Diane Sanchez began her selling career in 1970 as a field representative for Savin Business Machines. In 1973 she joined the Scholl Corporation, where she developed sales coaching skills and managed promotional programmes for the sales force. In 1979, as vice president of marketing for newly formed Miller Heiman, Inc, she developed a telemarketing and direct mail system that she implemented there and, in the 1980s, in her own consulting practice. She rejoined Miller Heiman as president and CEO in 1988, when its annual revenues were just over $2 million; in the tenth year of her presidency, that figure surpassed $20 million.