Business POV

What if everything you know about acquiring new business is changing, obsolete or wrong? asks Rick Farrell. At the University of Chicago's GSB Alumni Sales Leader's Roundtable, Farrell, a consultant, talked to guests about new tactics for getting prospects to reach for their wallets: ask questions, listen to them carefully and, he says, "identify their pain."

Mr. Farrell runs a sales consultancy and public-speaking firm called Tangent Knowledge Systems. His presentation was called "Sales: The Last Frontier for Business Improvement and Efficiency Gains" and took place at the Gleacher Center. The premise of the presentation was that sales organizations and their sales people, Farrell says, are very good at a game no longer being played.

GSB Sales Roundtable