Organization for the Account Rep - The Set Up

In case you missed it, we are doing a little series for Account Reps and how to manage their time and organize their systems. We started with The Recap and The Beginning and are now at The Set Up.

After a full day of relaxing and venting, we were both ready to start tackling our little problem and figuring out some wonderful solutions to make everyone's life a bit easier. I am a HUGE fan of doing things outside of the office whenever I can. It just seems that the overwhelming oppressiveness of the actual "office" can totally destroy a productive working session. So, after my little bout of getting my ass kicked at kickboxing Wednesday morning, I certainly wasn't in any mood to put up with any crap from an unhappy work place. Instead, we met for lunch and sat out on the patio! The weather was perfect in Arizona and fresh air always opens the mind for solutions.

With my composition book in hand, I had her regurgitate everything she had to do for each specific account. I am talking detail by detail. It didn't matter how small and insignificant it seemed, we wrote it down. By breaking it down my client, it gave my Darling Diva a chance to actually feel like she was in control. It wasn't overwhelming because she got to see that some of her accounts required very little babysitting. They were essentially self sufficient they just needed a little love every now and again.

Next, we went over the materials for each client. What did she have to have on hand when she went and saw them? Again, instead of feeling like she "had to carry so much crap around" with her, she realized that even though there was a lot of materials she had to have on hand we could go shopping for some really nifty supplies to help organize her car! We all know that shopping for new things is ALWAYS fun!

During our 4 hours of brain dumping, there were a couple of things I noticed about the habits of my little account rep. 1) She would get phone calls and people would need something from her. She would either just say ok and then hang up the phone OR she would scramble around in her purse and look for a scrap piece of paper and write something down the proceeded to stuff it back into her purse. (CRINGE!!!!) That just about drove me over the brink of insanity, but I maintained my professionalism...for a while. 2) She was so gung-ho on doing EVERYTHING herself she failed to see areas where other people were doing essentially the same job OR similar tasks. Why bother duplicating efforts if someone else was doing it or could do it?

Example: One of her tasks was to make small deliveries, stock product, and handle returns. Now, she could only make small deliveries because a) she had a small vehicle and b) she could not physically move some of the equipment. So the install guys would deliver the big items, stock them and handle the returns. Anyone else see where I am going with this?

With a quick phone call to the Powers That Be, I made arrangements for the installers to actually deliver, stock and handle ALL returns regardless of the size. They would also take a look at the display, dust it off and make notes if marketing materials were low and get it back to their manager so he could pass it off to the sales rep. Ahhh, the art of delegation! Do you know how much time this erased from our AR's schedule? Including drive time to and from the factory and how long it takes to receive the product (on a daily basis), 20 hours a WEEK! 20 FRIKKEN hours!

Now here is the beautiful part of this, it took off 20 hours a week for the AR, but it only added 2 hours to the installer. He already had to go to the factory on a daily basis, he would be given a route to coincide with the store needing a delivery and since he was already going there anyway an extra 10 minutes wasn't going to kill him!

You should have seen the poor girls face. I thought she had died and gone to Heaven!

If you are in the same boat, just follow these simple steps:

• Get out of the office!
• Write down EVERYTHING you need to do by account
• Take a look at your list and see what you can realistically delegate to others
• Delegate those items, don't just recognize them
• Write down the supplies or items you need to do your job

Tomorrow, we are going to review which goodies we bought to help her with "all the crap" and then also my solution for her scrap piece of paper defilement. :)

Until tomorrow,

Happy Organizing!

Suzanne Babb