new advisors

[nonails]

dodgybracket said:

Farmer was positive following the recent Leeds/Reading meetings.

What was said about recruitment??

In this area there are 4 steady long-term agents. Time has never stretched beyond 3 days mostly we are max 48 hours for customers to get seen once they ring Hillarys.

GUESS WHAT?


THEY HAVE ONLY GOT AN ADVERT IN OFFERING £3000 PER MONTH WORKING FOR HILLARYS IN THE LOCAL PAPER.

WHO GET THE SACK?? NONE OF US...

WHY DO THEY DO THIS??

WE WILL GET SOME b*****s IN BECAUSE THE FSM WANTS TO BANG ITS DRUM AND WE WILL ALL LOSE AND THEN WE WILL HAVE TO PICK UP THE PIECES..

IF THIS IS LOYALTY TO EXISTING AGENTS FOLLOWING YOUR DECLARATIONS AT THIS WEEKS MEETINGS--HILLARYS..

THEN WHERE ELSE ARE YOU TELLING PORKIES?

CAN YOU TRULY BE TRUSTED.

DO THIS TO US AND EXPECT LOYALTY...eh???


THAT'LL BE THE DAY!!!!!!!!

Yes, Dodgybracket, we have the same advert in our local rag....
Listen up....

How motivational is it to come home after a hectic day, (7 sales apps and 3 fits, 107 miles driven, 11.5 hours out of the house to have ones wife greet one with--

"You didn't tell me you had jacked in Hillarys?"

" No," says I," I haven't"

" Then why is your job advertised in the ******* ****?"
" Show me?" says I.

There in black-and-white is my job, advertised.

Try to ring area FSM --of course its after 4.00pm on a Friday (in fact its 18.45pm) and no response.

So am I sacked or what ? Wife gives me the usual
"Why dont you tell me things like that ??"

She will take no amount of convincing that a Company can advertise your job, when you have been in it for 7 and a bit years and you are muddling along well enough.

She is convinced they have got rid of me without even a letter or phone call, and I am having a cr*p weekend at home.

This is entirely down to this advertisement.

I am relativerly isolated geographically--neighbouring agents I know well, and one of them is convinced its just some prat in Hillarys who desn't know what they are doing and has stuck the ad in the wrong paper.

How would Riseman. Rismann, rushmann, whoever like it to come in on Moday and see his job advertised.
Would he think the Board was being loyal??

He has probably never been 7 and a bit years in one job and neither knows or comprehends the anguish and sheer , hopefullly , unnecessary worrying and mental trauma that this causes.

Hillarys, it is not motivational.
It is not clever.
It is frankly symptomatic of an unthinking and uncaring management structure which delights in "Divide & Rule" techniques to , in their minds, "keep us on our toes".

Farmer mentioned that she was told an advert was going in in Huddersfield.
Well I am nowhere near Huddersfield--were other Agents thereabouts told of an ad being placed??

My wifes statement that " You don't need to work for them if thats the way they can treat you "has hit home very hard. Sometimes you need an outsiders viewpoint to see whats going on.

I am , to say the least dismayed, and disheartened, and will in my present mind-set, no longer strive to give my best to Hillarys, despite soundings coming from last weeks meetings.
In view if the above adverts, I think you were all conned at those meetings.
Action speaks louder than words. There were a lot of words, and if this is the first action we get then I suggest everyone who went to the meetings quietly looks in a mirror for 5 minutes, because the person looking back has had a flanker of industrial proportions visited upon them.

Sorry to be so down, folks, but as you can see I am really unhappy at this ad on my area, and I can no longer trust these people at Colwick, when they make my wife and family to have a s**t week-end.

Nonails

[grumperbear]

Sorry to hear this, but l think it is going to happen to us all.
Long standing full time agents don't seem to mean anything anymore.


Nice to see that RossK is online now (Sunday morning) and hopefully taking note of our concerns.

[hereticus]

I, too, am very concerned by the postings from Nonails, Farmer, and others about a rash of recruitment advertising, and I have also received a couple of personal messages on the same subject from advisors who don’t like to post openly. Ross Kenney seems to have visited the forum on Sunday morning so must have seen this thread, and I am sure he will make it a priority on Monday to find out what is going on, who authorised the ads, etc. Whether he is then able to put our minds at rest, or how much he is able to tell us, is a different question but I wait in hope because none of us needs this happening just when we are turning a corner in company / advisor communications.

Nevertheless, despite this very disturbing new issue, I remain very positive that the recent seminars are the beginning of a very different relationship and that we are going to see lots of positives in the coming months. A posting yesterday on the old steam driven forum posed the question :


‘The two recent Meetings involving selected advisors and certain hillary's top brass seemed a good idea. BUT..... since the meetings, the attending advisors are non to keen to detail exactly the out comes we can expect. Either hillary's have asked them not to , OR they are un-expectant themselves in any positive changes in OUR favour!’


I am not going to post a reply to the other forum because apart from a couple of Luddites they are all on here anyway, and because it was this forum that put in all the hard work towards the seminars. But on here I am happy to assure you all that we were not in any way gagged by Hillarys, nor are we in any way negative about the likely outcomes – simply that we don’t want to raise false expectations by jumping the gun.

The meetings were very positive, the company are very open to hearing our ideas and our concerns, and were even surprised by some things they were not previously aware of, and they are definitely motivated to address these issues. So what happens next, and when can you expect some results ?

Firsly, as all attending the forums are aware, there were a number of points that were identified as potential ‘quick fixes’ and these are already being expedited at Colwick – even so, nothing could be promised at the seminars because implementation involves people and departments who were not present. The process on these now is to involve the right people and ask the obvious questions – is it do-able, are there any compelling reasons why it can’t or shouldn’t be done, and how soon can we do it – and as a result I am confident that we still start to see some positive results over the coming weeks.

Many of the issues presented at the seminars are meatier subjects involving policy changes, changes in working methods, staff training would be necessary as part of implementation, and perhaps even financial investment required, so these must be viewed as medium to long term. Even on these, however, we would hope to see some undertakings on what can and will be done, and what sort of time scale is required, but not until top management are on board. The next step will be a board meeting this week, at which the management team from the seminars will present our input to the board (two of whom attended Leeds, and one of whom has already gone into writing to all of us), following which the necessary actions will be identified, prioritised, costed, and in due course communicated to us as an action plan.

Things are definitely going to happen but Rome wasn’t built in a day.

[rossk]

Hi everyone,

I have been reading your comments and thought a response was needed. Here goes.

Since the introduction of new advertising messages lead numbers have increased significantly in many counties. During the run into Christmas we thought that some of this may be seasonal, but since our return in the new year lead numbers overall have been at record levels. Not everywhere, but in many places this has led to a reduction in customer service that will continue if more diary availability isn't created.

The first method to achieve this is to ask existing advisors to work more hours and this I know we have been doing through e mail and telephone conversations. However, we do have some genuine vacancies that need to be filled which will not effect the lead levels of existing advisors. If this is the case then our planning is poor and so please let me know so that any unfair situations created can be reversed. You all have my e mail and phone number. 07770 646894. [e-mail].

Before we place an advert your FSM should inform you of their intention. I know that this often isn't the case and this creates unnecessary bad feeling that can usually be avoided. One problem we do have though is that many recruitment sections span more than one paper. We need someone in town a, but the section covers town b and town c. This cannot be helped, but we should tell you when it is likely to happen.

We all want to be part of a growing business and we are. Most advisors I speak to are having their best ever January, but in places we just cannot cope with the numbers. Last week 450 leads could not be placed in a diary at the first attempt due to a lack of availability. Only 15% of these leads ever gets visited. Yes we need more advisors, but lets talk more.

Cheers

Ross Kenney
Regional Manager
07770 646894

[grumperbear]

Thanks Ross, this is the kind of response that we require. Lack of or no information from HO can only lead to agents becoming concerned which in turn lead to a lot of bad feeling. We a present have a them and us culture and there is very little togetherness and team effort, which is what we all want.

[keenasmustard]

hello Ross
nice to hear from you again and I hope you can answer this one then as regards leads.I recently had a meeting with my fsm who asked me what level of earning I needed and how many leads I thought I would need to reach this point.I am full time.
for family commitments etc I felt that at least5 leads a day was appropriate I do have very very good sales figures almost consistently every month. my day is taken up as the following 5 sales calls spread across the day making the remaining slots available for fits/service calls etc.
my working week is as follows Mon to Fri all day, 2 evenings a week and sat am. this doesn't take into account all the extra time I may spend doing admin.
so in reality I'm doing 32 + leads a week total hours approx 55 or so.
my point is that my fsm agrees with me that my figures are excellent and to keep up the good work but in the next breath he said and I quote you could make this amount taking less leads.
as you can imagine this I didn't like and in no uncertain terms told him so.but he still begs to differ and to me he is foolish and wrong to say as much.
you say we have calls that can't be placed I haven't had a full week since before last summer.
In my area we have 4 agents I've 11 years service but the others are quite new so have a bit to learn, these were taken on by a fsm who straight away offered them full time without consulting anybody else when in fact we only wanted 1 par time agent to cover evenings. in other words too many and not enough calls to go round .Fsm's are pron to panicking when they should be consulting.He also tells me that he wants to have a field visit with me,if I was new or not having good results then yes I feel that I would need it,but having had them in the past they never achieve anything his time could be used elsewhere.

[greenpesto]

To expand on this further I'll tell you of my conversation with my FSM.
How much business do you want to do?
Are you fully available?
Are you wanting to increase your business?
etc. etc.
My reply to ALL was in the 'positive' as I am Full-time & have been for 7+ years but with business dropping due to an over recruitment policy in the area.
After an hour of discussion he told me "I'm happy to expect £6000 per month net from you!"
Ends the conversation & leaves 5 minutes later.
As I say ... I am supposed to be full-time & WANT to be full-time AND WANT the business. I have a mortgage to pay & kids to raise & yet he dismisses everything I said in a single sweep.
My performance out performs every one else at the meetings when information is displayed up on the screen & yet this 'moron' couldn't care less that I'm here to earn a living.
I can't survive on this. If he wants to get me out then tell me.
What he will not admit is that I get paid a lot from 'customer care dept' because I'm undoing countless jobs from the other Advisers in my area every week.
I recently got paid £140 in one week for numerous service calls from other Advisers.
These same people let us down week after week. Disappear at a moments notice. Go on calls if they feel like it.
I'm available all the time ( with-in reason ) & yet my FSM won't make proper use of my experience or availability.
What hope is there for me OR Hillarys with this attitude???

[highwayman]

quote author=hereticus board=hillarysfeedback thread=1134853928 post=1138538654] A posting yesterday on the old steam driven forum posed the question :

...........

I am not going to post a reply to the other forum because apart from a couple of Luddites they are all on here anyway, and because it was this forum that put in all the hard work towards the seminars.
[/quote]



What other forum??

There are still plenty of advisors out there that still do not know about this one never mind another forum.

I have told a couple of other advisors about this forum over the past couple of weeks as they knew nothing about it and of course knew nothing about the Reading & Leeds meetings.

[hereticus]

Keenasmustard.......re your post this afternoon (addressed to Ross) - I read your comments with interest, then again in some confusion, and not sure I understand the point you are making.

It seems your FSM has told you that you could achieve the same income from fewer leads - if I have understood this correctly then it also means that you could make more money from the same amount of leads, or lots more money from extra leads - so perhaps your FSM is being positive about your business and trying to help you maximise your potential (but perhaps not making his point in the appropriate manner).

If he is using this argument to justify the fact that you are not busy enough, or to justify new recruitment in your area, then I agree with you that this is negative and unhelpful. However, if he is trying to point out that you could maximise income through higher conversion rates or improved lead effect, then pursue it with him and see where it goes.

You already state that your figures are good, and your pseudonym 'keenasmustard' says it all - I'm just playing devil's advocate to suggest that there are two sides to every story, and different interpretations to every situation. However, I fear that in your situation it probably is a case of overcapacity - too many agents chasing too few leads, undermining your earning potential, so there are really only two options :

- suggest extra leaflet drops, direct mail, etc in your postcodes to create enough leads to go round and/or

- next time one of the local agents terminates, make a strong case that there is sufficient capacity to service the available business without further recruitment.

I've been in your situation a few times over my fourteen years with Hillarys, and even now I seem to be one of those still in a slump with no evidence of the current lead bonanza, so lets both hope that it can only get better.

[russell]

there seems to be alot of inconcistancies regarding fsms at the moment i have a good one judging by the posts of people with the same fsm as i so do they the ones amongst you with the as you say bad ones should in my eyes speak to rossk or craig edwards both i feel would listen to your comments as it seems to me a pattern is emerging if however you feel unable to do so email me and i will take your case onboard anon :-Xand would speak to them on your behalf

[*Star*man*]

The 'other' forum , was formed a few years earlier than this one....



uk.groups.yahoo.com/group/Hillarysagents/

highwayman said:

quote author=hereticus board=hillarysfeedback thread=1134853928 post=1138538654] A posting yesterday on the old steam driven forum posed the question :

...........

I am not going to post a reply to the other forum because apart from a couple of Luddites they are all on here anyway, and because it was this forum that put in all the hard work towards the seminars.

What other forum??

There are still plenty of advisors out there that still do not know about this one never mind another forum.

I have told a couple of other advisors about this forum over the past couple of weeks as they knew nothing about it and of course knew nothing about the Reading & Leeds meetings.[/quote]

[JoY]

Maybe we NEED some new advisors if we have people working for Hillarys going out to customers saying this sort of thing....
_________________________________________
Quote from "Hillarysblindman"
"With the most recent Woood issues - today i walked away from a
£615 potential sale giving the customer the number of 'another '
blind company to use . I could not dare take the order from
such a 'quality' demanding customer . just not worth the hassle .



hillarysblindman"

__________________________________________



Can you believe they would turn down £90 commission??

Must be earning more than me if they did???

Anyone know who this agent is???

[*Star*man*]

£90 commission is great , but i too would not be keen with the following.....

1) the need for D/O/Rs
2) no payment to put the D/O/Rs Right
3) Lost time and fuel in car
4) Claw back of commission when discount given

Sometimes the Advisor must do what he considers best.

BTW , where did that 'post'come from?

jayandemm said:

Maybe we NEED some new advisors if we have people working for Hillarys going out to customers saying this sort of thing....
_________________________________________
Quote from "Hillarysblindman"
"With the most recent Woood issues - today i walked away from a
£615 potential sale giving the customer the number of 'another '
blind company to use . I could not dare take the order from
such a 'quality' demanding customer . just not worth the hassle .



hillarysblindman"

__________________________________________



Can you believe they would turn down £90 commission??

Must be earning more than me if they did???

Anyone know who this agent is???

[russell]

anyone turning sales like this down are mad its a good job youre not in my area i would clean up we all have wood issues but 90 pounds commision for a few hours work ::)what i cannot believe is that you send them to a competitor that is even dafter what must you be thinking at least give it to another advisor

[desmorse]

Understand the frustration of wood vens, and the almost definite DORs, but £615 is the equivalent of
3,1/2 orders of capri @ 2/£175,
or 5,1/2 orders of clouds @ 2/£109,
or even worse - over 6 orders of 3/£99

Think I'd rather do the wood & DORs, overall less time involved