Ethical Responsibilities of Sales

Managers Billie Daniels

By: Group C7
Mounica Chilla

15P209

Surana Anish Prakash

15P234

V Vivekananda Reddy

15P235

Vaibhav Pahuja

15P236

Vivek Agarwal

15P240

CASE OVERVIEW
Billie Daniels was the district sales representative for
Consumer Food Wholesalers Inc. (CFW)
Billie observed that staff in some stores are not giving
importance to their product lines resulting in clogging
Billie was a strong believer in profit incentive and free
enterprise
Billie devised a scheme whereby he made a private
arrangement to mail a quarterly cheque to selected head
store men of supermarkets in his territory
Payment was a small % of stores orders from CFW, and
Billie was paying that from his own commission

CASE OVERVIEW
Scheme worked well and sales in Billies territory
improved significantly as he expanded scheme to more
stores
2 years after he started scheme, CFW named him
Representative of the Year for his performance
Shortly, however CFW headquarter received a complaint
from a small chain alleging that Billie was paying to store
men to get extra attention to CFWs product lines
Fred Harper, national sales manager for CFW reviewing
the complaint was perplexed by Billies candid
acknowledgement and his genuine belief and defense of
scheme

Issues
Unreported commission sharing unaccounted money can lead
to legal issues lawsuits, fines, career issues and imprisonment
Sets a wrong example for sales representatives and they might
adopt similar practices
Store men influenced by incentives of CFW, focusing more on its
product lines, which is against the interests of store
management
Peer pressure might force other Sales mangers to follow a
similar strategy
Billie seemed honest in his beliefs, which is a strong indication
of sales managers misunderstanding/lack of knowledge about
ethical aspects and companys values

Issues
CFW didnt go into the details of significant improvement
of sales in Billies territory but honored him with
Representative of Year issues in performance review
In an attempt to push sales of CFW, store men might
resort to unethical selling practices like providing false
information/deceiving consumers
More push by store men might affect the brand image of
CFW and might loose potential and loyal consumers
If Billie changes company then there would be uncertainty
in sales, he might takeaway sales to competitor

Recommendations
Retain Billie Daniels as he is unaware of ethical aspects and
companys values

Identify reasons for clogging and address them rather than

depending on incentives
Organize a discussion and training session for all sales mangers
to sensitize them on ethical and legal aspects involved in
business scenarios
Ensure that mangers realize the importance of passing on the
knowledge to sales persons so that whole team is on the same
page
Encourage discussions in a sales team before taking any
decisions involving promotions, gifts and incentives
Managers to factor qualitative aspects in performance appraisal

Thank you