Sales Management and Leadership

Program Overview

We used to think great salespeople had been given a gift. While this may still be true, we know today’s sales managers play a key role in developing this gift to meet its full potential. During this two-day interactive program, Drs. Scott Downey and Dave Downey will guide you in assessing your people development skills, creating a high-performing culture, using tools to become a more effective coach for your team and more through group discussions, activities and networking opportunities.

This workshop is especially valuable for sales managers and team leaders in livestock and input supply businesses — whether you’re new to the role or looking to sharpen your team-building and leadership skills.

For questions about this program or more information on who should participate, please contact DeShea Wallace at wallacda@purdue.edu or 765-496-3099.

“I would highly recommend Sales Management and Leadership to any manager — good, practical tips, techniques and systems I can use tomorrow. It is definitely worth the time away from work.” – Terry Hastings, Ruminant Sales Manager Kemin

 “This program provided time for an inward look at my management and leadership skills. A great takeaway/reminder I gained is to be careful of jumping to a solution too quickly. Instead, think about the challenges and tools needed to address the situation.” – Joe Murphy, Senior Manager of International Ammonia & Industrial Sales, Nutrien Ag Solutions

Key Benefits

• Increase your knowledge of tools and approaches that have evolved as a result of changing market dynamics.
• Learn to categorize traits of successful sellers to effectively recruit, retain and evaluate your team.
• Practice handling management situations such as retaining good salespeople and dealing with challenging employees.
• Discover how your internal strengths can maximize team performance.
• Identify components of a strong sales culture and ways to measure and grow your team’s culture.

Program Content

The Future of Selling and Metrics for Sales Outcomes

The evolution of customer-focused marketing has progressed from the product era where the company was in control to the market era where the customer is driving decisions. This has caused significant implications for the sales process, consequently impacting sales managers. During this session, you’ll explore sales managers’ role in prioritizing and allocating resources and measuring efforts and results.

Development Assets and Engaging with Your Salespeople

This session will focus on the assets salespeople and managers use to maximize sales performance and ways managers can draw from these assets to develop others. You’ll also explore research on the frequency in which these tools are used in agribusiness today.

Changing Sales Organization Culture

Changing company sales culture can be a major challenge for any organization. Hear real-life examples of organizations that have successfully shifted their sales culture and processes.

Coaching at Work

Coaching processes and techniques are critical to the development of individuals and creating a synergistic team. In this session, you’ll have the unique opportunity to hear from Purdue Athletics coaches and experience the crossover between coaching athletes and coaching business professionals.

Intentional Planning for Interactions with Your Salespeople

From baby boomers to millennials, retaining good employees is critical. This session will help you understand the importance of giving feedback and having a career path for individuals across generations.

Educational Credit

You can earn CEU and CCA credit at this program.