There is nothing more exciting, or more dangerous, than a sales professional who can attack the game of selling with the strategic mind of a golfer. I am a lifer in sales who, somewhere along the way, fell in love with golf. These may seem like two unconnected occurrences in anyone’s life, but with time I realized that there are too many similarities between the game of golf and the game of sales to ignore.

It seems after four decades of talk about the “consultative” or “solution” sales approach, companies would be adept at selling this way by now. Unfortunately, that’s not the case: Many sales professionals struggle to move beyond pitching their products or services to providing solutions that are connected to customer business outcomes.