Technical Aptitude - The Ability to Onboard New Knowledge Rapidly

On a Friday afternoon I sat across from a very talented server administrator asking questions about his career, how he got to where he was, and what he liked best about his current role. He joined the ranks of IT professionals at a young age, quickly came up to speed on his specialty, and still enjoyed it fifteen years on. So far, so good. The goal of my questioning was to determine his fit for a new role at the company that would require enhancing his current skill set, putting him in a position of influence and leadership, and increasing his salary. Given his tenure at the company and experience in the industry, along with how well he got along with the rest of the team, he was the natural fit. 

I began to describe to him the background of the new role, how it came to be needed, and what the company would require of whomever filled it.  He was attentive and asked the occasional insightful question. Things were going well. I finally got to the point where I asked him if he had any interest in taking on that kind of a challenge. His answer was, "not in the slightest". I pressed, explaining why I thought he was the perfect fit for the role. His answer shocked me.  He said, "Look, I'm really good at what I do. I know that. It's taken me a long time to get this good and I have no interest in starting over with a new technology, even if it is very similar to what I already do. I'm sorry, but you're going to have to get someone who's interested in learning new things. I'm just not." I sat for a moment trying to process what I had just heard. His answer wasn't wrong; you can't fault someone for knowing what they want or what they don't want just because it doesn't fit into your plan. I was surprised because it never occurred to me that in IT, where technology changes almost daily, that I'd find someone with a 'happily stuck in the mud' mindset.

The role I was considering this engineer for wasn't in the Sales Engineering (SE) field, however, one of the hallmarks of a good SE is the ability to learn new products/technologies and become an authority on them very quickly, sometimes in as little as a weekend. As stated before, technology evolves at an incredibly rapid pace. SEs, regardless of industry, must stay on top of the latest and greatest. Not only must they stay on top, but if they're going to stay in this field for long they must personally enjoy this pace of change and the challenge and excitement of constantly learning new things. If they don't enjoy it, it will become a burden that will eventually drag them down and out of the field.

It is the sales side of sales engineering that requires this.  Whether you work for the manufacturer, a reseller, or an installer/implementer, new versions of old products and altogether new products are constantly being released. Manufacturers must continue to evolve to continue to be relevant in their industry. If they stagnate, they eventually go out of business. Think about Blockbuster, Kodak, and Borders.  Sales must help customers understand the value of the new feature or product and whether it is a fit for the their business. If an SE isn't on top of new product developments they can't hope to help customers navigate these questions. If the SE for your company can't help find the answer, the SE for a competitor will.