Community and technical colleges play an essential role in their neighborhoods. Tasked with supporting pathways to stable employment, these institutions are a critical piece of reducing local unemployment and supporting the socioeconomic success of their communities. Unfortunately, for many colleges, it’s challenging to update programming and content to ensure it keeps pace with the needs of local employers and key stakeholders. In this interview, Eric Richardson shares his insights on the barriers to relevance for community and technical colleges and shares his thoughts on bridging that gap.
Ave Maria is providing the Personal Selling class based on the GDA Consultative Selling course to provide its college students with sales and business communication skills. The students are using the GDA Consultative Selling online course as their textbook, and they are practicing the techniques and learning real-world applications with Frank Shepard, Associate Professor of Finance at Ave Maria University.
Twenty-four percent of women say the ability to afford the education required to change careers would make them more likely to take the leap. Second to that, 22% of women identify access to employer-led education and training, and 19% identify access to career coaching/counseling as the opportunities that would make them more likely to pursue this change.
Richardson held a kickoff event for the organization, the Sales Institute of Southwest Florida, at Keiser University’s Fort Myers campus May 16, where he tasked audience members to engage in an object lesson to prove his theory. Searching Indeed for open accounting positions in Fort Myers resulted in 207 jobs and 258 in engineering. Then a search for open sales positions showed more than 1,700 unfilled jobs and customer service more than 2,100.
We conducted 3 GDA Consultative Selling classes...The first class set 28 appointments, the second, 34 and the third class set 42 appointments. Before that, we averaged just a few appointments in an entire week!
Robert ToatleyFindLaw
I was 37% of quota for the six month period prior to GDA and 129% of quota during the three month period after learning the GDA techniques.
Will ZiacomaAccount Rep
In one week I quadrupled my biggest deal ever…and then in the same week quadrupled it again!
Mark SuretteMarconi Federal
The first time I tried the 'feel, felt, found' technique, it worked like a charm.
VP SalesMedical Equipment Manufacturer
Discounting your product is a function of not knowing the impact of your solution on the customer's bottom line. Thanks to GDA, I don't discount anymore.
Sales RepIT Industry
Within the year we had won back all of the major accounts that had been exclusive to our competitors for ten to twenty years.
John McCrackenAmerican Express
Last year, we doubled our revenues and increased our profit margin by 5X. In 1 year, we learned how to actually sell our value and produce results in a 100% bid environment.
Nathan ReedeCEO, UPCI
...the Netherlands sales team uncovered a possible €250,000 project, and they know what they did that made this project successful. This means they can do it again and again and again.
PLM Solutions BV