
📌 And most importantly: Do you dare to insist that commercial responsibility doesn’t sit in one department, but across the entire organization – from the CEO to the intern?
In the end, it’s simple: Without sales, there is no company. Without the courage to ask for the order, we’re just standing around waiting for the phone to ring. And unfortunately, it rarely does.
