Who's the best sales trainer you ever had? Mine was ElmerFudd.

Thanks to Mel Blanc and Looney Tunes, I grew up attendingSaturday morning sales training each week. And Elmer Fudd was thebest in the business. He opened many an episode by looking into thecamera and whispering, “Shhh. Be vewy vewy quiet, I'm huntingwabbits.” It's genius, really. But it's also subtle.

It wasn't until just after my 20th birthday that I had my firstFudd Epiphany. The carrier I had been recruited to work for sent meto a 4-day indoctrination, er, sales training program. Our trainersaid, “99 percent of U.S. businesses have less than 500 employees,and most of those have less than 10 employees, so guess where yourprospecting should be focused. Get those dreams of landing GeneralMotors out of your head. You're not going to eat if you wait untilyou bag an elephant. You have to shoot some rabbits along the way,and there are a lot more rabbits out there than elephants.”