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The Shape of Sales to Come

Canada's sales executives search for winning ways to attract savvy customers and manage a new generation of sales pros

The Shape of Sales to Come

Whether it’s the old-school Willy Loman who carried a bag in Death of a Salesman or the present-day account executive trying to harness social media, being a sales professional means adapting to change. These days, change and disruption just keep coming.

To better understand these challenges, Jim Hamilton, Distinguished Faculty Fellow of Sales Management at Smith School of Business, convened two roundtable discussions with some of Canada’s most seasoned sales executives. This paper highlights the key issues that surfaced: the increasing complexity of sales; the unique characteristics of millennial sales professionals; and the challenge of managing churn within the sales ranks.

Roundtable participants were: Mark Girvan, Chief Commercial Officer at FreshBooks; Josh Guttman, Regional Vice President at Salesforce.com; Conrad Mandala, Regional Vice President of Sales at OpenText; Shimona Mehta, Head of Sales Enablement at Shopify Plus; Kyle Norton, Vice President of Sales at League; Naseem Salooje, Senior Vice President of Revenue at Top Hat; and Tim White, Vice President of Enterprise Sales at IBM North America.

Download discussion paper (PDF, 1.4 MB)