Derby Management's "Competitive Edge" Blog

Last week I celebrated my xx birthday.   No magic number.  No big celebration.  But, as a friend of mine from my daily high school email posse remarked... "Having birthdays is a whole lot better than not having them".  James Geshwiler and Maia Heymann began our 8:00 Monday morning  status call at Common Angels by singing "Happy Birthday".  Mike Schumann, VP of Sales at Salsify, asked through Linked In how it felt to be 49? I responded, of course, that "I wouldn't know...yet." 70 of my FaceBook friends chimed in with best wishes and another couple of hundred through Linked In. And, yes, I did get two actual paper birthday cards...from the cats.  And, oh yeah, I bought myself a car as a birthday gift.

Tags: sales productivity, Sales Optimization, Sales Best Practices, sales effectiveness, sales management training, sales training, sales boot camp, sales management boot camps

In yesterday's Wall Street Journal, there was an interesting marketing article on Wheaties.   Most of us grew up with the marketing tag line of "The Breakfast of Champions" ringing in our head along with pictures of Michael Jordan, Dorothy Hamil, Michael Phelps and similar top level athletes featured in full color on the outside of the box.  Wheaties actually taste pretty good! The problem is that although they are an iconic 91 year old brand, they no longer sell very well. 

Tags: sales productivity, Sales Best Practices, sales, sales enablement, sales effictiveness, sales boot camp

Recognition for this title to Seth Godin in his blog last Saturday.  A Tufts grad, Seth has a knack for minimalism both in his blog content and in his persona.  As I was reading his blog, immediately I thought of how important a statement this was for the sales people at most companies.  And the reason for that are these disturbing facts below from a recent study at the Harvard Business School:

Tags: sales productivity, sales coaching, Sales Best Practices, sales, sales effectiveness, sales management boot camps

Now that we've settled into the actual competition of the Olympics and moved past the media distractions of uncompleted hotel rooms and relentless weather reports of melting snow, the pure athleticism in Sochi is just outstanding.  World records and gold medals are decided in hundredths of a second after skiers and skeleton sleds plummet downhill at 80 miles an hour while hockey teams play repeated rounds of sudden death overtime.  So far, this Olympics has been both exciting and heartwrenching (my snowboarding friend, Lindsey Jacobellis ,falling) to watch.  

Tags: sales productivity, Sales Best Practices, sales, sales effectiveness, sales enablement, sales tools, selling skills, sales training, sales management boot camp

With Valentine’s Day tomorrow, does it ever cause you to ask, “Who?", or maybe more fitting in the world of Sales, "What do you really love?”  

Tags: sales productivity, Sales Best Practices, sales management boot camp

You're one month into the year, and already you should have a pretty good idea as to whether your sales team is tuned up, armed with the right tools and ready for what just might be another rough and tumble year ahead.

Tags: sales productivity, Sales Management Best Practices, sales management boot camp

Cannot imagine what it would be like to become the CEO of Microsoft, but since my buds, Bill and Steve, once again passed over my application, I was reading up on Satya Nadella on Saturday morning (since this is a winta' without snowboarding), and I was struck my his simple, but provoking quote that...

Tags: Sales Optimization, Sales Management Best Practices, sales plan process, selling skills, sales training, sales management boot camps

Last Sunday, I was walking out to the barn and noticed that the big red thermometer read 6. Just by it's naked self...6.   Certainly a lot colder locations over the last couple of weeks. -31 in Fargo, -19 in Albany, and yesterday,-8 in Chicago, but here in the woods of Bondville-Winhall (pop. 725), it was just plain old 6 without the pluses or the minuses.  Just so that I would keep my sanity as I shoveled yet another path for the propane delivery guy to get to the tank, I thought about the relevancy of the number 6.  

Tags: sales coaching, Sales Best Practices, Sales Management Best Practices, sales, sales management effectiveness, sales optomization, sales boot camp, sales management boot camp, sales checklists

Guiding the brand new Subaru carefully out of NH and into Boston through yet another snow storm and blasting cold wind this morning. Steel gray skies and and tough sleddin' everywhere, but that's why they invented 4 wheel drive.  

Even though it seems like we're already two or three months into this winta' season, the calendar technically notes that it's just 30 days. All I know is that I'm burning way more wood than usual in the stove in Vermont, and right now it looks like all my careful planning isn't working out that well.  

Tags: sales productivity, Sales Optimization, Sales Management Best Practices, sales effectiveness, sales enablement, sales tools, Sales quota, sales boot camp, sales management boot camp

Toward the end of a very hectic December, I was facilitating a series of 2014 sales plan reviews for the senior sales team of a new customer.  It was interesting for me to note that in a few of the presentations, even heavily experienced salesguys commented that although this was their plan for the year, there "are a number of factors that are out of my control".   Always the pain-in-the-neck, provoking guy that I am, I asked about those, and the responses were...

Tags: Sales Optimization, Sales Best Practices, sales management effectiveness, sales effectiveness, sales optomization, sales training, sales management boot camp, sales boot camps