Growing the Talent Pool: How Sponsorship of Professional Sales Programs Enhances Employer Branding

Increasingly, professional sales programs receive financial support from company sponsors in exchange for varying types of branding and recruiting opportunities. This study builds on the literature regarding employer branding and talent acquisition by examining the effect sales program sponsorship has on students. Grounded in organizational reputation theories, brand equity, and the literature on corporate sponsorship, it is proposed that sponsoring a sales program leads to positive student–firm related perceptions. Additionally, it is predicted that classroom engagement in the form of coteaching enhances these positive effects. Two natural field experiments, one involving two semesters of professional sales students ( n = 90), the other involving four semesters of professional sales students ( n = 174), are conducted to test the conceptual model. Results confirm the study’s predictions that sponsoring firms are perceived more favorably by students, and classroom engagement enhances these positive perceptions. Finally, results suggest that firms with lower initial familiarity among students have the most to gain in terms of enhancing student perceptions through coteaching.

A deep learning computer vision iPad application for Sales Rep optimization in the field

Computer vision is becoming an increasingly critical area of research, and its applications to real-world problems are gaining significance. In this paper, we describe the design, development and evaluation of our computer vision Faster R-CNN iPad App for Sales Representatives in grocery store environments. Our system aims to assist Sales Reps to be more productive, reduce errors, and provide increased efficiencies. We report on the creation of the iPad app, the data capturing guidelines we created for the creation of good classifiers and the results of professional Sales Reps evaluating our system. Our system was tested in a variety of conditions in grocery store environments and has an accuracy of 99%, a System Usability Score usability score of 85 (high). It supports up to 40 classifiers running concurrently to perform product identification in less than 3.8 s. We also created a set of data capturing guidelines that will enable other researchers to create their own classifiers for these types of products in complex environments (e.g., products with very similar packaging located on shelves).

Everyone’s a Winner: The Initiation and Effectiveness of an Intracollegiate Sales Competition

Job opportunities in the field of professional sales are fast growing, with sales organizations striving to hire sales students who are prepared to embark on a sales career. Unfortunately, university business programs and faculty often lack the resources necessary to thoroughly prepare students for a sales career, or to expose them to career opportunities within their local market. This research posits an intracollegiate sales competition as a tool to benefit students, corporate partners, business schools, and faculty, and in doing so, provides considerations and best practices for initiating a competition. The findings of two additional studies provide empirical evidence suggesting that after competing in a sales competition, students have an increased perception of sales careers, an enhanced knowledge of the sales process, and an increased intent to pursue a sales career after graduation. Furthermore, student competitors’ perceived preparedness for a sales career fully mediates their intent to pursue one. Additionally, competitors had better learning outcomes than students completing a traditional in-class role-play activity.

Relationship of Collegiate Resiliency to Early Career Success in Professional Sales

This research examines selection and training factors that influence the success of recent college graduates in professional sales careers. The outcomes of this research are positioned within the use of personality traits in the selection process when hiring sales professionals. The results suggest that for recent college graduates, indicators of resiliency are better predictors of early career success. Using comparisons between business and non-business majors, the outcomes show that early career success depends on indications of resiliency and extraversion.

An Examination of High Schools Students’ Perceptions of Sales as an Area to Study in College, and Factors Influencing their Interest in Sales as a Career to Pursue after College

Each year employees aggressively seek undergraduate business students to fill openings in their companies. While the number of universities offering sales programs is growing, it is apparent students’ desire to pursue a career in sales continues to lag behind demand for sales professionals. This article presents a study of college-bound high school students’ willingness to consider majoring in sales, and factors influencing their interest in pursuing a professional sales position after college. The findings indicate students’ perceptions are shaped by their view of sales professionalism, their perceptions of how others view salespeople, and their own sense of sales knowledge. Their perception of sales ethics does not appear to influence their intentions to study sales or pursue a career in sales.

Professional sales coaching: an integrative review and research agenda

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to provide an integrative review of coaching research from different contexts (e.g. athletics, executive coaching, project management and sales), delineate professional sales coaching from other developmental activities and develop a research agenda for stimulating research on professional sales coaching. Professional sales coaching is considered an important sales force developmental program by both sales practitioners and researchers. Yet, research on sales coaching remains fragmented in the extant literature. Design/methodology/approach – An extensive literature review of extant research and theoretical perspectives on coaching as well as insights gathered from exploratory, in-depth interviews of ten sales managers were used to develop the research agenda. Findings – The review and research agenda identify a number of sales coaching-related topics that warrant further research. Specifically, the research agenda addresses salesperson characteristics, sales manager and coach characteristics, selling organization characteristics, sales coaching approaches, nature and effectiveness of the sales coaching process and, finally, outcomes of sales coaching. For each topic, extant research, relevant insights from exploratory interviews and directions for future research are discussed. Originality/value – This paper is the first integrative review of coaching-related research in the sales literature. It offers an updated conceptualization of sales coaching and identifies opportunities for future research.