We all know that women in sales encounter unwanted sexual invitations and suggestions, and that they must sometimes deal with outright sexual harassment. There are, however, other important but less well-known sexual dilemmas which sales professionals face.

From my vantage point as a sales psychologist and consultant to major corporations, I have seen that these dilemmas are capable of causing much pain, frustration and anxiety. The purpose of this article is to shed some light on these sexual quandaries and to show how some salespeople have successfully dealt with them.

Place yourself in this situation and ask yourself what you would do. You are a new salesman working for ZBA Computers. (All company names and all personal names in this article are fictitious.) The salesman you are replacing was fired because he was having an affair with the secretary of Mr. Robert Sayers. Mr. Sayers is the president and owner of the City Computer Stores, which was previously ZBA’s largest customer in the state. However, since Mr. Sayers found out about the affair and helped to get the salesman fired, he has refused to buy or stock any ZBA Computers.

Your job: To win back the account. What would you do?

Rod Rigglio faced this challenge in real life. He called on Sayers and was informed that no matter what products ZBA came out with, and no matter how low the price, City Computer Stores wouldn’t carry them. Sayers didn’t want to do business with a company he considered unethical and without moral standards. He did, however, say he would grant Rigglio an appointment every now and then because he did remain curious about what ZBA Computers might come out with.

“Fair enough,” Rod thought and he called on Sayers nine or ten times a year. Rod thought it was important to restore the image of ZBA Computers, even if he never got a sale. He was willing to invest his time and energy to undo the damage the previous salesman had done through his sexual escapades.

Mr. Sayers started to develop a grudging respect for Rod but told him many times that he could never forget what had happened and that he would never again buy from ZBA. Rod continued to call into his second year on the job, still with no prospect of making a sale. While Rod was doing well in his other accounts, he had not been able to make up for the volume lost when the City Computer Stores account departed.

Near the end of the second year, a sad and tragic event took place. Mr. Sayers had a massive heart attack. Open heart surgery was required. As he lay in the postoperating room, Mr. Sayers wondered if he were going to die.

Rod was the only salesman who visited him in the hospital. After Mr. Sayers got out, Rod and ZBA Computers began getting lots of business from City Computer Stores. It is now once again the biggest account for ZBA in the state. Rod is now a hero inside ZBA.

“There was a bit of luck involved in it,” Rod says, “but I would have been willing to call on him for a couple of extra years, if necessary, to get the account. We all had to pay a big price, in terms of lost income, time and frustration because my predecessor wanted a few evenings of sexual fun. The lesson I learned from all of this is that, at least for me, sales and sex on the job aren’t even worth considering. It’s playing with dynamite.”

Karen had been the Bank of London’s top new business salesperson in 1983. With an income of over $100,000 and an outstanding set of contacts, Karen seemed assured of having an even better year in 1984.

Yet, three months into the year, it all started to slip away. She was in a severe sales slump and few people held any hopes for recovery.

When I was called in, I’d been consulting with the Bank on psychological testing for the selection of salespeople. The sales manager had no idea of what was wrong. He did say that in late 1983, Karen had talked with him a few times about a customer who was sexually harassing her. “But nothing ever came of that and it is all in the past,” the sales manager assured me, “Karen told me so herself.”

Karen’s husband was also puzzled by her depression and sales slump. He recounted that Karen had told him about the sexually-aggressive customer back in December. He gave her some tips and pointers on how to handle the customer and said the situation took care of itself. “It was a tempest in a teapot,” her husband said, “and it blew away.”

I gave Karen the H.R. Chally test of sales aptitude and traits and she scored extremely well in all areas except one: stress tolerance. I showed her the test results and asked her to explain to me what she thought the results meant. Karen admitted she was very depressed and then she began to sob uncontrollably. She claimed to now know why she was so unhappy and said that she was willing to try anything to break out of her sales slump.

Under clinical hypnosis, Karen revealed that she had given in to her customer’s sexual advances late one afternoon in December. She was racked with unresolved guilt and felt she had no one in whom she could confide.

She found her sales manager’s advice simplistic and insulting: “Just be nice to him, he’s probably only kidding around.” She found her husband’s advice simplistic and impractical: “Tell him to go to hell and drop the account.”

Finally, she gave up talking about it. Everyone thought the problem had gone away, but it had only gotten worse. And Karen kept all her frustrations and fears bottled up inside.

She was sure her customer had told some other members of the financial community about their sexual encounter, although she had no definite proof. Moreover, in early 1984, three of her new prospects tried to put the move on her. She couldn’t stand the pressure. She wondered if this would go on indefinitely. Suddenly, she lost interest in prospecting and in making sales calls. Her productivity dropped to less than half of what it had been in 1983. And she dreaded her husband’s learning of her one afternoon of infidelity.

Through a number of therapeutic counseling sessions, Karen was able to consciously confront her fears and work through them. As I helped her work on her self-esteem and taught her a variety of assertiveness techniques, she gathered the courage to go back and confront the man who had seduced her. To her surprise, she found he was also racked with unresolved feelings of guilt and was very apologetic. He assured her he had told no one of their afternoon together.

After several months of therapy, which her company paid for, Karen made a nearly complete recovery. She rebuilt her friendship with the man who seduced her and he has provided her with some referrals which have turned into strong Bank of London accounts. While she hasn’t yet regained her position as top salesperson, her production is very strong and she feels good about herself and her work.

I don’t wish to imply that sex and sales always lead to lost business or to depression and anxiety attacks. On a recent consulting assignment in Switzerland, I was working with a salesman who covers several European countries. Andre claims to have four girlfriends and they each work for companies who are his customers. Andre is single and he seems to think he has it all balanced and figured out. Only time will tell if he can keep this up or if there will be a price to be paid.

Sales and sex on the job is much more prevalent than most sales managers realize. From what I have seen, this mixture is explosive and dangerous. When such a situation comes to the attention of a sales manager, it deserves careful attention and clear-headed thinking. Simply firing the employee or giving surface-level advice are usually not effective strategies for the 1980’s. Besides the very real threat of lawsuits from fired employees, there is a big price to be paid in terms of lost business and destroyed self-esteem. Salespeople who have made the mistake of mixing sex and business can usually be helped, and the situation can be corrected with a supportive attitude and professional assistance. This seems to be the formula that produces the best long-term payoffs, in both financial and human terms.