How'd I get here!?!

You know, I never planned to be in a sales career. Not at eight years old, when I used referral techniques to get more lawn mowing jobs. Not at 12 years old, when I prospected my neighborhood for people to save newspapers for me to recycle (had to pay for Scout Camp somehow ). Not when I was 14 and buying a 50 cent pack of bubble gum and selling it on the bus for 25 cents per piece (150% profit!)
I just never saw this coming!
Anyway, here I sit in a decent sales job - I sell software to the transportation industry - and I'm really floundering. I've always worked in phone sales, but this is the first time I've been in complex, long cycle, high level selling.
My mentor left the company three weeks after I got promoted to this position, and his replacement is a hot shot seller from a partner company who isn't keen on sharing technique or advice. The worst of this, though, is my boss has a serious man-crush on the new guy and I'm totally brushed off.
Long story short: here I am, under quota, directionless and floundering - but determined to succeed. I've decided I need to look outside the company for mentoring and advice.
Got any suggestions? Advice? Mentoring? ANYTHING? I'll take it.

Welcome to the community.

There's more than a few great minds here that can probably lend you a hand. If you have a specific question my suggestion would be to start a thread in whichever forum your question best fits and go from there. I'm sure not everyone reads the introduction threads.

Mr Paul,

You provided an excellent synopsis of your situation. I don't envy you, I've seen those types of situations before. But at least you found SalesPractice, and there's a ton of expertise here.

Perhaps you could tell us what sales challenges you're facing. The political/management challenges are clear, but what are you struggling with? What are you good at? What have you tried?

Skip Anderson