Sales Partnerships, Inc., Broomfield, CO, United States: Demonstrating Diversity Drives Sales

Total 115 words used.

The following attachments and links are included to support our nomination:

●  Documentation on SPI’s Diversity and Inclusion Work
●  Case study detailing the field work performed for the nomination for telecommunications
●  Case study detailing the field work performed for the nomination for financial services sales
●  “SPI Gives” summary document referencing our community engagement (helped with recruitment, retention, and deepening community relationships driving better sales)
●   Documentation on SPI’s metric based hiring system that includes behavioral assessments and a built-in process to avoid bias
●   Link to the SPI homepage for more information about our organization

Thank you again for your time and consideration for Sales Partnerships for the Diversity and Inclusion award.

Written answers to the questions

This nomination is a written submission including attachments. Our nomination for achievements in Diversity and Inclusivity Initiative of the Year focuses on our field sales work nationwide and how our focus on successes in diversity and inclusivity drove superior results. Thank you for your time and consideration of this nomination.

Total 249 words used.

Field sales is one of the least diverse professions in the US. 2021 DOL data shows that 79.7% of all field sales representative are white. This is a stark difference from current census data showing the country at 60% white. Although racism still exists in the industry, the more prevalent cause of the disparity is hiring practices based on past successful experience. In years past, minority representation in the sales force was low due to direct racism. Today, many representatives are still working in sales from those days. Because more of them were white 10-20 years ago, those individuals are more experienced and tend to be selected based on a longer proven track record of sales success.

Although Sales Partnerships has always used a bias-resistant hiring practice of metric based interviewing, it still gave experience as an important indicator of future behavior. As such, we were still near 70% white field representatives as late as 2015. We increased recruiting efforts into minority communities and took similar measures to try and improve our overall diversity. By December 2022, SPI was 52% white with representation nearly identical to the communities we serve.

The diversity work has been a boon to us. By becoming a more diverse workforce we built better rapport in our communities yielding more sales. At the same time, the changes in hiring metrics to focus on more behavioral characteristics than just experience saved us as the recruiting markets became more challenging in 2021-2022.

See the results below.

Total 174 words used.

Sales Partnerships (SPI) is an 8-time prior Stevie winner in the top Field Sales Category, specializing in face to face selling environments while representing the brands of some of the largest and most respected companies in the world through turnkey sales outsourcing. Our client roster includes notables such as IBM, Google, US Bank, Praxair, and Dow Chemical. 

Sales Outsourcing means providing cradle-to-grave sales services under the brand of each of the clients represented. Our teams are recruited for and dedicated to just an individual client based on that client program’s requirements.

Our hallmark is using and inventing systems and processes that optimize all the important areas impacting sales: recruiting, diversity, technology, training, management, analytics, and strategy. Our work has been covered in Selling Power, Sales and Marketing Management Magazine, Inc. Magazine, and CNNMoney. Since 1997, we have helped establish the standard for providing field based sales outsourcing services generated more than $10B in gross profits for our clients. SPI operates in the field throughout the United States as well as in select markets globally.

Total 249 words used.

At 48% diverse, SPI is twice as diverse as the national average in field sales. The two big benefits are our teams better reflecting and understanding their communities while increasing our talent pool.

2022 gave us demonstrable results from the diversity work. When asked to relaunch post Covid closures, we had to hire more than 100 sales representatives in a 90 day period. With the weakest experienced field sales candidate pool since the 1940's due to retirements and reps leaving field sales during Covid, having accurate tools to allow us to bring in less experienced talent at similar (or better) production levels gave SPI a tremendous competitive advantage.

In telecommunications sales, we went head to head with Fortune 500 providers such as Xfinity, Centurylink, AT&T/Spectrum, and Verizon while representing a solid but much smaller competitor to them. By the end of the year, we went from 5% market share to 55% market share and did so below the target cost of acquisition. Head to head, we outperformed competing channels by more than 50% measured on a per rep production basis.

In financial services sales acquiring and activating merchants for a Fortune 500 credit card provider, SPI was given 9 months to generate 12 months of results due to internal client delays. Of the hundreds of sales channels from this client, SPI claimed the top performance spot delivering 105% of annual results (135% of monthly targets) in a year where only 15% of thier teams came within 20% of target.