Upskilling: the informed way

Blown away by the results

Celcat was the brainchild of a director of corporate engineering at Warwick University in the 90s. He needed to schedule his classes and asked for his son’s help in using computers to do so.

Celcat has been perfecting their timetabling software ever since, creating an additional French-speaking edition. It’s now used by universities and colleges around the world including in the UK, Australia, South Africa, the Middle East, Canada, India, France, Belgium and Senegal.

“Timetabler” (Celcat’s education timetable software) is used daily by over a million students.

Neil Jordan, Celcat’s General Manager, was initially looking for baseline data to support his sales team and assess their strengths and weaknesses.

Objective Management Group (OMG)’s methodology fitted his bill. Through OMG, Neil was introduced to Tim Ogle of Toggle Switch.

Tim explained to Neil why a follow-on course and some ongoing coaching would maximise his team’s potential in conjunction with the initial team assessments. Neil, sceptical at first, was blown away by the results.

He said:

“We got so much from it that it was a very easy decision to continue with the coaching. So that’s what we’ve done. We’re still working with Tim now.”

Neil’s team have had another targeted course since and have continued with ongoing coaching, and Neil has recently used OMG and Tim, to recruit for a New Business post.

Discovering strengths and weaknesses

Neil has a finance background and was asked to take over running Celcat on its acquisition. He was excited to accept the role as he already knew the company.

When he was left holding the reins of the sales team after the incumbent Sales Manager moved on, he sought his parent company’s advice – having had little experience of sales. Upscaling the existing team was deemed preferable to the tricky task of externally recruiting a new sales manager. Soon Neil found himself running the sales team alongside the company!

Neil knew that the team needed to upskill with a greater focus on new business if they wished to achieve their growth targets. He also understood that Celcat’s ultimate parent company preferred decision-making to be based on objective data:

“What we were looking for at the time was sales training. The idea was: ‘How do we know what the team is good at and where they are weak? So can we put them on a course that’s going to fill in their weak points?”

These combined factors led Neil to OMG and, through them, to Tim.

Coaching for growth

Tim proposed that Neil should not only do the team assessments, but also a course “off the back of them” and some ongoing coaching.

Neil was “pretty sceptical” with this suggestion at first.

“We just wanted a course and… There’s always a suspicion when you get a guy coming to your door and talking about all the extra services, it feels like  they’re trying to maximise what they’re getting out of this.  But actually, the way it was explained to us by Tim made a lot of sense, so I thought let’s give this a go, and I’m interested in the assessment.”

Before they assessed everyone, Neil was shown a sample of what an assessment looked like and the kind of information it turned up. That convinced him to forge ahead.

An easy decision to continue 

Neil explained,

“The ongoing coaching was the bit I was most sceptical about, if I’m honest with you. But Tim made a good point: How do you know that the training is sticking?”

Neil decided to do a short experiment of a month’s worth of ongoing coaching.

They were blown away with the results. It was “excellent” and “an easy decision to continue with it”.

His team still has sessions with Tim one to two times a month following-on from their training. They can discuss what they’re doing each week and what they plan to do. Tim gives them advice and tips on different approaches, and they can bounce ideas around; exploring plans with someone with experience. Neil remarked:

“It’s going down really well.”

The team have also had follow-on courses on consultative selling and on cold calling, areas where the team was weaker. Both have been great, with Neil describing the latter as:

“terrifying, but brilliant. You got so much from it!”

Recruiting the easy way

When he needed to recruit into the sales team, Neil sought Tim’s advice and followed his recommendations. He used OMG’s tools together with Tim’s guidance and said:

“It was brilliant. It really narrowed down the quality candidate.”

Neil has been “really happy” with their choice of recruit and with the ease and efficiency of what he’d thought would be a much more difficult (recruitment) process.

Sold!

Overall, Neil, CEO of Celcat, has been “really, really happy” with his engagement of Tim, Toggle Switch:

“From the initial scepticism, I was quickly won over. The course was excellent, but it was the ongoing coaching that I think has been the most benefit. Certainly to me, in coming into a new role as a sales manager… just having a neutral party  to guide me has been revolutionary for me.”

Neil feels more in control as a result. He now has, for example, an improved format for sales meetings and his team have clearer expectations:

“Everything’s become a lot clearer through the coaching…It’s totally changed our approach. I feel we’re organised. We’re consistent in our approach…It’s been a big change for us.”

Neil also remarked on how amazing it’s been to watch how much a member of his team has grown and developed by fully embracing the training.

All of this has, of course, paid dividends for Celcat. New leads have at least doubled.

Of Tim and Toggle Switch, Neil concluded:

“I’ve been very satisfied with the service we’ve got.”