Derby Management's "Competitive Edge" Blog

In the rhythm of the seasons, we're right now at the peak of leaf-peeping time here in New England.  This afternoon, I'm headed to my little (population 697) town of Bondville in Vermont along with hundreds of buses from Iowa, Indiana and everywhere else just to get a glimpse of fall color.  

Long ago, I learned from 'The Boys on the Bench' down at the Winhall General Store that the month of October is known as "the money month" by the locals around all of the resort towns in Vermont.

A good example of the quirkiness of Vermonters (me being a 7th generation Vermonter and a perfect example of quirky) is the fact that the Winhall General store is directly across the street from the Bondville Post office.  Vermont calls my town "Winhall", while the federal government calls it "Bondville".  Only in Vermont!

Tags: sales productivity, sales coach, sales enablement, sales management boot camp

Fall has officially begun, and we're deep into it already
Summer's gone with a snap of the fingers and a turn of the page of the calendar with lingering self promises that "next year, I'm going to plan my schedule better."  

Good luck on that btw...

Tags: sales coaching, Sales Optimization, sales coach, sales enablement, sales management boot camp

Recently, I've spent a lot of time thinking about two of my favorite and most interesting customers

Tags: sales coach, sales tools, sales culture, sales success

I'm now going to date myself, but it's an important perspective in understanding just why I, you and the entire profession of sales need to keep rapidly evolving while it focuses, not on the practice of sales itself, but on the value that we bring to our customers.

Tags: sales productivity, sales coaching, Sales Optimization, sales coach, sales planning, sales tools

"I'm not old enough yet to play golf"

At the tender young age of whatever I am, I keep saying that "I'm not old enough yet to play golf".  That somewhat "too cute" comment, especially at the age of whatever I am, is also just a bit too sarcastic even for me, so I've dropped that phrase in response to the frequent question, "Do you want to join us for golf this weekend?"

Tags: sales coach, sales planning, Sales quota, sales training

The numbers are in....

I've been roaming the sales cubicles of lots of companies most of last week and this.  Probably 20 plus companies in 10 work days. Opening doors into the heads of heavy-hitter sales leaders along with young, hard working BDRs. Asking the tough questions of hard-charging, get-out-of-my-way 35 year olds and also to a few 55 year old trail-beaten veterans who still hang on to "the old days" of relationship selling.  

Tags: sales, sales coach, sales tools, sales plans, sales process

Back in the day, you probably remember your mother warning you about making sure that you were wearing clean underwear "because if you're in an accident, and they bring you to the hospital, then, you want to make sure that you don't have dirty underwear".  I must admit I didn't think about this a lot during my various ER experiences of broken bones after falling off my bike or crashing into trees while learning to snowboard. Actually, there never seemed to be any checklist at the ER asking about the health or even the cleanliness of my underwear.

Tags: sales coach, sales planning, sales tools, Sales quota, sales culture

My first real job out of BC, after returning from three years in the Peace Corps, was as a Purchasing Expediter working for Honeywell's new minicomputer group.  In a work-hard, work-harder, baptism-by-fire-environment in which you either performed or were fired, I quickly learned the realities of purchasing, inventory control and production.  A great education and a great company...even though they missed the whole mini-computer thing..which prepared me well for a long career at Becton Dickinson Medical Systems-another great company with solid management development programs allowing me to eventually rise through the ranks.

But, all through that development process with more and more training, and more and more education programs, the complexities of P&L's and balance sheets always eluded me, but since I had by then become president of various companies, I had the luxury of hiring the best CFOs at Datamedix (Bob Badavas, currently CEO of Plum Tree, is a superb example) who were much better in Finance than I would ever be.  

Those experiences led me to adopt a simple axiom that I use today with all of the managers in all of our customers:

"Your job is to hire people who are much better than you in their own skills"

Today, although I believe I'm now pretty fluent in everything Finance, my three simple Finance rules that always guide me to success are...

Tags: sales management, sales coach, sales management coach, sales management training, Sales quota

 Saturday mornings are always perfect...

• up later at 5:00 AM, not my usual in-week ritual of 3:15 to get into Boston early
• Keurig's KenyanAA in my favorite Orvis cup
• most non-winter weekends, walk up from the NH beach to my office in the studio
• during VT winter weekends, same regimen, just keep an eye on the time since the lifts open at 8

Typically, uncluttered time, with only a customer project or two to complete by the end of Sunday, and, most importantly, it's my time to think, to plan out the week or the month ahead by taking just a couple of hours to view the world from 100 feet off the deck.

Tags: sales coach, improved sales management, sales plans, sales producitivity

So, did you play The Recent PowerBall?  

     Come on now, of course you did...and so did I, and why not?

Tags: sales productivity, sales, sales coach, sales effectiveness, sales enablement, improved sales management