© Zlatko Guzmic | stock.adobe.com

Many representatives report that a common quality of their favorite principals is that they “Let me figure out the best way to do my job and let my results speak for themselves.”

So when MANA VP and General Manager Jerry Leth came to me a little over two years ago with the idea that MANA should facilitate the formation of Special Interest Groups (SIGs), I took a cue from our representative members’ favorite principals and asked Jerry to spearhead the program, manage it as he saw fit, and keep me updated on his progress.

And progress is just what Jerry has achieved, with five robust Special Interest Groups in regular contact on topics that serve a particular subset of MANA members:

• The Professional Development Council (PDC) focuses on professional development resources for our representative members, enhancing our current offering and giving guidance on the resources needed to complete MANA’s wealth of knowledge. Most recently the group helped draft an Agency Sales magazine article on what to do when principals ask for lengthy reports for their online CRMs.
• The Manufacturers Educational Development Council (MEDC) mirrors the PDC, but from the manufacturers’ perspective. In addition to helping recast MANA’s Nine Steps to Being a Quality Principal Program, the MEDC also had helped guide the Agency Sales article on principal’s online CRMs.
• The OEM Aerospace Special Interest Group (OASIG) shares knowledge and experiences of the group in dealing with the unique issues of the aerospace industry, such as its procurement practices and extensive industry/supplier consolidation.
• The International Special Interest Group (ISIG) gives MANA members who sell into international markets or represent international principals the opportunity to discuss topics like the challenges of vetting international principals or being vetted by them, the added risk of having to collect commissions across international boundaries, and how to best communicate with companies where employees with English fluency are more the exception than the rule.
• The Young Professionals Organization (YPO) is a forum where younger, millennial manufacturers’ representatives can share solutions and best practices to deal with the unique issues they face.

Although each of these SIGs addresses concerns of a very different group of MANA members, they do all have one thing in common. They exist because a talented and dedicated guy took ownership of the SIG program and ran with it. And because the CEO, like some of our representative members’ favorite principals, had the good sense to “let him figure out the best way to do his job and let his results speak for themselves.”

Special thanks to Jerry for launching and managing this very successful program. If you have a suggestion for a SIG that would add value to MANA members, you can reach Jerry at [email protected] or (949) 600-6465.