ABSTRACT
As a corollary to these changes, it behoves us at this point to touch upon the indigenous unease and dissatisfaction felt at the stage of implementation. The progressive transference of “the marketing function”
from the former sales directors to the new marketing team was a particular cause of bitter resentment, recrimination and even resignations. Even the nominally innocuous switch from a “volume” to a “profitability” emphasis was regarded with marked consternation, especially among sales teams habituated with meeting and beating the old-style “unitshifter” targets. Against this backdrop the challenge ahead – and in particular for the Western-parented companies – lay not so much in the redrawing of structural boundaries, as in successfully operationalizing a long-term adoption of change among the local teams. Its successful institutionalization and enactment among the locally led sales teams – with their powerful hold over key account portfolios – was therefore of primary concern.
