MassTLC (short for Massachusetts Technology Leadership Council) keeps doing everything perfectly! Having run a number of business associations such as SBANE, ACGBoston and the MIT Enterprise Forum of Cambridge, I personally know how very hard it is to keep things new, exciting, and constantly refreshed. Members want to feel engaged, sponsors need to feel loved, and new prospects want to join only if "the cool kids" belong.
Tags: Sales Optimization, Sales Best Practices, sales management, sales enablement, sales planning, sales effictiveness, sales management boot camp, sales boot camps
Fall is more than in the air in Vermont. It's in my aching back from last weekend's hauling, cutting and splitting three huge trees which fell in my woodlot as a result of the big blow two weeks ago. It's also been in my head all this week as a result of my unexpected discovery just before I left Vermont on Sunday of three more equally big trees that had fallen out of sight on the other side of the ridge. As a result, in my never-ending quest of "a clean forest is a happy forest", I'll find myself back in VT tomorrow, crack of dawn, up on the ridge, steam billowing from the tractor in the 40 degree air, the sound of the chainsaw ripping through the stillness and focused on "gettin' her done" since the seasons in VT and its inevitable snow wait for no one.
Tags: Sales Optimization, Sales Best Practices, sales, sales management, sales effectiveness, sales enablement, sales management boot camp
Speaking of time, did you notice, it's getting colder and darker
every morning. Can't stop the seasons. Can't lengthen 24 hours.
Can't change the length of the month or the quarter. All we can
do is use our time more efficiently, effectively and comfortably.
"I must govern the clock, not be governed by it" -Golda Meir
Tags: Sales Optimization, sales, sales management, sales enablement, sales training, sales effictiveness, sales boot camps
No new news here. We continuously balance our work and
personal time commitments. We endlessly shuffle our
schedules cutting off 15 minutes here and there to be able to
squeeze in another call, another meeting or just maybe a vacation day here and there. We know that there is no such thing as Work-Life Balance except in the fantasy world of academics, and what always loses out in trying to create that balance is that over-rated sleep thing.
Up at 4:00 yesterday, after a 2 hour trip, I found myself at a customer's at 8:00 and then spent the afternoon in Providence at a quarterly board meeting. The company is doing great, and perhaps not coincidentally the meeting began and ended with comments from the senior management in this high-performing business about the fact that they were more stressed for time than ever before. They commented that there customers' demands for their time were accelerating at a quicker pace and that those same customers were constantly being pressured themselves by their customers and the new normal of their retail markets for even quicker deliveries and faster design cycles.
Arriving back in Boston just before a customer dinner at 7, I managed to squeeze in a few minutes with my friend Brian, a long term EVP at one of our customers. With 5 weeks of vacation every year, he proudly told me that the only way that he had figured out how to use any of that time was to put himself on a regimen of taking Friday's off. Cute idea, but in the reality of Brian's unforgiving schedule, let's see just how many weeks that works...as in NEVER!
Tags: Sales Optimization, Sales Best Practices, Sales Management Best Practices, sales, sales management, sales effectiveness, sales enablement, sales planning, closing sales, sales boot camp, sales management boot camp
John Landry and I had the opportunity to present the week before last to the 128 Innovation Capital Group at the IBM Innovation Center on the subject of angel investing. Great group of entrepreneurs and Annette Reynolds, the Executive Director, runs a tight ship. Check out her next Pitch Party at the Piranha Pond, which is coming up on the 30th at 6:00PM at the Tech Sandbox, in Southborough With the significant market shifts in angel investing in general and specifically regarding the very positive changes at Common Angels, where John and I are partners, it was a great time to wave the flag and talk about something we're both passionate about.
Tags: Sales Optimization, Sales Best Practices, sales, sales management, sales plan process, sales effectiveness, sales enablement, sales tools, sales management training, selling skills, sales training, sales plans, sales management boot camps
Jack McAvoy, Lifeguard & Rock-Solid Marketing Guy!
A senior marketing executive at Parametric Technology, Jack and I met a few years ago out of our common love of caring for the beach. Jack's been the senior lifeguard in Wallis Sands for a long time and is as passionate about taking care of this beach (Rated in the Top 5 cleanest beaches in the U.S. ) and its visitors as he is about the practice of marketing in the rapidly changing ecosystem of 2013.
Tags: sales productivity, sales coaching, Sales Optimization, sales, sales management, sales management effectiveness, sales plan process, sales management coach, sales effectiveness, sales enablement, sales planning, sales tools, selling, selling skills, sales boot camp, sales listening, best sales practices;
My favorite blogger, especially at this time of year as we prepare to celebrate the 4th, is Benjamin Franklin.
An amazing patriot, which is why I always tie Franklin to the 4th. An inventor, an entrepreneur, the creator of Poor Richard's Almanac (the leading blog of his day), an extraordinary statesman, a lover of good food and wine, and provider of wonderfully simple quotes such as...
Tags: sales coaching, Sales Optimization, sales, sales management, sales management effectiveness, sales plan process, sales management coach, sales effectiveness, sales enablement, sales planning, sales tools, sales management training, selling skills, Sales quota, sales training, sales plans, sales boot camp
I was sitting with the senior team at one of our most successful customers last Friday, and we were prepping for an upcoming sales and marketing planning meeting later this week.
Status: Solid first half performance
Status: Great processes & people
Question: How does everything fit for the 2nd half?
Tags: Sales Optimization, sales, sales management, sales management effectiveness, sales management coach, sales effectiveness, sales enablement, sales planning, selling, sales management training, sales training, sales listening, sales culture, sales boot camps
Late Friday afternoon, I managed to squeeze into the Winhall General Store minutes before closing time and found myself waiting in line beside my friend, Mike, to order takeout.
Tags: sales coaching, Sales Optimization, sales management, sales management effectiveness, sales plan process, sales management coach, sales effectiveness, sales enablement, sales planning, sales tools, selling, sales management training, selling skills, Sales quota, sales training, sales plans, sales listening, sales jobs, sales boot camps
When I first began working with the senior command of the Boston Police Department about five years ago, I needed to change everything that I knew about doing strategic planning with companies. Suddenly, I was working with a heavily experienced senior management team where there were no revenue streams to increase. No sales channels to modify or expand. No pricing strategies to think about either outside or inside any boxes. No corporate ROI metrics on gross assets or debt. Just the deliberate strategies and highly practiced tactics of good old community policing and being measured by the reduction rate of violent crime.
Tags: sales productivity, sales coaching, Sales Optimization, sales management, sales management effectiveness, sales plan process, sales management coach, sales effectiveness, sales planning, sales management training, sales training, business tools, business planning, sales boot camps
