- AKAM
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Past Events
Our popular workshop format offers KAM topic-focused presentations by experienced practitioners and KAM experts, followed by group discussions on interesting questions and challenges. Everyone present can share their experiences and benefit from those of others.
'AKAM Technical' workshops are half-day intensive, smaller-group learning sessions at which an expert workshop leader shares specific techniques with practitioners.
Our annual conferences have a more traditional conference presentation format, and therefore more speakers.
Meetings are held in a different location each time as far as possible, so that AKAM can reach as many people around Europe as we can. Presentations and, where possible, discussion outputs are uploaded afterwards to the Member Resources area of the website.
FRIDAY 13th May, 2022 - Members Only
11:15am-12:15pm GMT/12:15-1:15pm CET
Information sharing in KAM Teams
Professor Christine Lai
FRIDAY 8TH April, 2022 - OPEN TO ALL
11:15am-12:15pm GMT/12:15-1:15pm CET
Key Account Managers – Behaving as leaders?
Alistair Thursfield
FRIDAY 4TH FEBRUARY, 2022 - OPEN TO ALL
11:15am-12:15pm GMT/12:15-1:15pm CET
Developing KAM structures: removing roadblocks and bottlenecks
Dominykas Cibulskas
FRIDAY 14TH JANUARY, 2022 - MEMBERS ONLY
11:15am-12:15pm GMT/12:15-1:15pm CET
Sustainability and Ethics in KAM
Jakob Rehme
FRIDAY 3RD DECEMBER, 2021 - OPEN TO ALL
Engaging top management
Geoff Quinn | Pfizer
KAM is a corporate strategy, so obviously involvement of Top Management is essential.
But does your organisation really have it?
FRIDAY 12TH NOVEMBER, 2021 - MEMBERS ONLY
Integrating functions through KAM
Simon Templar | Cranfield School of Management
This short session will explore your role as the manager of the relationship between your organisation and your key account. However, I would argue that you are creators of demand for your business and value for your key accounts
FRIDAY 22ND OCTOBER, 2021 - OPEN TO ALL
What do Key Accounts really value?
Paul Wilson, Independent Consultant
FRIDAY 1ST OCTOBER, 2021 - MEMBERS ONLY
Leadership in Global Account Management
Sylvie Lacoste, Professor, Excelia Business School
Professor Sylvie Lacoste shared her latest research on leadership in GAM and what it means for global account managers who work in necessarily matrix structures but superimposed on vertically-led organisations.
FRIDAY 10TH SEPTEMBER, 2021 - OPEN TO ALL
Customer Driven Business Development
Michael Widing | Experify Group
Increase your relevance by letting your customers show you how to develop your company. Relevance is not only about offering the right products and services but also about challenging existing ways of working and adapting business models and internal processes. The effect will be increased loyalty which means more, and recurring, business for you.
FRIDAY 9TH JULY 2021 - WEBINAR MEMBERS ONLY
Strategic partner conversations: from supplier-customer to partnership
Dr Régis Lemmens, Salescubes
FRIDAY 18TH JUNE 2021 - WEBINAR MEMBERS ONLY
Vested relational contracts
David Frydlinger, attorney and managing partner at Cirio
Vested is a sourcing business model used by organisations such as Dell, BP, Johnson & Johnson and Procter & Gamble to build long-term partnerships with strategic suppliers based on a What’s In It For We?-mindset. The vested model is based on research at the University of Tennessee on successful partnership across a number of industries. The approach meets the growing global need to build long-term and flexible partnerships with a strong focus on achieving strategic business objectives.
FRIDAY 28TH MAY 2021 - WEBINAR OPEN TO ALL
Does KAM have a dark side?
Dr Nima Heirati, Associate Professor of Marketing, Surrey Business School, University of Surrey
Yumeng Zhang, Research Assistant at the School of Business and Management, Queen Mary University of London, UK
AKAM hosted a zoom webinar on Does KAM have a dark side? Are close business relationships always synonymous with superior performance? Does the dark side of a business relationship spread in relationship portfolios? Dr Nima Heirati, Associate Professor of Marketing, Surrey Business School, the University of Surrey and Yumeng Zhang, Research Assistant, explained their research findings.
FRIDAY 7TH MAY 2021 - MEMBERS ONLY
Buyology: The art and science of putting the buyer first
Armond Mertikian, Amber Professional Development
In the relationship between executive buyers and providers of complex services, trust is a function of understanding and responding to the buyer’s emotional and rational needs. In order to “step into the buyer’s shoes”, providers must be prepared to take off their own shoes - and they should not always expect a perfect fit. This webinar introduced the concept of “Buyology” – the art and science of putting the buyer first.
FRIDAY 16TH APRIL 2021 - MEMBERS ONLY
Why KAM fails - and how to rescue it
Cedric Roesler, Xseed & Ylera
Some companies are disappointed with the outcomes of their KAM programmes. And yet what should be a major strategic initiative has been downgraded to ‘just another management technique’ – a ‘nice-to-have’ rather than a ‘must-be’. This webinar identified 4 causes of failure to be anticipated and and 4 recipes for avoiding them.
FRIDAY 19TH MARCH, 2021 - PROGRAMME MEMBERS ONLY
Creating and enabling cross-functional KAM teams
Programme Directors Forum
Participation in the Programme Directors’ Forum is limited to two preselected representatives of organisations with full Corporate or Programme Membership of AKAM. These discussions are confidential to members, we are sorry we are unable to share them.
Cross-functional KAM teams themselves spread the KAM approach through the company and help hugely in securing the resources need to fulfil KAM commitments made to key customers and, indeed, are a fundamental element in KAM. If they don’t exist, probably KAM doesn’t either, it’s a fiction. But how do you get them going and ensure their success? Are function managers blocking the programme? Do team members want to participate?
FRIDAY 12TH MARCH 2021 - WEBINAR OPEN TO ALL
Key Account Journey Mapping
Dennis Chapman, The Chapman Group
Dennis Chapman's webinar tackled what has been one of the most difficult tasks within the strategic account management profession, i.e. engaging a complicated and always changing complex Account. This workshop covered how to navigate and engage your key customer and effectively engage your cross-functional team to address all critical relationship touchpoints, including core relationship measurements and metrics.
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FRIDAY 29TH JANUARY 2021 - WEBINAR OPEN TO ALL
How to get a Diploma in KAM
Diana Woodburn, AKAM Chair
How do you gain a Diploma in Key Account Management? Until then skilled Key Account Managers with solid experience haven't had any objective way to demonstrate their competency to current or potential employers. This webinar describes the process by which experienced Key Account Managers can achieve validation of their quality.
FRIDAY 22ND JANUARY, 2021 - PROGRAMME MEMBERS ONLY
Programme Directors Forum
Grading and remunerating key account managers, shifting perceptions from KAM as a Sales role
Participation in the Programme Directors’ Forum is limited to two preselected representatives of organisations with full Corporate or Programme Membership of AKAM. These discussions are confidential to members, we are sorry we are unable to share them.
Patterns of remuneration for sales roles are well established and hard to shift, but also mismatched, even destructive of KAM. But you won’t get the quality you need in your key account managers if you don’t reward this challenging job in the right way and the right level and create career path for them.
FRIDAY 18TH DECEMBER, 2020 - WEBINAR OPEN TO ALL
What can KAM and HR Management share about informal influencing?
Dr Mantas Tvarionavicius, Geoff Quinn, Ramūnas Bagdonas
This webinar offers the combined experience of Dr Mantas Tvarionavicius, Board Member of Lithuania’s association of HR professionals (PVPA) and Geoff Quinn, Director of KAM Centre of Excellence for Pfizer Global, with moderator Ramūnas Bagdonas is People and Engagement Head for Telia Lithuania, Telia Company group, a leading Telco and IT provider.
FRIDAY 27TH NOVEMBER 2020 - WEBINAR MEMBERS ONLY
Virtual Meetings: how to promote effective business relationships with key customers
Cristina Mariani, Alinea Consulting
Over the last few months, everyone has been thrown into meeting customers via Zoom etc. Most of us would rather be seeing customers face-to-face but, even when we return to the ‘new normal’, face-to-face visits are likely to be severely curtailed. Both supplier and customer companies see opportunities to save money and be more efficient by blending visits with virtual meetings. And for the foreseeable future, most meetings will be online.
In this webinar, Cristina Mariani will help you learn how to ensure you get meeting participants attention and keep their engagement. This new skill will be crucial in the coming years, as well as the next few months.
FRIDAY 20TH NOVEMBER 2020 - PROGRAMME MEMBERS ONLY
(Re)creating a sense of excitement in KAM, in the organisation and the team
Programme Directors Forum
Participation in the Programme Directors’ Forum is limited to two preselected representatives of organisations with full Corporate or Programme Membership of AKAM. These discussions are confidential to members, we are sorry we are unable to share them.
It’s not easy to keep going after the first rush of enthusiasm, but critical because it’s still likely that KAM isn’t sufficiently embedded in the organisation to guarantee its continued existence – all too often there are counterproductive forces and initiatives that can undo all the good work. How can KAM programmes be revitalised?
FRIDAY 6TH NOVEMBER 2020 - WEBINAR OPEN TO ALL
What is Key when searching for the perfect Key Account Manager?
Gintarė Bėtaitė, Amrop
Gintare’s session at our meeting in Vilnius ‘Key account managers ahead of the game – who are they?’ was very popular and now it’s more important than ever to know what businesses want in a key account manager. With turbulent times for business ahead, some companies have terminated their KAM initiatives and made all their key account managers redundant. This webinar was invaluable for those who might need to look for a new position.
FRIDAY 16TH OCTOBER 2020 - WEBINAR - MEMBERS ONLY
Sharing customer knowledge - a total organisational approach
Jeremy Campbell & Steve Dolan, EMCOR UK
Sharing customer knowledge described EMCOR’s story, exploring the highs and the lows, as the company's KAM programme leaders shared their practical experience of implementing KAM over the last 15 years. EMCOR has developed KAM to an exceptional level so the organisation has a really pervasive - and enviable - KAM ethos.
FRIDAY 25TH SEPTEMBER 2020 - WEBINAR - MEMBERS ONLY
Enhancing KAM through collaboration
David Hawkins, Chief Operating Officer, Institute for Collaborative Working (ICW)
Collaborative partnerships are often stated as a goal in KAM, but how are they achieved? How do they actually work? It's ICW's mission to explain and educate: they have even developed an ISO for collaboration. So in this webinar David Hawkins was able to provide a wealth of invaluable tools and frameworks to underpin the desire to genuinely practice collaboration.
FRIDAY 18TH SEPTEMBER 2020
Exploring the relationship of KAM with Sales and Marketing
Programme Directors Forum
Participation in the Programme Directors’ Forum is limited to two preselected representatives of organisations with full Corporate or Programme Membership of AKAM. These discussions are confidential to members, we are sorry we are unable to share them.
The relationship and organisation of KAM with Sales and Marketing Departments and how they should work together is a thorny issue in many organisations. KAM requires all those skills and more, so the question is why and what can be done about it. Part of the problem is a lack of understanding of KAM, but traditional structures and power bases also hinders KAM optimisation.
FRIDAY 4TH SEPTEMBER 2020 - Members only WEBINAR
Leading in a virtual workspace
Colin Hughes, Head of Graduate Business School, TU Dublin
Trust has long been recognised as an important ingredient of effective leadership - its centrality to a range of leadership theories has been well documented over 50+ years. But the nature of leadership has changed dramatically in recent decades. Key account managers often need to work with regional teams of salespeople as well as Head Office cross-functional teams, so the emergence of virtual working is already a reality for KAM leaders.
Strategic key account plans in practice
Friday 3rd July 2020
12:15 - 12:50pm CET/11:15 - 11:50am BST
The quality – even the existence – of strategic key account plans is patchy even in some of the most forward-looking organisations. Why is that? After all, these are the principal instruments through which key account managers secure the resources they need from their own organisation and the commitment to future business from the customer.
In this half-hour webinar Geoff Quinn of Pfizer Global will share his thoughts and experience on the barriers to good strategic account planning and how to overcome them. Plus how to produce better plans and gain for them the attention they require.
Guest speakers: Geoff Quinn and Diana Woodburn
7 Covid-driven supplier risks your customer didn't plan for - Why KAMs need to know
Thursday 25th June 2020
12:15 - 12:50pm CET/11:15 - 11:50am BST
The COVID-19 outbreak is causing the biggest disruption in decades to economies and businesses across the world. State of Flux 12 years of global annual research into supplier management best practices shows that most organisations are significantly exposed when it comes to supplier risk management, specifically pandemic risks.
Guest speaker: John Newton
Valued-based Pricing 5020
Friday 5th June 2020 - First Friday members webinar
12:15 - 12:50pm CET/11:15 - 11:50am BST
Price can often be the first casualty as companies compete in markets shrinking due to COVID19. But now, more than ever, it is essential to compete on value and not just on price. Join this 30 min webinar with Richard Ilsley and Kedar Ghapure to explore different pricing strategies and the relative impact on EBIT of price and volume increase, plus a case study on the impact of a price based approach.
What is the value of trust in Key Account relationships?
Friday 15th May 2020 - Third Friday members webinar
12:15 - 12:50pm CET/11:15 - 11:50am BST
Is trust itself valuable? What should you do to be trusted and learn to trust others? Is a relationship even possible without trust? What is the difference between relationships with and without trust? Join the webinar to find some logic you can use in your own KAM role.
Programme Directors Forum
Thursday 14th May 2020 - Programme members only
11:00am - 13:00pm CET/10:00am BST
This first Programme Directors Forum will focus on how to get senior management ‘on board’ with the KAM programme. AKAM Board Members Dr Diana Woodburn, Richard Ilsley and Mike Green will input short key insights from their research and practical experience for members to interrogate and challenge.
KAM in the Coronacrisis
Friday 24th April 2020 - Webinar - Non-members welcome
12.15-12.50pm CET/ 11.15-11.50am BST
Join us for our KAM in the Coronavirus webinar to learn from the experience of frontline practitioners Dominykas Cibulskas (SIA ZB) and Nicola Boni (Bonfiglioli) from the Baltics and Italy, hit first and hardest in Europe. Non-members welcome.
3rd Annual Conference on all KAM topics
Wednesday 4th March, 2020, Berlin, @ Pfizer Head Office Berlin
85% of booked delegates attended in spite of coronavirus concerns and travel bans, and heard speakers on a challenging and valuable range of topics in KAM, from practitioners, academics and consultants sharing their multi-company experience. Speakers from Fujitsu, Namics, Brightbridge, Business Improvement & Growth, Yleracare and AKAM addressed key account team effectiveness, KAM programme failure, ABM, value creation and value propositions, case studies in telecomms and engineering, and bipolar KAM - what happens when companies haven't decided what KAM really means and how to execute it. Delegates challenged speakers, networked together and picked up new ideas and new resolve!
AKAM Technical: Technology in KAM
Tuesday 3rd March 2020, Berlin @ Pfizer Head Office Berlin
This workshop explored key technologies and practices that help acquire, manage and develop top/key accounts. Dr Olivier Rivière illustrated the principles with real-life examples and offered guidelines and advice as take-aways. The workshop benefited both Key Account Directors with direct influence on selecting technology for KAM programmes, and Key Account Managers who wanted to know how to get the most out of what is already there, or lobby for technical support that would really make a difference.
Account Based Marketing in KAM: How does it work?
Friday, 24th January 2020, Members Webinar
Mike Green and Kate Owen of Capita held a fascinating webinar on Friday 24th January 2020 for AKAM members, discussing whether ABM is just a cosmetic make-over of B2B marketing, how ABM works with KAM, what KAM need to know about ABM, and how KAM and ABM marketers should work together. Kate explained how KAM should be making use of ABM with their customers, and exploring the full picture to ensure all parties work together in synergy to create a hyper-personalised approach.
Value in Key Account Management: What does it mean?
Wednesday, 6th November 2019, at Campo de las Naciones, Madrid
Dr Antonella La Rocca, Associate Professor at Rennes School of Business addressed Value Solutions and Key Account Management; while Carlos Ferrer, Sales Director, BT Global, introduced KAM matrix: Pills for creating value in Key Account Management before leading a group discussion. Dr Diana Woodburn, AKAM Chairman, described the vision for AKAM 2019/20 before Laura Gonzalez Pariente, Key Account Director, Johnson & Johnson Vision provided insight into Key Account Fundamentals.
Creating Customer Value Through Design Thinking
Tuesday, 5th November 2019, at Campo de las Naciones, Madrid
The event focussed on practical issues encountered in developing key customer value, and how to introduce a method to identify and create real value which has measurable commercial benefits for both supplier and customer. Growth of between two and five times the growth rate of the rest of the business can be achieved by focusing strongly on identifying and delivering measurable customer value.
Richard Ilsley, AKAM Deputy Chairman and Managing Partner with the Key Account Management Group drew on practical case studies from a number of corporations who recently engaged in a long-term program to enhance their commercial performance through the identification and implementation of customer value with selected key customers.
Key Customer Relationships
Thursday, 27th June 2019, at SDA Bocconi School of Management, Milan
How can these crucial relationships be kept positive and productive for both sides? Andrea Busnelli, Client Director, Automotive Industry, IBM addressed how to stay successful in long-term customer relationships; while Andrea Dori, Head of International Key Account Department, Illycaffe introduced the contentious idea of using social media in key account relationships. Michael Widing, Customer Experience and Insight Manager, Hiab AB, described a structured approach to managing customer experience to grow business with key customers.
AKAM Technical workshop: Customer Experience Mapping
Wednesday, 26th June 2019, at SDA Bocconi School of Management, Milan
Not many companies have a key customer experience strategy, but they should, if they want to overcome complacency, match rising expectations, compete on unique relationships not products that can be copied, align cross-functional teams etc. Jerry Angrave, Customer Experience Association & Empathyce Managing Director, provided an invaluable customer experience strategy template and supporting tools, plus the chance to go away with a draft and stress-test it.
Making KAM work: Influencing and Resolving Conflict
Tuesday, 5th March 2019, at The British Library, St Pancras, London
We had a dynamic and informative line-up for this event: the challenging and entertaining practitioner, Kristian Kaas Mortensen of Girteka Logistics, with a much requested case study; expert consultant with huge experience to offer, Dr Brit van Ooijen; and host professor Stephan Henneberg presented his research on stress factors in selling.
AKAM Technical workshop: Negotiation in KAM
Monday, 4th March, 2019, at Regus Offices, 1 Northumberland Avenue, Trafalgar Square, London
Have you ever emerged from a negotiation wondering how and why did it all go wrong? It’s not just selling negotiations that can be brutal – securing enough resources internally or making the right decisions for your customer can be just as difficult. Even in close KAM relationships and great KAM programmes, negotiation plays a critical part. This intensive learning, small group ‘AKAM Technical’ workshop helped participants to understand how to achieve better outcomes for their key accounts.
2nd Annual Conference on all KAM Topics
Thursday 18th October, IESEG, La Defense, Paris, France
The conference covered a fascinating range of topics in KAM, from both practitioner and academic speakers. We talked about establishing 'legitimacy', which applies across all businesses, not just massive long-term projects: how KAM is different in emerging markets: understanding how to dig deeper and be more creative with customers: how to make sure you've chosen the right key accounts: and how to establish a KAM programme (and how long it takes!).
AKAM 'Technical' workshop: Metrics in KAM
Wednesday 17th October, IESEG, La Defense, Paris, France
Metrics are crucial in KAM, as in so many areas of business. They underpin diagnostics, strategic decisions, implementation tracking, operational delivery monitoring, risk assessment and individual performance measurement. In these four hours a whole workbook of KAM metrics was exposed and explained, together with instructions on how to collect and how to use the information.
Successful Key Account Managers
Thursday 17th May 2018, International School of Management, Vilnius, Lithuania
With Clara Carter, Accord-UK; Gintare Betaite, Amrop Executive Search; Kristina Maikštėnienė, ISM
There are many misconceptions about what it takes to be a successful key account manager, particularly among those companies who believe that it is really a sales role. This meeting made it clear that selling is far from the most important activity or competency required. We identified the desired multi-skilled profile, but accepted that different customers should be matched with appropriate key account managers, while recognising the common core of required competencies - high-level networking, for example.
Global Account Management
Thursday 8th February 2018, with the Sales Management Association, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
With Professor George Yip, Imperial College; Alistair Taylor, Brightbridge; John Bailey, Hiab
While acknowledging that GAM is not an easy initiative, presenters showed the importance, in fact, the necessity of having a GAM programme for global businesses. Different models are possible, but each has its issues and, which ever is chosen, it takes time and mistakes made and managed to implement. In a very practical session, GAM programme directors and global account managers widened their options by sharing their approaches.
AKAM's 1st Annual Conference
2nd November 2017, Dublin Institute of Technology, Ireland
With Rainer Schröder. Global Account Manager, ABB Semiconductor, Germany; Dr Jakob Rehme, Linkoping University, Sweden; Conor O'Malley, Salesforce, Ireland; Dr Diana Woodburn, AKAM Chairman, UK; Edel Redmond, Dublin Airport; Marco Reijntjens, Tenacity Europe, Netherlands.
Uncovering a wide range of KAM topics for KAM programme directors, key account managers and everyone else involved in the 'KAM sector': Key account teams; customer value; SAM at salesforce; KAM implementation frameworks; KAM as catalysts; key account retention in service businesses, and more..... A great opportunity to learn, to discuss and to network!
KAM in big and small businesses: learning from each other
6th June 2017, Università della Svizzera Italiana, Lugano, Switzerland.
Professor Ivan Snehota, the well-known authority on supplier/customer relationships, shared his insights into the differences from his years of research together with practitioners from big and small companies. In fact, KAM in big companies can be really difficult, while SMEs can apply their agility to be very effective. However, Armelle Dupont pointed out some essential decisions that SMEs sometimes miss, with extra insights into SME KAM from Mattias Bernhard of Loccioni. Critical research on the value of added services was offered by Dr Nima Hierati.
Influence of Senior Management in Key Account Management
30th March 2017, College of Business, Dublin Institute of Technology, Ireland
Key issues from AKAM's Chairman: why is it so difficult to engage senior management? Is the reason resistance or lack of understanding? Doug Gordon of Davy Asset Management on senior managers' role in key account manager well-being; Dr Lesley Murphy demonstrating why they should not step back after KAM set-up; and Dominykas Cibulskas of Walmart identifies 'the octopus in the office'.
Procurement and KAM
22 September 2016, Norwegian Business School, Oslo
How/can you challenge your customer on new procurement processes? Norway's national oil company, Statoil, shared its experience of current Procurement. Can you still create value? Where is procurement going? Professor Per Ingvar Olsen's research on how deals and business networks facilitate collaborative innovation offered a productive approach, while Dr Kevin Wilson discussed the role of the key account manager.
Value creation, key account teams and KAM in professional services
7th June 2016, Queen Mary University, London
Mike Green, RM Results explored the nature of value in KAM and how it is created. Strong research-based inputs came from Professor Björn Ivens (University of Bamburg) and Sebastian Forkman (Queen Mary’s University) on the importance of networks for key account managers, particularly internal networks, and how they use them; and the effects of deprioritising customers and how subsequent performance is affected. With experience in law firms, Richard Hinwood of Withers Worldwide looked at crucial issues in professional service firms that impact on KAM success.
Introducing the Association for Key Account Management
21st January 2016, KEDGE Business School, Paris
KAM professionals from every angle of KAM activity - key account managers, KAM programme directors; KAM academics and KAM specialists in consulting, training and development - discussed the reasoning behind the birth of AKAM, its hopes and ambitions. The workshop carefully considered the demand for key account managers’ competencies alongside AKAM’s proposals for professional diplomas offering the opportunity to gain a qualification in KAM.
