JessWesterly CaseAnalysis
Jess Westerly Case Analysis
Kanakavelan Gothandaraman
DeSales University
Professor: Dr. Alok Chakrabarti
CR505 – Organization Management (Winter-2015)
Table of Contents
1. Case Abstract 3
2. How effective has Jess Westerly been in taking charge an assistant product owner at Kauflauf? 3
3. Why did her first attempt to change sales call pattern fail? 4
4. Does her proposal to change call patterns make sense? Why or why not? 4
5. What action should she takes to ensure that her next attempt to change call pattern to succeed? 5
1. Case Abstract
Jess Westerly joins Kauflauf GmbH as an assistant Product Owner in the computer/office supplies department. Before joining Kauflauf, Jess Westerly had a similar position with a rapidly growing CRM software service provider in the US, where she had great success in growing market share. At Kauflauf she was responsible for positioning her groups’ product line to optimize design, sales, and profitability.
In the time of Kauflauf‘s orientation program and field training, Westerly learned a lot about its organization and culture. She also noticed that Kauflauf’s field consultants were spending a large portion of their time on relatively small accounts. To test her observation, she ran several simulations by categorizing the customer base and modifying assumption. All her simulation results helped her come up with the conclusion that the field consultant should redirect at least 30% of the time they allocated to small and less profitable client, to medium/large and high-profitable client.
Based on the her conclusion, Westerly had circulated an email in June 2011, asking her colleagues in sales to redirect call patterns towards greater coverage of larger, more established potential purchasers of CRM software services in the computer and office supply business. Even with date and logic seemingly on her side, Westerly failed in her first call pattern change attempt. She decides to try again in September with
Kanakavelan Gothandaraman
DeSales University
Professor: Dr. Alok Chakrabarti
CR505 – Organization Management (Winter-2015)
Table of Contents
1. Case Abstract 3
2. How effective has Jess Westerly been in taking charge an assistant product owner at Kauflauf? 3
3. Why did her first attempt to change sales call pattern fail? 4
4. Does her proposal to change call patterns make sense? Why or why not? 4
5. What action should she takes to ensure that her next attempt to change call pattern to succeed? 5
1. Case Abstract
Jess Westerly joins Kauflauf GmbH as an assistant Product Owner in the computer/office supplies department. Before joining Kauflauf, Jess Westerly had a similar position with a rapidly growing CRM software service provider in the US, where she had great success in growing market share. At Kauflauf she was responsible for positioning her groups’ product line to optimize design, sales, and profitability.
In the time of Kauflauf‘s orientation program and field training, Westerly learned a lot about its organization and culture. She also noticed that Kauflauf’s field consultants were spending a large portion of their time on relatively small accounts. To test her observation, she ran several simulations by categorizing the customer base and modifying assumption. All her simulation results helped her come up with the conclusion that the field consultant should redirect at least 30% of the time they allocated to small and less profitable client, to medium/large and high-profitable client.
Based on the her conclusion, Westerly had circulated an email in June 2011, asking her colleagues in sales to redirect call patterns towards greater coverage of larger, more established potential purchasers of CRM software services in the computer and office supply business. Even with date and logic seemingly on her side, Westerly failed in her first call pattern change attempt. She decides to try again in September with