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ADP Payroll Services
ADP Payroll Services Division has one of the best sales organizations
in the world. Achieving 20% growth year over year in a very
competitive arena was the stated objective of the division.
K Group was asked by the SVP of Sales to assist in the continual
improvement of the sales organization as it doubled in size
during the early 1990’s. From sales force productivity
modeling to sales manager profiling to the most effective selling
personalities to territory modeling, K Group consultants worked
with the sales team to increase the capacity of the sales force
to achieve uncommon levels of growth and productivity.
Courtyard by Marriott
In the 1980’s Marriott Hotel Division was rated number
one or two (depending on how you chose to measure) in the full
service hotel category. A new idea surfaced in the
Hotel Division that a very lucrative category of business might
exist that was under-served.
The logic of this entirely new category went something like
this: Many business travelers are turned off by the full
service hotel. They don’t like the hotel room too much,
they don’t like to pay the higher rates for all the ballroom
space and big lobbies that they never use, and they want more
of a personal experience that is centered on the room –
a working room, as opposed to a sleeping room. Holiday Inn,
their current first choice, is a “tired” concept
with relatively poor service and bad locations.
Thus, the concept was born – a new category of hotel –
the business traveler hotel category (designed by business
travelers). This new category was so different from the full
service hotel category, that the fledgling Courtyard business
unit was initially moved out of the main Marriott hotel headquarters
building so that it could “build its own identity and
values”.
This is new business development at its finest. A new brand
– Courtyard – loosely affiliated with Marriott (by
Marriott) and the most successful new hotel brand (and new hotel
category) introduced in the past 20 years.
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Shoka's Law
Passing a new law is difficult even when most legislators support
the new law. Passing a new law that isn’t popular or perceived
to be “important” by legislators is next to impossible.
Such was the case with Shoka’s Law.
The two principles of K Group lost a young Siberian Husky pup
to a myriad of diseases that could have been prevented had the
pet store he was purchased from provided basic veterinary care
and humane living conditions. His life ended after a short six
months. To the owners amazement there were no laws on the books
in Arizona (or most states for that manner) to protect puppies
or their new owners from uncaring pet stores. Selling unvaccinated
pups that had been “stored” in less-than-humane
conditions for the first few weeks of their lives was “just
part of the pet store business”.
To give meaning to Shoka’s short life, Lisa Shover of
K Group vowed that this should never happen again and that pet
stores should be accountable. She contacted a respected lobbyist
to determine how a “traditional” lobbyist would
approach this situation. The first words out of his mouth were:
“Not this year… maybe never”.
This slap of reality set into motion one of the largest word
of mouth lobbying efforts in the state of Arizona. Lisa looked
for partners that were willing to support passage of the bill
and she put together a team of influential supporters and advocates
(“trusted advisers” to the Phoenix community):
• John Oppendahl – editor of the state’s largest
daily newspaper
(The Arizona Republic)
• Senator Tom Smith – a respected state representative
(who became the bill’s sponsor)
•
Ken White – Executive Director of the AZ Humane Society
• Dwayne Adams – VP Operations and part-time lobbyist
for the AZ Humane Society
• Marilyn Tanious –
Classified Ad Director, The Arizona Republic
• Jeff
Williamson, Executive Director, The Phoenix Zoo
•
And twenty or so other influencers in Arizona
This team of dedicated advisors wrote editorials, accepted faxes
supporting passage of a law controlling pet stores (14.000 faxes
in two weeks), shuttled the bill though legislative committees,
got local pet owners to jam the telephones at the state offices
(due to the volume of their calls) as they registered their
support for the bill, implemented “calling trees”
with leading organizations to support the lobby effort and asked
their friends and business associates to do the same, and generally
created an unstoppable ground swell of support for Shoka’s
Law.
The law was passed into state law four months later. Thanks
to one passionate individual, a strong word of mouth campaign
and a well thought out strategy to accelerate a decision that
“no one was interested in” Shoka’s life was
not in vain.
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