#sales

Commercial team today (immediate). Field sales teams tomorrow (future state). Need to right-size for the future. Q2 1NA launch on a large scale.
@aq+1kbzgjt4w

Has there been much chatter about sales after Thanksgiving? Our store has slowed down a bit, and I'm curious how sales are going for everyone else.

Hearing rumors internally about layoffs and major restructuring. Anyone has any intel?

Which BUs? Sales/SE roles? Support/TAC/GFEP?

Bandy the clown lectures us all about going faster in the last Town Hall. 5 months later we still don’t have a defined sales organization. It is not difficult to split a few accounts between team and then decide how manny sales peeps. Q1 2026 will just be another few months of uncertainty and disruption. Obviously going faster doesn’t apply to Bandy, JUG and whichever Lex monkey does the sales coverage.

I am beginning to hear rumblings of some of the front line sales reps who were laid off being backfilled as early Q1. Primarily the VBG client execs, public sector and sled CEs, SAMs, and the SMB reps who were just laid off. It’s sounding like they laid off who they perceive as low performers only to be backfilling their positions for the same or similar territory come Q1.

Global sales leader has given mid level management orders to clean house before the new year. As much as 70% of the sales force could be in danger. Hug your loved ones and brace yourself!

This shady a-s company is looking to reduce headcount more and will find any reason to force people out. Look out for yourself and keep your eyes peeled for a new gig if you are able.

For perspective new hires, where are sales for the company? Where staples isn’t public, it’s difficult to truly understand how the business is doing. If someone has the rough sales numbers by division and YOY, that would be great.

looks like the house of cards is coming down...

Looks like the grinch is coming early, org getting hit this week.

I’m from the FLNA side but not in sales… so can folks explain why today’s Steve Llewelyn retirement news and John Dean promotion is good or bad? The context would be so appreciated for those of us not in sales. Thanks y’all.

Sales reps, category managers, and at least one branch manager.
Private Equity noise getting louder.

• The Mole

Interested to see what others experienced during Black Friday? My store seemed much quieter than usual. Wondering if the rest of you experienced similar things

Verizon still has an a deeply rooted anti-customer mindset that needs to be rooted out. The company’s employees are very internally focused (painfully evident on posts to this site & elsewhere online).

That ingrained problem (both conscious) can't be corrected by simply throwing money at the problem (e.g., Network improvements, addressing IVR routing, etc.).

What Verizon should do is require every Manager and Occupational to have a full rotational assignment (i.e., 1 1/2 - 2 years) in Sales or Customer Service!

P.s., If Verizon Leadership is monitoring online feedback this suggestion needs to be immediately taken back to Dan Schulman & The Board. In fact, I think I'll send this directly to Dan's Office.

I hope it’s just a fluke and not a preview of what’s ahead.

As part of the reorg, we have this new sales enablement function. I still have not seen the value of this function as none of the leads are not really doing much. What is this supposed to be? Can we get some competent people to enable this?

I’ve been in tech field sales for 7 years now, is this a dead end career path at this point? I assume I’ll eventually get reduced as well, and it’ll be even bleaker for me to find a new job when it does. What should I be looking to transition into if it is? Sales is all I have experience with.

Lets see who gets it right:

I keep hearing mid February. Sales team will be effected big time.

Who agrees?

• Apple cuts dozens of sales roles to streamline operations for institutional clients.
• Affected teams include government sales and briefing centers; employees can reapply for new roles.
• Moves align with broader tech layoffs and Apple’s shift toward third-party resellers.
• Strong revenue contrasts with stock underperformance amid competitive pressures.
• Restructuring aims to maintain Apple’s tech sector edge despite workforce challenges.

https://www.ainvest.com/news/apple-restructures-sales-force-boost-institutional-sales-efficiency-2511/

A California-based data company is trimming nearly a dozen Travis County positions after it was acquired recently by an Austin private equity firm.

Couchbase Inc. is eliminating 11 of an estimated 40 positions at the company’s Austin offices at 9050 N. Capital of Texas Highway, according to a notice filed with the Texas Workforce Commission. Most of the employees affected are part of the company’s sales and corporate teams.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/couchbase-laying-off-11-austin-190418814.html

Do store employees earn commission on a phone sold to an employee? I was going to upgrade my kids phones for Christmas and order them online, but if an impacted employee can earn commission, i would rather go to the store instead.

I heard this rumor many months ago, and it recently came up again.. SOVA is going to become lead for VBG wireline sales in 2026. Has anyone else heard anything similar?

Sales division just got a mass layoff - anyone below a certain point. Heavily hitting commercial as government is still putting up good numbers.

https://www.autoextremist.com

"China much better than John Wayne USA" (or are they?)

“In China, you can buy a heavily discounted ‘used’ electric car that has never, in fact, been used. Chinese automakers, desperate to meet their sales targets in a bitterly competitive market, sell cars to dealerships, which register them as ‘sold,’ even though no actual customer has bought them. Dealers, stuck with officially sold cars, then offload them as ‘used,’ often at low prices."

Had an interesting conversation with one of our customers today that said our CPO spoke to them in a condescending away, brushed aside their concerns, mumbled something about AI and the just walked away. We should probably have our sales team interact with customers only, it seems like we don't have a customer facing product team at all.

Can someone spill what the Black Friday Deals will be next week? Us retirees want to know!! Might go to visible by Verizon even with the 50% AT&T retiree discount…

Sold two rack servers to this guy, told him if he buys another 3 I will front another one for free. 1.5 percent margin

Are we safe? Or know anyone affected?

So with truly no CRO running sales these days, and Nasser the nightmare turning a blind eye to the people who matter, very curious if anyone is hearing is any impact to sales and sales leadership.

So just asking for a friend, if after tomorrow you're sticking around for a little bit and wanna give someone a major discount afterward know where I could find that person?

Currently working in technical team think about a change to the sales team next year. Can I make more money ? What's its like working in sales in the UK, they seem to do well ? What are the managers like ? Can they really earn these big ote that's banded about?
Also how long do you get to get deals on ?

Some more major talent left yesterday , many that were the glue for Enterprise customers. There are random sales people that noone knows filling the gaps of leavers.

The 15th of November fell on Saturday so the RIFs rolled Monday . Remember 2024 rolled same dates in January

Medtronic (MDT) stock jumped early Tuesday after the medical products maker reported adjusted earnings of $1.36 per share on $8.96 billion in third-quarter sales.

On average, analysts called for $1.31 earnings per share and $8.87 billion in sales.

Cut pay plans and increase quotas. What kind of talent do you retain? What kind of environment do you foster? You wind up with reps stuffing sales with undiscussed line items. Risking getting fired so they don’t get fired. Makes sense and sounds sustainable!

Lets go !!!

Survey of 1000 exhausted sales reps says…

Wonder how much money they made.

Is the I2B channel safe? Agents sale a lot of business but it doesn’t stick.

If you are in sales, it’s clear that this year has been one of the more challenging years.

As most of you know, sales journal is a fictitious number that is used for compensation only. It’s a number that is scalable to increase/decrease compensation. For example, Canon showed profits of 200% because they were able to raise quotas and pay out less compensation. It’s not because we were more profitable on deals. Print volumes are down so where do you think they took the money from? Yeah, let that sink in.

The one number though that will provide some real factual direction though is the billed revenue numbers. Central (with that layup PK gave to his friends) and West (another joke of a quota given to people who stop work at 2:00pm EST) have now dipped under 80%. The East (the FU quota) is just over 80% at 81%. These are the lowest numbers (not counting Covid) that the company has seen in a long time. This just shows they are completely off on their forecasts versus reality.

So what does this all mean. It means that we are not making enough money to support the number of people working here. As we enter the last months of FY2025, don’t expect the company to come out with any promotions or motivators that help you put more money in your pocket. The company can’t pay us while at the same time trying to retain profits for the almighty home office in Japan. The company will have to cut sales positions. I am not trying to scare people but Canon is not going to continue with this structure at these numbers. I highly doubt we will see that bonus in our paycheck at end of December with these type of numbers.

In addition, we will continue to dip on the market share pie chart as lesser end brands meet our current customers demand for a lower price. We are stuck trying to raise the price in an economy where no one is willing to pay more for these products. We are forcing our customers to price us out when we ask them to spend more.

So what happens next? More layoffs? Reduction or increase in quotas? Change in the compensation plan to adapt to the discounting needed to win deals?

All I will say is the decisions that are being made in Melville right now will either power this company through these tough times or drive the ship right into the wall.