Problem Solution: Intersect Investment Services Corporation

Running head: PROBLEM SOLUTION: INTERSECT INVESTMENT SERVICES CORPORATION

Problem Solution: Intersect Investment Services Corporation

Wayne Jason Conine

University of Phoenix

MBA 520

Tim Drake

October 24, 2005

Problem Solution: Intersect Investment Services Corporation

Intersect Investment Services needs to make an internal sales transformation to add value to customers, employees, products and services. Intersect provides a broad set of products and services to individual consumers and small businesses. In the past Intersect made quick sales calls, this technique was based around numbers. The more potential customers they contact the more sales possibilities. This technique provided no room for personalization or trust. Therefore, CEO Frank Jeffers identified a new vision, “Provide a broad set of products and services to consumer and small business customers using a model of customer intimacy that will build long term relationships based on trust and value to the customer.” This vision clashes with the current standards within the company and will be resisted by some employees.

Frank Jeffers, Intersects CEO was forced to let go of Executive Vice President of Sales and Marketing because he did not support the new philosophy and failed to lead his organization with the new vision. Frank expects this new vision to springboard their company to success, by giving customers what they deserve. Intersect will improve brand image and begin to establish long-term relationships with clients. In addition, this should prove to Wall Street that Intersect Investment Services ethical behavior will never need to be questioned in the future. However, there is tension within the workplace. Employees are not convinced the new vision is effective.

However, how can all this be accomplished and still be successful? To begin Frank hired Janet Angelo, the new Executive Vice President of Marketing and Sales. She has years of experience developing “customer intimacy” models for companies. However, none of these companies were quite an investment firm. One was a bank, and others were in the technology industry. Another change implemented was the training of the internal sales force. However, they are resistant to change due to past years of success with the existing organizational strategy. The issue also resides with the management not trusting the new vision. This is misleading employees and building mistrust with managerial decisions. The overall culture within the sales organization is lost in space. The sales format is following previous sales techniques while attempting to incorporate the new vision without proper guidance because the managers are also mislead and not convinced that the new vision will be successful. Intersect must prove to them that the new vision will provide the company with even more success that existing business practices.

Several opportunities exist for both customers and sales representatives if the new vision is embraced and practiced on a regular basis. Employees can increase their customer trust and possibly overall sales. Customers will also benefit by having a trusted advisor who can be trusted with personal investments and feel safe knowing the money is being invested properly. As the majority of people should be willing to give money to someone who has an established personal relationship. This could possibly springboard the company sales and overall vision to a new level. However, there is much more training the employees will need to attend to develop these types of personal skills. Currently the sales force looks at number of contacts, outbound calls instead of the number of personal relationships with customers. Such as a hit and run tactic instead of a customer satisfaction ratio. Although the sales force is not practicing the new techniques, the sales force has tremendous opportunity if the new technique is embraced and practiced.

If Intersect Investment embraces the new vision, they have the opportunity to benefit the customer and employee alike. The problem remains with the employees not practicing the techniques. The employees also do not believe upper management does not have the ability to pull off the new strategy. Plus management is not giving all the employees the information they need to practice their new job functions. This is because upper management within the sales organization has been watching numbers, sales and customer loyalty decrease over the past year. However, this is because