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Company: MeadWestvaco Corporation, Richmond, VA.
Entry Submitted By: Sales Resource Group Inc
Company Description: MeadWestvaco Corporation is a diversified packaging company that manufactures cardboard packaging, plastics and chemicals used in a multitude of packaging, commercial and industrial applications. The company is a global sales organization that has its roots in the forestry resource industry.
Nomination Category: Best Organization Achievements
Nomination Sub Category: Sales Compensation Program of the Year
Nomination Title: MeadWestvaco Corporation
How many people are in your organization's entire sales department?
425
What is your organization's annual sales volume? If this information is confidential, simply enter "Confidential" in this space:
$6.8 billion
Provide a brief biography of the leader(s) of your sales organization (up to 100 words):
John Luke Jr. CEO of MeadWestvaco Corporation committed to the sales
organization in September 2006 that the company would develop a world class
sales compensation program to support a strategic shift from a product-focused
approach to a customer centric sales methodology. He participated in setting
the future vision for the program with a requirement that every plan must
demonstrate measures and payouts reflecting value to the customer and
profitability for the company. His support of the initiative, including a
personal undertaking to review the final plan designs verified the sustained
commitment of the executive office to the field sales force.
Describe for the judges your achievement in this category (up to 100 words):
MeadWestvaco evolved different sales compensation plans in all business units
and over 15 different lines-of-business without consistency or relationship
between different sales roles to a common sales compensation program that
spanned the domestic operations of the corporation. The program was fully
aligned to the business, had a common framework to ensure salespeople were
treated fairly and equitably, but was customized for each group, providing
managers with a “tool” to focus sales representative behavior and communicate
what the organization valued and would pay them to deliver. This was done for
over 200 salespeople, in 30+ sales roles, within six months.
Briefly describe the 3 keys to the success of your initiative (up to 100 words):
Keys to this initiative were:
1. A reliable process used across all sales groups’ ensured design
uniformity and role comparability across sales groups. The process utilized
all stakeholder input (sales, HR. finance, sales operations) including an
interactive approach to create plan designs.
2. Active participation of sales management and field personnel in the
design process. Integrating their feedback/needs as design considerations
increased field buy-in to plan changes.
3. Implementation of a strategic initiative measure in ALL plans
influenced and changed sales behavior. These initiatives measured both
required quantitative financial (profit) measures and qualitative imperatives
(solution selling, planning and partnership development).
List the 3 most important lessons your organization learned during this process (up to 100 word):
Lessons learned from the process included:
1. The importance of quality and format in sales transaction data became
increasingly evident. Particularly, in organizational restructuring, when
information is extracted from several legacy systems, accurate and reliable
measurement is difficult but not insurmountable.
2. The value of technology as an enabler for the organization to
effectively design, produce plan documents, manage plans, calculate incentives
and report and communicate results.
3. Clear, open communication and transparency is critical in the program
so people develop trust in the numbers and understand the actions, changes and
the rationale for why they are necessary.
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