Appco Group India - Learning and Development for Future Stability

Learning and development is a complex process which involves going through a lot of stages to achieve and cater to a specific learning or training issue at a particular stage. In big organizations, where the number of employees at every level poses a different learning need, there is a requirement for a better understanding of the various challenges that the managers may come across. A thorough analytical approach towards addressing these shortcomings can help for a sustainable culture which is favorable for the near future.

Adapting to Change, learning, and development refer to the process by which organizations adjust to their environment. What future forecast is something which is hugely uncertain and can be determined as the time approaches. What a company aims for is the effectiveness of the training modules for sustaining in the uncertain times. Moreover, learning and development at the organizational level and at the individual differs. Though Organizational learning occurs through its people, it would be inappropriate to conclude that it is the result of their individual employee’s learning. 

Organizations are bound by systems and practices while individuals are bound by their personalities, personal habits, and behavioral attributes. This is where the need for content based training modules arises which caters to both Organizational goals and individual goals. The training modules need to be highly flexible and should involve practical experience rather than contextual approach. Heavy duty practical training can result in quality talent development and ultimately will serve the purpose of the Organization’s vision. The challenge is will it survive the future ahead. That’s what the uncertainty is all about. 

‘The wisest man has something yet to learn’

Appco Group India: Adopting Change with the Changing Times

The world markets are headed towards innovation and in a situation where there is cut throat competition; companies need to be adaptable to the inevitable ‘Change’. 

Experts have truly coined the statement ‘Change is the new constant’

While companies have started to adapt to the technological advances, there still is a long way to go for adapting to the newer trends in the markets. The industry is hugely volatile and changes with the blink of an eye, still, we as a company, can’t transform the systems with that speed. However, in keeping with this accelerated pace of change and our aim to provide world class sales support to our clients, the strategy at Appco has evolved considerably over the years. We are looking at our systems and process with a view to not just change it but to enhance it to meet our requirements. 

Our research shows that our revenue can be increased by a targeted approach towards our sales territories, customers, sales professionals and sales tools. Our aim, in such times, is to lead our organization through crises management which is driven by change.  

 But research alone is not important. Companies need to build and analyze their strategies in a way that the findings help the top management in making decisions in an accurate manner. Also with lot of innovative and newer business trends arriving, a lot of gap is created in the markets and the competitors await this very opportunity to grab the prey. Nowadays, the systems that we design have to be necessarily flexible to adapt to the tricks of the market. One of the most critical core components for the business to thrive and succeed is being able to adapt and endure the change and development. The ability to learn must never perish and newer tools in the training and learning functions need to be conceived for making the employees acquainted with the Change. Investing for Change is what is a dicey question for some firms and it still remains an uncertainty for people and organizations to go ahead and accept the Change.

‘To improve is to change… To perfect is to change continuously’

Appco Group India- Grooming Young Talent in the Business

Research has shown that the job markets have lightened in the recent years and companies now seek ahead to recruit and develop the younger talent, for they form an integral part of the new HR strategies. Building and grooming young talent, specifically for sales functions, have hugely helped organizations to secure their businesses in the long term.

We, at Appco Group, regard the new entrants as our ‘Young Guns’ in the business and are ready to invest in their talent. We believe that when the business needs become challenging, grooming the new sales recruits requires a critical approach. Quality is something we aspire for, be it in sales, in operations, in marketing and every initiative that our company undertakes. The young talent is generally raw and academically inclined which needs grooming to become practically acquainted with the business processes and how it works. This is to focus on the significance of caring and nurturing the young pool of people and helping them identify their potential. 

Although grooming the young talent yields many fruits, but it is a highly risky exercise in itself and managers face a lot of challenge especially when it comes to handling new entrants. The biggest challenge is that the young minds are highly volatile and driven by the influential factors easily. Hence dealing with them and grooming them to the right path becomes an increasingly difficult task where the new talent will have to be dealt with patience and trust. A planned employee introduction and training program in place will ensure that the new entrants go through various exercises and get exposed to real time business practices to understand and get hold of their interest factors. This will not only help them gauge their potential but also will form a feeling of connectivity with the business policies. 

Grooming and developing quality manpower is an investment to the organization and the ultimate gain is not only the workforce but the Organization too.

‘The new talent is the Company’s greatest asset. Put your time, money, efforts in encouraging them’

Appco Group India- Human Resource is Human Capital

The Organizational hierarchy of every company is based on the human resource it employs. Developing the quality of people an Organization hires is one of the most important functions which cannot be overlooked. In the recent times, human resource as an asset has been given utmost significance within all the levels of management as human capital is what drives the company and holds back the Organization’s network of people.

Being a multinational organization, we at Appco Group, focus on emphasizing our human capital and have been involved in training and recruiting quality talent and adopting ways to retain them. We believe our strength in the human asset is what drives our company’s success. The business is all about how we motivate each other and network within to form a well connected loop of people from across various cultures, geographies and background. This uniformity is a result of hiring raw talent and honing their skills to what best they respond to. How we perceive our talent resource forms the basis for nurturing them and getting our team to deliver the best for the business. We truly believe that our human resource is our capital and our biggest strength lies in them. However, human capital also comes with a lot of risks and challenges. 

The challenges arise when dealing with people on different levels of management. The issues faced by the senior management wouldn’t really be the same as the ones faced by the mid management or others. In such a situation, it becomes extremely important to address the problems with a different approach for different people in the business. This accounts the need for understanding that human resource is indeed an asset and to recruit is to grow and develop. And here is where we, as a company, look into developing more tools to manage and train our people with a bigger motive to grow and innovate. Our HR practices have been developed with the aim to impart knowledge and passion in our teams to achieve our Organization’s long term vision, ‘Be Something More’

It is our belief that the best talent emerges out of best practices, be it selection, hiring or promotions. With many more training and development programs in the loop for the next year, we look into expanding and hiring people who share a similar vision as ours because when we forecast our growth, we forecast our team’s growth too.

‘Real value comes from nature and human resources, both of which we already possess’

Appco Group India: Face-to-face pitching as a traditional selling tool

If you are in the selling business, winning new customers often requires face-to-face meetings as a very traditional yet winning approach. Many experts in our industry have regarded direct selling approach to provide an edge over the other approaches owing to the advantages and liberty it provides. Globally, face-to-face pitching has been looked on as a traditionally accepted approach which has gone down well in the industry standards and is still regarded as one of the top selling tools.

In practical situations, the seller who meets the prospect face to face has a better advantage over his or her competitors. The other modes of selling/pushing the product or service like advertising, print mediums, events have also proved beneficial because it increases awareness in the minds of the prospects; however the mass impact and accessibility that a direct selling approach provides is untouched. Moreover, face to face meeting is a much persuasive approach where you can gauge the reactions better and look into handling the objections directly. On the contrary, customers and prospects find it easy to ignore emails and calls and that makes selling tougher.

Another aspect in direct selling is managing the time. Proper time management can lead to more time with the customer and less time for the non-sales activities. This can boost your face-to-face interaction with the prospects and give you a higher chance of selling the product/service. There are traditionally some golden rules through which you can enrich your direct selling experience. The prospect is your potential customer so it is extremely important to ask and listen to the responses. This helps in better understanding and improves the interaction. Another significant instance is to resist the urge of selling the product/service immediately before knowing the need of the customer. Let the customer speak so that you address his needs for the product and tailor your pitch to suit his precise needs.

Many such loopholes are addressed with the help of direct selling methods, thereby proving it to be a traditional yet powerful approach.

Appco Group India: The Power to Sell

Most organizations in the selling business have regarded selling as a powerful factor for their businesses. Recent researches show that companies which regard selling as an important function for their organization have strived to develop their sales teams and empower them with the technological advances to improve their businesses.

Selling is regarded as the marriage of science and art. The Science, here is everything starting from your analysis, metrics, tools, predictability, calculations and forecasts that have been formed to apply to the everyday goals which a sales professional sets for himself and takes it head on daily. These goals are however incomplete only with the scientific tools which needs the Art to apply. This generally includes the art or technique for selling which comprises of the interpersonal skills through which the sales people can form relationships and nurture them.

The Power to sell depends upon the Science and the Art of selling. Any good sales person will have the attributes like friendliness, persuasive, ambitious, hardworking which help a great deal in acquiring customers. But sustainability in the selling business comes from adhering to the science of selling. It is important to have the skills to sell but it is also important to have the right approach and technique to sell. And that’s the difference between an average and an outstanding sales performance. A significant factor to boost your results is to forecast and measure the sales activities such as your visits, the outcome, complaints etc. Having established the metrics, one needs to have a goal to achieve them constantly.

This forms the foundation for a sales person’s performance as they focus and cater to the important activities which drive sales. The power to sell is thereby a debatable topic where he more the suggestions , the better the results.

Appco Group India: Maintaining High Performance Standards

Appco Group India’s monthly statistical report focused on measuring the performance standards of the leaders in our business reveals that time and again, the high rollers in all our teams have shown exceptional performance standards. Our leaders have developed themselves with a lot of integrity, hard work, curiosity and intelligence. However, to sustain in the business, there is a long way to go with maintaining the high level standards they have set for themselves and their teams.

The whole point of running our business is to focus the energies, attention and vision to a common goal and infuse the same objective and passion into the team with an aim to set the performance standards and work towards achieving and maintaining it with time. A good thing about our business is that it will immediately make the high performing teams a standard organization with an individual status growing up on the records. The challenge here is to sustain the standards set by the teams with a vision to outdo your own records. The industry mantra is if you have high standards, you got to make it much higher. And that’s the idea behind adopting various leadership programs and workshops to develop our high rollers constantly and empower them to be courageous enough to set and maintain their standards in the business.

Of course, for challenging stuff like this, there are going to be loopholes and failures in the system. If the goal of the business, for instance, is to create a wonderful product/service or provide excellent customer service or conceptualize innovative marketing campaigns- the leader is going to have to establish and maintain structured standards for him and the team. And accept the matter of fact that there are going to be lags in the plan which has to be addressed with solutions. It is here where his individual qualities of leadership will shine and pave the path.

An ideal leader, whose goal is to maintain the high standards of his business, has to be well equipped with essential skills where he can share his ideology with his teams and build the trust value. The factors that can help him sustain the business with high standards include being able to communicate the successes and failures with equal emphasis, evaluate the quality of work done constantly, actively seek opportunities to involve the team in the decision making process, trust and empower the employees with responsibilities and address them with timely support. These traits go a long way in addressing the problems and ensuring a smooth business structure.

In a competitive environment, they can be regarded as the pre requisite for sustaining the business with high standards and out doing your own mettle to constantly improve and grow.

‘Achievement is largely the product of steadily raising one’s level of aspirations, expectations and standards’

Appco Group India: Direct Relationship Building is the key to Effective Sales

The road map to effective sales has its foundation from direct relationship building and it thrives on the outcomes of effective relationship management. In the recent times, the focus of our sales operations has been laid on the importance of building and developing relationships with our prospects for getting an upper hand over the traditional sales tools.

In today’s industry, the sales methodology have been re-engineered to emphasize the benefits and the outcome of relationship development with the prospects as a way to build trust value and associate it with the product/service. The idea behind successful sales pitch is to think of you as a customer and analyze what points of interest can be generated in the mind of the prospects to push them to buy the product/service. This essentially requires a great amount of trust and confidence building which can go a long way in managing and acquiring clients across any industry. With the various products and services that we are associated with, our aim has been to nurture relationships with our customers and to build the brand value with trust.

Building relationships has been an integral part of our sales strategy wherein our sales people have gone an extra mile when dealing with the customers to ensure an effective trust building environment. This strategy, in turn has rewarded our business and a new turn to sales approach has been generated and tested among all our divisions. Another significant highlight of our approach is the customer service and support we provide as a part of our sales exercise so as to strengthen the existing relationship of our accounts. Our training model has stressed on the value of interaction, networking, and etiquettes to develop our sales people constantly for improvising on maintaining contacts with people and develop a sustaining relationship.

In the long run, the sales & marketing strategy will rely mostly on effective relationship management and the bigger the response of it, the bigger the sales numbers are likely to be generated.