I was interested to read that the future of the government’s Work Programme “hangs in the balance” as research has revealed that 90 per cent of contracted Work Programme providers will miss their targets to get people back into work.

“The future of this vital employment scheme hangs in the balance,” said Ian Mulheirn, Director of the SMF.  “The programme aims to get some of the hardest to reach people off benefits and into work, but past performance shows that providers will be unable to meet the criteria required of them by the DWP”. As reported in Management Today

The statistic raises a number of questions:

• Were the targets too high?
• Were the providers promising too much in their application for the contract?
• Were the providers competent?
• Is the economic downturn so deep that it makes delivery impossible?
• Are employers just not employing?
  

No doubt the answers, arguments and “justification” will depend upon being in Government, Providers or DWP.
 
Perhaps they’ll all blame the unemployed!

Technorati Tags: employment, Ian Mulheirn, Management Today, work programme, unemployed, job, job serch

The
future of the government’s Work Programme “hangs in the balance” as
research has revealed that 90 per cent of contracted Work Programme providers will miss their
targets to get people back into work.

“The
future of this vital employment scheme hangs in the balance,” said Ian
Mulheirn, Director of the SMF.  “The programme aims to get some of the
hardest to reach people off benefits and into work, but past performance
shows that providers will be unable to meet the criteria required of
them by the DWP. As reported in Management Today

The statistic raises a number of questions:

• Were the targets too high?
• Were the providers promising too much when they applied for the contract?
• Were the providers competent?
• Is the economic downturn so deep that the job situation makes delivery impossible?
• Are employers just not employing
  

I’ve no doubt that the answers, arguments and “justification” will depend upon being in Government, Providers.
 
Perhaps they’ll all blame the unemployed!

I love working with new sales teams. In particular I enjoy planning how to to restructure a sales team to maximise sales.

Pertinent questions
Recently I was talking to a Sales Director that was concerned because his sales team, as a whole, wasn’t meeting target. Some of the team met their individual targets easily and exceeded them, others were average and some below average. The Sales Director was continually asking “Were the targets too high, Was the sales team capable of meeting the required results? or was the economy to blame?”. All very pertinent questions but ones that didn’t deliver the answers he was looking for.

Focussing on stars and passengers
In my experience a major reason why Sales Directors have problems with targets is because their focus is often confused by the stars and the passengers in their team (Stars are probably producing all they can and passengers simply reduce the good effect of the stars!).

Instead I persuaded him to focus on the group of people who are making “average Sales” and just below, which tends to be the larger number of people in any team. If this group could raise their sales by just 5% – 10% the effect can be to massively increase sales.
Action plan in the making!

email me: stephen@assimilating-talent if you would like a SKYPE call to discuss your sales team issues.