Stemming Gender Bias in Sales Leadership

Filling seats for sales training can be difficult. Salespeople are often reluctant to step away from the field—the source of most of their income—to participate in personal development. My colleagues and I saw that frequently while working on the training operations team for a large healthcare company. There wasn't anything wrong with the training courses' content. Each course had the requisite good reaction scores and, more importantly, showed quantitative proof that the skills we taught positively influenced selling behaviors—if the sellers attended. Even with proof of impact, the company needed internal marketing to attract attendees. That held true for nearly every course our team offered—except one.