The future of KAM

23rd April 2017 |   Dr Beth Rogers and Professor Malcolm McDonald

Professor Malcolm McDonald and Dr Beth Rogers look back on two decades of key account management and consider where it can go from here.

The future of KAM

In 1998, Malcolm McDonald and Beth Rogers wrote a small book called Key Account Management: Learning from Supplier and Customer Perspectives. It was based on their research at Cranfield School of Management about the then relatively new discipline of key account management. The research had been dyadic: that is, matching suppliers and customers were interviewed in depth about the nuances of key account management – how suppliers tried to develop it strategically and operationally, and how customers rated their success versus competitors.

Recently, they have written a new book on KAM (see details below). In the last chapter, where they explore current views on the future of key account management with a number of eminent sales managers, they also cast their minds back to 1998 when a similar chapter was written. How much did they predict correctly, and where did they go wrong? In this conversation, they reflect on the past 20 years of key account management and where it goes from here.

Dr Beth Rogers

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Dr Beth Rogers has recently retired as Head of the Marketing and Sales Subject Group at Portsmouth Business School, She is also the author of Rethinking Sales Management. Before taking on an academic role, she had a career in sales and marketing in the information technology and professional services sectors. She is known as a pioneer of sales education from her work on key account management at Cranfield School of Management in the 1990s. Beth was elected chair of the UK National Sales Board from 2005-2009, which launched National Occupational Standards for the sales profession. She has taught account management and sales management in a variety of companies and countries, and has also contributed to the academic literature, trade magazines and The Times on sales topics.

Professor Malcolm McDonald

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Professor Malcolm McDonald is an Emeritus Professor at Cranfield and a Visiting Professor at Henley, Warwick, Aston and Bradford Business Schools.