I've been here or several years, rarely commenting and have never diaried. A conversation with my manager, however, got me to thinking about the microcosm of our business and it's similarity to the economy as a whole. You see, the vice president to whom I report is a younger conservative, and we jab each other about politics occasionally. A recent business issue, however, gave me an opportunity to hit home a point that seemed to make a deeper impact.
I'm in technology sales - a fast-paced, highly competitive field. My primary market is small/mid-sized manufacturing; I get to deal with many entrepreneurs that have started businesses in their garage, or spun off from large organizations to pursue their innovative dreams. I enjoy it, and have the opportunity to make 1%-like money - but whether that benefits the company as a whole is the crux of the economic discussion.
Our sales organization is set up in multiple tiers: call center (cold calling to potential clients), business development (forging initial relationships prior to a developed sales cycle), and field sales managers (that's me - consultative selling into a defined geographic region). I report to a Regional Director, who reports to the VP of Sales. The current VP started his career with the company in business development, and has risen successfully to his current position. I can't detract from his success - he's a good salesman with a good track record. Recent events, however, left me with my head shaking and thinking about how blind conservatives can be to their ironic dismissal of OWS and the real mission of the movement.
There are 5 field sales managers in my group. Within that group, we have access to 2 "pre-sales consultants", subject-matter experts whose job it is to demonstrate our software to potential clients. Obviously, the 2:5 ratio means that their time is valuable and should be used effectively. They are compensated based on the business we close, so it is in their nominal best interests to spend more time with the better-performing sales managers - here's where the economics lesson comes in.
One of the managers in our group started the year off with a bang - a couple of big contracts put him at the top of the rankings worldwide (over 100 sales managers). The faster you make your quota, the faster you'll make more money (quota generally equals $180K, 2x quota can get you to $400k - beyond 2X quota is extremely rare, due to an individual's capacity). Now, this manager starts setting all kinds of appointments, and requesting pre-sales consultants at every meeting. For the rest of the group, we start finding that the scarcity of PSC's obviously undercuts our ability to manage our sales pipeline. Left alone, this scenario is great for our early sales leader, but a huge problem for the rest of us (and the group as a whole). Inevitably, the result is reduced sales for the team for two reasons - top salesman doesn't have the capacity to manage all of the prospects he is contacting and starts to falter due to his inability to provide adequate focus on anybody, and the rest of the team falters due to a concentration of our scarce resources (PSC's) to one person.
The solution is obvious to all - a new rule is put in place that sets guidelines as to when/how PSC's can be deployed to a prospect. The sales managers must complete a document to reflect that the PSC is needed at the appointment, and they are providing the appropriate value. The result? Increased sales all around, as each team member has better access to the resources, and even top salesman is able to step back and better assess his opportunities, focusing more on the best ones.
After the rule is in place, I joked in a team meeting that it this was "socialism, dammit!" Most people chuckled, knowing my liberal leanings. After the meeting, though, my conservative VP came up to me and gave me a friendly smart-ass remark about it, so I engaged him in a little more serious discussion.
"You know, this is what OWS is really about. You just REGULATED the team, because enabling the TOP 1% in the sales group was CONSUMING MORE RESOURCES, but NOT GENERATING THE MOST EFFICIENT ECONOMIC ACTIVITY." Very funny, was his response, but we're a business and we have to focus on the bottom line, unlike government. "Of course - but your solution wasn't to eliminate sales managers. or cut our expense budgets. You made the right move to ensure resources were deployed to maximize revenue. You knew that there was no way that one salesman could sell enough to offset the reduced capacity of the other four in the group. That's the 99% argument. One person can't generate enough economic activity to offset 99 others reduced capacity. They still only eat 3 meals a day, can only drive 1 car at a a time, sleep in one bed at a a time, etc. It's not economically efficient to focus all of our resources at the top. You get it, you silly socialist!". He smiled, shook is head, and walked off with a "go be a capitalist, you dumbass lefty"..."it'll be easier now with your socialist regulations!" I replied.