No, I didn’t get laid.
What I did get is the gift of more time. Thru the graces of god, my presentation was rescheduled from this afternoon to Wednesday. I cannot believe my luck – I was so ill-prepared. Instead of practicing the presentation this weekend, I enjoyed time with friends, the warmth of the sunshine, organized my new home…. all the things that a normal person would do on the weekend….
My new job has been brutal. I have felt overwhelmed since the day I started. It seems like there has been something to do every single day …. a lot to do, an overwhelming amount of things to learn. I’ve been told that that it will get easier once I pass all the hurdles in the onboarding program. Here is the high-level schedule….
- 3 full weeks of back-to-back training in Boston. This includes deep-dive training courses in the new product.
- 2 full weeks of a demo build, and delivery of the demo in a role-play scenario (my managers behaved as prospects/customers). It was tough but I received very good feedback. Loved the experience.
- 1 week of product certifcation study and test… which I passed. Pat on the back for Paula.
- 1 week of standard pitch study, practice, and presentation delivery (what I’m working on now).
- a couple of days for a “demo on the fly” prep and delivery….
- 1 week of tecnical training to discuss enterprise architectures.. must deliver and pass the technical presentation.
Yes, you read correctly. My new company pays me while they train me to be the best possible sales consultant out there. Its shocking, I’ve never run across this in my 15 year career in the software industry, but I have to say, it is so refreshing. Instead of being set up to fail, I’m being set up to succeed. But it has been really hard. I’m emotionally exhausted, causing me to feel physically exhausted. Thank god I have a good friend who is keeping me on track with my yoga/pilates/run schedule.
Given all of this, I should be ready to meet customers/prospects in April… I’m still a month away from “doing my job”… I’m exahusted now.. mentally exhausted. There is so much to learn, the pace is definitely accellerated. I feel drained all the time.
But today, I caught a break… I’ve got a few more days to practice. My presentation is now solid I just need to practice the delivery. Lucky me, I am grateful for the extra time.
Paula's Ponderings 