Deb Calvert

Deb Calvert

President

Deb Calvert has worked as a sales productivity specialist and has been involved with leading edge sales research since 2000. She has worked with the newspaper industry for over 20 years as a Consultant, a Corporate Director in Sales and Human Resources for Knight Ridder, Inc., and as an Operations Director, Sales Training Manager, and Retail Sales Manager at The Kansas City Star. Deb’s early career included a variety of classified and retail sales positions. Over the past five years, Deb has worked with over 60 newspaper and media companies to accelerate sales productivity.

As President and Founder of People First Productivity Solutions, Deb also consults with agriculture and technology companies on boosting sales force productivity through people and process development. This work includes leadership program design and facilitation. Deb also works with executives, managers, sales trainers and sales reps as a Humanistic Performance Coach.

Deb is certified as a Master Coach and Master Trainer. She is a charter member of The Sales Force Advisory Board, a Kellogg Graduate School think tank that analyzes best practices from sales organizations across the globe. She is a graduate of the “Accelerating Sales Force Performance” executive program at Northwestern University. Deb is also a member of the Services Revenue Group, the SalesLab, and the Sales Leader Council.

Deb’s unique mix of senior-level Sales, Human Resources, and Operations experience give her a unique perspective in understanding the challenges faced by media companies and leaders. Because she also works outside the industry, Deb is able to bring best practices from other industries into media companies.

deb.calvert@peoplefirstps.com