Sales and Service Training Company Wins Contract with Scottish Plant Owners’ Association

Swindon business woman Diane Banister, who has run her training and development company Intelligent Dialogue for over 30 years has secured an important contract to work with the Scottish Plant Owners Association.

The Scottish Plant Owners Association, also known as SPOA, is a trade body which supports plant owners throughout Scotland, ensuring best practice and supporting the sector to face challenges and celebrate success in the world of plant hire, ownership and operation. 

“This opportunity came out of some webinars I recorded last year for the rental sector, someone saw one of them and pointed SPOA in our direction” 

Callum Mackintosh, President of the SPOA, explains: “It is becoming increasingly apparent members need additional support to navigate the current challenges they are facing. The reality is that costs are rising across the board and it is very easy to miscalculate the cost of doing business. 

“There is more to negotiating contracts than price and it is our duty to ensure that we do our best to equip members with tools and skills to support them to run a sustainable and profitable business.”

Diane and her team at Intelligent Dialogue will be running two courses for the SPOA, the first for hire controllers - a role which is particular to the hire industry. 

Diane says: “They’re the unsung heroes, they make everything happen. The role is part customer service, part technical, part operational, and part sales and it is very commercial. The way customers do business now is quite different, so they have to operate across many channels. It’s vital that plant hire companies attract and retain hire controllers, and training has a huge part to play in that”

“Our focus with them is about the commercial realities of being a hire controller, increasing revenues and protecting price.” 

The second course focuses on overcoming rental business challenges. 

“This programme is about helping business owners or directors explore their commercial challenges. The programme is a mix of training and individual coaching sessions where they can develop a blueprint for their business and how they will apply and embed their learning. 

Diane, who is originally from Lincolnshire now living in Wiltshire, is the managing director of Intelligent Dialogue. At 23, she got a job as a salesperson for a building society in London, and after promotions, found herself as a national sales manager. After asking for training, the incredible impact the development programme had on her and her colleagues showed her what she wanted to do. The result was Intelligent Dialogue. 

“I’ve worked in the plant hire sector for 30 years, and there is nothing quite like it, it has created a little bit of buzz in the plant hire world in Scotland, and people are already signing up for it before it’s been properly launched which is great news.”

Intelligent Dialogue works with companies to improve their sales and growth through training and strategic planning. The mission is to help clients secure their future by working strategically to move their businesses forward. For further information visit  https://intelligentdialogue.com