Welcome to December. 2008 is almost over – but not quite. Still a bit of business to take care of. For some China managers December is the busy holiday season – for others it is time to do the paperwork and collect the bills from the Christmas manufacturing rush.

This is a great time to think about what kind of message you want to send to your business community. You’ll want to send a thank-you to your existing clients and customers, of course. You should also think about what you should say to your team and professional network before people start taking off for holidays.

China has an extended holiday season. Europeans will start taking off in a couple of weeks for their extended winter vacations, while the Chinese staffers are thinking more about Chinese New Year at the end of January. Don’t loose track of the calendar. You want to use each holiday or special event to send a consistent message to everyone that matters to your business.

The only question that remains is what your message should be.

Message to Clients and Customers
You want to communicate two things to buyers. 1) We are in it for the long haul. We will be here next year and for the long term. We’ll get through this together. 2) We are about value, quality and service. Aspirational marketing is out. Look for a quieter, homier Shanghai in 2009. Even if you are selling to a luxe market, you probably want to turn the glamour down just a bit.

Message to Staff
This should be upbeat and reassuring but still realistic. If reassuring and realistic are at odds with one another, you have a problem on your hands – but don’t make it worse by alienating your core staff. Now is the time you want to look appreciative and sincere. Don’t try poor-mouthing to keep a lid on year-end bonus expectations, and don’t treat your people like they’re lucky to have any job at all. Remember that recessions can last for a year or more, and you will need your key people to get through the tough times. In China people aren’t as desperate to hold on to jobs as they are in the US.

Message to Partners
Your partners, service suppliers, professional team and outsourcers should also get a year-end message. Remind them that you are here, that you are strong and will be in building in 2009. Keep an eye out for potential partners, tie-ups and barter deals.

The important thing is to keep visibility high and the lines of communication open. Too many young entrepreneurs adapt a seize mentality when things get rocky. If your staff or customers starts feeling insecure, they might imagine scenarios that are much worse than reality.

This recession is going to have a strange affect on your local Chinese staffers – and customers. They’re going start aging before you eyes until they turn into their own grandparents. Physically they will appear the same as they ever were – but emotionally and mentally they are going back in time to a time 15 or 20 years ago when Chinese life was characterized by shortage, deprivation and insecurity.

The good news is that suddenly a steady job is one of the most important things in the world to them as they save every mao in anticipation of tough times ahead. The bad news is that Chinese customers and purchasers are going to do pretty much the same thing.

Ostentatious consumption is out. Paranoid saving is in.

I know this script well. My grandfather was an accountant at Western Union when the Great Depression hit. He felt it was his duty to indoctrinate all of us grandkids to be good savers and to beware of the specter of ‘hard times’. I grew up during the optimistic go-go years of the 60s and early 70s, but my parents would often invoke the spirit of Grandpa Sol and the Great Depression to get us to waste less and save more. Even though those particular hard times ended 60 years before I was born, they still made up part of my consciousness and identity.

Local Chinese have the same type of memories – but theirs are stronger and more recent. China has only been open to the West since the late 70s, and wasn’t really prosperous until very recently. Sure, they love to spend and to job-hop so much that it seems like part of their DNA. But that’s a blip on the radar of Chinese history. Deep down, the Chinese consumer is skeptical, conservative – and a cutthroat negotiator.

If your market includes Chinese middle-class buyers, you may want to moderate your approach. Try a tack that is less aspirational and high-status, and more practical and value-oriented. This item is more expensive- but not because it is European or the same one used by movie stars and royalty – it costs 20% more because it will last 75% longer. It is a better value.

Local workers are going to become more dedicated and committed to their jobs – which is both good and bad. Of course it will be great to field a team that really cares about holding on to their positions – and will be a refreshing change from the revolving door HR reality that plagued managers in the past. But you can also forget about voluntary head count reduction or furloughing unneeded staff until business picks up. If you have gotten used to Chinese staffers who don’t even bother to show up to tell you they are quitting, then you’re in for a shock. Any western manager who tries to fire Chinese staffers had better consult with their HR specialist AND a well-informed lawyer before moving forward. There will be trouble.

I’ve been on the road this week - talking to logistics managers in Shenzhen, US buyers in Jiangsu and academics at Fudan University. The sky isn’t falling for most of these folks in China just yet - but no one is talking about how tough it is to expand or how much trouble they’re having finding managers anymore. It’s just about holding ground right now. No big surprise there.

The really interesting development is what’s happening in my inbox. I’m hearing from lots of old friends and friends of friends - all showing renewed interest in China. But they’re not talking about investing or setting up businesses — they’re curious about the chances of finding gainful employment in China. Some of these people are recent grads trying to get a bit of real-life-China experience, but some are bankers and financial managers with serious experience.

They don’t know much about China — but they are convinced that it is the answer to their prayers.

Those Who Can, Teach

This is the beginning of a very one-sided love affair, if you ask me. I don’t know what Wall St. refugees think is waiting for them in China — particularly the ones who speak fluent Trader-ese and no Chinese. Unless they are willing to work 100% commission cold-calling cynical expat managers about offshore investing miracles, there are going to be few takers for their highly specialized talents. Aren’t the Chinese interested in learning about the securities business? Yes and no. Wall Street-style finance wasn’t too highly respected in China last year — and now it’s akin to a war crime. Chinese bankers aren’t chomping at the bit to learn how to repeat western mistakes.

Lot’s of these people will never get past the planning stages of their China adventure. Others will decide early that they won’t be able to transfer their skills. Many of the younger ones, disenchanted with their old industry or willing to take the time to build up their China CV, will follow in the footsteps of those that came before them. Many will end up teaching English and studying Chinese. The lucky ones will get to sit in the same room with professionals in their field and will doubtlessly try to parlay their new ‘guanxi’ connections into lucrative careers. Most will be teaching kids the finer points of grammar and pronunciation.

Are any of these folks appropriate for your business? Possibly. We’ll be seeing more of these economic refugees looking for a new life in Shanghai and HK if the global economy fails to spring suddenly back to life by the first quarter of 09. Now it’s the finance people, but soon you’ll be seeing CVs from a broader cross-section of professions and industries.

Choose carefully, and remember your own situation. There’s a good chance that the worst of the economic downturn in China will occur while western economies are already starting to recover. Make sure that any China newbies you hire will A) help you survive the downturn by reducing your overall costs or improving your SHORT TERM revenue generation, and B) stick around to put their new experience to work after western firms start hiring again.

You will probably want to take your time. The selection of CVs may be improving soon.

Yesterday we talked about the importance for expat bosses in China to do everything possible to hold on to key managers. Now let’s take a look at what the recruiting and hiring process will look like in a post-boom China.

Isn’t the China HR market on sale now? Can’t you hire from the ranks of the battered MNCs with hiring freezes and orders to slash headcount? Yeah, but remember — your cash flow is low, your profit sharing plan is underwater and commission levels are depressed. Your ability to make big hires is going to be as restrained as any other major prospective expense. Expat entrepreneurs with a help-wanted sign in the window (or on 51Job) are going to be getting the best CVs they have ever seen in China. But that doesn’t mean you’ll be hiring experienced Wharton MBAs for rmb 5,000 per month.

Just because they decided to hold a global recession doesn’t mean your China HR challenges are any easier.

China HR market will get looser and less rational in a recession

Most Chinese still see the global slowdown as someone else’s problem. It’s possible that migrant factory workers in Shunde and Dong Guan are stressing out about their prospects — but the Starbucks set in Shanghai is still gliding along with their head in the clouds. They like feeling like they hold all the cards at the HR table, and they show no sign of moderating that view. The recession is an unfortunate event happening to someone else, somewhere far away — and it’s probably their own fault or the result of a character (or cultural) deficiency. Sad, but not a China problem. Nothing to worry about — and certainly no cause to change expectations about salary, title or perks.

Don’t be surprised if that optimism persists even as MNCs start reducing headcount and medium sized businesses start declaring bankruptcy. The new “China HR Thing” that those damned bloggers talk about just may be the disconnect between the dismal economy and the outrageous demands for gold-plated compensation packages from unemployed managers with 8 months of experience.

Who is selling whom?
Lots of owners and HR managers will walk out of job interviews feeling very confused. Your attitude is that you control the last seat in the last life-boat on the Titanic. The guy sitting across from you is acting like you are damaged goods. China was already feeling more confident and self-assured BEFORE the Dow started spelunking - but now Chinese yuppies will start regarding westerners like the Ancient Greeks. Very sophisticated in their day — but that day is now long past.

So where does that put the expat owner who wants to make a strategic hire?
Chinese still prefer large, famous, international companies that pay well, promote fast, train often, and look impressive on the business card. Small and medium sized firms are even more suspect now than they were before the economy went to hell. It may seem like they are interviewing you. What can you do to make sure that your post-boom recruiting is the silver lining in this crisis and not another drain on your finances, resources and mental health?

Don’t oversell. Just because the Chinese interviewee doesn’t think that the recession is his problem doesn’t mean he thinks its not YOUR problem. This is no time for bravado. Remember, unless you are a Fortune 500 household name the kid across the table is 99% certain you will go bankrupt in a week. If you are expecting him to beg and plead for a spot on your team, you may be very mistaken.

Create a compensation plan that makes sense. If you think you can get away with the same salary that you offered last year — but effectively no commission, profit share, bonus or other variable compensation plan, then think again. One of the hardest thing for owners to understand is that workers who used to get bonus and profit share worth 25% of their base salary now feel that they are suffering from a pay cut. This is probably a great time to revisit your compensation plan for the entire team — because if your new hires get better treatment then you are going to have an enormous morale problem.

Don’t bad-mouth anyone. Chinese are much more team-oriented than westerners. You may be stressed, panicked and bitter about your shattered plans, but your interviewee isn’t. Keep the conversation professional, focused and upbeat. Entrepreneurs tend to get defensive about their business — but explaining why there is a vacancy in your shop shouldn’t be about character assassination. If you had to let someone go — or if they moved on because of falling real compensation (or falling real confidence), then explain it quickly, clearly, and move on. Remember — in slow times, team morale is critical

Focus on long-term The next couple of years are likely to be pretty dismal. Don’t hide from that, but don’t make that the central theme of your company description. Focus on your long-term prospects, and talk about where you expect to be in 3 - 5 years. If your guy finds a 3 year planning horizon unrealistic, then maybe you don’t have an appropriate candidate in front of you.

Use delegation, visibility and titles to make up for constrained funds. You may not be able to pay out big salary and bonuses, but you can make up for that with impressive job titles, highly visible projects and other signs of power and status. Don’t count on this erasing the salary issue completely — but it will help.

Now that you’re seeing sales drop and your growth plans are in tatters, you probably feel like its time to circle the wagons and start preparing for a long, tough battle. Good for you. And you may be thinking about having some great heart-to-heart with your team to build up morale and get everyone to pitch in to help the company make it. There will be sacrifices, disappointments and more sacrifices. In the end it will all be worth it when you take your company public and everyone who works for you gets to ride in your new Mercedes. After all – WE’RE ALL IN THIS TOGETHER.

Hold up there a sec, slick. We are NOT all in this together.

China expat managers who have already built up strong teams of dedicated staffers that trust and respect the boss and the company don’t have to do the “we’re all in this together” shtick. The ones that haven’t developed a strong, loyal team are going to find it very hard to maintain morale as sales fall and headcount starts to drop.

In a recession, people are your most important asset (cuz you may not have any others)

We’re in the early part of a global recession. Everyone who is good enough to find another job is sizing up their options. They can find another job, and this may be their last chance for a while.

Are your best people looking already? Take this three-part quiz.

1) Is their real compensation falling because of lower commissions, bonuses, profit shares or performance pay?
2) Did they ever hear you say, “Performance is all that counts”?
3) Is your company’s future in doubt?

If you answered YES to 2 or more of those questions, then your best people are probably looking around. After all, you hired winners and go-getters just like yourself. They are in it for the money. And you don’t have as much any more. You picked them because they were aggressive hitters who were all about the rumbas, and you trained them to put performance above everything else.

And now you are the one that isn’t performing. And you’re asking them to risk their future hanging on with you when it doesn’t even look like you’ll survive.

Realistic expectations from your staff

Unless your employees have equity in your company, you can’t count on them to work longer, accept lower wages or benefits, wait for their salary, alter their contractual agreement or assume any of the other risks of ownership.

That’s your problem now — just like it was your advantage when the world economy was booming.

The China Daily is reporting that all MNCs are going to be unionized by next year. (h/t to China Briefing for the heads-up.)

Ok, so China’s official union - the ACFTU - ain’t the Teamsters. It’ll cost big businesses something like 2% of workers’ pay, it’s an old law (2002), and the vast majority of MNC employees are already covered. We’re not looking at strikes, graft or strong-arm tactics. There is 1 government union, and its not likely to take a position too different from the official state policies regarding pay, benefits, contracts and working conditions. If you are Walmart, this is another painful twist in the China-entry process. I’m having a little trouble finding out how this could affect smaller companies, but I don’t think SMEs have much to worry about yet. (Maybe the ChinaLawBlog.com guys can shed some light here. Steve — are small JVs and WFOEs going to be affected by the push to unionize?).

BUT China is erecting a whole new series of bureaucratic hurdles to setting up and manning a shop on the Mainland. MNCs are already feeling pain at the bottom line due to the global recession and stock market crashes. Will the union rapidly morph into a shadow-government operating on the factory floor — and corporate back-offices? Will it try to exert influence on operational issues and strategic decisions? Is this just another entry in the growing column of ‘cons’ facing every China decision maker, or is there a silver lining? Maybe this a sign that China is maturing as a commercial center and a way for managers to ensure consistent job performance and productivity.

Are China unions good, bad or neutral?

Neutral — Same rules, different day. The laws have been on the books since 1992 and most of the big guys are already there. If anything, unions could actually help managers by giving them an official channel for enforcing rules and regulations. Compared to many labor laws in China (and around the world), this is background noise. No big deal.

Good — Small entrepreneurial operations will benefit from the swelling ranks of local Chinese talent suddenly freed up by the MNC freeze. Remember — this latest bump in the road comes after a MASSIVE drop in the MNCs capitalization due the stock market free-fall, the onset of a global recession, tight (or no) credit and a sharp drop in consumer spending. Even if China was rolling out the red carpet to MNCs, the big western companies would still have to slow their hiring. Small and medium sized shops finally have a good shot at hiring some A-list Mandarin speaking talent. If your business model targets the China market and you keep your head-count under control — this could be a positive development.

Bad — China is hell-bent on joining India as the least-loved international corporate management center. Unions? Government sponsored unions? As a result of the high cost of Chinese labor, many MNCs will not be expanding their management presence, and they won’t be expanding their workforces if there is any possible alternative. Sure, they’ll put branches on the ground. But the back-offices will be somewhere else. China is just getting too expensive, and the skills are still not here. The new contract law was a pain in the neck, but a government controlled labor union could have serious ramifications. Look for more and more China operations to be sales & marketing units — no more regional or Asia HQs in Shanghai. China needs to be taking leadership and redouble efforts to reform and modernize — not moving back to state planning. What’s next, a 5 Year Plan for training and individual retirement accounts?

It turns out that he’s always been really interested in China – and you’re really interested in his big, hot resume. His bank/brokerage/business has recently been laying off/going under/no longer exists , so he is ready to shake things up and try something new – like moving to China. Sounds like a perfect match! Let’s hook up and be togetha 4-eva! It’ll be totally awesome.

And if it goes badly? Well, that’ll be his problem. It’s not like you made any promises or gave him any guarantees. Or did you?

There’s a lot of misery in NY and London. Every clever senior manager in Shanghai is bouncing around the same clever idea – ‘now is the time to hire me one of them big-city western pros with lots of experience and no job at low-low pay’. After all, EVERYONE wants to come to China…

It may work out great. But first, consider 5 questions you have to ask yourself before you start what could actually be a pretty big effort.

1) Are you training your own competition (or at least his new hot sales pro)? If you are bringing a guy over and introducing him to China biz, then you’re facing the same bad math that you go through with the inexperienced Chinese: In 6 months he will be worth 150% - 500% more than you are willing to pay him. (Makes sense for 100% commission salesmen who will ramp up to full production and pay in 3-6 months. Tends to be disastrous for everyone else.

2) Are you looking for a guy who is smart enough to revitalize your operation but dumb enough to move half-way around the world for free with no guarantees? If this guy is expensive, then how do you know he’ll be worth it? If he’s relatively cheap, then why do you want him? Either he’s not the sharpest pencil in the cup or he’s got his own agenda. Setting up his own shop is a real possibility. So is going down the street. Or he may head back home when the dust settles. It’s going to be expensive to find out.

3) His cheap and your cheap are completely different. Before you promise a western salary, make sure you can deliver the goods. You may look at rmb 50k / month as lavish pay – and someday he may as well. But for now he’s looking at the US$ equivalent and can’t believe you expect him to live on less than the head of the mailroom at his old bank.

4) He knows nothing about china and is likely to be the high-maintenance cry-baby in your shop for at least a year. You are going to have to hold his hand, and maybe find him an assistant.

5) What makes you sure he’ll be able to function in China? This ain’t Wall Street – but it’s not Uncle Bob’s Cultural Adventure Rodeo, either. The last thing you want to do is finance a resume-building 6 month journey of intercultural exploration so that IBank boy can go back to Wall Street and parlay it into another $250k after the recovery starts. You need to make money off this guy. If you are looking to hire a sales or marketing person from the US, then they’re main job skill involves BS-ing for money. Make sure that you aren’t the one being sold to.

Bob walks into his boss’ office to discuss compensation. Boss turns conversation into an impromptu performance evaluation and an on-the-spot change of job description. Tensions ensue and escalate. Bob quits. Cost to keep Bob? A bump of rmb 3,000 and 2 extra days off a month. Cost to replace Bob? We’ll let you know when they finally find someone.

Some things in life require bold, spontaneous action. For everything else, there is negotiation training.

Managing smart means taking advantage of every opportunity to boost productivity and build a more efficient team. Old school management platitudes like “raises come faster to those who don’t ask for them” or “show me what you can do – then I’ll think about promoting you” make a lot more sense back home in the US then in Shanghai. Remember – you are fighting two HR trends simultaneously. On the one hand, you want to retain good people so that they can help you grow your operation. On the other hand, you need to control costs. Good managers will treat every negotiation as an opportunity to strike a balance between these two competing goals.

Five useful tactics for internal negotiation:

1) Listen
I know – this may be a radical departure from the norm for some of you out there, but this can really save you money, time and bad feelings. Just because the guy across the table is talking about money or compensation doesn’t necessarily mean he is jumping ship or demanding a 50% pay raise. It might be that – but you shouldn’t jump to conclusions. Sometimes people just want to talk, other times they want reassurance or have legitimate questions. What is his goal? Until you know, you aren’t negotiating – you’re just arguing.

2) Choose your battles
This is one of those great rules that make complete sense after it’s already too late. Over-scheduled senior managers try to take care of many outstanding issues at one time. Middle managers might introduce their request for a raise or promotion with a laundry list of organizational problems or extra work they have had to do to correct them. If you turn this into a point-by-point debate, then you should expect your conversation to be long, painful and hostile.

3) Linkages get messy
The guy asking for a raise or a promotion has come in late twice in the last quarter and completely blew what you though was going to be an easy sale back in June. Now you’re feeling clever by delaying action until you see progress in those areas. The good news is that you’ll succeed in delaying the raise. The bad news is that you have turned the process into a disciplinary hearing and not an opportunity to set goals or discuss the future. You should also not be surprised if this tack results in mutual accusations, fault-finding and retribution.

4) Watch the power imbalance
You say “honest and constructive dialogue”. He says, “arrogant bullying”. This is particularly important when managing cross-cultural negotiations – especially when an American boss is negotiating with a Chinese. Europeans can also be sensitive to this. And Canadians. Come to think of it, this warning applies to just about everyone but New Yorkers. You may see yourself as the “cool, with-it team leader”, but your team might see you as “cruel, wicked Dear Leader” – at least some of the time. Negotiations tend to be one of those times. This is a perfect opportunity it try out some of that ’sensitivity’ nonsense that you’re always hearing about.

5) Have a goal.
That goal probably shouldn’t be getting your employees to feel sorry for you for working so hard. First question – what do you want to do with the guy across the table ? Do you want to expand his role, maintain the status quo, or ease him out of the picture? Decide carefully. It’s ok to schedule another meeting – but be clear on your own goals for the meeting. Hint: thwarting his request is a pretty weak goal.

ChinaSolved finds itself in a family way. Not literally, but in terms of HR. It’s time to pick those special managers and key staffers that you want to grow old with – or at least keep on board for another year. You’ll lavish them with special training opportunities and higher pay - management tracks and nicer offices. The good news is that THIS time, you really DO get to choose your family. The bad news – they might not choose you unless you pay them to. What’s the price of commitment and true love in Shanghai these days? That depends on what you’re looking for.

As usual when you’re lookin’ for warm bodies in Shanghai, you’ve got your Pros, you’ve got you’re Semi-Pros, and you’ve got your Devoted Amateurs.

First of all, this is one time you DO NOT want nature to take its course. While that may work fine in some relationships, the tin rule of HR is that the ones you want to hold to on can find jobs anywhere, and the ones you want to see go away will do almost anything to keep their jobs (expect perform up to expectations).

So how do you find true commitment in the big, sweaty city?

Pros: These are the real leaders who can really do the job. Your key to meeting and finding these goldmines? Pay a lot – but not just yet. First you’ve got to plan what they’ll do and how visible it will be. (Hint – they should be RUNNING something big and important, and should be EXTREMELY visible.) Next you have to figure out how to monetize this. You don’t want to use a howitzer to ring the doorbell. If you can put a hotshot behind the wheel of something profitable, then you move on the next step – which is paying for it. Here’s the funny part – you actually WANT to pay for it, because that’s all the Pros care about. Don’t sweet-talk a high-potential hire into working for cut-rates at your shop. It’s just a training gig or a spring-board, and either way you’re the one getting hurt.

Devoted amateurs: Lots of cheap, earnest young workers who didn’t really know how to do much but had lots of enthusiasm and heart. That was the dream of HR departments entering China – in 2001. This demographic was a heartbreaker back then, it got worse as costs rose in the first half of this decade, and since the new labor law has been in affect they’re poison. You’ll need a few around, but the kids without skills are easy to hire but very hard to get rid of – and once you start collecting them it’s an easy habit to fall into. There was a time when we thought we could throw armies of cheap hands at a project and get by. Not now. No no no.

Semi-pros: Whether its day or night, 7:45 Monday morning or Friday at around 11:45 PM, the semi-pro is Shanghai’s most confounding mystery. In HR-world, these are the people with limited experience, wrong experience, weird experience, or some other type of glass-is-half-full thing going on. They’ll be your greatest success and your most disastrous failure. HINT: look for specific skills that you can use NOW or broad experience that you can apply to specific problems. Ie: You need a graphic artist in a hurry– in a pinch you can try a recent grad or someone from a different industry. Or, to take a different case, you see the CV of someone with 3 years of managing teams — you can put them in charge of people or projects right away and coach them through the product or business specifics in the short term. They’ve got huge potential and everyone will love the happy ending if it works, but you’re devoting seriously large chunks of time to this in the first 6 months — and they can be body-blows when a couple go wrong at the same time.

Your China HR budget is going to be severely stretched whether the China business environment is good or bad. HR spending in China has gone through the roof, and you are going to have to start worrying about retention and turn-over more and more.

Until now, you’ve probably been looking at controlling turnover and maximizing what little you have to spend on training as two completely separate problems. In China we have a strange situation where training - particularly outside training — is highly desired and sought-after. But the problem is that by the time your expensive training programs bear fruit your bright young manager may already be working for the competition.

Take a look at SmartChinaOrg.com ( www.smartchinaorg.com ) for an interesting take on ROI and training in China. It turns out that training’s true role in the organization may be more complicated than just skills & processes. In China training can be an important and cost effective tool for retaining key employees.

Here are a few ideas to maximize your training ROI — as a retention tool

1) Have a regular schedule. One cool training session 14 months ago stands out in your mind, but your team has forgotten it ever took place. Plan a regular schedule — which should include major multi-day events and smaller, less formal events.

2) Use for team building. Your Chinese HR manager may still think that packing a room full of unrelated employees is a great way to spread costs, but it kills one of the most important potential benefits — the team build. 6 - 8 in a group is best, anything under 20 can still work. Over 25 in the room and you are in danger of it turning into a lecture.

3) Outside is better than inside. Professionals are better than colleagues. Anyone is better than the boss. Make the training a break from routine. Let them get out of the office and go to an event at a hotel or conference. Put someone on a plane to HK or Beijing. This is a great, moderately priced way to recognize performance or smooth over a rough patch.

4) Chunk it. They aren’t going to learn the art and science of sales in a 3 hour seminar, so don’t waste their time and your money - unless you are getting another kind of benefit (fun, cheap, etc). Instead, focus on skill that will be beneficial to the company right away. In the case of sales, I’d work on phone skills with your locals and younger guys and closing techniques or sales management with your more experienced people.

5) Follow up immediately. This should include something real. A budget, a project, a promotion, a new office, an assistant, a raise - something. This is all cheap (relatively) and HIGHLY TARGETED. You can use it when and with whom you want — but it works much better as a preventative than as a cure. If they’re already talking to someone else, a 2 day workshop on time management ain’t gonna save it.

As with any kind of spending, follow up systematically and choose your metric carefully. I recommend months on the job be one of them.