business development manager. I am left to recommend and prepare proposals for solutions to customers in south eastern regions of Australia (sa, vic, tas, some nsw work). I spend most of my time traveling to either these states or driving around Melbourne or Victoria. Most leads are given to me and I am left to run with it from there, which is good because im not cold calling that much and im selling to companies who actually want/need our product. Im just there to listen to their needs and put together a solution that is suited to them and will produce the final product they want with as little fuss as possible (it varies quite a bit from industry to industry).
Positives:
Completely autonomous, i set my day, my work load, my travel and can work as little or as much as i want. But of course the more work i do, the more sales i get and the more i get paid. With the pay, its pretty awesome considering i never went to uni. i get a base salary and comms. If i have a bad month the base is more then enough to get by. Im also not tried down to a desk and move around a bit and get a good insight into the inner workings of businesses in ALL industries which i find really fascinating.
Negatives:
Im on the road a lot on my own so you need to learn to be self sufficient and have to figure out the best way to deal with situations on the fly with no support. Also, it gets pretty lonely, some times you can spend days on the road listening to people lie to your face and talk down to you just because they know you are a sales person or because they want to pay an unreasonably low price for the services we can provide. And with no support sometimes you get ganged up on by the reps of the businesses you sell to. It can get you down sometimes, but over time, you get a bit of back bone and learn not to take shit from those types.
Business works both ways, you have a want/need, we can provide it, but we aren't doing it for free! Which is what a lot of buyers i deal with expect for some reason!
Education/Training wise. I got into this job as a trainee, unless its technical sales you can get into most outside sales jobs with little experience. I was lucky in that i moved up the ladder very very quickly. I outperformed the incumbent manager from the get go and was made state manager after just a few months of joining the company. A few years on now and im breaking quota records year on year. I love the challenge and it keeps me on my toes.