In Conversation With: Michael Ahearne (Part 1)

CSO Insights recently had a chance to speak with Mike Ahearne, Professor of Marketing at the University of Houston and Research Director at the Sales Excellence Institute. He is the co-author of Selling Today: Partnering to Create Value. Mike’s path to academia has been an unusual one: After high school, he became a professional baseball player.
A career-ending injury sent him back to school, where he earned two Masters degrees and a PhD. Mike’s original research explores a range of sales-related subjects, from salesperson appearance (“If Looks Could Sell”) to managing sales teams in a virtual environment.
He and his colleague Tom Steenburgh are currently researching the question: “Why do salespeople have so much trouble selling new and innovative products into the marketplace?” An article reporting on that research will be published in Harvard Business Review this summer. Mike shared some of the high-level findings with us.
First, “Most of the companies out