Professor Michael Rodriguez recognizes that business school graduates are not entering the same sales field that they would have worked in 20 years ago. The traditional selling landscape is evolving with the integration of analytic tools for consumer relationship management and data visualization.
To better train future sales professionals, Rodriguez workshops sales analytics tools in his classrooms. His efforts to prepare his students with hands-on experience were recently rewarded when his teaching submission was accepted for the 2020 National Conference in Sales Management in Norfolk, Virginia.
Rodriguez will deliver his presentation, titled “Teaching Sales Students about AI, Part 2: Hands On Workshop of Salesforce Einstein in 30 Minutes for Adance Selling Course” in early April. His module gives students hands-on experience with Salesforce.com’s Einstein Analytics Platform in a lesson that can be conducted in one class period. The goal is for students to better understand how AI improves sales professionals’ ability to manage opportunities and predict win rates.
“Teaching students to use this Salesforce analytics platform helps them understand the impact of analytics on the sales process,” Rodriguez says. “The presentation will help other sales faculty implement a straightforward exercise to reinforce the importance of technology in today’s modern day selling.”