Setting Sail with Sustainable Sales Training

In line with the company’s sales strategy, Atos University’s Sales Academy has identified a number of key programs that it is delivering as a priority during the first half of the year and that form part of the company’s sustainable sales training program for the years to come.

"These programs are helping to create the common culture in Sales we require going forward,” explains Erwan Penheleux, who is heading up the program as a ‘top’ leader. “During the second half of the year, we will focus more on training that answers the individual needs of members of the sales community,” he adds.

The five key programs are:

• Sales Induction Program that comprises an introduction to sales effectiveness and Win Workshops. “Training around Win Workshops is all about developing creativity around opportunities in order to build a real value proposal to the client. Win Workshops are key to increasing our win rate,” Erwan says. The company’s goal is to improve its win rate from the current 25 percent to 40 or even 50 percent over the coming years.
• Proactive Sales Mindset that is concerned with teaching how to make the revenue required for growth and to anticipate anything that may prevent that revenue from being realized. “Our work at the Olympic Games is a great example of such a mindset. To successfully deliver the IT for the Olympics, we need to ensure we have not just one back-up plan, but enough to ensure that no matter what happens the event happens on time and runs smoothly,” Erwan notes.
• Global Sourcing (Offshoring) sends the sales force to India to get first-hand experience and knowledge of Atos Origin’s offshoring capabilities. According to Erwan, “meeting the team in India and seeing what they do helps to imbue sales people with the confidence to sell offshoring to the customer and in turn instill confidence with the customer that Atos Origin can deliver on its promises.”
• Sales Leadership Program that is aimed at supporting sales managers in coaching and managing their team in order to meet the company’s sales targets. “By helping managers develop their leadership skills, we are helping them become more confident about setting targets and measuring what is achievable, which in turn will help develop sales and revenue. It also demonstrates the importance the company places on the sales function as making a real and valued contribution,” Erwan enthuses.
• Global Offerings that offers information and training around the global offerings via a new form of webinars called virtual classroom, mixing eLearning and live speakers, and allowing people to attend remotely.

“These five main sales training programs represent 70 percent of our training efforts this year with 1700 individuals benefitting from them. Most will be delivered locally by Atos Origin champions in each country, which is not only cost-effective, but means they can be delivered in local language and provides powerful proof of our ability to develop the right approach and process to training and how it is becoming embedded in our DNA as a company,” Erwan says. And he goes on, “What we are doing today is sustainable for years to come, just as it should be.”

A matrix has been created that matches roles within sales with Atos University training offerings. “In this way, we are developing training paths for the coming years indicating what programs individuals can take advantage of to develop the skills they require for their assignments,” Erwan states.

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Winning the War on Rates 

United Kingdom - Reading > Two successful Sales training pilot sessions held in March are a first step in the global roll out of the 2010 Sales Training Program that will help ensure that everyone is speaking a common sales language around the world and move Atos Origin toward operating as a truly global company – a must-do to improve win rates.

With growing the company the major challenge for this year, there is a clear focus on the Atos Origin global sales force with knowhow and support being provided to help increase win rates. A part of this is the introduction Win Workshops. “The win workshops are all about focusing on the client and ensuring we bring all the creativity and skills within the team into the deal. Winning is about team work and Win Workshops (to watch a video about win workshops click here will help us use the full extent of team resources, explains Jan van de Wolde, Strategic Sourcing & Business Development. “We have been using a similar approach in the Netherlands for some time and it has proven very successful,” he adds.

Win Workshops are being introduced as part of the newly-developed Sales Induction Program that was piloted in March bringing together ten champions from around the world. “In 2009, we held sales effectiveness courses for our sales force in the UK,” explains Sales Director Adrian Hobday. “These were extremely successful and have helped us increase business. These courses now form the basis of what has become known as the Sales Induction program that is being rolled out across the rest of the Atos Origin world. The program is a three-day event with one day dedicated to equipping participants with the necessary skill set and behaviors to succeed in sales and two days focusing on Win Workshops,” he notes.

The Champions who attended the pilot are responsible for rolling the program out in their own country. “In this way we can be sure that everyone is speaking the same language and using the same tools and techniques to produce a consistent sales approach ,” Adrian says. And Jan adds, “It is vital that we become a truly global company, operating a global way, if we are to compete successfully in today’s global economy.

We can only achieve this if we are organized in a global way and if we really are speaking the same language to clients across the world.” And this is key for the entire sales force. To help ensure sales leaders are on the same page and using the same processes and language, a Sales Leadership program was also piloted in March. This brought together ten Global Sales Directors to gather their final recommendations and ideas for the global roll out of the 2010 Sales Training Program.

Both pilots proved to be successful, although they are of course just a beginning. “This was a great first step in helping us understand the strategy and what we intend to achieve. We now need to embed it in the company,” Adrian says. And he warns, “This is a must-do for Atos Origin. It’s much more than a just a tick-box exercise, it’s something we really have to do and it’s something that is going to add real value. If we don’t do it we will lose market share.

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