NOTES ON THE INTERACTIVE EXERCISE

Overview of Interactive Exercise onSales Force Workload

The objective of this exercise is to show a graphical example illustrating the concept of sales force workload. This exercise walks the student through the workload analysis and it provides a platform for discussing the implications of changing the workload.

Using the Exercise

Initial Screen

  1. This screen sets up the exercise.

A.As indicated in the text and on this screen, a sales manager can determine the number of salespeople needed by analyzing the workload of a typical salesperson for a finite time period, and then making an educated guess about how many salespeople would be needed in total.

  1. When ready, the instructor can click on the “Next” button to proceed to the next screen.

Next Screen

  1. This screen explains, in general, a scenario a sales manager might face, along with assumptions about how a salesperson might expend his/her time. When ready, the instructor can click on the “Next” button to proceed to the next screen.

Next Screen

  1. This screencontains a pie chart showing the breakdown of sales activities for a typical salesperson and the amount of time allotted to each activity in an 8-hour day.

A.The instructor can manipulate the numbers in the boxes representing the categories of work.

  1. Clicking “update graph” will change the pie chart to correspond to the numbers in the boxes. However, the numbers must add up to 8, or an error message will appear at the bottom of the screen.
  2. When ready, the instructor can click on the “Next” button to proceed to the next screen.

Next Screen

  1. The instructor should pose the following question: “Assuming that the typical customer or prospect needs to spend about an hour with the salesperson on a typical sales call, how many customers can each salesperson see in a typical day?”

A.If the salesperson has 3 hours in total to spend on customer contact in a day, the obvious answer is 3 customers per day.

  1. The instructor can click and drag the appropriate pieces of information from the bottom of the screen and drop them where they belong.
  2. If the information is in the right place, it will stay put when dropped. When an equation is complete, the correct answer will appear.
  3. When ready, the instructor can click on the “Next” button to proceed to the next screen.

Next Screen

  1. This screen shows how one can calculate the total number of sales contacts a salesperson could make in a year.

A.The instructor can ask the students where the appropriate pieces of information belong that will produce the right answer.

  1. The instructor can click and drag the information that completes the equation and generates the answer.
  2. The correct equation is: (3 contacts per day X 5 days per week X 50 weeks per year) =750 contacts.
  3. When ready, the instructor can click on the “Next” button to proceed to the next screen.

Next Screen

  1. This screenmakes use of the information in the previous screen to show how to compute the required number of salespeople to handle 500 customers.

A.As before, the instructor can click and drag the information that completes the equation and generates the answer.

  1. The correct equation is: (500 accounts X 6 contacts per year) ÷ 750 contacts per salesperson per year = 4 salespeople needed.
  2. When ready, the instructor can click on the “Next” button to proceed to the next screen.

Next Screen

  1. This screenposes a different issue about workload.

A.An aggressive competitor has entered the market and is trying to acquire customers.

  1. In response to this threat, management wants the sales force to increase the number of customer contacts per day, without increasing the total number of hours worked per day and without increasing the size of the sales force.
  2. This scenario, by the way, is not unusual in the real world of marketing, as companies try to increase productivity of their salespeople and use them as agents who build and maintain long-term relationships with customers.
  3. When ready, the instructor can click on the “Next” button to proceed to the next screen.

Next Screen

  1. This screencontains the same pie chart as Screen 3.

A.The instructor should ask the students how to reallocate the hours to accomplish management’s objective, keeping in mind the constraints on the number of hours worked per day.

  1. The instructor can change the numbers in the boxes. Clicking “update graph” will change the pie chart to correspond to the numbers in the boxes.
  2. When ready, the instructor can click on the “Next” button to proceed to the next screen.

Next Screen

  1. The instructor should also pose the following questions to the students:

A.Should the increase in sales contact time be accompanied by an increase in travel time?After all, the salesperson has to travel to another customer location.

  1. What would be the implications of time reductions for administrative work and answering phone calls and e-mails? Among them could be:

1)More lag time between the time a customer calls/e-mails and the time the customer is recontacted by the salesperson.

2)Less time for salespeople to fill out reports that may provide management with important marketing intelligence information from the field.

3)Less time for salespeople to update customer databases with important information.

  1. Instructors should also ask students how a sales manager might minimize the negative effects of less time spent on e-mail/phone responses and administrative work. Possibilities include:

1)Increased training on efficient practices and greater use of technology.

2) Other creative approaches include the use of additional compensation or incentives.

  1. When ready, the instructor can click on the “Next” button to proceed to the next screen.

Next Screen

  1. This screen raises another issue.

A.A salesperson has suggested working 10 hours per day, 4 days per week.

  1. When ready, the instructor can click on the “Next” button to proceed to the next screen.

Final Screen

  1. The salesperson has provided a pie chart showing how many hours would be allocated to each of the sales activities.

A.The instructor should ask the students if they would accept the salesperson’s suggestion, and why (or why not). Some of the topics that may come up include:

1)What advantages and disadvantages does the salesperson’s suggestion have?

2)Does working a 10-hour day compared to an 8-hour day raise issues about changing the compensation plan or the amount of compensation?

3)What happens on what used to be the fifth work day of the week? Training? Other sales force development activities?

4)Is it reasonable for salespeople to expect to limit their activities to a set number of hours per day?

  1. When ready, the instructor can click on the “Finish” button to end the exercise.

In summary, this exercise shows the impact of sales management decisions on the activities of individual salespeople.

1