People who work in national accounts are in charge of marketing products and interacting with clients and business partners who may be based in different parts of the country. National accounts positions are filled by a variety of people, including salespeople, accountants, business managers, and directors of operations. People who work in these positions are usually part of a central chain of command and do not have to report to regional managers or executives.
Many companies hire salespeople for entry-level national accounts positions. These people are in charge of expanding the firm’s client base by making proactive sales calls to potential customers. In some cases, members of the national sales team may be tasked with setting up face-to-face meetings with clients, in which case they may spend the majority of their time traveling across the country. National sales teams are employed by a variety of companies, including financial firms, manufacturing firms, and telecommunications firms. These salespeople frequently assist regional salespeople, despite the fact that national accounts group members typically have to meet their own departmental revenue targets.
Accounting and finance firms employ accountants and clerks who are in charge of the company’s national accounts. These people are in charge of sending invoices to clients and accepting payments from vendors and business partners. While accountants are more concerned with operations than sales, many of them are paid bonuses and commissions if existing business relationships are kept or expanded. In many cases, employees in national accounts departments only deal with business relationships with other major corporations, while employees in regional accounts departments deal with smaller businesses.
A national accounts manager is in charge of overseeing the daily operations of a sales team or other dispersed employees. A company director assigns annual revenue and production goals to this person, who divides the goals among the national accounts team members. The manager is in charge of the team’s annual budget as well as employee hiring and firing decisions.
In many cases, the national accounts manager reports to a director on the company’s corporate board of directors. The national accounts director establishes annual departmental goals and devises a strategy for the accounts team to meet or exceed them. During board meetings, the director must inform the company chairperson and the other directors of the year-to-date results. In a multinational corporation, the national accounts director may report to another executive who is in charge of the company’s operations in multiple countries.