Olga Cristina Rodriguez

I attribute my success to not being lazy and staying disciplined in my daily work. I come to the store every morning ready to do my job without getting distracted by co-workers - I pay attention to what I need to do, like paperwork and calling my VIP customers. I focus on the million-dollar clients I already have, calling them and asking if they need anything, letting them know I'm here for them. I send samples through regular mail to keep those relationships strong. The key is paying attention to what you're doing in your store, maintaining your customer book, calling people regularly, and staying disciplined. Don't be late, and always focus on your work. It's about being competitive with yourself, not with other people. When you don't know something, you need to study and be prepared, take notes about it, because this industry is very hard and if you don't know about professional things, you won't make it.

The best career advice I received was to be more involved by asking customers private, personal questions - things like finding out their birthday so you can call them and make them happy. That personal connection is very good for being successful. When you know something special about a customer, you make a little note, and then you call them, and the person feels great and comes back to your store. It's about building those genuine relationships and making customers feel valued and remembered.

When you're new and entering this industry, you need to take responsibility for your own learning. Don't ask senior staff questions in front of customers because you look very bad. Instead, when you finish work, take the book and go search on Google for every bottle, make notes, and learn it yourself. You need to know the answers before the customer asks. It's forbidden to ask me, the senior person, what the ingredients are in every bottle just because you don't want to learn about it yourself. You need to be prepared when you have a customer so you can answer every question because you already know about it. Never come asking me - you need to know yourself. This industry is very hard, and if you don't know about professional things, you won't make it. You need to work hard and be number one at anything you do.

I had an amazing opportunity before with Stefano Ricci that I couldn't take, but it was a challenge I had dreamed about. The position would have involved traveling everywhere in the United States as a coordinator, going to malls and checking the fragrance displays, putting in samples and testers. It would have been fun to fly everywhere and take care of the brands inside the malls. I never did it, but it represented the kind of challenge and growth opportunity that exists in this field - moving from store-level sales into a regional coordinator role where you can have broader impact across multiple locations.

The most important values to me are having patience with people and being focused on your training. When people ask you something you already know because you've studied your products, you need to be ready with answers so people don't feel like you don't know what you're doing. It's very important that you don't waste the time of the person who comes to your store, especially because my customers are high-end clients with money - not everybody can buy a bottle of Bond No. 9 for $500. You need to be accurate and knowledgeable about the brand, the shipping, and everything, because if I look bad, my manager looks even worse. Being prepared, accurate, and respectful of people's time are the values that guide everything I do.