Maruti drives managers to B-schools for training

Maruti Suzuki, the country’s largest carmaker, has launched an exercise to train managers from its dealerships at business schools such as Gurgaon’s Management Development Institute (MDI) and Ghaziabad’s Institute of Management Technology (IMT). More than 500 managers have been trained at these institutes so far.

The carmaker has designed a three- day residential course for managers. The training will cost around ~7,000 per head. The company and dealerships share the cost in a ratio of 70:30.

“Great products and features need to be supplemented with customer experience at dealerships.

The teams at dealerships should be able to deliver customer experience as well as sales volumes. The objective of the training is to build competency,” said RS Kalsi, senior executive director, sales and marketing, Maruti Suzuki.

The company has a network of over 2,500 sales outlets.

The automaker aims to train around 1,000 showroom managers in the next financial year. A number of managers had been in the profession since 10-20 years and their presentation and people management skills needed enhancement, Kalsi said.

“Our customers are evolving and quite savvy. They need to be dealt with in a highly professional manner,” he added.

Maruti sells over 1.6 million cars a year and has a share of over 50 per cent in the world’s fifth-largest car market. Showroom managers are being trained in strategy, sales management, customer experience management, team management and the use of data for decision making.