One of the most fundamental transformations in corporate people development has been the widespread acceptance that, for many subjects, teaching does not in fact promote learning. There is a limit to the number of facts that a person can absorb in a day, and not only that, absorbing facts does not necessarily equip the learner to take action in any new way.

For most of us, school consisted of being told things “Learn this, remember this, write this down”. It was often dull, and many pupils found themselves disengaged, unable to imagine how the things they were learning might be used in the real world, still less to actually apply them. It’s hardly surprising, then, that so many managers rely on the same approach when a team member needs to learn or improve at something; the default is to tell them what’s required “Do this, do this, do this”. Often, this gets results in the short term; probably the team member can return to his task, follow those instructions by rote and get the result that’s required. What he or she has not acquired is the investigative, analytical, decision making toolkit that the manager used to arrive at the instructions given. As a result, when a slightly different scenario arrives, they’re back at the manager’s desk, asking for assistance again.

In the workplace, the solution is a combination of mentoring; providing the team member with ideas of where he/she can go to find information on a subject, for instance, and coaching. Coaching is the process of asking questions which help the learner to think their own way through an issue, and identify their own solution. It’s effective because the coach, through asking the right questions, can help the learner discover structures and strategies of thinking which enable them to tackle other, different problems; it provides them with the toolkit to be more self-reliant, and more capable.

Coaching can work well in a workshop scenario too; facilitators can ask the group questions, ask them to share their ideas and knowledge, and the presence of others with different experiences in the room can mean the problem solving and knowledge acquisition happens even more quickly than in a 1-1 situation, but this approach relies on the interaction between learner and facilitator/coach, and the flexibility for the coach to respond and ask questions in ways which suit the particular needs of the group. This is much harder to replicate in the online learning space, where all of the “teaching” side of the interaction must be predicted and programmed in advance.

This has meant that all too often, e-learning has been linear, prescriptive, based on “telling”, and frankly, a bit boring. Worse than that, since people particularly don’t learn behavioural change very well through being “told”, it’s often been ineffective. The key to changing that dynamic is in finding ways for learners to explore concepts without the need for a responsive, human coach. Growth Engineering’s “Discovery Method” achieves just that through a range of means.

The first precept is that, wherever possible, we ask the learner to explore, reflect on, and capture what they know about the topic before we attempt to introduce a model or concept. When the academic thinking, be it a model of leadership styles or the structure of a buying decision making unit, is introduced, the learner is immediately able to see how it links with what they already know and understand, and how the models are often simply giving structure and order to thinking they have previously been doing. This might take the form of making decisions to guide a character through a business scenario, selecting words and phrases that describe situations or individuals they’ve worked with, or just reflecting and taking notes on experiences they’ve had.

After the model has been explained, another stage of reflection, exploration and understanding gives the learner the opportunity to apply the thinking they’ve been doing, in practical ways, to work they are already engaged with. In a piece of sales training, that might mean looking forward to a sales meeting they’ll be having, and capturing some of the questions they are now aware they need to answer. In a leadership scenario, it might involve planning an appraisal meeting, or preparing to try to influence a more senior manager’s decision. Through immediately using the knowledge they have gained, learners embed it much more effectively than through simple memory, and further, they discover the gaps in their understanding whilst it’s still easy to click the “back” button and refresh themselves on the topic.

A final piece of insight into behavioural change came from the realisation that when people are trying to improve interactions, be they sales presentations or operational team meetings, having a strategy of things to try was only part of the battle. What learners really need is the self awareness and emotional intelligence to appreciate the impact of what they are doing on the other parties. Increasing this understanding allows them to make good decisions and get better results far beyond the scope of the specific situations explored in the e-learning. In order to promote this awareness, we turned a common e-learning paradigm on its head. Typically, learners will view a scenario, and then be asked to reflect on what happened, and the results for the protagonist, who represents them. The breakthrough in the Discovery Method was to take the focus off “what were the results for you” and to place it onto “what was the impact on the buyer/colleague/employee”. This ability to consider the impact of behaviour on others, combined with the self-reflective ability to apply tools which the learner has thoroughly made their own, and to make sensible decisions, makes for far more empowered, capable, self reliant and effective employees. And after all, isn’t that exactly what you want?

Before we get into introducing the Sales Academy, you need to know why one needs an Academy like that. Some might be thinking that they know everything that needs to be known about sales, and some might be wondering what is there to ‘learn’ about sales because it’s an art and not a skill: Either you’re born a salesman or you’re not. A small minority may even cynically scoff at the idea of wasting their time in training instead of being ‘out there’, selling.

All these statements may largely be true.  But then, like they say about Pink Floyd concerts, you don’t know what you missed if you haven’t been there. For starters, Sales Academy does not teach you how to sell, because it believes you know that already. In fact it doesn’t even believe it ‘teaches’. The very word ‘teach’ is anathema to Growth Engineering. It is an oxymoron for a training company, is it not? Read on.

What is Sales Academy?

Growth Engineering’s Sales Academy is a development platform. It believes in developing sales people, enhancing performance, lifting up your graph northwards. Of course, it does train on all areas of sales. Last time we checked, we haven’t left anything out, but then we’re constantly on the alert. However, these training programmes are not just ‘dispensed’ as knowledge accumulation. You use it as your personal dashboard like your personal Yoda Master where you can bounce ideas, argue, discuss, take notes and, in this joyful process, also learn. So the next question is, how does it work?

How does Sales Academy work?

When you enter the Academy, it will present a set of competencies to understand your needs. Then you receive a Development Passport. This is your plan, which may include several training – we hate to use this word though – requirements. These training programmes will be more of interesting collaborative exercises rather than ‘teaching’ sessions. The eLearning sessions will be participatory and you will be actively engaged in them. Post these sessions, you will receive assessments which, you will be relieved to know, are not multiple-choice questions to test your knowledge but actual assignments which will go back and do at your workplace, often in consultation with your manager. You will then be assessed based on your performance, either at work or in the assignment.

How does Sales Academy assess?

Sales Academy assesses your ‘development’ in four stages, in line with the famous Kirkpatrick Model^©, pioneered by Donald Kirkpatrick. The four stages are:

• Feedback: How good was the programme? Sales Academy is a dynamic environment. Your feedback on the training feeds into the Academy’s internal conveyer belt, which continuously absorbs suggestions and improvises its content and deliverance.
• Learning: How effective was the learning? There is only one way of assessing this: by a quiz, which is for used your own evaluation and not for any certification.
• Behaviour: How improved are the learner’s skills? Sales Academy believes that any training is effective only if it effects in positive behaviour.  Therefore, your assessment actually comes from how the training has changed your behaviour, as observed and assessed by you or your manager. Often your team members too can add to the assessment along with your manager, making it 360°.
• Results: How beneficial was it to the business? Any training should have a business goal and organisations goals are often profitability, monetary or otherwise. So how have your training translated into organisational benefits? This is Return on Investment, ROI, which is the fourth and most important stage in the assessment.

How different is Sales Academy?

The actual question is, why go with us? Arguably, we are the only training provider who believe in ‘development’ rather than ‘teaching’. We focus on learner’s active engagement by:

• Capturing ‘The Way We Do Things Here’; not insisting on knowledge imposition
• Recognising and celebrating learner’s achievements, through Badges, Awards, Rising Stars
• Creating champions and not ‘trained’ staff
• Involving managers and groups in training, thereby making the personal development more collaborative
• Inculcating the culture of continual development

These are the benefits for the learner but the Sales Academy equally focuses on organisational development. Sales Academy achieves this by

• Including Net Promoter Score (NPS) for overall improvement
• Facilitating the measure of Return on Investment (ROI)
• Offering Performance Management tools for managers to assess and compare their team
• Providing various assessment options, behavioural, psychometric and knowledge

In a nutshell

Growth Engineering’s Sales Academy is a ground-breaking flagship product that sets a completely new benchmark for training development and assessment. It meets the needs of both the individual learner and the organisation as a whole. It believes that the purpose of corporate adult learning should be towards increased organisational effectiveness, which should result in tangible monetary benefits. It trains, measures, assesses, engages, and even entertains. So, next time someone questions why they need online sales training, pardon their ignorance, for they have not seen Growth Engineering’s Sales Academy.

Create a Sales Academy that’s perfect for training your sales team

If you're a Sales Director responsible for a team of internal and field sales executives, creating a Sales Academy for your staff is a proven way of increasing sales performance and driving growth. Investing in online training via a eLearning portal not only reduces staff attrition, but will directly increase the level of sales and drive profit, giving you a healthier bottom line and proven ROI. Your online Sales Academy will help you achieve 100% performance from your sales team, keeping you  a step ahead of the competition.  

“Through utilising the skills learnt on the Spicers Academy we have achieved a 28% increase in the conversion ratio of prospects to customers. This is directly attributable to know-how we developed through the Spicers Academy portal.”

Andy Unstead, Sales Director, Just Office

The Sales Academy solutions allows you to:

• Deliver online learning, accredited by the Institute of Sales and Marketing Management
• Tailor your training to your product or service offering and to your target customer base
• Communicate a consistent message internally and to your target market
• Deliver targeted training to individuals, based on level of competence, in conjunction with the British Standards Institute
• Set a Sales Competency Framework to give clear direction to your sales force and create a roadmap for development and rewards based performance
• Benchmark and report on progress against goals

We provide eLearning platforms, eLearning content and consultancy to deliver your people-development vision

Our eLearning solutions work for both for internal staff and channel partners and our eLearning portals and eLearning services enable our customers to link business strategy directly with the development of their front-line staff.

Providing you with clear and measurable reporting of development against KPIs and company goals, our Academy infrastructure allows you to quickly and cost-effectively set up a bespoke, online corporate academy. The courses allow you to assess your staff, deliver eLearning, book training, test and certify knowledge, perform surveys and report results.

A eLearning portal enables you to

• Provide a portal for up-skilling the knowledge and soft skills of internal staff, and external channel partners
• Implement a certification program that will enable the measurement of knowledge and skills internally and externally throughout the partner channel
• Reduce the costs of training through the provision of online learning assets e.g. eLearning
• Manage HR and training administration e.g. inductions, reviews, development reports 
• Provide transparency and visibility of training and development activity
• Have a portal for sharing knowledge
• Reinforce classroom training

Please see our White Paper on 'How An Academy is Used' here

87% of what is learnt in a training session will be lost 1 month after completion of the training programme. This is usually due to ineffective post-training reinforcement and monitoring by managers. (Huthwaite Research.)

With your own online development academy, you can build a strong development culture and a powerful infrastructure to support all your development and training. 

You can manage a complete, blended-learning programme, delivering development precisely where and when it is needed.