JINDI ENTERPRISES FINDING A NEW SALES MANAGER

MADE BY: NIKITA SANGAL

COMPANY BACKGROUND
Chinese company - Jindi enterprises makes heat exchanger units for the

commercial market.
It was established in 1997, in Xian in China. Two investors who joined Jindi were Sun Foodstuff Ltd and Trojan Software.

 Introduced 12 models with heat exchanger capacity ranging between 240KW-

5800KW.
They were all standardized products for these reasons:

the applications were consistent in technical requirements.

Standardization was production friendly

Easier for supply chain and working capital management. In 2000 Jindi set up its branch sales office in Lanzhou By the end of 2001, Jindi had a sales team of 12 - 8 in Xian and 4 in Lanzhou

Compensation
The sales engineers were paid

base salary: depending upon inflation and performance of the company

a year end bonus: venue depended on the total revenue generated by the engineer and the no. of deliveries made.

Zhou Xun was paid twice as high as the average because of his performance

and his ability to negotiate.

Sales Process
The sales engineer had two responsibilities:

Upstream (generate sales leads, establishing contacts, providing technical

support etc.)

Downstream (customer training, installation maintenance etc.)

The most important task was to generate sales leads by:

Direct walk in Targeted promotions

Customers
High end markets: referred to residential and commercial building

complexes which involved huge investment and strict procedures of

selecting vendors.
Low end markets: they refer to small scale residential and commercial

buildings invested in by small investors

Competition
80% of the Jindis revenue comes from the low end residential/commercial

market.
In 2000, Yongda emerged as one of the major competitor of Jindi in low end

as well as high end market.

Unlike Jindi, Yongda was a big player in the market with strong financial

stability.

 The industrial market was far less competitive than the commercial market.

Jindi entered into a partnership with Xian Pressurized Vessel Factory.

Jindi was concerned with product design, marketing and sales and customer

service, while XPVF was concerned with production.

The product was inspected by both the units and then dispatched into the

market.

Current case
Zhou joined the company in 1999, and soon became the top sales person.

He was the only one who had the capability to trap unlimited customers.
He helped the company penetrate into new markets of Ningxia and Qinghai. He was unsatisfied with his annual salary and the bonus provided.

The company could not bear is expenses, which were at least three times the

companys average.
Zhou resigned in 2002 and joined its competitor Yongda as a GM.

 There is a requirement in the company to head the Lanzhou office to compete

with Yongda. The four candidates have been shortlisted for selection:

Hu Bin Bai Dong

Qian Cheng
Liu Xiaogang

CANDIDATES
Hu Bin He is in early 30s, graduated in mechanical engineering, Willingness to locate in Lanzhou, became the first sales engineer at Jindi in 1998 ,hard working, loyal, strong technical background, enthusiastic, good leadership skills but Not a successful sales engineer as he is not tricky and pursuasive. Qian Cheng
mid 30s, Settled in Lanzhou, Pursued executive MBA, Smart and diversified in

experience, X-GM of the decentralized division, little overqualified for the job. Bai Dong Born in Lanzhou - 25 years of age, Pursued a diploma in computer software, First sales engineer to work wit Zhou Xun in Lanzhou office, Interested in technological side of Jindis products, Sales style was quite engaging and easily create a positive rapport with customers, good performer

Liu Xiaogang Graduated in degree of economics Worked as college lecturer for 3 yrs teaching business statistics Excellent interpersonal relationship skills, well groomed analytical. No experience is sales. His father is nationally famous professor in the field of engineering and was also a member of leading industrial councils and associations of the nation.