Well, hello everyone and thank you all so much for tuning into
it yet another episode of the Professional Pricing Society
podcast. My name is Terrence and we have
an amazing guest with us today. We have Mr. Scott Sinning who is
actually one of our speakers at our latest conference back in
Dallas, TX, our spring conference who did a phenomenal
job by the way, Scott's going to be here with us today to shed
light on the pricing world, the pricing industry and topics that
is in my personal opinion, well worth.
The listen, OK. So we're going to go ahead and
just jump right into it. Scott.
Scott, how you doing today? First and foremost how you.
Doing doing great. Thank you Terrence.
Appreciate being here with you. Good.
So I want to just go and dive into this conversation.
You know, I want to ask this first question.
How did you first initially get into pricing and share a few
highlights from your, you know, your journey, your experience?
Yeah, sure thing, Terrence. Well, I got into pricing
unexpectedly, I was. In a finance leadership role in
our business and got a call one day from our CEO asking me if
I'd take on a role as an executive leader for our pricing
team. And at that time it was a fairly
new pricing project and I didn't know what to expect.
So I approached the role with a little bit of background in in
in finance and sales, in the business, customer facing roles,
technology. So I think that's why they
thought I'd be a good fit for this, but I was basically
volunteered into the job. And and I think you know that's
a lot, a lot of pricing leaders are like that.
Very few of us have the benefit of a formal education around
pricing or the experience in pricing roles.
And a lot of times it's because folks are good at analytics, are
good at something, something around sales and operations and
they're asked to take on a special project and.
A lot of times fall in love with the role of a pricing leader.
So that's a little bit about my story.
And hopefully that resonates with a lot of the listeners
today of people who got into roles unexpectedly but fell in
love with it once they're there. Sure, sure.
And I would also add that there's a lot of people who may
have stumbled into. The pricing industry or may have
been asked to take on a project just like very similar to your
situation. So you're, I can say you're
definitely not alone and you already know that as well.
But there's a lot of people in pricing who that wasn't their
initial goal or intent. But hey, what were some of the
lessons you learned that you might want to pass along about
how to lead a pricing project to success?
Yeah. Thanks Terrance.
That's great question and you know a lot, a lot of.
What I work on now is based on my prior experience and based on
the passion I have for helping other people learn about the
role of a pricing leader faster so they can get better results
more quickly for their organization and maybe take
learn from some of the lessons I had along the way.
So my goal is to empower and enable people who are pricing
leadership roles to do a better job faster for their
organization. As well As for their own
personal career success. I really feel like pricing can
be a a stepping stone in a professional career because it
heck if you can do pricing you can you can figure out anything
right the and and or it's a career path that you can stay in
for a long time. So that's my goal is to pass
along those those lessons learned and and and also to
challenge people who are. In a role like this to to lean
into their leadership skills, to really lean into their
capabilities to influence and impact their organization and to
realize that they're in a job that requires the ability to
drive positive change. So it's more than being good
with numbers. It's more than being good as an
analyst. It's more than being good with
other sort of things around pricing.
The role of pricing leader is to take that.
As as well as then use your influence to drive positive
change in your company. Because if your company's
counting on you to do that and nobody else is probably going to
step up and do the things that you're uniquely capable to do in
the role you have. So that's what I'm hoping to
pass along in terms of lessons learned, Terrence.
That's good. That's good.
Now giving a couple of different examples of what that means, you
kind of. Keys that knowing your role and
and knowing your goal, what exactly how you know.
Expand upon that a little bit more for me.
Sure thing. Well, you know as we were
talking about, since a lot of people come into the pricing
leader role, maybe with a blank sheet of paper as their job
description, others will come in maybe with some goals or some
some problems that are being solved for.
But I think in a lot of cases the the person has the
opportunity to define what that role is.
And to help educate their executives on what it means for
their organization. So the idea of of the role is
you know what's the key job to be done, which has to do I think
with the where your company, your organization is at and it's
pricing journey, it's a new initiative that's the first time
it's really ever been done. Are you for example, inheriting
a role that somebody else has left and now you're picking up
where they that project that's already in in progress.
Or are you leading A-Team that's already fairly sophisticated and
established and your your role is to take it to the next level.
So part of it's just sort of an honest assessment of where you
stand as as a leader, what your capabilities are, where your
strengths are and matching that with what the organization
really needs most right now. And and that could be around
strategy, could be around building an apartment, it could
be around finding tools or technology for analytics.
Like pricing software, for example.
And and it could be, you know, driving some specific results
around customer experience. So it really depends on the
company you're working for, what that role looks like.
But I would encourage listeners to be as proactive to define
what that role is for yourself and for your organization as as
you can, because in all likelihood that's what your
company needs from you since they're not going to hand you
the job description on a silver platter.
Sure, sure, absolutely. And that makes perfect sense as
well. You know, when it comes to
knowing your role, especially within a pricing realm as a
pricer, a lot of people might think that they have to do a lot
of things on their own or or Spear had a lot of initiatives
by themselves. But can you talk a bit about how
a pricing project is very much a team effort?
Most definitely. And that's a great point you
raised, is that we all come into a role with our our strengths
and capabilities. And as you mentioned, pricing
does touch so many parts of the organization functionally from
sales to operations finance and the list goes on really across
your organization. But it also has to do with a lot
of things like and and I listen, listen to some of your recent
podcast, Terence and I would encourage our listeners to if
they have not caught those, go back and listen because they're
great. But you talked about, you've had
guests on to talk about the importance of how to manage a
price increase well. How to think about a I thinking
about the your product as a service or SESS applications or
subscriptions. There's just so much to do as a
pricer. In today's age, it's probably
harder than harder than it's ever been.
You can only be good at so much yourself.
So it's important to surround yourself with other people that
bring in the insights and knowledge and and experience
that you need to round out what you're looking for.
So. Like you said, great point.
You can't be, you can't be everything.
You can't be the superstar of all aspects of pricing, but be
good with your dad, recognize where you need help and find
that either internally or externally.
One of the things that I'd share is around the team effort.
Question is that often times we're coming into a role as an
army of one or maybe you have a small team, but most of the time
pricing departments are relatively small.
And and that's probably not going to change for most
organizations. But the good news is think about
building a team as not just the people that work for you or have
a direct reporting relationship, but broaden broaden your your
your vision towards getting a more diverse set of people.
In your ear. And what I mean by that is when
you're building a team, you want to be thinking about talking to
all the functional leaders in your organization, sales leader,
OPS, even HR and legal, certainly CFO, Certainly
whoever's running IT, you want them to be aware of what you're
doing, why you're doing it and where you need their help.
And you want to use that as a chance to ask them the question,
hey, how can ask them if they have any particular priorities
or concerns? That you should build into your
pricing project. The next question to ask once
you get their feedback is to say, hey, would it be possible
to borrow one of your staff for a period of time to help us
build this project out? And So what I found successful
in my experience was by tapping into the resources and other
departments I got #1 very capable resources.
That I wouldn't have been able to get on my own #2I.
I've started to embed Champions into this project so that it's
not just a pricing project, it's a organizational initiative that
that cuts across functions. And you know, when you think
about building champions, you're also established in a connection
of support to your your executive sponsors perhaps.
So that you made it the the people that represent those
departments on your project team.
And maybe you call it an Advisory Council or project
team, whatever wording works for you.
But now you've established a communication with their
different leaders in your organization through their
representative on the project team that helps them stay
engaged and informed and supportive ultimately of rolling
out a successful project. So that's what I think about
when I think about team building.
It's not only your direct team, it's the organization's team
that you can build sort of as a temporary.
Resource. And one last thing, Terrence, I
just bring up is there's a whole community of people out there in
the pricing industry that are there to help and the
Professional Pricing Society is a great organization for that.
So the folks who are in a pricing leader job and they're
thinking, boy, I feel like I'm on an island, I feel like I'm by
myself. Start thinking about your team
more broadly to other pricing professionals who are out there
in the marketplace. Who have shared experiences are
more than happy to be a resource and to be a networking partner.
Not to mention the number of vendors, whether it's software
providers, consultants, and other folks that work to support
pricing leaders. So it's important to know that
you don't have to do it on your own.
It's tempting to try to have all the answers, but don't try to do
that. Be be willing to tell, tell
folks when you're not sure, and you'll get back to them.
As well as tap the different experts that are in your midst
to make sure their voices are heard, as well as to get ideas
that you wouldn't be able to come up with on your own.
Hey, look that's all golden information is how I would
phrase that. You know, a lot of things you
said is very important, very crucial to the success of not
only an individual in their pricing role, but also a company
in their pricing organization. That's helping that company to
thrive. And so you also mentioned you
know networking reaching out to your your peers if you will in
the price industry coming to conferences just like you came
to our Dallas conference recently.
You know that's where that's also a place where a lot of
people can just come to not only learn but also network with
other professionals in different states or even countries to
enhance their pricing organization as well.
So I'm really glad you made mention of that networking
aspect because it really is a lot of these companies do have
very small pricing teams. If I could just add real quick
on that way I I I believe strongly in the networking
aspect in, in particular professional pricing society.
The reason is it wasn't that long ago that I attended my
first conference and I remember sitting in the back of the room,
you had scribbling notes out furiously listening to these
people and thinking, Oh my gosh, two things.
One, what did I get myself into? This is way over my head.
On the other hand though, I learned, wow, this is the place
to be. Because learning from the people
who've been there, done that, sitting with other people who
are in the same seat, different spaces of their pricing career
has been invaluable. And now here I am talking to you
on a PPS podcast and it wasn't that long ago I was just
starting out. So again, for those listening
who might be in a similar spot, really lean into the PPS as a
networking. And educational resource.
Also, Scott, I would like to consider you as an expert on
this podcast speaking with me, so I'm very glad to have you
with us today. Thank you, Terence.
Now one more question I want to ask you as well before I switch
gears. How would you typically measure
progress and why is it important to measure progress when it
comes to pricing within the organization?
Yeah. So the part of the part.
The importance of measuring progress is because you want to
be able to know that you're making, you're reaching a new
goal. So I'm going to step back from
the measurement for a quick second and say why it's
important to set a goal. It's important to set a goal for
your pricing project because you're going to encounter
resistance, you're going to encounter distractions, you're
going to and detractors. So the reason you want to have a
goal and really and when I say a goal it's a a a big why, what is
the why to improve pricing for your organization.
Often times this might be expressed in a business case
that talks about things like hey we want to grow revenue or we
want to improve our margin rates or we want to improve the
customer experience. It's it's important to be
thinking about how to make your customer experience.
Easier and faster to do business with your company.
You also want to be thinking about how pricing can be used to
make your your fellow employees jobs easier.
How can you make it faster to give prices to customers?
How can you improve your win rate?
So by having a business case that includes your goals around
revenue, margin, other other analytics like customer
experience and even tactical measures like gross margin rate.
Something that's measurable at a business unit level, at a
customer level, at a geographic level, it gives you some sense
of how you're going to measure it and IT And it also really you
think think about that business case as something that either
you're going to inherit as business leader or you're going
to have the opportunity to make it.
And when you want to build that case, it's really something that
you and your executive team and and the CEO can say, yes, this
is a priority of the organization.
Here's why it's important and here's why we're going to
support it and that becomes like the north star of your of your
journey. So that there's going to be a
lot, as we were talking about a pricing project tends to to go
and not a straight line. It zigzags, there's successes,
there's failures, there's wins and there's losses.
And what you want to make sure you're doing as a pricing
leaders, keep the company on course.
It'll be easy to get distracted or to have people who are.
Don't want to change or don't like it or disagree with it to
use it. Use an opportunity where there's
a a temporary setback to make a case for canceling the project
or doing something totally different.
So by having a good business case, you've established that
North Star that executives can stay on the same page with you
and you can communicate consistently that, yes, here
we're starting from point A, but we're going to go to point B and
here's why and here's how we're going to do it.
And you're going to help insulate yourself and your team
from the setbacks by being able to stay focused on the goal.
So having the big goal is key, but then thinking about how
you're going to measure that along the way is key.
And particularly Terrance, I would say measure the quick wins
and celebrate the heck out of them.
So every price of projects, you know it's a shortterm, longterm
deal, but be looking for quick wins, things that you can do
really for free. With your own decision, making
your own changes, and just getting ideas from the people
that you put on your advisory team, you're going to identify
things that can be done quickly, at low cost, and have great
results for your organization. Be sure to pause for a moment,
celebrate those, recognize the people involved, share the
credit, make a big deal out of it because it is a big deal and
it also plants the seed for positive momentum on the
project. So this will be a couple ideas
that share with you about the importance of measuring and
having goals. That is so important.
I want to thank you so much for sharing that with us because it
is important and it matters, you know And if there's any type of
way that companies can learn to become more efficient at
measuring their their progress, setting goals and measuring the
goals and becoming efficient in in that as well as celebrating
the small things, you know, it's all gonna make a huge difference
as time progresses within our organization in particular.
Now I wanted to switch gears and ask you this question.
I just happen to know that you are A/C, PP certified pricing
professional and I want to ask you for those who are not CPP's
or maybe on the fence about, you know, pursuing that path or not,
what would you say to those individuals?
Tell us a bit about your particular journey and what it's
what it's done for you since you've become certified?
Terrence, for me this CPP designation was important
because it gave me the confidence and capability to
grow as a pricing leader and serve my organization the best
of my ability by learning some of the best practices from the
thought leaders worldwide that teach the course through PPS.
So I would highly recommend that to people that are listening who
have not explored joining the PPS or.
CPP for yourself or for members of your team, it will be an
invaluable step in your pricing journey.
For anybody listening, that's not in the pricing role
themselves, that might be a senior leader or a CEO of a
company. When you think about your
pricing team or the individuals you're going to name to a
pricing role, think about how you're going to support them.
And so you might not be sure what resources to plug them
into, but as we were talking about here, one of the places
you might think about. Is joining the professional
pricing society encouraging your pricing leader?
Maybe they're new to the role, maybe they've got some
experience, but if you feel they've got some professional
development opportunity ahead of them to grow into the role that
you want, turn them on to the PPS and encourage the CPP
designation, That will be a huge win for your organization.
Well, thank you so much, Scott. I really do appreciate you
sharing that wisdom with us. You know, it does mean a lot
because. You know somebody of your status
in the pricing room, you know a heavy hitter if you will, and
A/C, PP, it means it means a lot coming from you to hear about
your journey, how you've navigated and progressed over
the years and also just you know, your journey with PPS as
well. So I greatly appreciate your
time with us today. Now for those who may want to
learn more about you, how you are involved in the pricing
community, where can they go to reach out to you or just to
learn more about you in general. Yeah, there's 22 easy ways to to
reach out to me. One is on LinkedIn.
Just look up Scott Sinning and feel free to send me a
connection request or a direct message.
I'd love to love to get connected with other fellow
pricing leaders. Another way to reach me,
Terrence, is through my website, which is pricing for
distributors.com. I do put the free content on the
website as well as connections to blogs and a newsletter that
has. Topics of interest and and
current topics for pricing professionals.
So I do offer a complimentary initial call and I would love to
speak to anybody that wants to go into more detail about
pricing challenges and and bounce them off each other.
I'd be happy to do that. OK, Mr. Scott sinning again.
Until next time, we will see you all on the next PPS podcast.
You guys have a good one. Bye, bye.