Blue Shield of California sought a sales performance partner who could enhance the sales and coaching skills of an already quite successful and tenured sales force.
An extensive research and discovery process allowed Janek Performance Group to create a tailored sales and sales management solution to achieve those objectives.
About Blue Shield of California
Founded in 1938 and incorporated in 1939 as California Physicians’ Service, Blue Shield of California has a long, illustrious history of high quality, trend-setting healthcare service – including the first health plan to offer catastrophic coverage (1950), cover a heart transplant (1984), offer online benefit and enrollment (1996), and offer an online enroll system for agents (1998).
A founding member of the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association, Blue Shield of California presently operates as an independent licensee of the larger organization.
The Challenge
Blue Shield of California had an accomplished, experienced sales force already in place. But the organization saw an opportunity to enhance the existing skills even further and sought a partner who could both do that and handle the largest training event in company history – one that involved not only the Northern and Southern California divisions but also the Small Business division.
Specifically, the company sought to implement uniformity in their sales management and varying teams through a common, universal sales approach and methodology. Bringing in the Small Business division was part of this strategy as well – it was the first time they were participating in this level of sales training.
Blue Shield of California also had a target in mind – to go from 800,000 members to 1 million by 2020 and equip their workforce with the knowledge, skills, and support to reach that goal – including soft skills training to help their managers become more conscious leaders.
The Solution
After an extensive research and discovery by Janek to gain thorough understanding of the company’s business and sales processes and environment, the team created a customized Critical Selling Skills workshop and TOPS sales coaching program. The sales training was delivered in 7 locations, composed of 14 workshops over a three-month period. Janek’s Xpert learning reinforcement technology was also added to ensure long-term behavioral changes would stick. Manager training ensured they were equipped with the tools and skills to coach and reinforce skills effectively.
The Results
The training proved a major success. Blue Shield of California realized a 913% return on investment with a payback period of just 1.18 months. The overwhelming majority of participants reported that the training enabled them to build stronger relationships with customers and improve customer satisfaction and retention.
In fact, the project was so successful, the joint submission was recently awarded a Bronze at the 2020 Brandon Hall Group HCM (Human Capital Management) Awards for sales performance. To read more about the award, click here.
90-Day Post-Training Results
913
%
89
%
87
%
