Your Story Makes You Unique
Dec 11, 2024
When I worked for Chelsea Sugar many years ago I had the opportunity to move from the Accounts department into the Sales department and there started a new career for me in sales.
What happened was that I took the Accounts Payable role at Chelsea as a Temp on my arrival back from living overseas. But I liked it there and they liked my work and offered me the role full-time so I took it and largely enjoyed it.
But I was still on a quest to figure out what I wanted to be when I grew up. I had gone back to school in the US to get an accounting degree but sitting in the accounting classes, well, I couldn't imagine doing that all day every day.
I mean, I was good at it, and in hindsight that might have been why I felt bored. It was an entry-level class and I picked things up very quickly.
But I was more inspired by classes such as Psychology, Philosophy, Sociology, Writing, and Communication.
I decided to see a career coach to help me figure out the what-I-want-to-be-when-I-grow-up question. And sales was something that was determined I would be good at and enjoy.
Very soon after that, a position for Territory Manager became available at Chelsea. I applied for it, and used my career coach results to back up my application. You could say that I sold myself because I got the job.
It's funny the direction that life takes us in, isn't it? When I started my first bookkeeping business it felt a bit like a full circle moment coming back to accounting, but running a bookkeeping business is not doing accounting all day every day.
Instead, this windy career path that I had taken which was varied and didn't seem to have much in common, all came together as valuable skills and experience for running a bookkeeping business, and then later, to becoming a business coach.
Everything made a difference, even the school holiday office job at a freight forwarding company one year. I was there for only a few weeks but I learned a lot about foreign currency and about how freight works which is useful with some of my clients who are exporters or importers.
There are countless other examples of experience gained that accumulated into useful skills and experience.
This morning I held a group coaching session for members of my coaching group The Business of Bookkeeping where we talked about sales conversations. One of the things we talked about was what makes us unique as a bookkeeper and using those things as selling points.
On the surface it can seem difficult to distinguish what makes one bookkeeper stand out from others. It can appear like all bookkeepers offer the same service but look beneath the surface at your rich history of experiences and learning and you will find your unique wisdom and value.
These are the kinds of topics and conversations that we talk about in my business coaching groups for bookkeepers. My god they're good!
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