Out of 80 teams, Elon placed fifth overall in the professional selling competition.
The Elon Sales Team of Ashley Follenweider ’19 and Jameson “Jamie” Malugen ‘19 finished fifth overall in the 2018 International Collegiate Sales Competition (ICSC) hosted by Florida State University.
The competition, which aims to enhance the selling profession by encouraging the development of critical skills needed by today’s collegiate sales graduates, brought together 80 universities, including Florida State University, University of Central Florida, Kansas State University and Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.
“Competing at ICSC afforded me the unique opportunity to simulate the challenges of the sales process and implement core lessons from the classroom, providing insight into what a sales career would entail,” Follenweider said.
The competition’s role play was based on a potential sale of Citrix XenDesktop to North American Plastics, parent of Laird Plastics. Competitors were judged on the different elements of the sales process, including needs identification, product presentation, overcoming objections and gaining customer commitment.
The speed selling event tasked students to present a 60- to 90-second introductory elevator speech to recruiters for four different companies.
“Competing at ICSC was one of the most valuable experiences I’ve had during my time at Elon,” Malugen said. “Not only did I develop my sales skills, but I had the unique opportunity to meet and network with students and employers from across the nation.”
Follenweider and Malugen both noted a large part of their success was due to the feedback and support received from faculty coaches Assistant Professor Nawar Chaker and Instructor Rob Elbitar, and sales team members James “Jimmy” Longo ’19, Sheefali Kavthankar ’19, Caroline McGranahan ’19, Ben Nelson ’19 and Sydney Melet ’21.
The Elon Sales Team is supported by Elon’s Chandler Family Professional Sales Center, which promotes professional selling and sales management, provides high-quality instruction to both students and sales executives, and conducts research that advances the field of sales. Its strong sales curriculum and experiential learning component earned it the distinction as a “Top University Sales Program for 2018” by the Sales Education Foundation, a section of The Dayton Foundation established to promote university level educational programs in sales through the provision of scholarships, creation of educational materials and other methods.