Students of the Sales Competition Team proudly represented Southeast Missouri State University at the 20thAnnual National Collegiate Sales Competition (NCSC) April 3-6 hosted by Kennesaw State University in Kennesaw, Georgia.The NCSC promotes and enhances the practice and professionalism of sales, and is the longest running university sales role-play competition in existence. This is the second year that Southeast students have participated in the team competition event.This years competing team consisted of Kris Groves and Chris Hensen, both of St. Charles, Missouri. Both placed within the middle of their brackets in the first series of sales role-play rounds, placing 56 out of 71 competing teams.Our team did an amazing job representing the University, said Dena Hale, assistant professor of marketing at Southeast. They had very difficult brackets to compete in against universities that have some of the largest and best sales programs in the U.S. and Canada, but they did extremely well. The team is looking forward to continue to grow and participate in more competitions.Kirk Comstock of Sikeston, Missouri; Tori Giesing of Eureka, Missouri; Blake Henson of St. Charles; Shannon Kobal of St. Charles; Austin Marler of Imperial, Missouri; Abbie Pope of Cape Girardeau, Missouri; and Laci Zeidler of Pickneyville, Illinois, served as this years alternates, assisting with competitor practice and preparation.
In addition to the competition, NCSC sponsors hosted a career fair highlighting national career and internship opportunities. Southeast students landed interviews for potential internships and full-time job placement with firms including Herc Rentals Inc., MoHawk Group, Insight Enterprises, AppDynamics, Tom James, Comcast Corporation, Cox Media Group, eMarketer, Sysco Corporation, ProCore Technologies and IBISWorld.The students made a very positive impact, said Hale, who has been contacted by several of this years career fair participants and event sponsors to learn more about the team and sales program at Southeast.The Southeast Sales Competition Team is currently preparing for the International Collegiate Sales Competition Nov. 7-10 in Orlando, Florida, and hosted by Florida State University.As part of its commitment to experiential learning, the Department of Management and Marketing in the Harrison College of Business has sponsored the Southeast Sales Competition Team since its start in Spring 2017. The team is a special interest group within the Southeast Collegiate DECA student organization.