The doom-and-gloom economic reporting continues and as a sales manager it is important to keep a pulse on your team. More articles are being released on the topic of employees getting skittish about their future with the company. Bob Rosner offers some good advice for these employees in his Working Wounded blog: Be careful to not drink the Kool-Aid with coworkers by being hyper-critical about your company’s future. Get an outside opinion. If you work for a public company, talk to a stock broker. A search in our city listed 391 brokers who offer a free consultation. If you work for a smaller company, check with vendors to see if… Read More
Continue ReadingWarning: Dinosaur Title Writer
I just read an employment ad for a sales position that had this for the title: Salesmen Honestly, how out of touch can you be?
Continue ReadingInterview Questions For Gen Y
From CollegeRecruiter.com’s Sample Interview Questions for Those Hiring Millennials: William recommends that interviewers “incorporate more personal questions that expose a candidate’s personality, work ethic, and personal motivations” because “how a person approaches life is often indicative of how they’d approach work.” He therefore recommends rephrasing typical interview questions in a way that they better apply to the personal lives of your candidates. Sample interview questions in this area include: How do you primarily communicate with friends? How often? When you have a dilemma to solve, how do you approach it? How do you spend your free time? (Do you prefer doing activities solo, with friends, or in groups?) Excellent advice… Read More
Continue ReadingMarquee vs. Mundane
I’ve been working with a handful of sales managers recently as they onramp new salespeople and I have seen a stumbling block occur more than once. The issue has to do with the sales manager’s perception of the typical sale. Sales managers, in most instances, work primarily with large, high-visibility accounts as they should. The issue that occurs is that the manager starts to view these marquee accounts as the model, or even norm, for all other accounts. What happens is that the manager loses sight of the history of activities that went into earning that customer’s business. Rarely do new salespeople fly out of the gate and close a… Read More
Continue ReadingIt Ain’t Experience
BusinessWeek.com discusses recruiting strategies based on who you are trying to attract in Recruiting Today: What Are You Promising? There are some excellent examples of different programs initiated by different companies. However, this one jumped off the screen: In some cases, offering young employees a unique opportunity can have special appeal. DHL, which used to hire only experienced salespeople, offered nine recent college grads a shot at sales last year (and a comprehensive training program to support the move). The company, which is expanding the program this year, says the program not only attracted nine top candidates, but the new hires generated more revenue and more shipments per sale. Many… Read More
Continue ReadingTrap The Fat Words
The Northwest-Delta airlines merger is the talk of this town as you might expect. There has been much posturing up here as people and politicians realize that Northwest will probably leave this town as Atlanta becomes the new company’s headquarters. I was reading an article on the merger in our local St. Paul Pioneer Press when I came across this quote (my highlighting): As for the covenants Northwest signed with the state in 1991 on maintaining a certain number of jobs, the airport hub and Northwest’s Eagan headquarters, Anderson said “we think we can get to the spirit of the original covenants that were struck.” That is a fat-worded, or… Read More
Continue ReadingDirector Of Career Mobility
Another good article here from WSJ titled New Career, Same Employer. The gist of the article: Ernst & Young LLP last year named Nancy Harley director of career mobility for the Americas, a new position designed to help employees of the accounting firm move into new roles. “The longer someone stays intrigued and challenged, the longer they’re going stay with the firm,” Ms. Harley says. Observers say employers are creating or expanding these programs to improve retention rates in a competitive job market, particularly as Baby Boomers begin to retire. The initiatives typically include Web-based programs for evaluating employees’ career goals and suggesting relevant paths. Interesting title – director of… Read More
Continue ReadingBig Brother Scanning Your Contacts
This Wall Street Journal quick-hit article is shocking: Companies are rolling out software that allows them to mine their employees’ emails and electronic address books for contact information, in a bid to make it easier to establish relationships with potential clients and others. But the tools also raise privacy concerns, and have been met with resistance at some firms. “Raises privacy concerns”…that is an understatement. There has to be more to this story, but I can’t imagine companies using these tools. If they do, I suspect the natural reaction will be for employees to carry around their contact info on their cell phone and not place it on their company… Read More
Continue ReadingTeleseminar Tomorrow – Information Overload
Tomorrow my friends at Golden Compass will be hosing a sales teleseminar that will discuss techniques for navigating to the information you need to be successful in sales. Michael and Sheryl have the gift of making learning fun. Here are the details: Information Overload is Killing You: Bullet Proof Your Sales Team with 5 Secret Strategies the other Yahoos Don’t Even Know Wednesday, April 23rd 2008 2:00pm Eastern / 1:00pm Central / 12:00pm Mountain / 11:00am Pacific Michael Benidt and Sheryl Kay, Golden Compass Every sales professional knows how essential it is to be prepared, but who has the time?! According to a recent LexisNexis survey, information overload is driving… Read More
Continue ReadingCover Letter Comedy
The Killian Newsletter is out which means another fabulous installment of Cover Letters From Hell. This edition features some dandies: …take this full of life, creative, fun, hardworking, quick learner, hands-on, intelligent, good looking, individually and help him by giving him the best possible experience, so he can continue the legacy of provided high level, knock your socks off advertising. That’s why one should have important letters read – out loud – by someone else. We’ve always had food-industry clients, and yes, we talk about food a lot, but we’ve never before been ordered to actually be food: … being a member of the (name withheld) Organization, and, braise yourselves,… Read More
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