The United Professional Sales Association is the only globally recognized non-profit, professional association, and champion of standards of excellence Professional Selling. We have built successful relationships with our members and the customer's they serve.
The first strategic plan for UPSA was accomplished in 1999 with the development of an Association Model that would become the foundation of the UPSA model, governance structure, revenue engine, and volunteer leadership model. As part of revised and adopted strategic plan in 2002, UPSA was founded and incorporated. The organization saw very little growth during its first year of the strategic plan with 30 members hearing of, and joining, the organization.
Since the 1999 and 2002 strategic plans, the main areas of emphasis have been to provide a robust effort that would provide the Five Pillars of the Sales Profession.Those pillars exist within the UPSA model today and are defined as the creation of:
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A well-funded and operational sanctioning organization
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An ethical code
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A standard of entry -- the Certified and Registered Sales Professional (CRSP) designation
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A service motive to the profession and society as a whole
UPSA had more impact in 2003, with the expansion of the association with the startup of the first local chapter (DC Chapter of UPSA). Also, UPSA HQ formed alliances and relationships with the George Washington University , Endiva, the International Sales Success Institute, and EyesonSales.com. UPSA offered the first Certified and Registered Sales Professional testing and certification at the end of 2003 – with 23 individuals becoming CRSP certified. In 2003 and 2004 UPSA held an annual sales conference increasing exposure of the group. The UPSA standard was also used to assess compliance of the GW CPD Business Development and Sales Program, and the Sales Activator sales simulator. UPSA worked with individuals and companies alike to instill the UPSA universal sales framework.
In 2003, UPSA's membership growth slowly tapered off – with a total membership capping at 63 at the end of 2003. UPSA leaders began putting infrastructure in place so its membership would grow. A major initiative to redo the website and re-accomplish the marketing and positioning was led. This year-long effort solicited inputs from sales professionals and existing members in an attempt to clearly define our niche in the market. The website navigation and copy were redone to make them more understandable and clear as to what our benefits were. A test direct-mail campaign was accomplished to 20,000 people across the US to test the revised model and positioning. As a result of the efforts, the organization refocused in 2004 and began driving the original objectives and goals differently -- with a lower barrier to entry as well as the adoption of an "open-source" approach to the Compendium and an online "virtual" networking approach. The objectives identified by the board were grouped into 3 key areas at that time to facilitate a sharper focus:
- Member Recruiting and Collaboration
- Standards Development and Establishment
- Organizational Structure
With this re-organized effort, in the year of 2004-2005, UPSA grew exponentially with major chapters being formed in Boston and South Africa . Key alliances were built with PI-Sigma-Epsilon and Selling Power Magazine. Linked In was chosen to provide virtual networking capability and over 400 Members have joined the group. Membership prices were reduced to a lower barrier of entry, and a regionally focused membership was adopted therefore allowing individuals located in areas where there were no chapters to participate.
Clearly, UPSA is making progress towards establishing itself as the only global organization for sales person standards of ethics, certification, and customization. But much work needs to be done as we approach our 10-year anniversary.
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To create these five pillars a 30 year view was adopted to properly set expectations and allow incremental 2-year ratcheting towards our goal. This 30-year view facilitated a real-world and practical approach to the creation of a Selling as a True Profession. The first official Board of Directors set forth five objectives (in the 2002 Strategic Plan) that supported the 30-year vision, long-term view, and objectives of the association. These objectives still exist today in the current version of the long range plan.
The five objectives are:
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To obtain & maintain public recognition of sales as a true profession
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To provide extremely high value for the members' investment of time and money
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Be recognized as the sanctioning body that maintains the universal and objective standard of sales professionalism
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To create a community where sales professionals can gather regardless of industry, company, discipline, or geography and can give back to their profession and their community.
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To support membership growth through local chapters
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Our Vision is:
"World-wide excellence in the practice and discipline of Professional Sales and Business Development through the understanding and advancement of the professional development, technical skill, and world-class education, of all B2B, B2G, & B2A Sales Professionals."
"Advancing the Profession of Sales"
Or Mission is:
"To assist in improving the understanding and competency of new and experienced Sales Professionals and customers worldwide."
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The United Professional Sales Association is a non-profit, member-based, 501(c)6 association. This classification is the same as most Chambers of Commerce in the United States. UPSA does not issues any stock. In short, the organization is not owned by anyone but exists to serve the members and the sales profession as a whole. UPSA is staffed by a volunteer board of directors who meet to enable and manage the organization towards the attainment of the mission and vision.
The United Professional Sales Association is governed by a set of documents. These documents guide the Association and they include:
- Bylaws : the rules adopted by the membership for managing the internal affairs of the organization.
- Charters : consistent with the UPSA Bylaws, the Board of Directors may establish and maintain other bodies that will serve the Association. Authority and responsibility is granted to these bodies through a formal charter.
 Click for a copy of the bylaws
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Advisory Board
Berkly Trumbo, CRSP, Corporate Executive Board
Jerry Hung, President, Endiva Software, Inc.
Dr. Bill Lynch, George Washington University, Director, Center for Professional Development
Allan Mills, Perdue Farms Inc. , Project Management Institute
Board Officers
Brian Lambert, CRSP, Chairman, Sales Professional, The Direct Marketing Association
Eric Kerkhoff, CRSPT Vice Chairman, International Sales Success Institute
Dave Porter , CPA, Secretary & Treasurer, Beers & Cutler
Board Members
Andy Miller, CRSP, Member at Large, CEO SM Guru
Robert L. Cantrell, CRSP, Member at Large, Landon IP
Tom Hippensteel, Member at Large, Chapter Leadership Liaison, Sales Professional, Liquid Concrete
Brian Schnieder, Member at Large, Membership Chair, Sales Professional, Improvision
Pat Mustico, CRSP, Member at Large, Sales Professional, Corporate Executive Board
Jonathan Sper, CRSP, Member at Large, Ethics Chair, Sales Professional, Election Services Corporation
Honorary Members
Jeffrey Gitomer, Honorary Member, BuyGitomer, Inc.
Brian Tracy , Honorary Member, Brian Tracy International
Brian Giese, Honorary Member & Strategic Advisor, IT Sales Bootcamp
Gerhard Gschwandtner, Honorary Member & Strategic Advisor, Selling Power Magazine.
Accepting Nominations for Board of Directors and Advisors
If you would like to nominate yourself or another for a position with the United Professional Sales Association, please email us. < back to top
World Class Technology for a World Class Organization
Our Self-Imposed Problem:
How do you unite millions of sales professionals together throughout the world? That was the challenge that United Professional Sales Association (UPSA) faced. In order to attain our vision of advancing the profession of sales throughout the globe, we needed to develop a brand new web presence that allowed our organization exponentially increase our membership base while focusing on facilitating communication, reporting, and content management. All of this needed to happen in an environment that was as easy to use as Microsoft Word and would support the UPSA membership in building a community around our profession.
In order to achieve our vision of “Advancing the Profession of Sales," the leadership of UPSA new that the association members would demand a high tech network that helped them collaborate with peers and gain new knowledge about being more successful in the sales profession. In order to do this, UPSA looked for an easy to use tool that would allow the volunteer leaders (with limited web design ability) to collaborate, lead and educate through meetings, knowledge sharing, certification testing and other resources. We looked for the ability to scale the web infrastructure in a rapid way, across international boundaries. The large amount of web content needed to be managed in a decentralized manner, while allowing each site to “talk” to each other site. Each site also needed to be able to process their own credit cards, manage their own content, provide their own web content, and create their own community. It was equally important to “push” information down from headquarters, so that the chapters didn’t have to type.
The overall goal was to find a technology that anyone could use, that would be flexible enough to provide the functionality they needed, as well as create the professional look and feel that sales professionals demand. This was no easy task for a group of volunteers.
Our Key Challenges
UPSA’s key challenge was to design a website portal with corresponding “sub-sites” that created high quality, easy to understand and navigate website community. The site must contain large amounts of information, have an integrated search function, allow for assignment of rights for viewing and updating, allow for the delegation of update ability, be “point and click” centric (so nobody needed to know html), be able to push information on demand, link to other partners, have integrated database management with the ability to export for reporting, have an online payment gateway that could be customized, and much more. The website was to provide a member-focused information architecture, with information, services, and member resources categorized by topic, and not based on geographic boundaries. Another challenge was to build the technology to support the rapid growth in a few amount of years.
Our Solution
UPSA chose Endiva as the platform of choice after an extensive search process. The solution provided by Endiva web technology provided chapter leaders, board members, and association members with efficient interaction with the Association and the knowledge generated by the community. The solution solved our key challenges and needs efficiently and easily, so we could set out to change the world.
Benefits to UPSA Members
Our new website located at www.upsa-intl.org provides a coordinated portal for UPSA information and services, allowing members complete access to important information about the sales profession, certification materials, events, and sales resources. All the information can be easily added or changed by a large amount of volunteers able to access the site with their own levels of rights and permissions. Our new web service helps UPSA achieve its mission by empowering emerging sales professionals with:
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Facilitation and event management for meetings with other sales professionals
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Ability to process membership dues through the HQ location, but allow each chapter to have their own payment gateway
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Organized Forums for discussions pertaining to sales
- Organized job postings with the ability to post resumes
- Community focused interactive environment for sales professionals that is easy to use
- Clearinghouse of educational materials and processes for becoming certified
- Valuable sales tools and standards managed by volunteers (with no HTML experience)
- Content management "push down" to sub-sites allows the HQ location to update all sites below it with a few clicks.
- And more....
For more information on Endiva, go to www.endiva.com and tell them that UPSA sent you.
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Guiding Structure