The Greatest Salesman in the World is a 1967
self-help book written by Og Mandino set in the time just before
Christianity arose. The book follows the life of an aging man, Hafid. Hafid was once a
camelboy who rose to become "the greastest
salesman" by reciting and practicing 10
principles given to him by his master and written in the book. The main theme is self-promotion but it was very dragged out and would have been more
powerful in half the number of pages. It tries to make you feel good while you're reading it, then when you're halfway through it, you think, "Damn, what a
waste of time!"
I often call Dr. Donahue, dean of the Honors College at
NJIT,
The Greatest Salesman in the World . When I was choosing
colleges in early 1996, I chose
NJIT for financial reasons and because Dr. Donahue sold it to me. Dr. Donahue once said that it was hard to always have a
smile on his face as he often had to have when he was showing
prospective students around and putting up with their
parents. This past spring, just out of the
hospital and in failing health, he showed up for
Dean's Day (for incoming and undecided
high school seniors) to either make students feel
confident about their choice or to convince them to choose
NJIT.
I didn't have the best of grades in my four years at NJIT. Often I fell below the GPA requirement for the Honors College and its free scholarship and thus was required to have a talk with Dr. Donahue, who let me stay in for all 4 years. Aside from talking to me about how to improve and all that jazz, he made me feel damn confident in myself that I could kick ass in my classes. Finally, in my junior year, I made Dean's List, and I owe a lot to him. What's important in Dr. Donahue's salesmanship wasn't his actual selling. It was making the buyer feel damn good about his purchase for all eternity.