Everyone lives by selling something...

...said Robert Louis Stevenson, author of Treasure Island and the Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

Sales reps, of course, sell products and services to customers.

CEOs sell their vision to their boards and employees.

CIOs sell their plans and budgets to the management team.

CFOs sell the company's investment plans to Wall Street.

CHROs sell the benefits of working in an organization to prospective employees.

Inventors sell their ideas to investors.

And CMOs must help sell all of these.

All require an in-depth understanding of both the offering and the buyer.

What are you selling?

And have you done the hard work to develop the insight required?

Experience matters.

Innovation hype

'Companies throw the term "innovation" around but that doesn't mean they are actually changing anything monumental,' writes Leslie Kwoh in "You Call that Innovation?"  Now that this has made the Wall Street Journal, "innovation" has probably reached peak of what the Gartner group calls the "hype cycle," and is likely headed for the "trough of disillusionment." But for those who follow trends, this should be no surprise.