One of the biggest learnings from the Sales Days 2023 was that communication is the key in managing a community / organization successfully and in ensuring transparency. I very rarely find myself in the position wherein I have to make a community-wide statement, but last week I did. This was a hair-ripping experience for me, but I was very happy with the result. The statement was posted on Teams, however I think that by posting it on the essaybank someone will benefit from it later on and can use it as a base/example whenever they find themselves in need of it:

(This announcement was originally posted by our project leader Santeri Simonen, but it was in fact drafted by me, Noora Hyttinen and Santeri Simonen. I was given the permission to post in on the essay bank.)

Dear Proakatemia community. The Sales Days are now over, and the results are finally available. The Sales Days were intensive experience for the whole community, from which we have learned a lot as individuals, teams and as a community.

On Friday, we made a decision on the results of the Sales Days. Before going through the decision, we would like to provide some background:

During the Sales Days, suspicions were raised in the Proakatemia community that Puhdistustiimi’s previous customer contacts were being used for sales during the days. As the situation was confirmed on Friday 24 March, the Sales Days project team raised the issue with Puhdistustiimi. During this discussion it became clear that the old customer contacts were being used by current and former product team members in Roima. At this point, the Sales Days project team concluded that this situation was a violation of the Sales Days rule.

“Product teams and Sales Day organizers are impartial and may not use insider knowledge for the benefits of their team during Sales Days.”

The Sales Day Team and Puhdistustiimi then sat down together to discuss the solution in more detail. The discussion concluded that the rule-breaching sales would be cleared and removed from the teams’ sales results. Due to time pressure, it was still unclear how this would affect the headcount of the teams, which was a major factor in this year’s competition. In the Sales Days, the headcount of the team refers to the active members of the team as reported on Wednesday morning.

Puhdistustiimi then pointed out the sales that were contradicting the rules from their customer data. Once these were brought to everyone’s information, the Sales Day Team met to make the final decision with a short-numbered team, with Niina Piirainen absent for scheduling reasons. Coaches Tutta and Annikka were also present. The final decision was made less than an hour before the actual event in which the results were to be published.

The decision made was to remove all sales that were against the rules, and that the headcount of the team remained as announced on Wednesday. The sales made in accordance with the rules were left untouched. The result was calculated after the decision had been made, and on this basis Kipinä was declared the winner.

After the results were announced on Saturday, the second-placed team, Roima, protested the result after feeling that the decision to remove the sales was unfair and that the sanction was too harsh. As a result, a paja with Roima was arranged for Wednesday 29 March.

In the beginning of week, the Sales Days team made verification calculations. These calculations didn’t change the final result. In addition, during the beginning of the week, the Sales Days project team was able to get a more comprehensive picture of the situation. In Wednesday’s paja, Roima elaborated why they felt that the decision was unfair. At Roima’s request, there was also a separate paja with Kipinä on Thursday morning. The aim of these pajas was to increase understanding between all parties.

At midday on Thursday, the whole Sales Day team met to discuss the protest, and any action it might have caused. The de-escalation of the situation was facilitated by coach Ville Parkkila, and an objective community and communication perspective was brought by assistant coach Noora Hyttinen. The aforementioned persons were not involved in the actual decision making. As a Sales Day team, we felt we needed support in our work and decision making.

In the decision-making process, different options and factors influencing them were discussed. The Sales Day team has concluded that the protest is justified and requires action and will result in changes to the decision previously taken.

In the new decision, which will remain in force, the two persons who made the rule-breaching sales will be removed from Roima’s headcount. With them, all the sales in which they were involved in are removed. The sales recorded by these sellers have also been directed to Empiria. Consequently, sales have been removed from the sales results for Roima and Empiria. The removed sales are not included in the total sales for the Sales Days and therefore not included in the commission. With this decision, Roima and Empiria will compete equally with all teams.

Following the new decision, sales have been recalculated. In the end, the decision did not change the outcome of the competition.

The results are therefore published and attached to this update.

And with this, the Sales Days have ended. The Sales Days team will collect feedback on this year’s Sales Days, and the Sales Days concept in general, as soon as possible. This feedback will play an important role in the future of the Sales Days.

Above all, this process has been a huge learning journey for us as a community, as teams and as individuals. The lessons learned by our Sales Day team this year have been particularly focused on communication, collaboration and decision making.

Sincerely,
Santeri, Niina, Arto, Samu and Lucas