One of the most conspicuous failures I know is a man who has “a winning personality.”  Times without number his genuine agreeableness has won him fine chances to succeed, but in the positions he has held he has never studied the needs of his employers for other qualities than likability.  Consequently he has fallen down on all his big chances.  Today he is just a popular door man for a big department store.  His intelligence and his physical ability are so evident that he is an object of pity and wonder as he smiles and bows to customers of the store.  Undoubtedly if he had studied the different opportunities he has had, and had fitted himself into all the requirements of a particular situation, his winning personality would have helped him higher and higher toward the mountain peaks of success instead of leaving him on an ant hill.

[Sidenote:  Three Impressions Necessary]

Of course the mind of your prospective employer acts in co-ordination with his heart when you attract him so much that he really wants the service you proffer.  He imagines you rendering that service.  He thinks what “might be” if you were associated with his business.  He paints mental pictures that please him, and he wishes his vision to come true.  But when he begins to imagine you rendering service, the picture of your agreeable personality will not be pleasant to him if he sees that he doesn’t really need you. In order to get yourself wanted it is necessary that you show him the lack, and that you can fill it, and that you would be likable when filling it.  If you make these three impressions on the mind and heart of your prospect, your success in your purpose will be assured.  You will not fail to get yourself wanted.

[Sidenote:  Desire is Turning Point Of the Sale]

In salesmanship “desire is the determinant of the sale.”  By this is meant that when the salesman sufficiently stimulates a real desire in his prospect, he has climbed the highest grade of difficulty.  If he is skillful, the selling process from then on should be comparatively easy sledding.  You realize that if you can get yourself wanted by an employer, the matter of landing a job in his business should not be hard.  We therefore are considering now the turning point in the process of selling the true idea of your best capabilities in the right field.  After you get yourself wanted, the odds are no longer against you, but grow increasingly in your favor.  If, having succeeded in getting yourself wanted, you then fail in your ultimate purpose, you should blame no one but yourself.

[Sidenote:  The Use of Tactful Suggestion]