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Conference ilbbak::us_sales_service

Title:	US_SALES_SERVICE
Notice:	Please register in note 2; DVNs in note 31
Moderator:	MCIS3::JDAIGNEAULT

Created:	Thu May 16 1991
Last Modified:	Tue Sep 03 1996
Last Successful Update:	Fri Jun 06 1997
Number of topics:	226
Total number of notes:	1486

106.0. "Sales Quality?? What is it and Do We have It??" by MADWT::HENDERSON (Another Casualty of Applied Metaphysics) Fri Apr 17 1992 15:48

I recently got a memo announcing a VTX infobase on Total Quality Management 
(TQM) processes in Digital. I discovered that while there
are costs associated with the sales finction if TQM is not implemented there
were no identified TQM efforts in the Sales organization. I wrote to an 
individual identified in the infobase and he responded that he did not know of
any effort to define "Sales Quality" or identify how to apply TQM concepts to 
the Sales organization.

Below is the body of my original memo. I would like to start a discussion of 
TQM and how it can or should be applied to the sales function. What are the 
rewards? What are the obstacles? Should there be a TQM initiative in Sales?

Charlie


    I have been with Digital for 8 years and I have been consistantly
    frustrated with the tools we are given and the methods with which we
    are asked to do our jobs. Its not that the individual efforts, policies
    and goals are poor but that as a collection they result in high time
    overhead, error prone processes (quoting, configuring paticularly), and
    large ammounts of waste.

    I also believe that there are more rewards to be attained by using a
    TQM aproach than just cost savings and error prevention (though these
    should be substantial). I think that if a quality orriented approach
    were implemented in planning, goaling, measurement and rewards for the
    field we would have as a result happier, more effective and more
    productive field organizations with more higher margin sales in the
    markets we really want to sell into and better information being fed
    back into engineering, manufacturing and marketing.

T.R Title User Personal
Name Date Lines

106.1 ALOSWS::KOZAKIEWICZ Shoes for industry Fri Apr 17 1992 17:13 49

T.R	Title	User	Personal Name	Date	Lines
106.1		ALOSWS::KOZAKIEWICZ	Shoes for industry	`Fri Apr 17 1992 17:13`	49
	I certainly believe that there should be a TQM initiative in Sales! Over the last few years, several of us in the office have toyed with the idea of just doing something on our own. Our consensus was that several things stand in the way of success, in no particular order: 1. What is Sales quality? I can't tell you what it is but I know it when I see it. Somethings are obvious, like returning phone calls in a timely manner or quality presentations. Others are not. 2. How do you sustain improvements which are not self-sustaining? Example: If better instrumentation can improve a manufacturing process, a single investment makes a permanent improvement. There is nothing you can do, however, to permanently insure that customer phone calls are retuned within 4 hours. Given the inherently subjective nature of the selling process, my gut tells me that a lions share of TQ in Sales will consist of improving things like this. How do you maintain the energy needed to identify and continually force such improvements in each of the 8,000 people in the Sales organization? People aren't machines. 3. Management commitment. Although I am one of the branch management team, I was skeptical that we would be able to sustain any sort of ongoing program without the explicit support of both the rest of the management team and Digital. The other two sales managers were receptive to our initial ideas, but we felt that they did not understand what we were trying to do well enough to make the level of commitment necessary to create change. This isn't their fault - a commitment to quality must originate at the top and filter down throughout the organization. 4. Fear of unleashing a monster. A thought which occured to me was that we would start a process which would piss people off. Given that there is no clear corporate (or US Sales) comitment to improvement, I feared that people would quickly start to identify significant problems which we in a local branch office can't fix. If we were unable to get those higher up in the organization committed to solving problems, people would get frustrated that they were putting energy into fixing problems which the corporation wasn't interested in fixing. 5. Tools. We didn't have a clue how to get started with a sustainable program. I looked around for help, didn't find anybody who knew how to apply TQM to a sales and service organization. I'm still real interested in making something happen in this area. What can be done? Al

    I certainly believe that there should be a TQM initiative in Sales!
    
    Over the last few years, several of us in the office have toyed with
    the idea of just doing something on our own.  Our consensus was that
    several things stand in the way of success, in no particular order:
    
    1. What is Sales quality?  I can't tell you what it is but I know it
    when I see it.  Somethings are obvious, like returning phone calls in a
    timely manner or quality presentations.  Others are not.
    
    2. How do you sustain improvements which are not self-sustaining?
    Example:  If better instrumentation can improve a manufacturing
    process, a single investment makes a permanent improvement.  There is
    nothing you can do, however, to permanently insure that customer phone 
    calls are retuned within 4 hours.  Given the inherently subjective
    nature of the selling process, my gut tells me that a lions share of TQ
    in Sales will consist of improving things like this.  How do you maintain 
    the energy needed to identify and continually force such improvements in 
    each of the 8,000 people in the Sales organization?  People aren't
    machines.
    
    3. Management commitment.  Although I am one of the branch management
    team, I was skeptical that we would be able to sustain any sort of
    ongoing program without the explicit support of both the rest of the
    management team and Digital.  The other two sales managers were
    receptive to our initial ideas, but we felt that they did not
    understand what we were trying to do well enough to make the level of
    commitment necessary to create change.  This isn't their fault - a
    commitment to quality must originate at the top and filter down
    throughout the organization.
    
    4. Fear of unleashing a monster.  A thought which occured to me was
    that we would start a process which would piss people off.  Given that
    there is no clear corporate (or US Sales) comitment to improvement, I
    feared that people would quickly start to identify significant problems
    which we in a local branch office can't fix.  If we were unable to get
    those higher up in the organization committed to solving problems,
    people would get frustrated that they were putting energy into fixing
    problems which the corporation wasn't interested in fixing.
    
    5. Tools.  We didn't have a clue how to get started with a sustainable
    program.  I looked around for help, didn't find anybody who knew how to
    apply TQM to a sales and service organization.
    
    I'm still real interested in making something happen in this area. 
    What can be done?
    
    Al