Summit 2009 | Minneapolis, MN

On June 9th and 10th Inside Sales leaders from across the U.S. came together to learn, share, and network at the Annual Emblaze Leadership Summit. The event was a packed full with presentations, demonstrations, and interactive discussions. Attendees left inspired and equipped with innovative ideas and techniques to improve their organizations.

Presentations & Topics

The Summit kicked off with opening remarks from Emblaze Founder and CEO, Bob Perkins. Bob spoke about his vision for the Summit and the Association and also challenged attendees to embrace their time together and focus on new ideas and best practices they can use for improvement. A heartfelt keynote address was then delivered by Thomas Stanley, Vice-President of Global Integrators for Network Appliance. Thomas addressed the challenges of motivating a sales force in today's environment. He reminded us of the key factors to success and opened his "vault" as he discussed his proven methodologies and best practices. The morning continued with Leadership, Development, and Productivity being a recurring theme. The morning ended with small group activities allowing attendees the opportunity to use their experience and decision making skills in solving some key inside sales team challenges.

The afternoon saw the first of 2 topic specific breakout sessions where attendees had the option of selecting sessions relevant to their needs. The group reconvened for an interactive panel discussion that saw spirited conversation centered on driving revenue and improving productivity. The afternoon ended with innovative and thought provoking presentations from Gregg Baron of Success Sciences and long time Sale Executive and a former VAR Business Magazine's Top 100 Executives, Larry Sheffield. Day 1 ended with a Networking Reception and Vendor Fair that allowed everyone to mingle, wind down, and see some great technology from the Summit sponsors.

Day 2 saw additional presentations and breakouts discussing the reoccurring themes of development, leadership, and productivity. Sessions that seemed to create some "buzz" included compensation and incentive presentations from Mark Quinlan, Director, GE Healthcare, and Jim Micklos from Motivation Excellence. In addition, Laurie Lynard's, VP TeleMasters, "Coaching Methodologies" breakout was also of great interest.

Annual Awards

Day 2 also included the Emblaze Awards luncheon where the Emblaze leadership team recognized outstanding effort and contribution to inside sales in four Categories - Sprit, Innovator, Excellence in Execution, and Executive of the Year. Below are descriptions of the award categories as well as the LS2009 Award recipients. Congratulations to each individual winner for receiving these well-deserved awards!

The Emblaze looks forward to expanding upon these awards, as well as the nomination process, for Leadership Summit '10.

Conclusion

No Emblaze Summit would be complete without a motivational message which was delivered by Olympic Gold Medalist Jeff Blatnick. His endearing style and inspiring message was felt by all attendees. Afterwards Jeff spoke with attendees and many took photographs with Jeff and his Gold Medal. It was wonderful way to end the Summit and had members looking forward to next year and asking question about where it would be held.

LS 09 Conference slides are available for download to Emblaze Professional and Corporate members from the list on this page, or the conference slide library.

View recaps from other years:

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