PTMBA2027 B2B Sales Management

Participation Prerequisites

Pre-experience prerequisites do not limit enrollment in this course. To successfully participate, be aware that:

• The course leverages discussion-based, mutual learning in the classroom. Attending all class sessions on campus is mandatory.
• Oral contributions to mutual learning are essential.
• The course requires your full attention to your classmates' comments. I do not appreciate web browsing on laptops or phone messaging in my classroom.
• The course requires preparation for each class day. If you do not prepare, you can neither follow the discussions nor contribute to joint learning.
• I would like to address you by name to maintain a personal atmosphere in the classroom. Please bring your name tent to every session.

Course Content

This course introduces financial analyses and social techniques for managing sales performance, addressing both the head and the heart of future business leaders. It offers high interactiveness and practical relevance. The course content is organized by class day: B2B Pricing (Class Day I), B2B Selling (Class Day II), and B2B Sales Force Management (Class Day III).

Class Day I: B2B Pricing

• Self-Study A: Channel System Basics
• Class Session 01: Introduction to Sales and B2B
• Class Session 02: Pricing Commodities
• Class Session 03: Pricing Value-Added and Sustainability
• Class Session 04: Opportunity Management

 Class Day II: B2B Selling

• Self-Study B: Sales Force Sizing Basics
• Class Session 05: Sales Processes and Playbooks
• Class Session 06: Role-Play Preparation
• Class Session 07/08: Selling and Negotiation Role-Play

 Class Day III: B2B Sales Force Management

• Self-Study C: CRM System Basics
• Self-Study D: Sales Force Motivation Basics
• Class Session 09: Sales Budget, Forecast, and Pipeline
• Class Session 10: Sales Force Compensation
• Class Session 11: Sales Force Leadership Styles
• Class Session 12: AI and Sales Management

Intended Learning Outcomes and Competencies

An influential book on business education (Datar, Garvin, and Cullen, 2010, Rethinking the MBA – Business Education at a Crossroads, Boston: Harvard Business Press, pp. 7-9, 103-106) organizes the education needs of business leaders around “know”, “do”, and “be”, a framework initially developed by the U.S. Army at West Point. This course operates at all three levels.

“Be”: Self-Awareness of Cognitions and Attitudes

Awareness of one’s cognitions and attitudes is called meta-cognitive knowledge. Many students underestimate the significance of sales in business. The course intends to shift participant attitudes fourfold:

• First, students are aware that the core of business is selling (for profit). Nothing moves in the economy unless somebody sells something and someone else buys it. CEOs and entrepreneurs sell all the time - to customers, suppliers, employees, and investors. Even if selling is not your job title, "the only thing you've got in this world is what you can sell. And the funny thing is, you're a salesman, and you don't know that" (Arthur Miller). Studying business without a course in sales would be like studying engineering without physics, or medicine without anatomy. 
• Second, students are aware that leading a firm requires leading the sales force. In other words: masters of business administration need to be masters of sales force management. Every business has two sides: a supply side (sourcing, manufacturing, logistics, and operations) and a demand side (sales and marketing). In the economy, more people work in sales than in production. One out of eight jobs is a sales job. And this number does not even include the part-time sales work of general managers, who spend much of their time with customers. Most country subsidiaries of multinational enterprises are essentially sales organizations. Andrew Carnegie (1835-1919), a 19th-century entrepreneur, emphasized the significance of salespeople by claiming, "You can take away my money and take away my factories, but leave me my sales staff – and I'll be back where I was in two years."
• Third, students are aware that sales is not a part of marketing. Many university curricula neglect sales. Marketing textbooks treat sales as a part of marketing. The business world, however, sees far more people working in sales than in marketing. Overall, sales force expenses are three times the combined advertising spending. The average firm expends 10% of its revenues on the sales force. In B2B, the sales function dominates over marketing. Merely in a few B2C firms, marketing is equally powerful.
• Fourth, students are confident that selling is not a magical art but a set of analytical and social techniques one can learn. Few people are born sales aces.

“Do”: Implementation and Execution Competencies

Knowing how to do something is called procedural knowledge. It includes knowledge of skills, algorithms, techniques, and methods, as well as criteria when to do what. The course intends to enhance the participants’ doing competencies at two levels:

• sales-specific procedural knowledge, for example, telling a selling story, responding to price objections, assessing the win probability of a sales opportunity, generating sales forecasts from sales pipelines, coaching salespeople, introducing sales incentive plans,
• general managerial procedural knowledge, for example, preparing for business meetings, making the best out of a limited preparation time budget, making concise contributions to discussions, and constructively building on arguments by other participants.

 “Know”: Facts and Concepts

Factual knowledge is knowledge of discrete, isolated content elements, that is, bits of information. It includes knowledge of terminology, specific details, and elements. Conceptual knowledge is knowledge of more complex, organized forms. It includes knowledge of classifications and categories, principles and generalizations, theories, models, and structures. This course conveys both:

• factual knowledge, for example, applying salespeople jargon to discussing the status of a sale (such as the "buying center," "red flags," "mentor," "RFQ," "gatekeepers," and other idioms), applying sales management jargon (such as quota, forecast, pipeline, DSM, and other expressions), defining sales performance metrics, and
• conceptual knowledge, for example, analyzing economic value-to-customer, calculating price-trade-offs against other profit drivers, analyzing the composition of a buying center, organizing the elements of a structured selling methodology, classifying different types of sales forces and sales jobs, classifying the dimensions of sales performance management, and evaluating sales KPIs.

Instruction Type

On-campus

Form of Examination

The course score is based entirely on individual written assessments. There are no team scores, peer evaluations, or oral participation scores. The maximum course score is 100 points. All students receive a base score of at least 5 points. I may lift the base score depending on the best exam result achieved.

Final Exam Score

The final exam contributes up to 50 points. The exam is a 90-minute, take@home, open-book, laptop-based assessment. It contains numerical, multiple-choice, sorting, and matching questions. There are no text questions and no case-specific questions. Participants receive a mock exam illustrating the final's style.

Class Preparation Score

Class preparation quizzes contribute up to 45 points. These take-home assessments refer to assigned cases and are due before each class day.

• 15 points: preparation quiz “Boise Automation” case (Class Day I)
• 15 points: preparation quiz “Windblades” role-play (Class Day II)
• 15 points: preparation quiz “Life of a Salesman” case (Class Day III)

Literature

There is no required textbook. I have not found a book covering all the topics discussed in this course. The learning material for this course includes presentation slides, articles, case studies, role-plays, videos, whiteboard notes, and mock exams. These and other course-related information are available on the learning management system Moodle.