8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A very good coaching session with an experienced collector, February 1, 2004
By A Customer
This review is from: Paid in Full (Paperback)
First, hat's off to the author for fine-tuning his book
over several editions and many years, to finally write up
a definitive version, covering spreadsheets, software (the
modern tools) with all the rest, and keeping it uptodate.
I definitely reaped rewards from this book, more than
Harold S. Long's book on collections called HOW TO COLLECT
ILLEGAL DEBTS, which although very useful, funny, realistic
and psychologically, very interesting and stimulating,
exceeded the bounds of acceptable, employable behavior.
The advantage of Paulsen's approach, is you're employable
as a professional by other companies, whereas Harold S. Long's
techniques would require you to open up your own business,
with a great deal of muscle-man, karate or boxing training
to do with the collection activities. Most will prefer the
Paulsen approach ...it's easier, and it keeps you out
of trouble.
Regarding the book itself, PAID IN FULL, its clearly written
by someone who is completely, entirely and fully immersed
in collections. Or in other words, collecting is Mr Paulsen's
Universe, written by someone who loves that work, and feels
comfortable and financially rewarded for doing good collecting
work.
That said, it can be summarized as a gigantic coaching session,
by an experienced mentor, who is extreme credible, and is willing
to share with others, his own personal techniques, psychological
approach, attitudes and professional behavior with the readers. That
certainly deserves a round of applause, as rarely do star performers
share their secrets with other people.
However, I gave this book a 4/5 for the reason that it didn't
strike me as a "PHENOMENAL" book about collection. Just a very
good, or excellent coaching session one. Perhaps the approach
by the author was too relaxed about it ...myself, I've read
books that are urgent in their coaching or training tone, very
motivating, upbeat and ambitious. In this book, the author is
self-conscious about showing too much enthusiasm about the profession,
or perhaps, disliked it or couldn't bear to practice is after many
years (my guess) and this would explain why the author is not training
people about collecting, contrasting with actually working as a collector.
I feel trainers often become slightly out of touch with reality,
in the sense that they become too comfortable and relaxed about
the pressures, performance stresses and keeping-your-job fears
that actual professionals feel when they're doing their job. Indeed,
it's likely a lot of pro's in the field get terminated from collections
from lack of performance, or lose their desire to be collectors,
or get paid very poorly to do that work. None of the negatives or
positives or even, the mention of salaries, career perspectives and
similar pressures are even referred to in Mr Paulsen's book, unlike
many other books that actually understand and acknowledge those
pressures, those questions and offer tips to address those problems. This
downgrades my rating of 5 to only a 4 for Paulsen's book.
All in all, worth every penny ... and clearly, this is a very nice
addition to people doing collections, or thinking about trying a collecting
job out for a while ...although, it's a small part of the story when
working in finance or accounting. For that, a college or university degree
in accounting, finance and more is advised, for example.
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