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What are the pay grades for C's and M's in S&C?
Can anyone tell me the Manager bandings for S&C?
Why is this bowl so cold? 😀
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Pro
You need to have supported sales and be comfortable leading commercial discussions (but you knew that) but there also needs to be a specific SM-shaped whole in a client account or practice that you are best fit for.
You need to have an answer to the question: ‘which account needs another SM to lead sales and projects’.
We don’t really promote SMs in the hope we can staff them (which we do for C and a good amount of Ms too). SMs trade more off their sector and functional experience than earlier levels so you need to be a good fit for whatever gap there is in a client account.
So it is kind of based on luck, to a greater extent.
My SM case of course had ‘this guy is a great manager who has sold loads blah blah’ but also the account I was supporting was growing a lot so I could say ‘this account is growing, there is a huge pipeline, and we need another SM to lead all these bids and then the projects.’
Be in an area that will receive promotion slots as a start… then understand who will make final decisions and make sure these people do know about you and your achievements (ie JK if in S&C)
Pro
This is a really good point: it is not just about what your account thinks. It is your practice that decides P1 P2 and gets the slots, not the client account.
So you need to approach *every* SM, AD, and MD in your practice as they will be in the meeting deciding promo priority.
It is a bit of a PR campaign. The best way I found to do this was to keep it simple. And email with something like “Hi, I’m building my promotion case for SM and I’d be really grateful for the chance to run it past you and get some feedback on what I need to add to prepare me”.
You can do this cold to people you don’t even know. It shows respect and even if you never talk again after your quick chat, they will remember you and that you are going for promo and so are less likely to cause a fuss in the PA call. You cannot have anyone saying “who is this person, I did know they were going for promo”. SM is the most junior member of leadership team so we don’t like promoting unknowns.
As most of S&C practitioners are on PACE career progression model what would happen if the promo doesn’t happen for any reason after 3 to 4 years as there will never be that many promo slots for M to SM as there are so many Ms already?
Nothing happens. There’s a backlog.
In current climate, 3.5 years TAL isn’t a lot for M—> SM.
Do you know how you’re ranking in your S&C node?
Shhh. Ranking doesn’t exist. Ladder is a forbidden word
F
Sell something