ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

It’s customary to make acknowledgments in a book and so, not wishing to fly in the face of convention, here are mine. They’re a tad gushing and emotional in places, but it’s my book, so tough.

My first thanks go to Mark Brundrett and John Mifflin. I don’t know whether they are still about, since I have tried looking for them on the usual sites but can’t find them. Mark was my first sales manager at Reed International and John was the bloke in whose classroom I sat at head office in East Grinstead for two weeks in late 1987 being taught how to sell ad space. Thank you to both of you for your enthusiasm and passion and for giving me the foundation on which my entire working life has been built.

Mum: Two kids, a single parent with an O level in cookery, living in a terraced house with a backyard in a suburb of north Manchester. Trips to the launderette on a Friday with our washing in a Tesco trolley, free school meals. Yet you put yourself through college, then polytechnic and after years of hard work typing night after night into the early hours at the desk in your bedroom, you qualified as a teacher and eventually became head of year. I can think of no better role model for having a goal, sticking to it and persisting despite the odds. You were the first person to read the first draft of the manuscript of this book and cast your former English teacher eye over it (and you hadn’t lost your touch with the red pen!). Thank you.

Dad: Selling was in your blood from being a rep in your twenties, flogging Angel Delight and Maxwell House coffee for General Foods, to running your own promotions agency to promoting your driving instructor skills today. Selling and marketing are what you’ve always done and had a passion for. Your love of business, of doing the deal and of living life to the full, always being positive, is what you’ve passed on to me. Thank you.

Sue and Andy Groocock (odd name, great people). These good friends live in what must be the remotest part of mainland UK, a house outside of the busy, heaving metropolis that is Applecross. In February 2010 I spent a week at their B&B, www.spindrift-applecross.co.uk, hunched over my laptop, typing the vast majority of this book. I should have only been there for two nights but was snowed in and had to stay for the week. Sue baked and cooked and generally looked after me through the cold days, but left me alone to get this done. Thank you.

Bren Tierney and John Hyslop, friends for as long as I can remember and two of the best sales people you’ll ever meet. Neither has a degree, they just started in sales at the bottom and worked their way up, doing what sales people do: making the calls, visiting the customer, asking for the order and hitting their target. Thank you.

Patrick McCann, friend and Global Head of Learning and Development at Herbert Smith. Patrick gave me my first break into the world of training members of the legal profession when he was head of learning and development at Berwin Leighton Paisner. He has been and remains my biggest advocate for what I do and the way I deliver it. Thank you.

Vincent Connor, Partner and Head of Asia Pacific and Head of the Hong Kong office of Pinsent Masons, a good business acquaintance and the best networker and worker of a room I have ever witnessed. Vincent is the very epitome of a polite, affable, immaculately tailored, erudite Edinburgh gentleman lawyer. Thank you for allowing me to hold you up as an example in virtually every course on networking I run.

Simon Shaw, a fellow Mancunian now living in Edinburgh and a superb graphic designer. He’s the guy responsible for designing the booklets I hand out at the end of sessions and the success that they are. People love the look and feel of them and that’s all down to him. Thank you for helping me to be remembered.

Iain Campbell, Jenny, Grace, Louise, Megan, Laura & Emily at Wiley/Capstone. From our first meeting at Costa on Victoria train station in London right through to the publication of this book, Iain has been with me every step of the way. He has been a fantastic advocate for me and this book and there’s no way any of it would have happened without him. Jenny read and re-read the manuscript and made sure the whole thing flowed and made sense.

Roy Dobbs, my friend and my former boss at Russell & Bromley in Manchester. The finest retailer you’d ever wish to meet. Roy has more passion and flair for retail than anyone I’ve met. He taught me that sales is not simply about product knowledge, it’s about delivering a performance, putting on a show; that the customer should be entertained and leave having had a retail ‘experience’.

My wife, Lisa. She has stuck with me since our first date on 22 September 1989, through a business failure, near bankruptcy, a law degree, Bar school, eight house moves, including one from Manchester to Edinburgh with a 14-month-old son, two new business start-ups and a handful of career changes, all the whilst being a senior account manager, training to be a beauty therapist and bringing up our two boys, George and Harry. Your love and support and unerring faith in me allowed me to get to this point. I simply could not have done it without you. I love you. Thank you.

Rebecca, my sister. For putting up with me tormenting her when we were growing up, for persuading me to start a recruitment business with her and for believing in me when many didn’t. Thank you.