Sales (Re)structuring & Selection in Maastricht

A sales department in Maastricht has to carry two speeds that rarely fit one pipeline. Around Randwyck a deal runs eight to eighteen months past clinicians, procurement and IT; on Beatrixhaven and Bosscherveld a repeat order leaves in two conversations. Force both into a single stage model and you end up with a forecast that predicts nothing. So we design two pipelines, each with its own stage definitions and exit criteria, and write down who owns which. In staffing, language counts as a hard requirement rather than a bonus: a rep who can only read German will not survive a call with a buyer in Aachen. The hiring pool here is unusually deep — the international service centres have trained a large group of multilingual people who handle customers superbly but have never closed a deal. We test them on behaviour: a real calling block in their second language.