Professional Development

Most professions require their practitioners to upgrade their qualifications and skills on a regular basis. This is, in part, because there is so much at stake if a professional makes an error in judgment or performs their duties unethically. It is also a professional requirement to remain competitive. It has been said, “Our only competitive advantage is to learn faster than the competition.”  
          Lawyers must study the latest laws and president-setting judicial decisions, doctors must stay on top of new medical breakthroughs and surgical techniques and accountants must stay abreast of new accounting rules.
          Notice that professional skills development is the obligation of the professional, not the hospital, the law firm or the accounting practice. Professionals invest their own time and money to upgrade their skills.
          For example, my friend Kennen Williams, President of Noll and Associates, a broadcast sales training company, makes a point of reading a minimum of one new business book a month.
Your people should have a similar self-improvement plan. Why?

1.       Advertising sales is a rapidly evolving and ever changing profession. Your clients entrust your account executives with tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of dollars to help them maintain and grow their businesses.
2.      Too many of our people treat our profession as a “job”. They rely on their employers or industry associations as their sole source of learning, taking no responsibility for their own professional development.
NOTE: “Professionals” also earn substantially better incomes than people holding down “jobs”.
3.           Because most media account executives benefit from a commission or performance bonus structure, their very livelihoods depend upon being the best they can be.
Have your sales people ask themselves;
??   Do I take the success of my clients and of my company seriously? To not do so is paramount to “malpractice”.
??  What am I doing to continually upgrade my knowledge and skills to ensure that I am qualified to be entrusted with crucial advertising budgets and to appreciate my worth to my employer?
Two final points;
1.      If a professional only gets the training their employer or industry offers, where is his or her competitive advantage over their peers with the same training?
2.      When you invest in yourself, that’s who owns the knowledge, should you leave the company.
 

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