PREFACE

A FRIEND OF mine once attended a performance of the famous group Cirque du Soleil. As you may know, Cirque du Soleil is an award-winning show featuring amazing feats of strength and dexterity all staged to music. The troupe describes itself as a “dramatic mix of circus arts and street entertainment.”1 When I asked my friend how he liked the show, he replied, “It was amazing—truly unbelievable.”

“So, it was good?” I asked.

“No,” he replied. “It went sailing way past being good. It was truly remarkable.”

Sailing Past Good

Those three words, sailing past good, resonated in my mind, and I began to think about my life and my job at IBM. My mission there is to help salespeople, sales managers, and sales executives “sail past good.”

Being good ...

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