In the last 6-8 months, normal business processes have been overhauled across the board. We’ve had to learn and adapt to our rapidly changing circumstances, and many of us have had to do it with new teams in tow. Not the least of obstacles has been how to train in this environment.

Over the years of managing a team and being personally on-boarded into new roles, I’ve both witnessed and experienced different ends of the spectrum of how that process can work.

• Trial by fire throws a new team member into the deep end to navigate it alone, figure out their own contacts and processes, and while prompting rapid learning, can be frustrating and disheartening, leaving morale low. At the opposite end of the spectrum is:
• Overly-structured training made up of classes, formal meetings, decks and flow charts, while having no responsibilities, meetings or deadlines for 30-45 days. This approach can be so detailed and last so long without the ability to apply new information that when released from the waiting period, the associate often has too high of expectations placed on them due to “time in training.” Meanwhile, it can feel like they’ve actually been thrown into the deep end because they’re unable to retain the amount of new information given to them without pacing it with context and application, which helps with retention.

Finding the correct balance of the two is difficult even under normal circumstances. Now throw a new curveball into that process: Quarantine.

I was fortunate enough to have made two hiring decisions at the beginning of the year. One new team member started 2 weeks before shutdown. She had the benefit of at least attending her formal onboarding week and receiving a computer and phone. The other associate started the week of shut down, wasn’t able to attend corporate onboarding, didn’t have any hardware for his first two weeks as our home office is out of state and everyone had been sent home, and we hadn’t seen each other in person since his interview.

How do you train in that environment? How do you build team culture and rapport? How do you quickly get to know and understand team members in a way that allows you to effectively communicate and teach when comfortable norms are taken away?

First, I’m incredibly thankful to have a fantastic, self-driven team. We all had to be flexible, as has everyone, to the learning curve of working and communicating exclusively digitally. With that in mind, here are some key takeaways from the training process that I would highly recommend as we continue to be physically separated and even as we head back to the office:

1. Go out of your way to be available.

We all have meetings. LOTS of them. And in an office environment it’s easy to refer a new hire to someone else to job shadow while you’re busy. If you’re the one who’s been bridging the gap between associates, the most valuable time they can spend is with you. Right now, they can’t drop into your office and ask questions easily. Making time at a distance requires more intentionality.

2. Be creative.

Culture and personality are the hardest things to learn digitally. We intentionally had meetings with no agenda. As restrictions lifted, we’ve had tailgate meetings. We do more calls and videos than emails and IM. People work best when they feel valued and appreciated, and finding creative ways to do that from a distance will go as far as any formal training because they will want to do well.

3. Encourage peer training.

This might be my most accidental and favorite success. I happened to have hired two people with drastically different backgrounds and experiences. My background happens to touch both of theirs, but without either of their specialties. Both were new, and yet outside of business-specific information, the best people for them to learn from was each other. I want to be very clear here: I’m not talking about scheduled time to go sit with people with similar jobs and watch them work. What we’ve done is essentially peer-mentoring. They’ve learned each other’s strengths and when they encounter obstacles, they lean on and learn from each other. It has created a team dynamic that allows for knowledge and process sharing, excellent growth opportunities and questions, and a true team culture where everyone is united in the drive toward success.

 

Leah Ecker

*Senior National Account Lead, Walmart – Barcel 

 

 

 

*Title and company of the author reflect their position at the time article was written.

The opinions expressed here by guest bloggers are their own, not necessarily those of Stout Executive Search.

Have you ever asked yourself if you are making an impact on your business, team, or company? Are you longing for something different from the huge corporate machine where you are currently employed? More importantly, is the work environment affecting your home life? Each year, during my own personal self-assessment and reflection period, these questions, among others, are ones I ask myself and my significant other. Ultimately, it is what drove me to scale down from the corporate giants I had been with over the course of a decade, to a small startup. That decision has made me stronger both in my professional and personal life.

Before talking about scaling down in company size, you must first self-assess your current situation. Understand the foundation you have built or are in the process of building, is critical in your development and ability to create opportunities down the road. Becoming a top talent in any organization involves a strong understanding of every aspect your business; the ability to deliver results, cross functional leadership, and some logical risk taking. I have been a part of three different billion-dollar organizations; two of which were extremely large companies, and the third a mid-sized. With each move, I scaled down in size of revenue, but significantly increased in responsibility, accountability, contribution, pressure, and leadership opportunities. In extremely large organizations, I have found unless you are part of the upper management, you are just another cog in the machine. The red tape and constant approval processes can be tiresome, leaving you with the feeling you cannot achieve the results you want, or your voice is not being heard on the business. Finally, if you have ambition to move up within these organizations, you can face barriers because of the bottleneck of people currently in the advanced roles, limiting opportunities for you to grow within these companies.

Ultimately, these larger organizations with their politics, red tape, and processes, can sometimes leave you being a shell of your former self. I have seen countless times where people have given up, versus fighting for what they believed was right for the business, because it was “not worth the hassle” or the push could have been “career limiting” long term. This is almost like your life force has been removed and you have become a drone, flying under the radar as to not rock the boat or push the boundaries. Personally, I could no longer accept that type of environment or lack of passion in the workplace. Plus, the constant stresses and pressure were coming home with me, significantly hindering my ability to be the husband and father I wanted to be.

It was when my wife finally broke and said, “I have never asked you to quit anything before. I have followed you everywhere and supported you, but please for our family, look for a new job.” That powerful statement was a turning point in my life. Move on with my career, or potentially lose my family. Looking back now, it also was the greatest thing to ever happen to me in my professional life, because I pivoted, truly assessing what drove me, what I wanted, and what was the best thing for my family. So, I started my search. Being selective, I looked for a team I could be a part of that was unique, special, and was truly building something from the ground up. What I found was a life I could have only hoped for, and a place where I feel totally comfortable. From the top down, Sovos Brands is creating a fulfilling, collaborative, work environment that translates to joy inside and outside the walls of our offices.

Leaving big and established companies to join one less than 6 months old was an experience. When I first started, we had no processes or systems in place. What we did have was a vision and a strong leadership team determined to build the ship while we sailed it, and while we selectively brought in top talent to better the company. From the Sales organization side, we had to rely on the fundamentals, become experts in our categories with our limited data, and utilize our brands strength to consistently over-deliver targets while building strong relationships with our customers. Being a part of this journey with a startup and enjoying the ride we are on has changed my life in so many ways. It has made me stronger as a leader. I have felt great empowerment and accomplishment, watching our brands grow, even while in acquisition mode. More importantly, I have learned a great deal from my peers, and our great executive team, truly experiencing a once in a lifetime opportunity.

I am not saying this is everyone’s experience with larger organizations, or even smaller ones, but it was mine. My pursuit for happiness came when I really wanted to make a change for the better. Some people are fearful of change, afraid of what life is like at a new place. I can tell you, sometimes the grass is greener on the other side and all it takes is the “want” to look for it.

Below are some helpful guiding principles or examples that can lead you to make the right decision for a happier work life, whether it is with a smaller or a larger company.

Things to look for in a company:

• The Leadership Team – Their personality traits, goals, and expectations. What example are they setting? Are they accessible to others not in the C-Suite? Can you learn from this team? Are they embodying the principles they have set in place?
•  The Culture/Work Environment – Does everyone have a seat at the table or have a voice? Can you debate, disagree, and ask tough questions at all levels? Is there red tape? Are diversity, collaboration, and respect, core beliefs or just talk?
• The Future Opportunities – What does a career path look like? Are people open to being mentors or willing to invest in your future? Are you just another cog in the machine? What does it take to become a leader in the organization?
• The Impact You Can Have – Can you deliver results? Are they achievable? Will you be viewed as the subject matter expert? Does your share of voice increase?

In conclusion, I want to share the best advice I have received in a long time. It came from my current boss/mentor, who knows my ambitions and understands me as a person and leader. During a candid conversation on performance, he shattered my world by saying in a strong tone, “What got you here today will not get you where you want to go tomorrow.” That simple sentence, struck me at my core. It was hard feedback to take and not react negatively. But I have learned that strong leaders can take tough feedback and use it to reassess their positions and stances. Strong leaders learn from their mistakes. Having altered my habits and viewpoints, I am constantly remembering that saying as it guides me today to be a better leader, peer, and more importantly, teammate. Once you understand the investment it takes to be a leader in a successful organization, you can start your journey in becoming a better, more effective and empathetic leader in the right organization.

Jason Parasco

*Vice President of Sales Walmart, Target, and Kroger – Sovos Brands

*Title and company of the author reflect their position at the time article was written.

The opinions expressed here by guest bloggers are their own, not necessarily those of Stout Executive Search.

I regularly tell people that, while I wasn’t born in Northwest Arkansas, I certainly grew up there professionally, spending 10 years serving Walmart and Sam’s Club customers in diverse ways.  That experience working with Buyers and DMMs from those great organizations shaped the way I think about the business world today. More specifically, it led me to realize that innovation isn’t just about a product; it is about a mindset driven by a bias for always finding a better way to do – everything.

That early CPG-focused experience working with Walmart and, eventually, a lot of other great retailers in the U.S. and abroad, proved invaluable when I pivoted to the retail side of the industry, joining the Ahold USA organization. There I learned from a number of great mentors and leadership experiences, assisted with their Delhaize merger and eventually landed in the e-commerce arm of the organization.

While the jobs and responsibilities changed, the center-point question of “how to do it better” did not.  Whatever the role, my job ultimately was to determine what aspects of the business I needed my teams focused on to uncover those improvements. That meant prioritizing 1) the right problems to solve and 2) getting the right leaders in place to innovatively improve the way we delivered those solutions.

Today, I am fortunate to spend a lot of my time working directly with two remarkable CEOs in two different but massive industries focused on the topic of transformation.  Together, we are determining the path to uncovering what it will take to benefit from change over the years ahead.  As an important side note, we spend very little time guessing (oops, I mean modeling a bunch of historically irrelevant data) about what that change will be.

Shaped both by recent learning and past experience, I am convinced that the transformation journey should begin with the question “what will it take to make the following metrics consistently positive over the coming weeks, months and years ahead?”

Starting here rather than focusing on the traditional metrics makes a massive difference when working to illuminate the most important areas of work:

• Learning % change, this week v previous week.   This is not about classroom-related stuff but rather an institution-wide commitment to learning that drives the quality of planning, reliance on measurement and much more.  When learning is focused on solving the right customer-important problems, this becomes an invisible force.  And when the bias is for week over week improvement, the progress multiplies.
• Empowerment % change, this week v previous week.  This is about focusing every associate on what is expected of them based on the problems being solved and having the tools and support necessary to deliver on those expectations.  From there, leaders or managers work around the clock to both monitor and fuel the progress AND put better tools in the team’s hands as frequently as possible so they can move faster.

The minute leaders begin thinking about what would have to be true in order to make these positive metrics on a scorecard, they start to get a focused list of what needs to change, from the very basic, like running meetings, allocating their time, setting smarter targets and driving tighter commercial planning loops…to the seemingly more complicated, like technology, data management, embedding and leveraging AI and up-skilling. Through this process, they realize that a lot of change is necessary from where they are today.

Leaders will also find that, by focusing on all that must be true in order to move the metrics above in a consistently positive direction, the core metrics that everyone is used to seeing every Monday morning also improve.  The only circumstance, under which these metrics would have a negative impact, if they are moving in a positive direction, is if leaders have installed the wrong targets.  Better said, don’t blame the metric if the progress is there on both of these and sales are off – the cause is that leaders are prioritizing things that don’t correlate with actually improving customer experience.

Once the list of changes is complete, the realization about the broader benefit of this focus is clear and a thorough inventory assessment of “current’ is complete, the final step is to prioritize the waves of work that must occur to get from point A to point E.  This is where the communication, the build, the grind and the governance come into play. This is the first step in the journey and what you’ll look back on as the real turning point to the consistent success your company began to enjoy.

 

Spencer Baird

*Executive in Residence, Office of Transformation – Inmar Intelligence  

 

 

*Title and company of the author reflect their position at the time article was written.

The opinions expressed here by guest bloggers are their own, not necessarily those of Stout Executive Search.

When having career discussions about next steps, how many of you were told, “you need to read this book”, or “take a seminar or course?”  Books such as “What Got You Here Won’t Get You There,” “The Five Dysfunctions of a Team,” and “Good to Great,” as well as courses like “Dale Carnegie,” are all very useful. However, do you think that is the best way to prepare a person to grow or to be your successor?  How much skill can one learn from a book or a course?

I’ve spent many years in the CPG industry with multiple companies and multiple bosses. I, too, had those same discussions.  I read books, attended seminars and took multiple leadership courses, and even went back to school to get my MBA.  But those weren’t what helped me the most. The most valuable resource to me was one of my managers.  He treated me differently than the previous ones and helped me grow and understand what I needed, and what I’d be facing, to get to the next level.  He was honest with me, sometimes too honest, but he didn’t sugar coat anything.  For that I thank him.  Was it hard to hear? Yes, but in the long-run, way more valuable than any book or course.

As I said, he wasn’t like most managers.  Most managers give you an annual evaluation, tell you what you did great and soft sell your areas for opportunity.  But the best feedback isn’t during the review. It’s daily feedback.  Share the “why” you are providing feedback. Give an example and how to improve so your employee can apply it to the next scenario.  Feedback is given because the manager is trying to help the individual.  It should be beneficial to the employee and said in a way that minimizes someone getting defensive.

All of this sounds right but what many managers do is focus on your current role. They don’t give specific examples of what you could improve upon for your next role, where you’ve met or exceeded expectations, or where you need to improve upon next year. They want to be nice; they don’t want to hurt your feelings, so they focus on the positives.  Often times, managers don’t prepare for giving feedback.  This could cause the feedback to not sound genuine or to sound forced without providing the employee a good foundation for what the real problem/situation is and without specifics on how to improve.

If you want to be in a leadership role you need to be able to hear the bad with the good.  What it will take for you to get to the next level.  What it will take for you to be sitting in your manager’s chair.  High performers want to hear feedback but it can still sting.  How you give that feedback is extremely important.  You need to understand your employees’ and how they respond best to feedback.   Don’t be afraid to give it. The point of feedback is so your employees can get better at what they’re doing and what will prepare them for their next role.

Consider the following when soliciting and giving feedback:

1. 1. Ask your employees what they have to contribute to the team.
   2. Ask your employees what they want to do and what are their aspirations? Prepare the employees individually based on what they want to do because the feedback will be unique.
   3. Build trust so the employee knows your feedback comes from a good place. If you do not have trust, the feedback will not be well received (or not received at all).
   4. Provide continual feedback and coaching throughout the year so there are no surprises when you sit down together to do their annual review.
   5. Be honest with them. Tell them what they need to work on to get to where they want to go.
   6. Encourage your team to provide you feedback. Take it how you would wish that person to take it, so you can be a role model.

Recently, I attended a leadership seminar and heard a great speaker who said something about feedback that really resonated with me.  She said, “Don’t just be nice, nice is shallow. Be honest, but be kind.”

 

Debbie Self

*Senior Director of Sales, Walmart – Riviana Foods 

 

 

*Title and company of the author reflect their position at the time article was written.

The opinions expressed here by guest bloggers are their own, not necessarily those of Stout Executive Search.

As I sit here today, having worked from home for the past few months, I cannot help but think about new ways of working in the future. The COVID-19 crisis has forced us to relook at how we work with colleagues and conduct training across the globe. I imagine that for some individuals, this has been a particularly painful process of change.

Thankfully, our office has always been quite flexible and given that we are deemed a remote (from corporate) office, we are accustomed to daily conference calls and video calls.  However, for some this is a new challenge.  I have two friends that work in offices that require bodies in the chairs, 8 am to 5 pm, hard one hour lunch and no offsite working. Neither of these offices allow leaving fifteen minutes early to get to a child’s ball game. Neither allow working from home when one is sick.  Hard old school rules.  It is quite surprising as these are both sales offices.  Over this month, I have often thought of those business “leaders”.  Their minds must be completely blown with all staff working from home, conference calls, and children home from school playing and or yelling in the background.  I have thought of them with a chuckle, while on my own conference calls, when I or another, neglected to hit mute in a timely fashion!  There is nothing quite like the poorly timed Nerf bullet hitting its target!

During this time, team members are under tremendous pressure.  Being a working parent has always had challenges such as juggling two worlds and compartmentalizing in time blocks during the day.  But now, the two worlds converge in one location and all the time –at home. Some of your team may also be caring for aging parents.  Some may also be dealing with illness, either for themselves, or a loved one.  We need to be considering them as a whole person during a whole day, and not just from 8 am – 5 pm.

Travel has been cancelled so we have conducted previously considered “critical in person” meetings via video conferencing tools. Presentations have been sent via email.  And do you know what has happened?  Business has continued.  People have stepped up.  We are not only surviving but thriving.  True leaders have emerged.  Team members’ strengths have been revealed.  Travel expenses are down.  Connections are up. People are paying more attention in meetings and focusing on the task at hand.    We are reaching out and checking on each other like never before. We are more patient and kind. With commute times gone, and a new flexibility in play, people are actually accomplishing more. The block from 8-5 is wider as some are working before and after that window.  And it is ok.  People are seeing the bigger picture.

As we experience new ways of working, here are a few questions to consider:

What has this time revealed about your leadership style?  Has this shined a light on your level of flexibility?  Have you been holding onto old school office rules that have been creating a stressful working environment for your team?  Has this period forced you to change?

At some point we will all go back to the office.  The kids will return to their normal school routine.  We will have in person meetings.  Travel restrictions will be lifted.  We will gather at the water cooler and connect again with each other over the latest show or sporting event.

What will you do differently in your office to continue providing flexibility and an employee-centric workplace? What things will your team need to continue to deliver at this level and quality of work? Will this period show your team how an office can work and cause them to look for another job? Does your leadership style promote your team working at THEIR best or YOUR ideal?

Change is no doubt hard.  But during change, especially forced, it can bring out the best in people.  It can reveal a side that we have never seen before.  Sometimes routines can become so inherent that we do not even realize it.  And sometimes a new way of working is just what the doctor ordered.

 

Shannon Brewer

*Walmart Account Director / Team Lead – PPG Industries 

 

*Title and company of the author reflect their position at the time article was written.

The opinions expressed here by guest bloggers are their own, not necessarily those of Stout Executive Search.

As our world and nation continues to struggle with the impact of COVID-19, I’ve found myself reflecting on historical crises.  I’m imagining what life must have been like for previous generations as they faced war, famine, economic depressions, and yes, pandemics.   Like many, I have a renewed appreciation for modern healthcare and the heroes that are fighting for us day in and day out.  I am relishing the blessings in life such as more time with my family and technology that enables meaningful connection to the outside world. 

This reflection has also given me a deeper appreciation for some of the seemingly ‘odd’ behaviors of my late grandparents.  Without fail, they planted gardens that produced a basement full of canned goods (yes, even gooseberries and beets), hoarded leftovers if only a morsel, reused every possible scrap of durable goods, and on and on.  I admire them for maintaining prudence long after they achieved comfortable wages, and for the way they intrinsically valued the things that money can’t buy – health, loved ones, quality time.    

Franklin D. Roosevelt’s famous quote from the era that defined my grandparents’ childhood rings truer than ever, “The only thing we have to fear, is fear itself.”  It certainly rings relevant today given the COVID-19 crisis.

We know that fear shapes behavior.  In a recent publication, Psychology Today outlines four common responses to fear:  flight, fight, freeze, or fright.  While certain levels of fear propel action in a variety of productive ways, overwhelming fear that lasts for an extended period of time disables v. enables productivity.  For example, people may obsess, ruminate, complain, but ultimately take very little action. 

While fear is certainly affecting behaviors today given the crisis and rightly so, there are also highly relevant applications of understanding the implications of fear in our day to day business operations and team effectiveness. 

In my experience with leading and belonging to a variety of teams over the years, I have found that one of the most toxic issues for a team is fear.  For individuals, this could look like a fear of career limiting failures such as not achieving their annual plan in back to back years or receiving tough feedback from superiors.  They may wonder, in a highly pressurized and competitive environment, if they are smart enough, articulate enough, experienced enough, extroverted enough, or analytical enough. 

In Northwest Arkansas, our businesses are big and meaningful.  All stakes are high stakes.  Our community is talented.  And sometimes even the best among us struggle with fear of career limiting failure, which can result in playing it safe v. taking bold risks. 

As Plato wisely stated, “Courage is knowing what not to fear.”  In an uncertain world, with a major crisis facing us, it is understandable that individuals have some element of fear.  Do they also have unnecessary fear at work? 

As business leaders, we can do our part to reduce any question or tension of fear in our organizations.  If our teams know that we have their backs, that we fail together, that pressure is shared, that they can be their authentic selves without fear of reprisal, that we care less about their failures and more about what they learn, that even if worst case scenario happens to their families or jobs, that we have their best interests in mind at all times.  Reducing unnecessary fear is how we will turn crises into opportunities to care for each other, serve our organizations and communities, and find good amidst the worst of times. 

 

Christine Wilburn

* Sales Director, Walmart – Unilever

 

 

 

*Title and company of the author reflect their position at the time article was written.

The opinions expressed here by guest bloggers are their own, not necessarily those of Stout Executive Search.

Have you ever seen a team that just seems to be unstoppable? Maybe they are an athletic team like the 1992 USA Men’s Basketball team, one of the greatest of all time. In your vendor world it may be a team that seems to hit every product launch, stretch goal or line review.

“The harder you work, the luckier you get.”

Building a high-performance team starts with intention, understanding, and principles. Intention to focus on the longer-term team. Understanding of what success really looks like and how to achieve success in whatever model you work within. Then setting principles you will hold to as you go down this journey towards building a high-performing team. Once a high-performing team starts making eight or nine half court shots out of ten, then they become your dream team.

It is a natural temptation to think Dream Teams you have seen were just always in the right place at the right time. But Dream Teams can actually make luck by putting your company in more right places at more right times.

Success cannot come from you alone, but from a group of individuals performing at their best in concert together. Budget professional and personal time towards building your team. If you want to fight fires and ignore building the long-term team, then you will be very pleased to find that those fires will never stop. The long term success of your company is most impacted by its talent and how it is used. So as you set aside a good amount of time to invest into team building, know it’s the absolute best investment you will make.

I have had a few “Dream Teams” over the years in different functions and geographies. They each took at least a year of obsession to build, but in the end, the personal and professional satisfactions were unbeatable. Here are the success principles I discovered for building the elusive “Dream Team”:

• Obsess on talent
  • Talent Type: What types of professionals do you need in each role for success? Do you need deep experience? Are you ok with less experience but high-potential filling certain roles? Does this require internal or external talent infusion? Etc…
  • Talent Density: What level of talent do you need to hit your ambitions?
  • Recruiting: Clearly using this map makes recruiting cheaper, quicker and more successful.
• Team chemistry isn’t a random occurrence
  • Multi-dimensional diversity: Personality type, gender, business experience, strengths and life experience such as traveling/moving all play into diversity of thought. Try to find a good balance to have the greatest cumulative team experience and knowledge.
  • Focus on the goal: The goal is not to build a team of friends. Nor is it to build a team of very good individuals. Build a team that communicates well, respects each other and becomes a sum greater than its parts.
• Get the most out of the talent you have
  • Vision: Get a vision or cause for the team to work toward together. Getting people passionate about what you are doing works better than money or pressure.
  • Individuals: It is a diverse team of individuals, so ensure you don’t take a one size fits all approach on coaching, rewarding and communicating.
• Personal commitment from you
  • Resist temptation: Do not give in to pressure or crisis. If you are working overtime to cover an empty position, do not settle on talent just to fill it. Wait it out. Do not disrupt principles for short term goals.
  • Agility: Don’t rest once you get the team. The thing about “Dream Teams”, they are a moment in time and can fade quickly with turnover or new market conditions. Always think about how you reload next year instead of rebuild.

Go look up the 2004 USA Men’s Olympic Basketball team. They had huge talent like other teams the USA had fielded, but that team came up drastically short. They did not sum up to greater than individual parts. Get the right people. Do not settle on talent. Get them inspired and bring out their individual bests. You then will get professional and personal satisfaction like you’ve never had before.

 

Buster Arnwine

* General Manager – UpSpring US (a subsidiary of Reckitt Benckiser)

* Title and company of the author reflect their position at the time article was written.

The opinions expressed here by guest bloggers are their own, not necessarily those of Stout Executive Search.

Beware of hiring yourself.  You may not even be consciously aware of doing it.  How can you help yourself?  You found the ideal candidate.  You went to the same college.  You had the same major.  You played the same instrument in the marching band.  You were in the same sorority.  You both binge watch Netflix.  You both have the same awkward pose in your LinkedIn profile picture.

It’s kismet.

You are awesome.  They are awesome.  Get the offer sheet ready.

But first ask yourself one question.  Will a team full of your career clones really give your organization the best chance at success?  After all, you’re the quarterback on your team and who couldn’t use another one?  Why just imagine a football team that consisted of nothing but quarterbacks!  How amazing would that be!  As long as there’s no blocking, tackling, kicking, or catching to be done, you would be unstoppable.

It’s not that you aren’t great and all.  We’ve already established that you’re awesome.  But what if, and this is just an if, you are not equally awesome at everything.  Maybe you can sell anything to anyone, anytime, anywhere.  But you couldn’t correctly answer what OTIF stands for if your life depended on it.

What do you say we take a moment, step out of the box, and ask ourselves a few more thought-provoking questions?

Filling the Current Gap

Obviously, you have an opening to fill, but have you sat down and really assessed the needs of your team versus your current staff’s capabilities?  Is your team missing a skillset or experience that you may not realize? It’s common to look for someone with previous experience selling to a major retailer or someone who has worked in replenishment for a major retailer.  Individuals with those backgrounds provide invaluable experience not easily replicated by those who lack it.  But there is also great value from experience that may be a step removed from the direct realm of retail merchandising.  So much of a company’s success in working with mass retailers is the ability to consistently fill orders on time and in full.  A direct understanding of demand planning, manufacturing, warehousing, and transportation are powerful skills to maximize engagement with the key cogs of your internal organization.  Having someone in Bentonville that really understands the constraints and strengths of your plants, mixing centers, and transportation department can prove to be priceless.  Though the process may vary depending on the type of products your company sells, i.e. National Brands or Private Labels, domestics or imports, and anything from perishables to hardlines, don’t underestimate the importance of someone who can take an idea or a suggestion from your buyer and bring it to fruition of a purchase order in hand.

Upward / Lateral Potential

Does your office/company provide deep career paths in a given function or is it critical to transfer between functions to move a career forward?   Does your candidate have the experience and/or aptitude to excel in multiple functions such as sales, supply chain, category management, etc.?  Does your situation necessitate that your candidate has to be a jack of all trades?

Succession Planning

Can the person you’re hiring be your replacement in one year, five years, or ever?  Do they have a demonstrated history of leadership?  Do they display traits that are important to you and/or your organization?  Do they have a continuous learning mindset and/or the aptitude to grow beyond their current skill sets?

Conclusion

Some of the best professionals with whom I’ve had the pleasure to work in the Retail and CPG industry have come from diverse fields including psychology, biology, and physics.  I have a background in supply chain and information technology and I’ll readily admit that I love getting resumes from candidates with education and experience that are similar to my own.  But I’ve found that being open to the right people with the right attitude can pay big dividends even if they didn’t major in business or supply chain.  So before you hire your Mini Me for your next opening, take a few moments and ponder how a different, but complimentary skill set than your own, might open a host of new opportunities for you and your team.

 

Jeff Young

* Director of Customer Logistics and Systems Improvement, Walmart & Sam’s Club – Bonduelle Fresh Americas (Ready Pac Foods)

 

*Title and company of the author reflect their position at the time article was written.

The opinions expressed here by guest bloggers are their own, not necessarily those of Stout Executive Search.

What’s more important?  What you do or who you work for?

Think about the grade school teacher that had the biggest impact on you and your education.  More than likely, they weren’t teaching you a subject in which you naturally excelled.  They were likely dynamic teachers who brought a subject to life for you.  They likely cared about you and your development.  They likely stretched you to think differently and helped you gain appreciation for a new area.  The subject didn’t matter.  It was the teacher that made the difference.

The most consistent question I get from people seeking career advice is “how should I manage my career?”  It’s a question that no doubt has a lot of answers, but which is easily answered with a simple hypothetical.

“If I offered you your dream job, with the worst boss ever or an average job with the best boss ever, which would you choose?”

While such binary choices are never actually presented to us in real life, the question draws a clear distinction between what we value most: vocation or leadership.  Without exception, every time I have asked that question to someone, they choose the boss over the job.  The choice is simple when presented in such stark contrast.  Yet many of us find ourselves in our chosen profession working for horrible bosses.  But if we focus on what we most value, we can all go home at the end of the work day feeling valued and rewarded.  But how?

We should manage our careers by following the leader, not the job.  Work is work and everyone has a boss.  Most of us work in a field we enjoy and know something about.  Rare is the person who lives out the adage about doing what they enjoy and never “working” a day in their life.  Kudos to those folks. The rest of us live in the world where our work is fulfilling and rewarding, but it is still work.  There are good days and bad days.  Exhilarating days and mind-numbing days.  There will be good quarters and bad quarters.  Numbers hit and numbers missed.  Good evaluations and bad evaluations.

What people ultimately want is rewarding work and to be supported in doing it.  Studies have shown that feeling valued at work is more important than compensation.  So, who makes you feel valued at work?  Your peers certainly, but your boss has a greater impact on whether you love your job or whether you dread going to work in the morning.

That’s why picking your boss over the job matters.  Great leaders are invested in you.  Great leaders support you.  Great leaders pick you up when you fail.  They sit humbly in the back and cheer you on.  They step to the front when blame is being passed around.  They challenge you and give you responsibility before you are ready for it.  Great leaders also bring out the best in you.  They inspire you to work harder.  They embolden you to take bigger risks.  They challenge you to get out of your comfort zone and try new things.

My advice:  Find the great leaders and go work for them.  Irrespective of the type of work.  You will not only feel valued, supported, and appreciated, you will learn a new skill: how to be a great leader.  Leadership is not learned from a text book.  It is a lifelong endeavor learned in the trenches by observation.  Our personal brand of leadership is learned through osmosis.  By observing great leaders and emulating their behaviors we become leaders ourselves.

Any great leader aspires to be the type of person people want to work for.  Great leadership begets great talent.  It’s no wonder high-performing teams are usually led by dynamic and effective leaders.

Ask yourself:  Do you love working for your boss?  Are you the type of boss people love working for?

Al Dominguez

* Customer Vice President, Walmart – Kimberly-Clark

* Title and company of the author reflect their position at the time article was written.

The opinions expressed here by guest bloggers are their own, not necessarily those of Stout Executive Search.

Are you a “natural salesperson?” You know the type…the ones who walk into a room full of strangers and get energized. Those that talk you into things you would have never thought you’d do on your own. I know the type because I married one. But I, on the other hand, am the worst at small talk! A crowd of strangers makes me want to hide. And trying to convince someone to do something I know they do not want to do, makes me feel badly! So, the question I would like to pose, can you be in sales, without having that “natural sales” personality? I would say, “Yes!”

When I first started in the Consumer Products industry, fresh out of the MBA program, I started as an analyst. I was working in a Walmart sales office in Northwest Arkansas, but I honestly thought I would go into finance or marketing. I quickly realized I enjoyed numbers and the story that the numbers could tell, but I didn’t see myself as someone that could “sell to Walmart.” After a couple of years as an analyst, I was moved into Category Management. As an advisor for Walmart, I was given a unique privilege to see firsthand how basic changes could impact sales within the whole category. This is when I realized a win for a brand could also result in a win for the category. I had learned when you dig into the 4 P’s, (Price, Products, Promo and Placement), you can drive category change. Around the same time, I had the benefit of attending a Delta Associate’s training course named “Fact Based Selling.” This is when I was exposed to the idea of selling based on data versus relationship.

Delta & Associates has a powerful opinion that changed the way I viewed my role as a category manager. They suggested, “Most presentations fail. They tell you what the numbers ARE, not what they MEAN. They use too much data, too many slides and overwhelm the audience with a complex story that is difficult to quickly understand.”

Over the next few years, I was able to take multiple training courses through Delta Associates that shaped the way I viewed selling and my ability to do it. I was able to practice this idea of ‘fact-based selling” in a clear, concise way. I realized that once I truly understood the data, and what it was saying, it made it easy to frame my sell. The data would then dictate if my biggest sell would be an internal sell or an external sell.

In addition, being in Northwest Arkansas allowed me to work with two great companies whose cultures thrived from data driven, decision making mentalities. Walmart and Sam’s Club are sophisticated, driven by facts, and focused on the consumer. Tickets to a local event won’t get you anything with either. You must rely on your 1:1 scheduled appointment at the home office. All your convincing and influencing will be based on the data you bring and how simply you can articulate how this will be a win for not only your brand, but the category.

I know “sales” in today’s world is much more than selling. And specifically, when calling on Walmart and Sam’s Club, you are a business manager versus a ‘salesperson.’ However, my intent today is to encourage younger colleagues who may be starting their career, not to cross out sales just because they aren’t a natural salesperson. Also, to encourage the business manager who hasn’t yet experienced success at Walmart, to ask themselves the following: Am I considering the full impact of what I am selling and how it will drive the category? Am I sharing numbers or sharing what the numbers mean?

Here are a few of the key elements I like to consider when starting a presentation:

1. Know the data – You must do the work upfront to understand what is really going on. You must dig into the data, from all angles, to make sure you have a clear vision of what’s happening.
2. Know your audience – What is important to them? What will their key questions be?
3. Create a story – Make sure your data flows from slide to slide. Is there a logical flow?
4. Keep it simple & concise – If your audience has questions regarding methodology, etc., it’s much easier to follow up on those questions versus getting bogged down in the details before you get to tell the story.
5. Critique it – Try to poke holes in the story. What have you not considered? What questions will your audience ask? Present it to others and let them ask questions.

In summary, my hope is to encourage you, even if you aren’t a natural salesperson. With proper preparation and perspective, you can have a successful career in sales.

Alicia Clark

* Team Leader, Walmart – Upfield

 

 

* Title and company of the author reflect their position at the time article was written.

The opinions expressed here by guest bloggers are their own, not necessarily those of Stout Executive Search.