Maslow's hierarchy of needs

Maslow

The Life of a Good Salesperson -- Abraham Maslow and his theory of a hierarchy of needs

The philosopher and psychologist Abraham Maslow is best known for his establishment of a theory of a hierarchy of human physical, emotional, and social needs. He wrote that human beings are motivated by unsatisfied needs, and the promise of fulfilling unfulfilled needs is what primarily drives human beings into action -- like the hungry donkey who pulls a cart, running to nibble at the dangling carrot held by the cart's driver. Maslow also wrote that certain lower needs need to be satisfied before higher needs can be satisfied. (Gwynne, 1997) This is a significant hermeneutical framework to consider for a salesperson, for the very nature of sales is based on needs, namely of generating a sense of unsatisfied need and then convincing the buyer he or she can fulfill this desire with any given product.

The salesperson's calling is also based upon needs, as in "I need to make a living and earn 'y' amount of dollars, therefore I will sell you 'x.'" However, the relationship of a salesperson on commission is even more needs-based than perhaps some other professions. On the most basic and elemental of levels, the salesman or woman is motivated by his or her physiological needs -- the need to eat, the need to feel warm, to buy clothes -- all of which require a salary. The salesman will sell homes via the mortgage company to facilitate a buyer's own physical needs to have a kitchen to eat and store food, to feel warm in a residence, or to have a place to stay to weather the elements. Thus selling mortgages fulfills the prime, first, core base of the psychologist Abraham Maslow's hierarchy of human needs.

The second aspect of Maslow's hierarchy of needs is safety, something that a home, especially a home that is owned and not rented, can provide. The salesman also needs to feel safe that the homes he sells will be available, that the buyers will not retract their offers, and the sellers will not do the same. It is the third aspect of the selling of mortgages and homes where the Maslow pyramid of needs becomes subtler, however, in its operation. The need for love is satisfied on the salesperson's part by the appreciation he or she receives from the seller and the customers, and also from his or her employer's praise in naming the seller employee of the month. On a slightly more insidious level, a buyer may buy something on an impulse to receive a momentary sense of approval, however self-interested, on the part of the salesman.

Esteem, such as a seller who seeks to buy a house to achieve a raise in the esteem of his or her community, might be a better result to seek from an emotional home purchase -- likewise the seller of the home or the mortgage increases not simply his or her own immediate self-esteem, but his or her sense of empowerment as a competent and ethical salesperson in general. Lastly, the ideal of self-actualization in sales comes from the salesperson's feeling that he or she has achieved a worthy goal, namely that he or she has helped a buyer, through a mortgage, gain the ability to become a homeowner in a community that is healthy and safe for the buyer and the buyer's family and children.

A key element to Maslow's hierarchy of needs is that it is a hierarchy, namely that the baser needs must be satisfied before the higher needs can be met. A salesperson scrabbling to make a living might be willing, to satisfy his or her physiological needs, to sell anything to anyone, even encourage someone to go into dangerous debt with a mortgage he or she can ill-afford to buy an overpriced or unsuitable house. A person who lives in an unsafe community might enter into such an agreement, to earn enough money for his or her own immediate self-interest to move out of that community. The foolishness of buying a home on such a basis in the long-term is difficult to appreciate when short-term needs are not met on a physical level. Only when the salesperson's bestial instincts of food and shelter and safety are satisfied can he or she think about truly receiving love, much less helping the customer.

This is not simply a reason to mistrust hungry salespeople living only on commission, because this mentality is also reflected in the customer's mindset. The customer will not care about buying a home if even more basic needs such as food are consumed on a hand to mouth basis. To be safe, an individual might be willing to live in a cold community, hostile to children or his or her racial group. To be safe, the buyer might take on a mortgage he knows he will default upon, to help his family. To receive love from a salesperson, a woman might agree to an unwise purchase, to receive momentary approval and to see a smile on the real estate agent's face.