When Quality Takes Over Sales
The customer wanted a quotation.
The Quality Manager wanted a clarification meeting.
Customer: Can you deliver in 2 weeks?
Quality Manager: Depends. What exactly do you mean by delivery? Dispatch date, receipt date or installation date?
Customer: We may need a few specification changes later.
Quality Manager: Please define “few”.
Customer: Can you give us confidence that there will be no issues?
Quality Manager: No issues is a very broad term. Please clarify expected acceptance criteria.
Customer: Can you reduce the price?
Quality Manager: Before discussing cost, let us first freeze the scope, assumptions and risks.
By this point, the customer is already looking for the real Sales Manager.
But to be fair...
If Sales Managers sometimes overpromise, Quality Managers sometimes overanalyse.
Sales can teach Quality how to move faster, simplify communication and focus on relationships.
Quality can teach Sales how to ask the right questions, identify risks and avoid unrealistic commitments.
The best companies are not the ones where Sales wins or Quality wins.
They are the ones where both work together before making promises to the customer.
In your company, who usually wins: Sales or Quality?
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