PAN (Planned Action Management) Simulation of a District Sales Territory

Abstract

A large distributor of automotive and industrial repair parts determined the need to train its current and prospective district sales managers in the short and long term business consequences of their decision making. A microcomputer-based simulation, pan, was developed to facilitate this. Because of the specific developmental objective of the simulation, face validity was considered critical to its success and was a guiding factor in its development. This paper provides an overview of the development and testing of pam and the simulation itself is described in some detail. The resulting simulation is of generic value in developing sales managers and of specific value within the host company because of its face validity.