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I took a marketing class at the U of MN in the late 80's. We read a book called "Conceptual Selling" (which was a fantastic book by the way). The author was asked during a seminar that he was giving "How do you motivate sales people??"" He paused and paused.... He said you can't motivate sales people: You hire motivated people and stay out of their way! How true.
Hire motivated people and stop demotivating them like messing with pay plays, dicing up territories, quit micro managing them with call reports, bi-weekly meetings at 6PM, etc.
In a previous life when margins were at 30% for selling semiconductors, I grew my territory by $1M in gross profit in a year. My reward was to a big year followed by a new pay plan to control my wages reducing my wages by 40%. In conclusion, I had to get another job, threaten to leave and they bumped me back up until the next year when they did it again. I now work for myself because it seems to be human nature to attempt to control other peoples wages.
Hire motivated people and stop demotivating them like messing with pay plays, dicing up territories, quit micro managing them with call reports, bi-weekly meetings at 6PM, etc.
I couldn't agree with this statement more. When I took the job I'm at now I was pre-driven to kick-ass and take names on the sales floor and be the top rep....and I was. But then they put a new management infrastructure in place, and now my manager stands over my shoulder making sure I'm working, constantly asking me stupid questions like "what's going on?", "What do you have today?", "When is this going to close?".
Basically it's to the point where I don't do my work anymore and it's gotten me meetings with upper management to discuss MY attitude and MY problems. I told them my manager was an idiot. They weren't happy about it, but it did get me a new manager that knows to back off...
It's highly unorthodox, that's for sure- I'm not sure there are any laws regarding an employer saying this, but if they say it to one person they best be saying it to all applicants going to school....I know an employer couldn't say 'you have to quit alcohol/ drug rehab in order to work here', or 'you have to quit receiving services for your mental illness to work here', etc.- preventing going to school on off-hours seems pretty extreme and in some instances likely could be viewed as discriminatory. But who'd want to work for a company like that anyways? Most reputable/ good companies will put a high value and encouragement on their employees to continue professionally developing even if not related to their position. Might have dodged a bullet with that one, and good choice Shizzy-
they didnt say the exact words, but it was along the lines of
"well, we need you available 24/7 and you going to school would disqualify you for this position"
to me that means quit school or we wont hire you. NOT going to happen for $12hr.......
I couldn't agree with this statement more. When I took the job I'm at now I was pre-driven to kick-ass and take names on the sales floor and be the top rep....and I was. But then they put a new management infrastructure in place, and now my manager stands over my shoulder making sure I'm working, constantly asking me stupid questions like "what's going on?", "What do you have today?", "When is this going to close?".
Basically it's to the point where I don't do my work anymore and it's gotten me meetings with upper management to discuss MY attitude and MY problems. I told them my manager was an idiot. They weren't happy about it, but it did get me a new manager that knows to back off...
Most Sales Managers that I have met are not that great at sales and don't understand what makes sales people tick. In my limited experience, sales managers are the best politicians (butt kissers). I've seen some great sales managers get out maneuvered by the butt kissing style. So they get replaced by aggressive micro "managers". Those micromanagement skills are best applied to unmotivated people that need a daily kick in the butt.
they didnt say the exact words, but it was along the lines of
"well, we need you available 24/7 and you going to school would disqualify you for this position"
to me that means quit school or we wont hire you. NOT going to happen for $12hr.......
Can you name the company so I can make sure to never do business with them? You can PM if you feel uncomfortable with it being in here.
I work in the IT field where there is a constant need for some people to have 24/7 availability AND to keep up with their professional training - same for my sister who is a nurse, and I'm sure that applies across the board to EMT's and others in high stress/high availability/high skill professions. That person is just flat out being a bully and I want nothing to do with them.
I remember one position I applied for downtown. It was during the Y2K hiring frenzy, and some company had just acquired the outfit I was applying for. The manager showed me a massive book of facts I would have to practically memorize, it was obviously a position where someone had to put down deep roots and become a subject matter expert on arcane information to do their job well. He'd complained that he'd had to let go a lot of the former staff for "company culture" reasons and stressed there would be dress requirements, and said some other things that raised massive red flags along those lines about strict adherence to arbitrary (non job-performance related) standards. I had also heard other things about that company from one or two other people that confirmed my suspicions.
I walked out of there, and had great pleasure in passing that information along several years later when my current company was considering them for a multi-million dollar contract. They were a finalist with two other outfits, and my comments made sure they lost the contract.
Can you name the company so I can make sure to never do business with them? You can PM if you feel uncomfortable with it being in here.
I work in the IT field where there is a constant need for some people to have 24/7 availability AND to keep up with their professional training - same for my sister who is a nurse, and I'm sure that applies across the board to EMT's and others in high stress/high availability/high skill professions. That person is just flat out being a bully and I want nothing to do with them.
I remember one position I applied for downtown. It was during the Y2K hiring frenzy, and some company had just acquired the outfit I was applying for. The manager showed me a massive book of facts I would have to practically memorize, it was obviously a position where someone had to put down deep roots and become a subject matter expert on arcane information to do their job well. He'd complained that he'd had to let go a lot of the former staff for "company culture" reasons and stressed there would be dress requirements, and said some other things that raised massive red flags along those lines about strict adherence to arbitrary (non job-performance related) standards. I had also heard other things about that company from one or two other people that confirmed my suspicions.
I walked out of there, and had great pleasure in passing that information along several years later when my current company was considering them for a multi-million dollar contract. They were a finalist with two other outfits, and my comments made sure they lost the contract.
What goes around comes around. I have seen a fair amount of this on call all the time stuff over the years as well. Hard to have a life at all if you are on call constantly. THis stuff needs to be divided up and rotated, which is pretty much the standard in any shop worth working in.
Regarding the drop in salary, and lowball offers - this is another case of what goes around comes back. In the early 90's the company I was with was hiring way to fast and I did hundreds of technical interviews. The salary demmands were way out of line with reality, but offers were tendered. Now we see the pendulum swing the other way.
Never count on current salary being something you can replace. Lot of fat IT salarys out there, and if you end up getting laid off, it is a real tough situation to find something even close to where you were.
What goes around comes around. I have seen a fair amount of this on call all the time stuff over the years as well. Hard to have a life at all if you are on call constantly. THis stuff needs to be divided up and rotated, which is pretty much the standard in any shop worth working in.
Regarding the drop in salary, and lowball offers - this is another case of what goes around comes back. In the early 90's the company I was with was hiring way to fast and I did hundreds of technical interviews. The salary demmands were way out of line with reality, but offers were tendered. Now we see the pendulum swing the other way.
Never count on current salary being something you can replace. Lot of fat IT salarys out there, and if you end up getting laid off, it is a real tough situation to find something even close to where you were.
+1.
I have a friend who was making $75/ hour as an IT consultant. The consulting firm he worked for billed him out at $150 an hour. He was let go a few months back and he is struggling to find something for $40 an hour. Those $75 per hour gigs are gone as the labor supply is much large than the demand in the IT industry.
Yes. The pendulum has swung hard the other way. That includes income for the business owners as well. I know several owners that had to feed their business $1M or more. Worse yet, they invested all of their profits back in the business. So there is not a deep pocket to reach into. The longer this recession hangs on, the more business will shed people, cut salaries etc just to stay afloat. Most owners goals are simply to be in the black.
Location: Mableton, GA USA (NW Atlanta suburb, 4 miles OTP)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Clifford63
What goes around comes around. I have seen a fair amount of this on call all the time stuff over the years as well. Hard to have a life at all if you are on call constantly. THis stuff needs to be divided up and rotated, which is pretty much the standard in any shop worth working in.
Yup. When I was on call for operational IT stuff at NW, we rotated the pager (later cell phone) around the entire group, so you ended up getting it for a week once every three months or so. It was a week of potential hell, but you had several weeks of relaxation in between, and it also gave us a chance to use the informal comp time we might've accumulated during the on-call week.
I'm on call 24x7 every other week now, but it isn't a high-stress postition (where even five minutes could result in a flight delay) like the NW position. I'm quite grateful for that.
[quote=MN-Born-n-Raised;9214044Those $75 per hour gigs are gone as the labor supply is much large than the demand in the IT industry.[/quote]
I hate to be the one to bring it up as I'm sure I'll get racist accusations and threats, but here goes:
I'd like to find out how many of those $75 hour gigs going to IT people are far and few between not only due to the economy, but due to foreign immigrants (particularly middle-eastern) who are willing to take those jobs at a lower pay grade.
The business can't turn them down if they need the service and can't afford an IT with an inflated wage.
I used to be in IT sales and a good chunk of the people in these IT departments don't speak English as a first language. Maybe years ago they were in high demand due to lack of an IT labor force, but in the situation we in now, they're being kept on in some situations over others because they will work for less.
This is true evertwhere. In Portland OR where I live it is really awful. We have mandatory overtime, our pay increase ceiling was just cut, they are letting long-time employees go before they can collect their grandfathered pensions (which no longer were offer after 1995), they are doubling and tripling up on job duties.
There are 100 aplicants for every job. Employers know this and take advantage of this. The economy will recover but I think the job situation will remain stagnant for a longer time especially in over-hyped places like Portland which people seem to think is some sort of Nirvana.
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