The ultimate Sales Manager's Guide
The Ultimate Sales Manager's Guide is a collaborative effort with John Klymshyn, the creator of The Klymshyn Method. This course helps sales managers lead enterprise sales teams as well as coaches those who want to become sales managers the qualities, dispositions, and skills needed to successfully attain this position.
The Ultimate Sales Manager's Guide is a collaborative effort with John Klymshyn, the creator of The Klymshyn Method. This course helps sales managers lead enterprise sales teams as well as coaches those who want to become sales managers the qualities, dispositions, and skills needed to successfully attain this position.
-
Responsibilities: Instructional Designer, Learning Architect
-
Target Audience: Salespeople looking to progress in their career to a management role
-
Tools: Thinkific, Mind Meister, Canva, HandBrake, Adobe Illustrator, Zoom, iMovie
-
Budget: low
-
Client: John Klymshyn
-
Year: 2020-2021
-
Responsibilities: Instructional Designer, Learning Architect
-
Target Audience: Salespeople looking to progress in their career to a management role
-
Tools: Thinkific, Mind Meister, Canva, HandBrake, Adobe Illustrator, Zoom, iMovie
-
Budget: low
-
Client: John Klymshyn
-
Year: 2020-2021
Background
I wrote my first children's novel during the lockdowns of 2020 and was looking for a mentor who could assist and guide me into getting my book published. In looking for a mentor, I reached out to John Klymshyn, a business coach, author, and speaker, whom I have known for years.
Through those interactions of getting my book off the ground, I had asked John a simple question, "Have you ever thought of making your books a course?" His answer was, "I think about it every day but don't have to tools to see it to production."
That is where I came in. With a background in educational leadership and coming off of my instructional design certificate, I knew I had the expertise to see the course to fruition. John sent me his best-selling book The Ultimate Sales Manager's Guide along with conference pamphlets and flyers, digital resources, and videos and I began to decipher the material.
It was apparent that the material spoke to those interested in or finding themselves in a position of managing people. I decided to lean into this and create a learning experience that focused on developing the attributes, dispositions, and skills of a successful sales manager, as there was limited professional development for these individuals. I was eager to build a learning solution that could help those in this field. Being new to the sales field, I was curious about its inner workings.
After reviewing the material, I wanted to create a lesson that was targeted at developing sales managers as well as be available all over the globe (as John has a worldwide audience). As a secondary goal, I wanted an interface that provided a robust backend for analysis that was simple and cost-effective. While we could have used traditional eLearning authoring tools the upfront costs were too large of an investment for this initial concept. As this project grows, so will it grow on a traditional authoring tool, LMS, and LRS.
Working with John closely we debated a variety of platforms and settled on Thinkific because of its low monetary commitment, its ability to pull student data, built-in payment interface, and its ability to customize and design the lesson. As we began the process John took on the role of Subject Matter Expert (SME).
Process
I began the process with John by creating an action map in Mind Meister. When the content was mapped out I went ahead and identified the learning goal. In this case, the learning goal was for participants of the course to utilize strategies in the book to develop greater success. From there we developed three small goals.
I identified the three supporting learning objectives that would enrich the overall goal.
-
Identify the factors that create The Ultimate Sales Manager
-
Enhance learning with the expertise of C-Suite sales leaders relating personal experience
-
Explore the key attributes, skills, and dispositions of an effective sales manager
​
After determining these learning goals, began to storyboard the project. I used a text-based storyboard as well as visual mockups. With John being a very hands-on SME, he created the written text of the course and focused on creating interviews with industry leaders which not only helps participants learn but pays homage to the book which had similar features
​
​
​
Designing the Lesson
This project in a sense was a revival for John. For over twenty years, John had built his brand with little in the way of visual branding. His branding at the time reflected styles that would not translate with our target demographic. So we began bringing our visual components to life by first creating a brand color palette and font selection. John was adamant about using fire engine red so we chose an analogous palette to complement the tone and hue of that color. When it came to font choice we wanted it to reflect John's personality and demeanor. We chose block fonts with distressing as they encapsulated were easy to read, bold, and reflective of John's personality.
When designing the course, we also had to consider the platform we were using for this course. While Thinkific has a lot of great features the design end leaves a lot to be desired. Creatively this proved to be a challenge. We could not upload massive files or complex training components done on outside software such as Articulate. To combat this challenge, we focused on delivering high-quality materials. We spent countless hours writing and creating training PDFs for customers so that they could print and use the materials or download them and use them digitally on the go. Our videos were shot on high-quality professional-grade cameras, lighting, and microphones. I edited and put together each of the videos in the course. Written segments were done by John as well as audio incorporated from the audiobook.
Takeaways
The final product has been delivered to the client and he integrated it into his professional portfolio offering.
This project is an example of how creating a digital course can refresh, update, and diversify a sole proprietor's offerings” We used the performance-oriented action mapping approach, and we focused on reinforcing key concepts that made the book successful.
This memorable and profitable eLearning lesson could translate directly into better sales management leaders, better company culture, and more effective leaders in the sales industry.
Going forward, I hope to use my instructional design and eLearning skillset almost exclusively on projects like this — where the focus is on improving performance and helping people in meaningful ways.
For More
To learn more about this project and other works by John Klymshyn, check out www.klymshyn.com or follow John on one of his many social media channels.