Someone post from a discussion question... (Respond to it)

Q1. Outline the key decisions made from the beginning to the end of this case. Who made each of those decisions, and why?

The key decisions that were made by management were geared toward the training of the salespeople. At the approval of management, the training department obtained a prior needs assessment that was to be used to develop new training material, etc. However, management did not want to wait and became impatient with the training department and instead opted to purchase training software from a local company. Management was excited and hopeful about this new software, but things took a turn for the worse when sales continued to decline. Management once again turned to the training department and the training department was able to figure out the problem and it had nothing to do with the ability to sell but everything to do with the number of new products being released. The salespeople were unable to keep up and had to seek guidance from the engineering department on product information.

Q2. Describe the ideal process for handling the concern about declining sales, ignoring for now the pressure from management.

The ideal process would have been to have the training department complete their needs assessment, this would have verified that the current training model was sufficient though outdated and that the real problem was not on the training but the number of new products being pushed out onto the sales force.

Q3. What arguments could be made to convince management that working with an outdated needs assessment is not wise?

It would have been hard to convince management to update their needs assessment. They werent open to new ideas and wanted a quick fix right away because of this they lost valuable time and money for the company. On the other hand, the training department could have come up with a compromise with management that would have allowed the training department to develop an updated needs assessment before purchasing training material from a third party.

Q4. If you were asked to develop a training program for these sales agents, what content, method, and media would you choose? Explain your answers as best you can, given the limited information provided.

Developing training programs can be difficult because there are so many factors to consider, however, I would implement a multi-faceted approach to learning (in-person, online, and hands-on) and focus on developing the salesman skills and product knowledge and awareness. I would then separate the sales force into smaller groups and have each group focus on a select number of products instead of every product that is being sold.