Joel Whalen

Graduate Curriculum Guide

The Center for Sales Leadership began in April, 2003 with a grant from the 3M Company
to establish a sales education curriculum. The university was selected based on its size,
diverse student population and faculty with business experience. The program’s mission
is to connect the best students with the best companies. The program’s strategy is to train
students both academically and motivationally - producing qualified entry level
candidates who pursue a lifelong career in sales.

The graduate curriculum consists of three courses:

Courses are taught through a variety of lecture, group projects, role plays, selling
activities, case studies, coaching, technology tools and other teaching methods. An
outline and weekly topics for each of the courses follows.

All faculty members have excellent academic credentials and significant business
experience in sales and marketing. The faculty has deep expertise in marketing, sales,
finance, communications, sales technology, leadership, organization development,
strategic planning, consulting and general management.

For more information on the Sales Leadership Program, please contact Sarah Laggos at slaggos@depaul.edu.

Marketing 576 - Effective Business Communications

This course is offered:

  • Spring Quarters, Monday evenings

Course Summary
Participants build skills in message packaging and delivery for both spoken and written
communication: Voice mail, presentations, one-on-one conversations, and, e-mail,
memos and reports. Skills are built in managing communication anxiety, facilitating team
communications and assessing communication style. Coaching to enhance performance
and facility in business/social networking are enhanced.

Course Outline:
Week One

  • Power and limitations of communication—Five Realities of Communication©
  • Fundamental message packaging. Controlling meaning: Boring to Brilliant©
  • Understanding communication anxiety—Kennedy Eyes©

Week Two

  • Telephone and voice mail message packaging
  • Advanced message packaging: Question Opening©, Sense-rich Message©, Cold Closing©
  • Message strategy: when to write and when to speak

Week Three

  • Advanced anxiety management
  • Coaching others to enhance performance
  • Building message packaging skills: Share Your Moment©

Week Four

  • Visual communication techniques: design and layout for e-mail, memos
  • Assessing communication style: DISC profiles
  • Conference memos

Week Five

  • Advanced message packaging: Nichols Two-Things©
  • Team presentation techniques
  • Relationship and trust building communication

Week Six

  • Team message packaging
  • Building high-impact PowerPoint slides and graphs
  • Rehearsing team presentation with peer coaching

Week Seven

  • Delivering team presentations
  • Advanced message packaging: Big Messages©
  • Translating features into benefits

Week Eight

  • Assess written communication skills
  • Effect of shyness on business communication
  • Advanced and fast message packaging and delivery: Stand & Deliver©

Week Nine

  • Understanding and managing social anxiety
  • Building social networking skills
  • Message packaging for social networking: 20-Second Pitch©

Week Ten

  • Advanced team presentation techniques
  • Peer coaching
  • Self and team assessments
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Marketing 577 - Leading Business Development

This course is offered:

  • Fall Quarters, Thursday evenings

Course Summary
This course is designed for managers or future team leaders seeking to maximize their
resources to achieve sound business results for their organizations and customers.
Utilizing current practices, processes and proven in-market techniques, students will learn
to create and maintain a customer team that achieves results with the internal as well as
external customer. Emphasis will be placed on: Team Leadership Skills, Profiling and
Segmenting Customers, Managing Team Performance, Developing Business Plans and
Relationships, internally and externally.

Course Outline
Week One - Trends in Organizations

  • Leadership vs. Management Relationships
  • Review of Syllabus and Objectives
  • Leading Teams vs. Managing Teams
  • Trends in Sales Organizations

Week Two – Selling and Buying Processes

  • CRM in Today’s Business Environment
  • Subject Matter Expert Speaker
  • Review and Discussion of Case Study Assignment (Session One)
  • Buying and Selling Processes
  • SPIN Selling Approach

Week Three - Leadership Skills and Characteristics

  • Leading in a Team Environment
  • Review and Discussion of Case Study Assignment (Session Two)
  • Leadership Characteristics and Skills
  • Case Study Exercise: “An Ethical Dilemma”

Week Four - Motivation and Networks

  • Motivation, Management, Environment and Career Factors
  • Best Practices in Leading Teams
  • Role of Motivation and Application/Effectiveness
  • Exercise: “Your Network”

Week Five - Sales Organization Models

  • Team Dynamics and the Leader Role
  • Sales Organization Models
  • Characteristics of Good and Problematic Teams
  • Review and Discussion of “What Makes an Effective Leader” by Peter Drucker Page 5 4/21/2008
  • Mid-Term Exam

Week Six - Account Management; Prioritization and Segmentation

  • Value of the Customer
  • Segmentation Models and Applications
  • Customer Relationships and Prioritization
  • Subject Matter Expert Speaker

Week Seven - Key Account/Priority Account Management

  • Role of Key Account Management within Organization and Customer
  • Roles for Key Account Managers and Leaders
  • Best Practices of Successful Key Account Teams
  • Review and Discuss Session Six assignment

Week Eight - Developing Business Plans

  • Strategic vs. Tactical Plans
  • Integrated Business and Customer Plans
  • Role of Budgets, Forecasting and Components of an Integrated Planning Process
  • Subject Matter Expert Speaker: Planning with the Customer

Week Nine - Evaluating Sales and Customer Performance

  • Criteria for Measuring Performance
  • Decisions for Leaders in Evaluating Customers/Sales Associates
  • Team Evaluation vs. Individual Evaluation
  • Subject Matter Expert: Force Logics

Week Ten - Negotiation

  • Negotiation Skills and Techniques
  • Negotiation with the Customer and the Organization
  • Final Exam

Week Eleven - Final Project Presentations

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Marketing 578 - Sales Strategy & Technology

This course is offered:

  • Winter Quarters, Monday evenings

Course Summary
The key to the development of superior customer sales strategy is detailed intelligence.
This course investigates sources of customer data, the state of data management
technology and the contribution that current and accurate customer information can make
in changing sales strategy. Students gain an appreciation of data leveraging, or the use of
customer insight to produce winning selling strategies.

Students work with the technical tools of selling, including on demand segmentation and
research systems from the ACNielsen Company, the Saleforce.com CRM system and a
variety of on demand CRM applications. Upon completion of this course, students have
acquired significant skill in using technology to resolve sales cases.

Course Outline
Week One – Information Rich Selling

  • Course Overview
  • Presentation of Sales Strategy & CRM
  • Presentation on Sales Force Automation Tools (Speaker)
  • Introduction to Salesforce.com Case and Exercise 1

Week Two – CRM & The Sales Process

  • Buyer Process Management Presentation (Speaker)
  • CRM & the Sales Process (Speaker)
  • Salesforce.com Case Exercise 2

Week Three – Salesforce.com Case Preparation

  • CPG Sales Strategy Presentation
  • CPG Promotion Specifics
  • Salesforce.com Case Exercise 3
  • Software as a Service Presentation (Speaker)

Week Four – Salesforce.com Case Presentations

  • Select Individual Presentations Salesforce.com Case

Week Five – Salesforce Evaluation Tools for Today’s Salesforce

  • Concepts in Evaluating Sales Performance
  • Salesforce Optimizer (Speaker)

Week Six – Category Management

  • Category Management Presentation
  • ACNielsen Home Scan and Category Planner
  • ACNielsen CBP Exercises

Week Seven – Consumer and Customer Segmentation and Targeting

  • Introduction To Spectra InfiNet
  • InfiNet Exercises

Week Eight – The New Supply Chain

  • Supply Chain and Category Management
  • Supply Chain a Retailers’ Perspective (Speaker)
  • InfiNet Exercises

Week Nine – ACNielsen Category Management Presentations

  • Group Presentations
  • Guest Judges

Week Ten – Sales Technology and Diversity Panel Discussion

  • Panel Experts discuss the role of technology and diversity issues in selling today.

Week Eleven – Final Exam

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