Morris Hite revised this many times. It is his Account Executive training. He realized that his AEs were getting a bit sloppy, so he put together a twelve week course for them. He kept it interesting with his "salty" language, and got positive feedback from the Account Executives. In announcing the training program, Hite had written in a memorandum, “if any women elect to attend, the must do so with the understanding that they will have to listen to some foul language.” (From AdMan: Morris Hite's methods for winning the ad game by Russ Pate)
a. Use all departments; call on everybody for help group effort, not one man thinking. “But the account man is the quarterback.”
a. “It requires going out and learning about the clients business. It requires learning things about the clients business that the client doesn’t know himself.
a. With out these you are in no position to judge too well the work of other people
a. Every account executive must go out and sell his clients product with the clients salesmen so that he knows the problems of the sales force first hand
b. Morris, as a young exec, made deliveries with the Borden route men. Loaded the milk truck, went to the grocery store with milk men, checked the dairy case to see how much milk had been sold, if any had been damaged, restocking needed, check pricing and packages of competitive products, chatted with the grocer to gem the merchants pint of view.
a. There are few new ideas…you can’t begin to realize your potential without keeping a file of ideas
a. “It’s a lot better to kick your own self in the behind than it is to wait until somebody else does it. It’s a lot less painful when you do it yourself.”
a. “It’s a simple matter of learning to think about it”
a. Feeling for the business, terminology, abreast of what’s going on
a. This prevents misunderstandings between you and the client.