As the Sales and Support Manager for the KRS Club Project, my responsibilities include taking support calls from our clients as well as sales enquiries.
Some of the sales enquiries actually turn into sales and then the wheels start turning for me to arrange the installation of our software at our clients’ gyms. These gyms are spread wide and far across the southern continent of Africa from Namibia to Botswana and back, in some very interesting little towns.
One such journey took me to Gaborone in Botswana where I had to install our gym management system for a gym owned by the president of Botswana’s brother TK and his wife Thea.
I arrived at the airport in Gaborone to be met by two of the staff members of the gym who took me to my hotel where I was to stay for the three day trip. It was a great three star establishment opposite a large casino separated by a beautiful stretch of lawn with gardens and trees surrounding its perimeter.
After checking in, I was taken to the gym to meet the staff and to start the KRS Club installation process. After installing all the hardware and the software, training started. I was amazed at the pace of the training and the eagerness of the staff to learn the application. Training these clients was great and they caught on very quickly, which made my job very easy.
What’s amazing about going out and training clients is that you are able to experience and see places you never would have otherwise had the opportunity or inclination to visit. After wandering around the casino that evening I returned to my room for a good night sleep. The second day of training went very well and as this was a Friday, some of the staff planned a road trip to Johannesburg to go clubbing for the weekend.
This I found very interesting as it was about a 4 hour drive and these clients used to do it a few times a month. I finally met TK on the second day and what an awesome first impression. He was the most down to earth person one could imagine. He had quite a sense of humour and his staff treated him with the utmost respect and admiration. TK had just returned from South Africa on business and brought with him the membership cards that were printed by a company in Johannesburg.
That afternoon I had completed the training at the gym and I was dropped off again at my hotel.
That evening I spent in the casino lounge enjoying a beer and a very nice Botswana beef burger whilst listening to a tall slender lady entertaining us to the sounds of Randy Crawford.
On Saturday I was picked up from the hotel by TK. He was there to take me to his house to go and train his wife Thea on the software. The reason for this was that she had just had surgery on her lower back for a collapsed disc and was house-bound.
We travelled through the outskirts of the city towards the vast flat landscape that opened up before us. There were only a few mountain-like domes that protruded from the landscape and I found myself heading towards one of these domes.
One thing I noticed about driving around Botswana is that most cars had cracked windscreens and you can understand why because although the main roads are tarred they have a lot of gravel roads that link the various little suburbs together.
Once we got to the house, I met Thea and we got some training underway but only after TK had insisted we all sit down for a nice cup of coffee and a chat. I must say he is quite an amazing man who is very family-orientated. The pressures of a political life seem distant from him when he is at home.
I was due to leave that afternoon so I quickly went through all the training that I needed to with Thea and then TK was going to take me back to the airport. Thea wanted us to first drop off the membership cards at the gym before TK took me to the airport so off we went. We had left later than expected and TK was feeling a bit on the peckish side and stopped to buy us some lunch which consisted of KFC twisters.
I must say at this time I started to worry a bit as the time had passed by so quickly and I had to be at the airport by 1pm as the flight was due to leave at 2 that afternoon. I said to him that we were not going to make the airport in time if we go and drop the cards off at the gym. “Don’t worry about that” he said. “you will make your flight”. And he laughed a bit and carried on munching on his twister.
When we got to the airport it was already 1:30 and as we walked in to the airport all the check in counters were closed as it was the last flight to SA for the day. OOOPS. Now what???
As we are walking past the check in counters, he called to one of the staff there and says “hello there, my friend here needs to get on that plane and I would appreciate it if you could assist him”.
These guys jumped into action like you would not believe. They took my ticket and scanned it. Unlocked the security doors to the apron and escorted me past security to a waiting plane on the runway. What service…
It was quite an experience to be in the company of someone who has the power to pull a few strings to get me to a waiting plane. Needless to say it was probably one of the best training trips I have been on.
By: Richard Woodborne