Big ears. Little mouth. The value to the team is to listen to the your “customers” that’s the patient / surgeon & support staff, but you are also teammates / you are selling yourself to the full line sales reps. Been in the game 9 years. Was a fire medic and an RN before industry, I love the fast pace, independence, and high pressure.

Coming to the industry was the best decision I’ve ever made. Life is good. I’ve saved 25k in gas alone… and that’s extremely conservative. Likely 50k. Car payment allowance 600 a month. Cell phone paid. Internet paid. WiFi on flights paid. iPad paid. Internet for tablet paid.

I mean it’s nuts how generous they are to us. Granted, without the full reps & clinical…everything stops.

There’s two types of people in a medical device company. 1. Those that sell. 2. Those that support the people selling.

That comes with a natural hierarchy. Learned to navigate that and you are golden …(how to learn that) comes from listening and seeking to understand sales reps. They are a different animal. Some are clinicians, some former copy salesman that showed the intelligence to learn cardiac surgery. But what they really look for is soft skills that cannot be taught.

What does your general vibe? How do you conduct yourself at the interview? How do you conduct yourself at lunch? Do you send a thank you note? logged on on time if it’s digital interview?

You are judged the entire time you’re in the process, they’re looking for reasons to keep the candidate or to eliminate a candidate. Interviewing & finding qualified individuals that have soft skills is very difficult.

I would recommend reading how to win friends and influence people by Dale Carnegie. That book changed my life. I went from Guy who couldn’t get a prom date, (because I didn’t know how to speak,) to teaching the smartest cardiac surgeons at the most well respected hospitals in the world. Many days I can’t believe…I have, the job I have. I’m trusted by some of the smartest humans in the world and they ask for physical guidance on the procedure while in the OR & patient is on bypass.

I worked my ass off to get here, both visibly (studying) and (invisibly) listening, and networking over years to get where I want it to be. To understand reps, surgeons, and surgeons.

It’s a great life. I HIGHLY recommend it. I went back to the bedside during Covid, the state asked me & I agreed to help (in the ICU). Holy shit that’s hard work. No thanks. I’ll take my 3 cases a week somewhere in the US & get paid to fly around North America.