"So What's In It For Me Applying Sales Principles to Sell HR

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"So What's In It For Me?Applying Sales
Principles to Sell HR

• Bernie.Deem

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Self Introduction
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• Designated Senior Professional in Human
  Resources.
• Honored with HR Excellence Award.
• 18 years in corporate life, many as SVP of Human
  Resources.
• Actually began HR Consulting in 2001.
• Once described as

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The Best HR Person in the State of West
Virginia.
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Todays Goal

• To leave todays session with the ability to
  sell upper management on one aspect of HRs value.

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The Sales Approach to Selling HR

• Using common selling techniques to communicate
  HRs value.
• Three solid selling points.
• Two reasons why buy-in is essential.
• Features vs. Benefits.
• Being influential by by speaking their language.

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Human ResourcesThe Rodney Dangerfield Syndrome
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Why is it that We Just Dont Get No Respect
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HR Obstacles
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The Survey Said
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Survey Information Based on

• Random sampling of HR people. (Any HR person who
  responded within 24 hours).
• Size of companies from ____ to ____ FTEs.
• Didnt ask them to identify the company.
• Individual information completely anonymous.
• Some answers based on a survey conducted among
  Charleston SHRM in 2003.

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Survey Details

• 100 Companies
• From 2 to 6000 FTEs
• 68 Had one or more person(s) dedicated to HR.
• 32 Did not have a full time HR person

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Weird Barrys Jeopardy Game

• Ill ask the question similar to Jeopardys
  format
• Ill then name a card
• First one with that card to ring bell gets chance
  for an answer
• If not on the chart, another card is drawn.
• Humungous, Expensive, Elaborate Prizes!
• (As defined by Weird Barry)

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In a survey of 100 HR practitioners
If you feel HR does not have the influence it
should, please explain the reason in one
sentence.
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Of 100 HR Practitioners Asked

• 29 Survey participants had no response.
• 19 They think of HR as paper shufflers.
• 18 Management doesnt see the value of HR.
• HR is viewed as simply as a
  necessary expense.
• 14 The organization structure places HR
  as a low priority.
• 12 They dont really know what you
  people do.
• 8 HR is viewed as the companys
  police force. They think we always have
  bad news.

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What is the Title of the Highest Level HR person?
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Of 100 HR Practitioners Asked

• 54 Administrator/Coordinator/Representative
• 21 Director
• 17 Vice President
• 6 Executive President
• 1 We dont use titles
• 1 Gods Gift to the Universe

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Of 100 HR people asked What is the highest
priority your CEO has for HR?
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Who Does HR report to?
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Of 100 HR Practitioners Asked

• 55 President or CEO
• 21 V P (titles from admin to ops)
• 12 CFO
• 5 Depends on the situation
• 4 Executive Vice President
• 3 Did Not Answer

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The Hypothetical Case Study

• Giving raises to the teller staff who are
  underpaid, overworked, and never appreciated.
  Theres 150 of them, most are making minimum
  wage. Turnover is high and morale is awful.

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Traditional HR Approach

• We really need to increase what were paying
  tellers. Their morale is just terrible, we never
  keep them very long, and we cant expect people
  to live on minimum wage. A lot of them are
  single parents.

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Have You Ever Heard a Stakeholder Say
Oh well, giving all the tellers a raise will eat
up our profit, but who cares as long as the
tellers are happy.
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Have You Ever Said

• Hey, who cares if the balance in my 401-K goes
  down. The company gave all the tellers a good
  raise and thats what I care about the most.

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Trends

• The larger the company, the smaller the employees
  per HR person ratio.
• The smaller the company, the more diverse the HR
  experience.
• Smaller companies had a significant number of
  roles for the HR person to handle. In most HR
  was not the primary function.

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The Four Things Sales People Know That You Dont
and One Extra

• 1. Absolutely everyone, and that means everyone
  is motivated by one thing
• Whats In It For Me?

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The Four Things Sales People Know That You
Dontand One Extra

• 2. No One wants to be sold, but they like to buy
• Whats In It For Me?

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The Four Things Sales People Know That You Dont
And One Extra

• 3 Features VS Benefits
• Leaders dont get sold on an idea. The get
  sold on the advantages ages of using it
• Whats In It For Me?

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The Four Things Sales People Know That You Dont
and One Extra

• People have individual needs.
• Whats In It For Me?

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Meeting Needs

• Oh Great Kahuna,
• youre so important, we are grateful to have you
  and youre handsome too

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NOT!

• I think even our competitors see us as setting
  the trends. They dont even try to be as
  progressive as we are.
• The success of this endeavor would make a good
  topic for a rotary meeting
• This reminds me of the time we made an
  adjustment to the janitors pay and the newspaper
  made a big deal of it. Didnt they call us the
  fairest of the fair.

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The Four Things Sales People Know That You Dont
and One Extra

• The Power of
• Proving Statements
• Whats In It For Me?

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Proving StatementsThe Power of Metrics

• Our turnover rate for tellers is 60 and that is
  costing us _______ .
• The preliminary statistics predict we will
  reduce turnover to 20 which should reduce our
  cost by_____.
• Formula for turnover rate No. of separations
  during a year divided by ave. number of employees
  during the year.

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What are Common Decision Maker Needs/Desires?

• Examples
• Save more money
• Make more money
• Security

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Todays Goal

• To leave todays session with the ability to
  sell upper management on one aspect of HRs value.

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