Case Study: Ecolab

Ecolab is committed to being a first class workplace learning organization – pioneered training in its industry with developments such as Ecolab University. The training strategies were innovative, but there was still room for performance improvement. Analysis targeted key areas to improve upon based on field studies.

Ecolab’s corporate strategy is to continually expand the range of related products and services it offers to existing customers, no matter where they do business around the world.

In the past Ecolab has had the traditional problems associated with a 20 60 20 performance hierarchy. Like many organizations, Ecolab saw the fruits of their labor end up with 20% of the sales representatives performing at a high-level with the remainder not reaching their performance potential.

Ecolab has and will continue to invest in strategic and program development, with the focus on creating a workforce that is both willing and able to do the job at a high sustainable level. Ecolab has developed a custom sales process, implemented screening survey tools for hiring, revised classroom training, and trained in-field mentors to continually improve performance in sales and sales training. To a certain degree, Ecolab’s developmental and strategic endeavors were effective; however, a majority of these efforts were missing practice as a key, development component.

While working with another vendor that provided sales process consulting services, Ecolab was introduced to Allen Interactions. Ecolab was in the midst of a national sales meeting when the two organizations met, which included sales role-play practice. The initial partnership between Allen Interactions and Ecolab began when Allen Interactions’ virtual voice-recognition role play system was introduced. Ecolab eventually ended up piloting the tool measuring success rates of up to 119% increase in sales.

Ecolab selected Allen Interactions, the industry e-learning solutions leader and pioneer since the early 1990’s to continue to develop its e-learning. The company has a team of worldrenowned industry experts, including instructional designers, learning strategists, developers, and multimedia specialists. Allen Interactions dares to involve the learner emotionally. With content that resonates personally, the learner gains a deeper understanding. Allen Interactions tailors e-learning programs to respond directly to the learner’s actions, teaching useful concepts, not forgettable data.

With a successful start, Ecolab continued to work with Allen Interactions at a strategic level to redesign the entire strategic learning curriculum for the Institutional Division of Ecolab – a five year strategy has been put in place that began with the development of a blended learning solution for the new hire workplace learning curriculum. The new blended solution replaced a three and a half week traditional classroom training solution and includes 26 e-learning modules, pre-training, on-boarding, and follow-up field practice guides for district managers.

The modules are highly interactive and instructionally sound. Ecolab’s traditional classroom training culture has been very receptive to the new learning methods resulting in increased field performance.

One of the 26 e-learning modules is called the “Four Phases Of A Sales Call”. As a free-standing module, this course has won industry awards for its instructional design.

The “Four Phases of a Sales Call” made its debut to the field in two different ways. It was first introduced via a company intranet and later rolled out with the release of new Tablet PCs that were introduced into the field. Temporary tracking systems were developed for both systems while Allen Interactions and Ecolab continually collaborate to determine the most appropriate long-term LMS solution.

The “Four Phases of a Sales Call” course is based on a communication model that simulates the dialogue and steps typically encountered in the four phases of the Ecolab sales process. The learners are guided through the four phases sequentially, but they are free to choose the scenarios within a given phase. Each phase has at least three scenarios for a total of thirteen scenarios. The learners must successfully complete all scenarios to receive credit and are provided feedback along the way.

Developmental costs for the initial curriculum are already paid off with the reduction of expenses normally spent on travel for classroom training. The courses are also driving performance in the field and the result is increased sales and profits as well as improved customer satisfaction. Ecolab is currently measuring performance in the field over a one year period, conducting a historical data results comparison analysis with learners who completed traditional training. Early results indicate significant increases in both speed to market (competence), revenue and customer satisfaction.