Business
The old purpose of a sales force was to explain the worth of what a company already makes. That job is shrinking. Sellers now succeed by adding value the customer could not get without them, through the selling encounter itself.
Not all selling is the same kind of work, and lumping it together hides real differences. Some sales are simple transactions where the buyer mainly wants a low price and an efficient, cheap channel. Others call for a different way of creating value, so the sales force should be organized around these types.
In today's economy the customer holds the dominant power, and sellers must rebuild their approach around that fact. Buyers are changing what they expect from a sales relationship and how they go about purchasing.