Executive Certificate in Sales Leadership

Course overview

The landscape of sales has changed dramatically over the past decade. With the advent of customer relationship management and the ever-changing and increasing customer expectations, the standard has been raised for professional salespeople. Furthermore, the increase in the demands on salespeople, it is evident that even greater expectations have been placed on the both salespeople and sales leaders within the firm.

This program introduces you to cutting-edge sales techniques, leadership models and practical tools for effective sales performance. As a participant, you’ll learn both strategic approaches to challenging topics and the tactical implementations of these different strategies. Led by thought-leading faculty, each highly focused learning session features fresh insights, ground-breaking practices, interactive discussions, and real-world case studies.

This program is designed for senior-and middle-level managers with leadership, newly appointed sales managers, and high performing sales people with leadership aspirations. Consultants or general managers who would like a broader understanding of how the sales process works and the critical factors in sales leadership will also benefit from this program.

To earn an Executive Certificate in Sales Leadership, candidates must successfully complete the following four (4) courses:

Professional Selling

This module details a set of selling skills that is backed by rigorous academic research. Through interactive discussions pertaining to each element of the sales process, participants will practice how to prospect, approach customers, ask questions, negotiate, and close effectively. In addition, they will learn the language of sales, which allows them to walk away with expertise in the area of persuasion and have the ability to share this newfound knowledge with others in their organizations. Special attention is given to certain skills, including cold calling, behavioral style recognition, and adaptive selling.

Key Account Management

Key account management is at the frontier of professional selling and sales force management, and with it comes added complexity. This module, developed based on practices used by the world’s most sophisticated KAM organizations, prepares practitioners to operate in this environment. Selling across geographic boundaries and business unit lines effectively takes skills beyond those taught in the professional selling module. These skills include knowing how to leverage internal resources, map accounts, and forecast sales. On top of learning the skills needed to succeed in KAM, participants will develop a deep understanding of the role key account managers assume and the way they contribute to corporate strategy.

Customer Relationship Management

This module moves away from one-to-one sales interactions and takes a 30,000-foot view of sales. The result is a comprehensive framework that allows participants to move on and excel as relationship managers. Key concepts that are taught include territory management, pipeline management, and customer lifetime value. Overall, these skills equip professional salespeople with know-how that allows them to avoid typical customer relationship management pitfalls (i.e., time wastes, effort drains, and lost opportunities). In addition, these skills allow salespeople to build account portfolios that maximize sales, profit, and customer satisfaction.

Leading a Sales Team

This module covers sales leadership topics from an informal leader perspective. Ideal for salespeople who operate in sales team environments, it explores and practices the fundamentals of motivation. Without formal power or incentives to motivate, salespeople need to know how to lead by example, inspire a vision, and facilitate group goals. Micro-management is rejected by all but the most novice coworkers, so we deliver a set of skills that help salespeople lead and prepare for more responsible roles in the sales organization.

By completing this high profile Certificate Program, participants will be able to:

• Win the confidence and trust of prospects
• Increase success in acquiring new business and building customer loyalty.
• Explore different sales leadership approaches and how to implement them.
• Build a foundation of knowledge on how to categorize and create an account portfolio of your customers based on current and future value.
• Understanding the how to and tactical implementation of the strategies developed and discussed.
• Learn how to effectively manage salespeople across different levels in the organization.
• Identify the strengths within your organization and determine how to leverage them while improving upon the weaknesses.

Who should attend

The Executive Certificate in Sales Leadership is designed for sales professionals with, or about to take up, leadership or key account management responsibilities and those practitioners outside the sales discipline whose role interacts with the sales function. It is also well suited for individuals who desire to enter the sales field and learn about developing contemporary selling and leadership strategies to drive their company and industry forward.

Head of Faculty: Michael Ahearne

Michael Ahearne is the C.T. Bauer Professor of Marketing and Executive Director of the Sales Excellence Institute at the University of Houston.

He is also a principal at ZS Associates, responsible for the development of innovative methods across its various practice areas. He has a Ph.D. and MBA in Marketing from Indiana University as well as a BS in Mathematics with honors from Worcester Polytechnic Institute.

He was recently recognized by the American Marketing Association as one of the 10 most research productive scholars in his field. His research has been profiled in the Wall Street Journal, Business 2.0, Business Investors Daily, and Fox News. Michael’s book “Selling Today: Partnering to Create Customer Value” is the highest grossing professional selling textbook in the world, with copies being distributed in over forty countries.

Schedule at a glance

All courses will be from 3pm to 5pm (UAE local time) on Mondays and Wednesdays.

What’s included

Access Courses Anywhere, Anytime

All learning materials, assessments, study support and work-based activity are delivered entirely online.

Up to 100 hours of online CPD

This does not mean you spend all 100 hours in front of the computer, some of this time will allow you the opportunity to reflect on the course materials and relate your learning to your workplace.

Dedicated and authoritative faculty

This certificate is designed and developed by thought-leading faculty and industry experts. All our senior faculty are teaching at Leading Business Schools with a minimum of over ten years of university and corporate education experience.

Comprehensive learner support

An expert learning adviser can clarify study materials, answer questions and help you relate each course to your specific needs.

A certificate of completion

Upon successful submission of your program, you will receive a certificate that can be used as evidence of CPD for your employer or professional body; it details the number of hours you have studied and the learning outcomes you have completed.

The strong link between our programs and your work practice creates relevant, enduring and transferable learning outcomes. It requires no more than 20 hours of your time in total to complete each course over a period of five weeks. But the learning is far richer than more expensive executive education workshops.

Why NYIM

Higher Quality Education

We develop our programs with a focus on the fusion of theory and practice. Practitioners learn more than just concepts; they learn how to apply those concepts to real-world work situations. The NYIM curriculum is designed around industry standards and expectations for professionals in each field of study. Students learn by participating in live classroom sessions, watching video lectures, doing reflections and collaborating with other participants

Flexible and Accessible

Studying with NYIM puts you in control. We provide access to robust online executive education programs that enable flexible scheduling and logistics to meet the needs of our students. All our courses are self-paced but instructor facilitated and you can study whenever and wherever you like without compromising on quality. Each program is carefully designed to foster collaboration, interaction and networking among participants and faculty members.

Effective Program Format

NYIM courses are designed to run for five/six weeks. Each week there is a scheduled live classroom session of 45 minutes lecture and 30 minutes of reflections and group discussions. Throughout each course there are rich opportunities for practitioners to connect, share experiences and best practices, discuss on-the-job application, raise questions and pose ideas for optimal course of action

Practical and Relevant

Theoretical knowledge is essential, but there’s also no substitute for applied skills. We draw upon the experience of thought-leading faculty and use real-life scenarios, providing you with practical skills that you can employ in the workplace. Students are immersed in an engaging and collaborative learning process that enforces them to build dynamic relationships with other participants online that will continue to stay active beyond each program.

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