In the News

Sales professi onals across the globe have sounded a huge sigh of relief. Busineses surviving the GFC have begun to open their cheque books once again , and the days of stalled pipelines and defered projects , a signature of the GFC , may we ll be forgotten – we ll at least for some.

When NetApp Inc. executive Suresh Padmanabhan signed up for a class on honing management skills, he expected whiteboards and PowerPoint presentations. Instead he found a conference room full of board games.

Robert Cohen interviews Autodesk's Tom Kopinski who implemented a sophisticated computer based business simulation designed by BTS for Autodesk's VAR's. Said Kopinski," We needed our 1,700 VAR partners who accrue 90% of our sales, to sell higher within an organization. VARs need to move from a transactional model to a solutions model where they help customers to manage change and solve business problems.” More than 500 VAR sales reps, in 12 countries, in 8 languages, have gone through the simulation since March 2009.

Coauthored by BTS' Marshall Bergmann, this article describes how Coca-Cola Enterprises, the world's largest bottler of nonalcoholic beverages, has made a training investment in new customer-facing employees as a strategy for reducing turnover, improving productivity, and increasing employee engagement. CCE Pathway, developed with BTS USA and Coca-Cola Enterprises, is a structured program of daily self-study, on-the-job learning, peer coaching, reflection, and weekly manager assessments that accelerate onboarding so that new frontline employees can quickly focus on keeping their customers happy.