Organization and the Sales Force

Abstract

A sales person has to have many qualities in order to become an ace salesperson. Communication skills and inter-personal skills are absolutely necessary for a sales person to succeed in the marketplace. He also has to have coordination skills and the ideal condition would be to develop leadership skills as well. This is because these are requirements of moving up the hierarchy where performance is not good enough – potential for higher positions are also needed. The organization structure in sales organizations are developed on the basis of the product-market combination as well as the spread of the organization. The specialization of the organization is also dependent on the degree of centralization of the organization. Key or major accounts are very important for the organization. The organizations have separate teams to manage these accounts as they are mostly spread across a wide geographical area. As in major accounts, the sales team overall has to perform a lot of coordination work. This coordination is with several departments within the organization and with many external agencies and stake holders as well. So, meetings become very important for sales management – both external as well as within the sales team. There is an underlying theme of competition within and outside the sales team. Sales persons are motivated by challenges – and so does the market. So, contests are held regularly – and, sometimes, they are an ongoing process within the sales team.