Your Course of Study
In this program, you will examine the essential connections among business strategy, sales channels, sales processes, and the rest of the organization. Learning how to identify obstacles to growth, articulate strategies in the context of sales, and coordinate across your organization, you will discover new ways to increase revenue and, in turn, boost enterprise value.
World-renowned HBS faculty will lead you through a combination of classroom presentations, small-group work, case study discussions, and action-planning workshops in which you will explore the diverse ways leading companies empower and enhance their sales organizations. Curriculum topics include:
Moving from a Strategic Vision to an Integrated Selling Plan
- Setting a strategic foundation for sales success
- Defining how your products and services deliver value to customers
- Identifying customers presenting the most opportunity and the most risk, and how this impacts programs, people, incentives, and behaviors
- Differentiating your offerings from competitors and substitutes
- Developing and enforcing rational companywide pricing and discount policies
- Determining the revenue mix and allocating resources appropriately
- Identifying the desired customer, along with goals for acquisition, retention, and up-selling
- Establishing the right mix of sales channels, from direct sales teams to resellers to e-commerce and beyond
- Articulating, communicating, and refining the strategic vision and selling plan
Building Your Sales Organization to Match Your Strategy
- Defining sales tasks and optimal selling behavior
- Establishing the right recruitment criteria and adjusting hiring practices to meet sales requirements
- Driving desired performance through training, compensation, measurement, and evaluation
- Empowering and leveraging talented sales managers
- Building the competency of your sales team on an ongoing basis
- Mobilizing functional areas to work together smoothly to optimize sales performance
- Understanding how your company culture helps or hinders selling
Creating the Optimal Infrastructure and Processes
- Transforming corporate strategies into effective account management
- Minimizing channel conflict as your offerings and the market evolve
- Setting realistic goals and forecasting effectively
- Maximizing the value of sales information systems for account management and compensation
- Using feedback from customers and sales representatives to adjust processes
"I loved case study learning. We were forced to make a decision and defend our arguments in our group and then in the classroom. The professors were amazing—highly skilled at leading intense, productive discussions that challenged us, drew on the experience of everyone in the room, and generated new insights. Rather than offering one simple approach or model, they helped us examine a situation from many angles and grapple with the real complexity of doing business."
Michael Höglund [Vice President, Marketing & Sales] Saab Group, North America, Inc., U.S.