Advanced Office Reviews

The people are what make this company great. We’ve always believed that, and our four consecutive Top Workplace awards (based on anonymous employee surveys by a third party) confirm that. We also know we have things we can improve on, so we appreciate the feedback. If you have any specifics you would like to share that you think would help, please reach out to the friendly HR people. We would agree that an Account Executive has to be able to do a lot of things at the same time. Sales is a game of keeping multiple balls in the air. It’s not easy, but the rewards are good, and the work is meaningful if done well for customers. We do understand that this can be difficult for some, and we are continuing to look for ways to streamline and simplify in appropriate areas. We also agree that we expect results quickly. “Too fast” is maybe a subjective description since everyone has their own viewpoint. For example, when we hire an Account Executive, we invest a lot of time and money to hire, onboard, and train them. We purchase a laptop, a cell phone, and other materials needed to be successful. We invest countless hours of other employees’ time into the new team member to get them up and running. We start paying the new Account Executive’s salary from day one, and while it may be below some and above others’ pay in the industry, it’s still a large outlay the company makes before any results. And we are happy to do it. We know it’s an investment and it will take a little time for most Account Executives to get up to speed. That’s why we offer a ramped quota period, a comprehensive training agenda, and ongoing support from multiple key resources, including (but not limited to) management. We know that closed sales may not come right away for everyone. We do expect new Account Executives to be moving forward appropriately to ensure their success. They will need to be conducting the right prospecting activities, completing training courses, building a strong pipeline, and moving opportunities toward a close. Our mission statement reads, “We relentlessly care about getting it right, so that you can do what inspires you.” We are sorry that your experience wasn’t what either of us hoped it would be. It’s so important to get things right for our customers and for our employees. Your feedback (and the feedback we regularly gather from our current team members) will help us continue on our mission to get it right.

Thank you for taking the time to share your experience. We are proud of our office and work hard to provide a pleasant and productive workspace for our team members. It is clear that your experience was not what you (or we) were hoping for. We understand that coming into a new company and building a sales pipeline can be challenging, and we are currently taking steps to enhance our territories to make it easier for new Account Executives to gain traction faster. For clarification, we do provide a number of tools for prospecting, including a CRM populated with 4,000 to 8,000 prospects per territory, a D&B Hoovers account, and an in-house marketing team to create or customize print and digital materials and content for our reps. We will continue to investigate other tools to make our team members more effective. You are correct that due to territories being geographically arranged by zip codes, no two territories are identical. We do want to assure you that there is no favoritism at play when assigning territories. In fact, we regularly assess our territory distribution (as we are in the process of now), to ensure as much consistency as possible between territories and Account Executives. We do understand that “paperwork” and process is not everyone’s strong suit. In fact, that’s why we provide administrative support in the form of a trainer, an administrative assistant, and order processors to support Account Executives’ quotes, reports, and orders. Your feedback is appreciated and helps us understand where we can improve our support and ensure transparency in the hiring process.