Description of Concrete Learning Experience, Essay Example

Role of Sales and Business

Business related experience has come from starting a small computer business which I operated and managed with the assistance of two partners for two years. The business was located online which was ideal for marketing and prospective customer contact. To run a successful online business, customers must be incorporated into the product and service development scheme. Our online business was successful for two years because we made use of the feedback received from customers to launch new products into the market. “The internet also helped us tap into customer needs by providing a constant, real-time channel through which to interact and collaborate with our customer base. Elements of structure ensure key deadlines are met and approvals obtained, while elements of flexibility defer costly decisions until a time in the process when more accurate information is available.” (“Innovative New Product and Service Development”).  After the computer business, I worked in sales, as a sales manager, finance manger, finance director and presently as a General Manger of two stores. I have controlled a $50,000 a month marking budget, $15 million in inventory, floor plans of 60 employees, recruited, trained and motivated several employees throughout my career in sales. In addition, I worked in automobile sales. Further I have been allocated to work with manager manufacture and vendor relationships and control cash flow. My education of 12 semester hours at Weslayan Baptist University has afforded me some knowledge and skills to succeed in the line of sales.

One of my present job duties as a sales general manager is to create a financial chart in a 930 chart of account to submit to manufacturer and of course primary goal is to insure profit and retain earnings. Further, I am familiar with reading and underwriting consumer loans. With this position I have attended many financial industry specific training courses to aid me in past jobs.

Organizational Policy Formulation

Program managers are responsible for overseeing that all content posted by the assistant managerial team is in conjunction with the IT department and credible. Volunteers and student may help to maintain the web pages but only the upper management team may upload and download pages to the site as per the policies and procedures of the community college.

In my sales job, policies and procedures implemented were set up so that the chain of command was first through the salesman, then the finance manager then the general manager if the customer had issues with the price of the car or wanted to negotiate. As a small business owner for two years I implemented policies with the aid of my other two assistants.  The purpose of these policies were to insure that we were compliant with federal and state regulations, to ensure we were operating in an efficient and effective way and to promote sales and ensure there would be a profitable bottom line. The most effective means of writing a policy and procedure that will help the company is to start out with a policy and procedure manual that can be referred to and enforced without undue merit. There will be no room for argument and ambiguous nature if the policies and procedures are written clearly and concise in manual form. ISO standards should be used if operating under such anticipated measures. Most, but not all of the companies that employed me worked under ISO certification. This enabled me to follow protocol with much ease because of the manuals that were associated with the ISO certification protocol.

As a current general manager, I am not the point of first contact; rather I coordinate and manage all departments internally through the use of creative leadership skills. Policies and procedures are enforced at the stores to keep organization and uniformity in context.

Role of Research and Media in Community Service, Sales and Management

Internal and external surveys are paramount to determining satisfaction and perception of an organization. This is helpful to determine and overcome an internal issue that could hamper good relations.

While working as a partner in a small computer business it was important to know the past performances of companies, what our current goals were and to implement a plan of action to achieve these goals. I also needed to incorporate financial standing and holding research into my position in order to be competitive with the other companies.

While working at my present position as a general manager of sales it is important to know the bottom line and how I plan to achieve that by means of reducing costs and researching ways to do such. I had to refocus the vision of the company in order to prompt the sales force to be more competitive and to provide additional sales and customer service training. I chose the Dale Carnegie sales training method because it has been long established as a successful and motivating sales and customer service focused training tool.

A survey tool that I included into the current position as general manager was a Cross Impact Analysis that breaks questions into priority identification. This information was useful to make changes in policies, adjusting the vision plan and for any other internal change desired.

Role of Research in Sales and Community Service Jobs

“Producing phenomenal results involves discipline, a reliable repeatable process.” (“How Sales Results Can Improve Your Sales Results”). It is essential that I am aware of any negative threats that may bruise the image of the company. Publicity comes in forms of media advertising and good and bad information. Publicity is a guide to the mission statement at hand because different forms of publicity make a need to alter the mission statement in order to be in constant compliance with it. One cannot control what someone says about your company directly but indirectly you can control what the media says in relation to a statement. Keeping a good working relationship with the media is essential to getting your word across to them and keeping them with an open mind to print what is true and honourable. It’s called getting a fair shake.

Role of Training in Sales

Training of employees is a large part of an effective sales force. Managers play an essential role in the motivation of a sales team. Company profiles of leading pharmaceutical companies Abbott and GlaxoSmithKline were examined. Research shows role-playing is one of the top ways to illustrate to a sales force how to effectively sell a product. Role-playing represents both a visual and participative effort that stimulates performance in any given situation. I critiqued the role play situation and took the available feedback to improve the sales techniques. I made a decision to video tape the role playing exercise so that the sales force could analyze their own mistakes before I made any recommendations. Role-playing helped my team to anticipate their problems that might arise and to pose adequate proposals on how to overcome customer objections.

Plan, Implement and Evaluate Your Public Relations Program

Even if you are a sole-proprietor with one employee or a large corporation with 5,000 employees is essential to plan, implement and evaluate your PR program in order to ensure its success. Identification of appropriate personnel contacts are made through learning all aspects of the company you are going to do business with. Attending seminars of other established PR programs can aid in implementing your program successfully. “Paid advertising increases name recognition and media relations increase credibility.” (“Elements of a PR Plan”). A good public relations manager will plan his/her marketing area and establish what is the best interest to measure the program in advance. Further, one should plan how media relations programs will be incorporated with other marketing communication programs.

Reflections

Role of Sales and Business

I noticed that other online computer companies used different methods of advertising to promote their company such as graphic arts and linking to other sites. I incorporated this into my business partnership. When creating the web design I structured my design from a competitor company but added some focal points that were easy on the customer’s ideas and further provided innovative reasons to choose our site to conduct business with rather than competitive sites.

A goal was to market the business through the local community through online advertising as well as advertising at local sponsored events. I made flyers and passed them out on windshields of cars in all the local hot spots, advertised in the local newspapers and ran a broadcast on the local radio station.

Organizational Policy Formation

With regards to the joint computer business, the absence of a well formulated marketing plan caused the demise of the business. We were not able to support our expenditures with the business that was allocated to us. Our pubic relations policy was very strong because we formulated a well-written plan and had several local high authority contacts, but were unable to sustain an income for longer than two years. Market research shows that other companies were successful where we were not.

At present the sales company that employs me is very successful because they possessed a willingness to change by implementing a new training and public relations program the very instant they hired me. I was given the opportunity to attend training seminars and motivational seminars with relation to the job description.

Role of Research and Media in Community Service, Sales and Management

I can distinctly remember sales increasing 15% just six months after I started my position as general manager. Research plays an informative and persuasive role in the role of sales. As general manager I am the voice of the company and responsible for branding the products to ensure the company’s success and profitability.

Role of Training in Sales

I can distinctly remember going through the role play sessions with the anticipation of providing a successful motivated sales team that was able to anticipate and overcome virtually any customer objection. The idea is not a new idea to the scheme of sales but is often not used because it takes much time and effort to implement. “One of the key elements that contributed to our success was the fact that we as a team chose a topic, wrote it down in detail, divided into small groups and selected the best solution to overcome the objection together.” (Gart S., 2005).

Plan, Implement and Evaluate Your PR, Sales and Community Liaison Program

I successfully implemented a new public relations program at my current job as general manager by defining the objective of the media plan and establishing a good rapport with my peers, the press and potential customers. My goals were to increase the sales within the company structure by 20% within my first year of employment. I accomplished a 15% increase within the first six months by having a defined and measurable, time-specific plan. My target audience was the middle age career women shoppers. The key message to them was that we deliver quality merchandise for a lower price than competitors. We offer competitive credit card rates and easy law-a-way plans to be paid out in 90 days with no fee down. I have further increased the knowledge of the sales force by suggesting they attend a Dale Carnegie training seminar. All employees have successfully completed the training and are more precise with their sales techniques including motivational sales and customer communication probing techniques. This has certainly attributed to the increase in sales over the past six months.

Generalizations/Principles/Theories

Role of Sales and Business

Sales training must meet the desired vision plan objectives. Marketing and sales go hand in hand because they are internally and externally dependent upon each other’s attributions for success.

Organizational Policy Formulation

“It is often described that ‘Fellowship is heaven, and lack of fellowship is hell; fellowship is life, and lack of fellowship is death; and the deeds that ye do upon the earth, it is for fellowship’s sake ye do them.’” (A Dream of John Ball, Ch. 4; first published in The Commonweal 1886/7).” (Smith, 2002).

Tests for product suitability were conducted to ensure we were targeting the appropriate market. Integrity of the sales force was examined. Examination of sales styles were discovered reviewed and developed. Finally top producers from other companies were brought in to give demonstrations to the sales force and lower management. Research was conducted on present success measurements and desired sales output was considered. New training and sales motivational policies were made according to observances and new vision plan.

Data showed that the company must maintain a positive image, focus on the mission statement, have a direct liaison between the customers and the sales force and promote new training techniques for lower sales employees.

Role of Research and Media in Community Service, Sales and Management

It is important to implement the research policy in a written and organized format to ensure proper efficiency and to anticipate any downfalls that may arise.

The media is present to help a company gain public attention. Henceforth, it is ideal to maintain a good image in the public eye to promote your business. Further research helps a company to keep a competitive edge, to evaluate needs constantly and to evaluate stock-holder options.

Role of Training in Sales

The key in promoting sales is not to settle for the ‘status quo’. A manager should have a good enough relationship with his/her team to effectively motivate each sales person individually. Managers should be firm fair and give quality time to each sales person individually. This is accomplished through delegating some authority and responsibilities to assistants to free time to work personally with your sales force. It is important to keep your relationship with your staff on a business level and keep your personal feelings out of the relationship. Give positive feedback to your employees and set up your business to be fun to work at. Successful sales staffs is working towards a common goal and rewarded based on achievements.

Plan, Implement and Evaluate your PR, Sales and Community Liaison Program

Planning of your sales program should be done with the assistance of well-structured teams with experience and other academic professionals. I used a Dale Carnegie seminar for my sales training needs.

Testing and Application

Role of Sales and Business

One of the ways I tested the internal sales program’s success was to do surveys and to check recruitment records as compared to sales from external companies.  Further in my current general manager position one of the ways to test my position as a general manager was to determine if the sales or profit margin was increasing. The profits increased over a six month period by a striking 15%. The sales force was motivated and nearly all individual sales employees’ numbers rose which was attributed to the training received and new organizational scheme implemented. Other attributes were marketing schemes to direct sales toward career motivated women.          

Organizational Policy Formulation

One of the most effective ways to incorporate the message of the sales and marketing program at the store  I am employed at now was through the local newspapers, radio stations, websites and the Chamber of Commerce.

The Role of Research and Media in Community Service, Sales and Management

Finding the appropriate client base and how to market this base is the key to any businesses success rather small or large. I worked for three companies throughout my career in communications, public relations and sales. I found that research is a pre-empt to any organizations success because it employs power thorough knowledge.

Role of Training in Sales

The implementation of action sales training programs creates gains in sales performance and advancement in employees’ behaviours. Testing shows increased sales, reduced sale cycle time, increased margins and the ability to self-improve will be created from such testing and implementation of action sales programs.

Plan, Implement and Evaluate your PR, Sales and Community Liaison Program

For any general manager it is certainly essential to implement a great public relations program because the PR person is the first point of contact with the customer and normally is in charge of settling potential disputes. Implementation of a new sales training program starts with a sales performance analysis (SPA). The next step is to measure the selling skills of your sales team and develop a specialized training, PR and sales program to suit your individual needs.

Works Cited

“Innovative New Product and Service Development-Pursuing success through full customer involvement” IBM.com.16 Sep. 2002.20 Sep. 2009. http://www-935.ibm.com/services/in/index.wss/consultantpov/igs/x1022257?cntxt=x1022261

“Elements of a PR Plan” E-Agency.com 2009. 22 Sep. 2009. http://pr.e-agency.com/pdf/elementsofaPRplan.pdf

“How Sales Research Can Improve Your Sales Results” Hoovers, a D&B Co. 2007. 21 Sept. 2009. http://www.hoovers.com/business-information/–pageid__15684–/global-hoov-index.xhtml

Smith M. “Community” Infed.com. 2002. 21 Sept. 2009. http://www.infed.org/community/community.htm

Gart S. “Role-playing is an effective sales training tool” Powersports Business. 16 May 2005. 21 Sept. 2009. http://www.allbusiness.com/sales/sales-management/437483-1.html

Smith M. “A Dream of John Ball, Ch. 4; first published in The Commonweal 1886/7.” 2002.