Ed Tries To Motivate The Sales Force

'It's pretty simple' writes Ed, 'the guy who gets the biggest increase in orders over the next six weeks gets a couple of tickets to the World Cup Final in Johannesburg, all expenses paid.' 

'I know the senior management team will kick up a fuss and raise all sort of objections so I choose a day when they're out of the office and tell a few people what I'm planning. In this gossip shop that'll be enough for them all to know about it in a nanosecond,' writes Ed.

A diary entry from a few weeks later reads: 'All going well. Sales are significantly up. At the next SMT meeting, I'll point this out to them. Perhaps it'll be the first of many more sales initiatives.'

At the senior management meeting, a few days later, Ed kicks off with some self-congratulation.

'"My sales drive has been a success", I tell them, "I see from this morning's bookings figures that orders are 20% up on where they were this time last month."'

'The vice president for marketing and sales has a nasty look in his eye.'

'"Well Ed, you could call it a success," he pipes up, "we've got loads of orders for parts which are easy to sell because everyone wants them, and which we can't deliver - they're mostly on 26 week lead-times now - up from 15 weeks before your sales drive - and the sales team have simply ignored the stuff we need designed in to maintain long-term repeat orders which typically require some customer hand-holding, and take time."'

'Not a success', Ed tells his diary, 'still it's only 242 days till the IPO and I'm out of this dump and filled to the gills with filthy lucre.'