Case Study on CG Engineers Ltd.

SUBMITED BY
Deven Rana A-10

SYMBIOSIS INSTITUTE OF MANAGEMENT STUDIES

SYMBIOSIS INTERNATIONAL UNIVERSITY

January 2015

A Case study on CG Engineers Ltd.

Problem Statement:
Ashok worked with CG Engineers Ltd. as the Regional Marketing manager (Industry sales) in
the Western Region. The National Sales manager transferred him to the Eastern Region as the
regional manager with instructions that he was expected to set things right in the Eastern region
as this region was not performing well on sales and profits. Ashoks main responsibility was to
effectively manage 12 sales engineers and achieve the sales volumes and profit quotas. For
Ashok the Industrial customers in this region as well as the sales engineers were new.
The sales engineers were paid a salary plus allowances such as house rent and medical expense
reimbursement. They were not given any incentives. The Eastern region consisted of West
Bengal, Bihar, Jharkhand, Orissa and Assam. Ashok felt that the sales engineers did not cover
this region effectively and were spending more time travelling than in selling activities. After
speaking to the sales engineers individually he found that most of them were not motivated as
they were not given freedom of operation and were also not given recognition whenever they got
good orders. Ashok thought that this was a good opportunity for him to apply what he had learnt
in the management institute and achieve superior results.
Question: If you were in Ashoks place what would you do achieve the sales and profit quotas?

Solution:
The case study is not very large in terms of volume but does some intricate details that cannot
afford to be missed. This is the reason why the solution is structured in a comprehensible
manner.
Following are the important details given in the case study and the inference derived from them.
Ashok is being transferred to the Eastern states of India. The demographics and the
psychographics of the people living in these states can be inferred.
The team Ashok is being made the supervisor of consists of 12 sales managers. Its a big
team and can be divided to target bigger areas.
Majority time spent on travelling. The sales force must be allocated efficiently to allow
for more time to sell.
Lack of freedom of operation observed amongst the employees.
No additional Incentives other salary and medical reimbursements provided to the
employees. A prerequisite to a sales job is the incentive reward which it offers because it
helps drive the salesperson to put in more efforts. Absence of this can cause lack of
enthusiasm in the sales force.
Medical Reimbursements. Its a known fact that medical reimbursements are the most
abused form of benefits that a company offers.
Lack of motivation seen in employees. A key characteristic of every successful business
is the highly motivated behavior of the sales force of the company. A non-motivated sales
force team could prove to be almost fatal for the firm!
Absence of performance recognition measures in the company.
Based on the above listed observations found in the case, the proposed solutions to achieve the
sales and profit quota are mentioned below.
Please note:-The suggestions are corresponding to the findings that are given above.

 The first thing that the Ashok should

concentrate on is

the

Geological-

demographics-psychographics trio of
the region. The people from the Eastern
states are known to be creative,
intellectual and smarter with a pen in
hand than an axe! Since Ashok has been
newly transferred to the East, hence he
must first himself get educated in detail
about the behavioral aspects of the
people of the region and also focus on
conducting training sessions for the sales force based on his learnings. This will help the
sales force target the customers in a better way.
The team assigned to Ashok is of a decent size. He should utilize the team efficiently and
try to expand the reach of the product to newer markets as this will help tap the untapped
sections of the region and boost sales.
-If the finances allow for, then he must also look to promote the product more via social
and print media.
The sales force wastes majority of its time travelling and hence this is hampering their
productivity. Ashok should design the sales areas to
be covered intelligently and try to avoid far off and
heavy traffic areas. If not already provided, he
should also give bikes for faster travelling of the
sales employees. These set of measures will help
increase the number of customers engaged in a day.
The sales force is not happy with the amount of autonomy on operations given by the
management head to them. Ashok should give more responsibilities to the sales managers
with respect to the process intricacies. Weekly meeting should be held discussing the
need for improvement in the firm and ask for individual suggestions for boosting
revenue from them. The employees should be encouraged to be professional
entrepreneurs.

 Selling is a high pressure and stressful job. It requires highly self-driven and motivated
people. Ashoks firm does not provide
incentiv es along with salary and other
expenses which is a major set-back to the
performance of the team. Incentives are a
prerequisite to any successful sales stint.
Ashok should work out effective ways of
introducing incentives to the CTC. Some
suggestions
include:
- Commission on every sale.
- Special rewards on achieving sales targets
- Additional pay for customer retention (if applicable)
In short Ashok should talk to the higher management to introduce incentive based salary
packages for the sales persons. This will definitely act as a propeller to the performance
of the firm in terms of the sales generated.
Along with the addition of incentives to the salary package of the sales employees, Ashok
should also try to reduce the cost being incurred by the management on the medical
reimbursements on the employees. Yes medical reimbursements is a good way to increase
job satisfaction but it is also one of the most abused forms of benefits offered by the
employer since it is very convenient for people to generate medical bills. The suggestion
is that Ashok should reduce the cost on medical reimbursement and use that money for
other investment activities mentioned earlier in the solution like giving bikes, increasing
incentives etc.
There is a lack of motivation in the employees and this is a cause of major concern for the
management. More employee friendly HR policies
should be introduced into the system. Some
suggestions other than the usual include team
parties after achievement of goals, good number of
holidays, travelling allowance and job assurance.

 Recognition of the hard work done by the employees is extremely crucial for motivating
them to continue the good work. Absence of the same in the firm is appalling! This
should be a prime agenda in Ashoks to-do list
.
----------------------------------------------------The End------------------------------------------------------