Meet Virtanza: Three Sales Pros Share Insights
We recently conducted a Meet the Team survey and we’re ready to start sharing with you the interests and insights from some of the amazing people at Virtanza! We are kicking off with three key team members, including our Founder and CEO, Debbie Holzkamp. Debbie has held many sales leadership positions before launching Virtanza, and she’s put her valuable experiences to work in shaping Virtanza’s business model and Professional Sales training courses.
We’ll also hear from Jim Hynes. Jim is Head of Instruction and a Certified Instructor who has been committed to the Virtanza mission of training sales professionals for many years. He previously held positions in Marketing, Product Management, Sales Management, Sales Operations, and entrepreneurial roles. Bringing years of unique experience to the classroom, Jim offers our students a great resource to learn from and model in their sales career journeys.
Bernice Burns is Virtanza’s Director of Client Success and a Certified Instructor. She started her career in sales right out of college and has been working with Virtanza for six years. She previously worked with publishing/information/media companies before finding her way to Virtanza. Let’s learn more about all three team members.
We asked our employees, what do you enjoy about the work you do?
For this question, Debbie expressed that she is passionate about her mission to encourage learning fundamental sales skills. “More than anything”, says Debbie, “I enjoy seeing people succeed in work and life.”
That’s what Virtanza is all about, after all. We help people uncover things they enjoy about sales and paving the way to the perfect sales job for them to succeed.
In her role at Virtanza, Bernice loves that she’s able to combine her passions with her sales background.
Sales as a vocation is vastly underrated and under-respected!
A career in sales has afforded her -- and her parents before her -- the opportunity to learn about a myriad of different businesses, consult with powerful and diverse business leaders to solve their business challenge, travel, and learn about different business cultures.
The most enjoyable part of Jim’s job is developing people and helping them learn how to put information into action. In the Professional Sales virtual classroom, he builds connections with students and uses his stories and experiences to demonstrate effective sales strategies.
What are the values that drive you?
Debbie is driven by honesty, integrity, perseverance, grace, and a genuine love for people. Bernice’s values are integrity, work ethic, and humor. “We are all in this together, no matter what it is. Let's respect each other and have some fun!” she says. Jim said his guiding principles are teamwork, collaboration, and adding value wherever and whenever you can.
What piece of advice would you give to people taking the Virtanza sales course?
Debbie emphasized that it’s important to go through the entire program and give your best effort to every part of it. If a student perseveres to the finish, good things will happen as a result of focus and hard work!
Bernice explains it is key to make the most of the role plays. It may be intimidating at first but the more you put into it, the faster it becomes a skill. Practice makes perfect!
“Use this program not only to propel your career in sales but also put these processes and techniques to use as life skills that go beyond your sales career!” says Jim.