They don't understand schemes at all?

One of the Northern region managers of an fmcg company recently was complaining about the poor execution excellence of his team, especially in the are of implementing schemes.

What was the problem?

During every MRM (monthly review meeting), the marketing team would send info on new schemes that would need to be run in the markets. The Area Manager would explain the schemes to the Sales Officers who would then move into their markets and implement them.

The quality of implementation, the less said the better.

Why does this happen, he asked?

We suggested, lets look at the way you explain the schemes.

How do we explain the schemes? The area manager who is an MBA from a premier institute explains the schemes verbally explaining each and every point. He is a superb communicator.

That's the problem!!!.

We absorb only 5% of what we hear, 30% of what we see, 50% of what we do and 80% when we practice or teach others.

So?

So, instead of running a ppt and talking about it, a better method would be to design exercises like mathematical problems. eg if a retailer asked for 3 cases of XYZ soap and 1 dozen of shampoo, what would be the price to retailer under the regular margin and the new scheme.

Make every Sales Officer do the problems, design at least 20 of them. Then make them solve the problems in front of the whole group and explain them to others.

That will automatically ensure 80% retention and understanding (learning by doing, teaching others)

................a training discussion in response to a question asked by Kushal Kumar, Zonal Head - North of a large fmcg company