Marketing Management

Bus 258fSales and Sales Management

Tuesdays and Thursdays

2:00 3:30 pm

Fall Semester 2014

Lemberg 54

Grace ZimmermanSenior Lecturer

Email: gzimmerm@brandeis.edu

Office: Lemberg 161

Office Hours: Mondays and Wednesdays

11:00 12:20

and 2:00 3:00 pm,

or by appointment

Brandeis University

International Business School

Course Description

To be successful in business, you have to be able to sell yourself, your ideas, your product and your company. Indeed, one of the primary skills any good CEO must have is the ability to sell her ideas and passion to shareholders, the board of directors, senior staff, employees, customers, vendors and lenders.

Sales is the ability to learn about a customers needs in order to present just those products and services offered by the organization that most effectively help the customer achieve her stated goals, secure her commitment to buy the product, receive payment, provide installation and ongoing service and maintain a positive relationship over time.

Obviously, the sales function is central to every enterprise, as every enterprise needs revenues. This course will explore professional sales concepts and techniques, as well as options and methods to best manage the companys sales force.

In most classes, we will analyze case studies that require us to identify sales and sales management opportunities and challenges, and to develop strategies to maximize revenue and customer satisfaction while optimizing costs to sell, service and maintain the customer relationship.

Learning Goals and Outcomes

Through case study discussions, you will learn to:

Analyze and solve complex sales and sales management problems through case discussion.

Evaluate applicability of sales and sales management concepts and techniques in a variety of enterprises and markets, including, but not limited to financial services, consulting, and high technology sales.

Build a persuasive argument

Express that argument extemporaneously in the classroom among peers, in writing and in with the aid of visuals in a formal presentation

Make marketing and sales management decisions backed by solid reasoning

To listen critically and respectfully to the ideas of classmates.

Course Approach

This course will combine case study pedagogy with a professional online sales training program. The first half of the module will be based on the sales training program and will explore professional B2B selling techniques. The second half of the module will utilize case studies to explore B2B sales management issues and strategies.

In each session of this course we will analyze and solve selling and sales management challenges. We will use our time together in the classroom to sharpen our skills in diagnosing problems and to build a framework to understand and leverage individual sales representatives and sales managers opportunities.

To benefit from this approach, each student must come to class prepared either with the sales training materials and exercise assignments or with an analysis and solution for the sales management opportunity or challenge at hand, not simply regurgitation of case facts. Class time together will follow a discussion format, with a constant challenging of viewpoints from the instructor and student alike. Meaningful, daily participation is essential.

Course Materials

Textbook: We will not be using a textbook per se for this course. Instead, we will use an online professional sales training program from Rain Group called Rain Selling, Harvard Business School cases and notes. The HBS cases and notes are included in the coursepack.

I also highly recommend a Harvard Business Review Special Double Issue: Sales, Managing Global Accounts, HBR R0709G, and a classic sales book by Dale Carnegie: How to Win Friends and Influence People. The book is sold widely. You can buy new, used and electronic copies at Amazon and other booksellers, any edition will do. It is an older book, but a classic for very good reasons. Its a quick and powerful read. Dont overlook it. The cheapest ($16.95) and easiest way to buy the HBR Special Sales edition is by following this link:

http://beta.zinio.com/www/browse/issue.jsp?skuId=150962285&categoryId=47

RainSelling (the online professional B2B sales program): This sales training program is typically sold to corporations for their professional B2B sales representatives at a cost of $200/month/sales rep. We are lucky to be able to access this fabulous program for $60/student for the module. The president of Rain Group will be the opening class speaker. He will see how many of us there are. Please dont infringe copyright material and jeopardize future student access to this program. Buy your own access to the program. Ive negotiated a fabulous deal for us. Heres the link:

http://store.rainsalestraining.com/product?catalog=TP-002Orglv

Once on this page, you will be able to create a username, password and enter payment information for the program through PayPal ($60 for the course). You will receive a confirmation email of your payment. Once youve registered, you can go to: www.rainselling.com/moodle

CoursePack: Case studies are the focal point of most class discussions. Course packs with the cases we will cover are REQUIRED and only available through Harvard Business Publishing at http://hbsp.harvard.edu/, with a specific link to our course pack at: https://cb.hbsp.harvard.edu/cbmp/access/27988992 Course packs are comprised of copyrighted materials. Again, please respect intellectual property by purchasing your own copy of the materials.

Syllabus Changes and Updates

The intention is to follow the syllabus as presented. However, changes to both order and content will occur to make the best use of available or new resources, or to explore in greater detail topics that arise during class discussions. Changes and specific assignments will be announced during class, and students that are absent are responsible for obtaining relevant changes from their classmates.

Grading

For the purpose of grading, assignments will be weighted as follows:

Class Participation40%

Case Write Up30%

Negotiation exercise10%

Sales Negotiation Exercise20%

TOTAL 100%

Disabilities: If you are a student with a documented disability on record at Brandeis University and wish to have a reasonable accommodation made for you in this class, please see me immediately.

Academic Integrity: You are expected to be familiar with and to follow the Universitys policies on academic integrity (see http://www.brandeis.edu/studentlife/sdje/ai/). Instances of alleged dishonesty will be forwarded to the Office of Campus Life for possible referral to the Student Judicial System. Potential sanctions include failure in the course and suspension from the University.

Class Participation. Students are expected to attend every class and participate on a regular basis. Less value will be placed on the quantity of your contributions than on their quality. Participation is graded daily, as follows:

-5 absent without prior notification

-3 absent with prior notification

0 present but without a class contribution

+1 contributed a case fact

+2-3 contributed analysis or a reasoned recommendation

+4-5 contributed excellent analysis and/or reasoned recommendation

For many students, qualitative analysis comes more easily than quantitative analysis, therefore, I will on occasion cold call students to present their quantitative analysis to the class. Be prepared. If you are hesitant to participate in class, please come to see me. I will work with you.

Absence from two or more classes can result in a failing participation grade for this course. If you have to miss class for any reason, please notify me in advance. Further and importantly, anyone interested in taking this course MUST ATTEND THE FIRST DAY OF CLASS. NO EXCEPTIONS!

Many of you will bring your laptops to class. This is fine if you are using your laptop to access the case we are discussing or your notes on the case. Using your laptop or other electronic devise to access the Internet is distracting to others and is not acceptable. You will be marked as though you were absent if you are online during class.

To allow me to get to know you more quickly, please send me an email with your preferred email address and a few sentences about your work experiences and career goals. Also, please select your seat for the semester by the start of the second class, and use a name card, at least for the first several sessions.

Simulation Exercise. For class #4, Thursday, November 7, you will take the simulation exercise in the RainSelling program, parts 1 & 2. Submit screen shots of your scores.

Negotiation Exercise. For class # 5, Tuesday, November 12, you will participate in and write up a negotiation exercise prior to class. Follow the instructions for the exercise listed below. The analysis and negotiation are to be done on your own, without any outside assistance.

Case Write-Up. For class # 9, instead of just preparing the case for class discussion, students should submit their answers in a case write-up of up to 4 pages. This is an individual assignment, one that you need to do entirely on your own. Cases should be handed in at the start of class on Thursday, November 20. Submissions after the start of class will not be accepted.

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