Glenn Solomon was assigned to manage a new sales district made up of representatives from two previously underperforming districts. The new district was ranked last out of 106 districts nationally. Solomon's goal was to address the overwhelming negativity in the group and rebuild their confidence. He held a two-day meeting to establish his vision of integrity, simplicity, development and commitment. Solomon then implemented a development plan focused on constant communication, encouraging employee dissent to improve processes, and building respect among representatives. While performance is still not top ranked, some pods are now top ranked in the region, and negativity has been reduced as representatives have improved their skills and commitment to excellence.

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Leadership Scenario- MPE 7302
. . . . . . . . . .
Leading to Success After
Inheriting a Failure
Managing a Group of Sales Professionals
Who Have a History of Failure
Glenn Solomon
3741 Powder Horn Drive,
Furlong, Pennsylvania 18925

2. Situational Background
As I was contemplating the leadership challenge to write about, I was
torn between an individual representative’s situations or what I feel is
the most important challenge in my management career. That
challenge is the current district that I am leading.
For background information, I have managed at Ortho-McNeil for four
years. Prior to this, I was a manager at Roche Labs for 3 years. It has
been my experience to manage both tenured and non-tenured
representatives over the course of these 7-plus years. During that time
frame, the districts under my leadership have won the national district
award twice and the Region district award 3 consecutive years from
2000-2002.
At the end of 2002, realignment was configured at the behest of the
corporation that translated into a disbanding of the very successful
district that I was managing. The reallocation of human resources
moved me to the newly created Philadelphia District. This group
consisted of a combination of 6 representatives from the former
Philadelphia District and 6 representatives from the former Harrisburg
group. The Region Business Director explained to me that he was
placing me in this precarious situation because I was his greatest
“leader” and he felt that I could “turn them around”.
In a national ranking of 106 districts, the old configured Philadelphia
District listed at 106/106. The Harrisburg group ranked at 96/106.
Needless to say, there were issues that were going to be unique to me
as I approached the first meeting with these people.
So here I was, facing the greatest challenge of my professional career.
What was this challenge? It was an amalgam of both business and
personal failure on a level that had forced the termination of another 5
representatives and a current review process that had listed 4
representatives in the “do not meets” category. This is one short step
away from termination.
Even more so however, was the overwhelming sense of dread and
negativity that was present with the group. The previous two district
managers were very task oriented, hard driving, and low empathy
types. Obviously, low performance can be the result of negative
feelings and poor leadership.
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My first goal to speak would be to address this negativity and lack of
“belief” in anything positive relating to performance. Only after that was
accomplished could I address the specific business issues that were
germane to the long-term success of the unit.
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4. Representative Background
Of the 12 representatives in the newly configured district, there was a
breakout as follows based upon gender and age:
Gender Tenure
F 2 months
M 6 months
F 2 years
F 1.4 years
F 1.2 years
F 2.5 years
M 39.4 years
M 12 years
F 6 months
F 1. 2 years
F 1 years
F 3 years
As is evidenced by the tenure alone, there were going to be issues that
relate to the primary quads of the situational leadership format. This
was borne out almost immediately. Within the first three months of my
tenure as leader of the district, I had placed the representatives into
the model as follows:
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5. .........
Unwilling
Not Able
1 Representative
Willing
Able
4 Representatives
Unwilling
Able
1 Representative
Willing
Not Able
6 Representatives
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6. After this analysis, I scheduled a two-day HUB meeting for the group.
This was going to be my chance to establish my short and long-term
goals with the group but even more so, begin the process of building a
team through empathy and positive statements.
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7. ........M.anagement Skill Sets
Based upon various psychological profiling techniques that Johnson &
Johnson requires of its’ management team, I had already been placed
into the various incarnations of leadership modeling that are the
popular paradigms of today.
Looking at the seven standards of leadership that Johnson & Johnson
measures its’ managers by, I scored extremely high in the empathic
leadership categories. Secondly, my leadership style is based upon
high relationship building and high expectations/high tasks frame-working.
With respect to KSAs, my product and markets’ knowledge placed
amongst the top 2% of J&J managers.
Overall, I was selected as one of the companies’ top managers with
respect to the culture and style of Johnson & Johnson developmental
opportunities.
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8. Establishing the Group as Team
The First Two-Day Meeting
Agenda
Welcome
Meet the Team
My Philosophy/Vision for the Group
The New Philadelphia Mantra
Integrity
Simplicity
Development
Commitment
It was simple and to the point. I wanted them to understand the basics
of what I felt were important to our success, both personally speaking
and with respect to business opportunities. As I stated to each of them,
“If you can look in the mirror at the end of the day”, then you know you
have achieved something worthwhile.
Their Vision---Have them develop their own vision statements
Team Building Exercises
Dinner
End of day One
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9. ........D.ay Two involved a didactic presentation on all of the phases of a
complete developmental plan. The representatives then spent
approximately two hours beginning the process of writing a career
development plan.
The afternoon was spent meeting with their counterparts to write both
short term and long term product performance goals. This included a
90-day action plan for each of their customers and accounts.
The feedback I received was quite warm and energetic. However, I
knew that this challenge would be a long-term effort and not something
that could be turned around in a two-day management scheduled
meeting.
Further thought, discussion, and the development of specific goals for
each individual would be required.
My Development Plan
What was perhaps the most daunting of all tasks was the development
of a plan that I could implement that served to address my beliefs and
expectations and also serve to gain buy-in from these points that had
been communicated to the district during the previous two-day session.
They key as I discovered, was to restore my reps confidence in
themselves and in one another.
Here were my three cogent points that I truly believed would serve to
turn around this system of negativity:
1) Constant communication. I established multiple routes of
communication. Some of these are-a.
Live interaction prior to the upcoming coach in-field
sessions to establish representative needs,
b. Weekly emails communicating product information and
company news
c. Establishing a district newsletter that is specific to
personal and family news (two team captains)
d. Monthly product report updates relating key indicators as
to performance—presented in a digestible format
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10. 2) Employee Development Thru Dissent
a. None of my processes or expectations should be exempt
from questioning, and I was very specific to state that I will
not only tolerate but also reward those who question in a
positive way, our district business processes. This meant
not blaming anyone but hearing what is wrong and why.
b. Allow each representative to state what he or she wants
his or her career to look like. I would in turn be honest
with them, assist in facilitating those skill sets that needed
attention, and also guide them based upon their
performance rating and their overall prospects for
success.
3) Building Respect
a. Acknowledging the unsung heroes, those performers who
do the job and do it well day in and day out. Becoming the
PR hound for these people but rewarding them with
economic and other less tangible awards.
b. While this prospect is not easy, I have always found it to
be my greatest strength. I believe that everyone, unless
they are the rare person who does not work or attempts to
cheat the corporation, has certain innate abilities to be
quite successful at their chosen profession. Using
empathy, communication, humility, and an understanding
nature about their plight, can only lead to their wanting to
do well not only for themselves but for their manager.
The Ongoing Saga
What has transpired to this point?
The district currently is ranked 17/21 districts in our area. There are
some very interesting positives however. One of my pods, which are
made up of two reps, is currently ranked #1 in the region. These two
representatives did not receive any over base compensation last year.
Two other pods are performing in the top half of all representatives in
the region. The representatives in these two workgroups have made a
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tremendous effort to improve their skills and have made the
commitment to excellence.
The only workgroup that is not performing up to expectations has one
representative who is currently in corrective action. This individual
could be the subject of another scenario. Suffice it to say that this
individual was not a good motivational fit for the position but received
the job do to a forced hiring by the previous manager.
Managing is a very difficult profession. Leading in a complex industry is
even more demanding. It takes the situational leadership skills that
incorporate a true belief that sales representatives are not assembly-line
robots but fluid, dynamic, growing people.
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