Sindhura Ramesh

Honestly, I think everyone in the world already knows how to sell. It could be as simple as convincing your husband to buy something for the house, it's a universal skill, most of us just don't call it "sales." For me, it started way earlier than my first job. I was a really good listener as a kid, and that's actually what made me good at sales later, not talking. So I attribute my success to that early habit of listening, and to the people along the way who helped me figure things out when I didn't have all the answers on my own.

My mum gave me advice that's guided me across every version of my career - sales, project management, whatever comes next. She said: whatever profession you choose, listen first. Don't rush to act on it. Just keep actively listening, over and over, until you start noticing the patterns underneath. That's what makes you learn faster, work smarter, and solve problems better.

I saw that principle in action watching an IT project manager on one of my accounts at Dell. He carried the budget, the timeline, the requirements and his whole job was making sure none of it fell apart. Blame landed on him if things went wrong; if they went right, it was just "doing his job." That balance felt like a superpower to me, and it's what pushed me to go do my master's in project management.

Talking isn't the skill people think it is - listening is. People assume selling, and honestly a lot of professional success, is about talking a lot. It's really not. It's listening about 70% of the time, asking the right questions 20% of the time, and only pitching a solution the last 10%. I'd tell young women entering this field to trust that instinct to listen rather than perform, and to know that quieter skills, patience, attentiveness, asking good questions are often the ones that move a room the most.

I didn't grow up with a lot of privilege. I've had to figure a lot of things out on my own, or by finding the right person to ask, so problem-solving became second nature to me. I think that's the biggest opportunity in this field right now: recognizing that most of what people buy, or need, or ask for, I'd say 80% of it — is really about solving something for them. Whether it's sales or project management, the underlying skill is the same. The challenge is getting organizations to see that listening and problem-solving aren't soft skills sitting on the side — they're the actual mechanism behind good outcomes.

Listening first, and solving problems second. That's really been the throughline of my whole career, whether I was in sales or project management. It's actually what I'm writing my book about right now, it's called *Before You Reply*. My hope with it is to spread awareness about the art of listening and to give people something practical they can use, because I think if more people actually listened, most of our problems at work and honestly in life would solve themselves.