There’s an adage that states: “Nothing happens until somebody sells something.” Companies onboard new employees to design, engineer, and distribute high-tech products. In the hiring world, however, sales prospects are too often left bobbing in the wake of candidates applying for highly sought-after supply chain and manufacturing positions. And, no good salespeople are being molded without high-quality sales education.
Office technology dealers who resell products and services know how important selling is. What, though, does the next generation of sales reps look and feel like? Should they be expected to make cold calls? (The short answer is yes.)
These days, academia is helping with the answer via sales classes, sales clubs, and experiential learning-based activities such as sales competitions. You can look at your local university for classes labeled as marketing, sales, or even entrepreneurship. For example, through its Tampa campus, the University of South Florida (USF) offers a Master of Science degree in Entrepreneurship in Applied Technologies. The 30-credit-hour program integrates the principles for successful opportunity recognition, technology and market assessment, product commercialization, new venture formation, and new venture financing into a single interdisciplinary curriculum. Sounds like a fit for business, right?
Gators can sell! The University of Florida team with Jon Dunkelberger (far left), senior region sales director in the South Region of Ricoh USA’s Dealer Division, and Chris Glover (far right), Ricoh senior manager of sales engagement & partner development.
Dealers need to understand that Gen Z members in the workforce want more than the promise of a job. These 20-something “Zoomers” seek a plan, informed Jon Dunkelberger, senior region sales director in the South Region of Ricoh USA’s Dealer Division. How would a 26-year industry veteran know that? Because Dunkelberger teaches sales strategy to college juniors and seniors. (More on that in a moment.) He also facilitates scholarly coursework that requires students to complete corporate partner-sponsored sales operations projects.
“Sales organization development is an overarching theme,” Dunkelberger noted, “and the hiring, development, and retention of sales professionals is always top of mind with the dealers.” Why should a dealer spend time engaging in a university sales program? Think of it as an investment in the literal future of your dealership. Internally at Ricoh USA, the effort is part of the manufacturer’s business development resources campaign.
If your dealership employs interns, summer is an ideal time to hire aspiring young people. Document Solutions Inc. (DSI) in New Mexico, Flex Technology Group in the Southwest, Integrated Document Technologies (IDS) in New Jersey and Florida, and Shore Business Solutions in New Jersey are four dealers with active internship programs. Meanwhile, Nashville-based RJ Young has developed a relationship with the University of Mississippi BASE program that provides a sales talent pipeline, according to Tim Williams, RJY sales manager.
Student-centered scenarios are win-wins for all involved parties, noted Casey Lowery, president of Applied Innovation, which participates in USF’s “Selling with the Bulls” intercollegiate sales competition. Entering its ninth year, the two-day judged contest brings together nearly 170 students from 38 universities across 25 states for what organizers call “the toughest test in sales education.” The 42 teams hailed from schools across the United States—Arizona and Utah to Texas, the Midwest, Northeast, and Southeast.
The awards ceremony at the end of the competition is a highlight for the students. Dr. Rob Hammond, director of the Center for Marketing and Sales Innovation at the Muma College of Business, University of South Florida, shares opening comments.
Lowery explained that the event is “a great way to recruit students,” adding that Applied Innovation acquired Tampa-based Upstream Office Solutions in 2020. “It’s a newer market for us,” and the USF event is helping the Michigan-based dealer to strengthen its foothold in the Florida Gulf Coast. To date, Applied Innovation has hired two people from the program who started as interns. One young employee, a woman from the Tampa area, attended Michigan State. The initial connection was made by Dunkelberger and Ricoh, which served as the business case sponsor for Selling with the Bulls in 2026.
Selling: from Grand Rapids to the Big Apple and Virginia
For fellow dealer Atlantic, Tomorrow’s Office (New York City), Selling with the Bulls has greatly improved its relationship with Pace University, which maintains campuses in NYC and Westchester County, New York. President Adam Weiss enjoys the contest categories that progress from initial phone calls and discovery meetings to closing the sale. “It’s a way for us to give back and also . . . recruit top talent, which can be a challenge,” said Weiss, who has a passion for sales.
He and his team at Atlantic, Tomorrow’s Office have taken the engagement a step further, showing up to lead afternoon programs at the university’s downtown NYC location. They also helped Pace students to prepare for the competition. “We did advanced, one-on-one roleplay calls in person,” Weiss relayed, while follow-up feedback sessions were conducted virtually.
Conducting on-site mock interviews is a large part of the Selling with the Bulls competition, “where we pretend to be the customer,” Lowery confirmed. The undergraduate students pose as sales reps calling on a fast-growing tech company, for example. More than 500 such roleplays can take place in a single day, according to Rob Hammond, PhD. and director of the Center for Marketing and Sales Innovation at the USF Muma College of Business.
The young people competing represent the proverbial cream of the crop from their respective universities, Hammond stressed proudly. “Faculty from each school picks their four top students,” he continued. “Where else can you find the top 168 sales competitors in one weekend? They’re all highly motivated and want to be coached. It’s a high bar.”
Throughout the latest competition this past February, high-potential students focused on selling Ricoh’s next‑generation SD Series of A3 Color Laser Multifunction Printers featuring advanced document management capabilities. By centering roleplay activities, prospecting exercises, and sales meetings on the OEM solution, participants gained hands‑on experience articulating the real business value of modern digitization and workflow automation. Post-contest evaluations indicated that most students “loved” the Ricoh use case, reported Prof. Hammond. Tangible products and smaller companies resonate with most members of Gen Z, he noted. They liked the AI angle, too, of course.
Many marketing professors, such as Hammond, believe in the power of experiential learning. In addition to digital transformation (DX), which starts with endpoints, artificial intelligence (AI) is another timely discussion point. University sales programs are at the forefront of preparing students to leverage AI in their sales internships and field sales roles after graduation. Ricoh’s Dunkelberger encourages hiring managers to ask collegiate program leaders: “How are you preparing your students to leverage AI in their future sales (or sales enablement or marketing) roles?”
This year’s Selling with the Bulls hardware focus was fun and educational, too, Weiss added, because “some of these 19- and 20-year-olds have never made a copy in their lives!” Product demonstrations showed them how to troubleshoot workflow challenges and why mixed-size and mixed-media documents sometimes get “chewed-up” due to the limits of traditional scanners.
When the students arrive in Tampa, the first event is networking where competitors meet with business partners to learn about careers in sales and opportunities for internships and full-time roles. Some of the business representatives also have a backstory about the event. Here, Ricoh’s Tom Koenig and Chris Glover shared insights about our industry and the career opportunities for aspiring sales professionals.
“Programs like Selling with the Bulls offer students real‑world, career‑shaping experiences,” said Jim Coriddi, Ricoh’s chief dealer officer in North America. “We’re proud to help equip future sales professionals with the skills, confidence, and mindset they’ll need to thrive in a rapidly transforming industry.”
The winter scene near balmy Tampa Bay offers ample opportunities for prospective employers and employees, pointed out Hammond, whose background includes product marketing experience in the tech, telecom, and defense fields. “There are over 1,000 scheduled networking conversations,” he said, noting that each student has in-depth talks with six different companies. Lowery credited Hammond with connecting Applied Innovation to major universities in other markets, including Indiana.
Vinnie Paladino, one of Dunkelberger’s colleagues, brings the sales energy to students enrolled in James Madison University (Harrisonburg, Virginia). Paladino, who is a district manager for Ricoh Digital Services in Virginia and West Virginia, is a JMU alumnus. Over the past decade, he said, the relationship has evolved to participation in a half-day AI marketing initiative at the public research university. (Ricoh now sponsors the lunch hour.) He has also spoken to classes, giving a “Day in the Life of a Sales Rep” type of presentation.
Cultivating sales talent; hiring innovative thinkers
Back in 2016, “I was frustrated with the quality of talent we were pulling through the interviewing process,” admitted Paladino, who is a 15-year veteran of Ricoh. Now, he gets directly in front of marketing majors who concentrate in sales. “We interact with these students up close and in person,” he noted, “and can identify who the rock stars are.”
The growth of these university collaborations often is organic. For example, the University of Virginia (Charlottesville, VA) is the alma mater of one of the JMU professors, who networked and connected Ricoh with UVA four years ago. Associate Professor Hammond pointed out that several former university faculty members now run sales programs across the United States. Paladino agrees with the USF center director that most of the students he meets have the necessary talent. “They come in understanding the sales process and the importance of prospecting cadence as well as articulating value propositions,” he explained. They also:
- communicate well.
- know how to talk on the phone.
- possess sound presentation skills.
- can effectively organize their workdays.
In general, “these young people possess the required skills,” he noted, “which we then tweak a little bit.” Just how good are they? In the past year, Ricoh has hired five such individuals for its direct organization. “Yeah, they’re definitely ‘keepers,’” Paladino added with a smile.
The bright faces of the Winona State University (Minnesota) sales team members are shown working on their closing presentations at Selling with the Bulls. Fresh off the discovery meeting, they were preparing to individually present their Ricoh IMC-SD proposal and close for the customer agreement.
From the dealer perspective, Lowery confirmed Ricoh’s praise and stressed the importance of non-tangible “soft skills.” His experience at Applied Innovation has shown him that more seasoned reps are not the only ones who possess the desired gift of gab: “I think there are introverts and extroverts in every generation,” he observed.
The modern sales climate is all about learning to think like an innovator, added Dunkelberger, who knows a thing or two about selling. A two-and-a-half-decade veteran of Ricoh, he started at IKON Office Solutions in 1999. While working in the dealer channel, he has directed sales strategy and major accounts from Pennsylvania before moving to South Carolina in 2019 to team up with Ricoh East Region VP, Dru Baker, who has been very supportive of Dunkelberger’s expanded dealer engagement. Since then, he has become certified as an information professional (CIP) through the Association for Information and Image Management, as well as in integrative and experiential learning.
When it comes to developing and nurturing future, high-potential sales professionals, Dunkelberger is a big fan of the Sales Education Foundation (SEF), which seems to fly under the proverbial radar in our sector of the technology industry. Founded in 2007, the organization elevates the sales profession by supporting the entire talent pipeline—from education and curriculum development to student preparation and employer engagement.
Nineteen years ago, there were only about a dozen colleges with sales programs. Seton Hall University (South Orange, New Jersey) is among the pioneers. Presently, there are more than 250 such programs. (The SEF’s 2026 annual report lists all of them on pages 28-29.) Dunkelberger’s relationship with this sales education community dates back 16 years.
These schools are preparing students well for future sales opportunities. As Lowery pointed out: “They didn’t offer sales curricula like these when I was in college!”
“Involving Ricoh and its dealer community adds tangible value to Selling with the Bulls,” praised USF’s Hammond. “Their commitment to cultivating emerging talent and pushing innovation forward creates an environment where students can apply what they learn in a way that mirrors real‑world expectations.
He urged dealer owners to consider the time and financial costs of bad hires in the sales game. “The students who come here to compete are truly incredible,” the educator concluded. “All of them are hires who will require less training and will be faster to onboard. I’m just glad I have a 40-year head start because they are going to get big in the rearview mirror!” So, dealers, circle your calendars for February 18-19, 2027, on Florida’s Gulf Coast.
SEF by the Numbers
According to the Sales Education Foundation:
- 55% of college graduates begin their careers in sales.
- More than 100 universities offer sales programs supported by SEF.
- There’s a 40% drop in turnover with trained sales talent by SEF.
- Sales-educated grads earn up to $15,000 more in their first year.
Despite doing some great work, led by dedicated academic and sales professionals, “SEF is not widely known in the dealer channel,” confirmed Ricoh’s Dunkelberger, who serves as a part-time, professional-track adjunct within the marketing department at the University of South Carolina’s Darla Moore School of Business. The man is on a quest to increase SEF and sales student exposure within the channel. (Incidentally, he and his Gamecocks’ biz-school colleagues are looking for an office technology dealer partner near the Columbia, South Carolina area. Any takers?)
For the “Selling with the Bulls” intercollegiate sales competition, the USF lab is set-up like a sales company facility with rep workstations. Students call the prospect, who was portrayed by a Ricoh or dealer participant. During the first roleplays, competitors complete the prospecting round by making phone calls to book an in-person discovery meeting. Additional prospecting events (email, LinkedIn, voicemail) occur remotely earlier in the week. Judges listen in to score and provide feedback.
A Sales Community Mission at USF
Reflecting the wholistic approach of USF’s Center for Marketing & Sales Innovation, Hammond shared this: “Our mission is to catalyze regional and global growth by empowering learners, including students, faculty, business, and government, to master marketing and sales through research, experiential learning, and collaborative innovation.” In support of this mission, the center is home to two human behavior labs, including the Tampa campus Customer Experience Lab with 20 individual biometric testing stations equipped with eye tracking, galvanic skin response, and facial expression. Four of the stations are even equipped with electroencephalography (EEG).
What does your next generation of sales reps look and feel like? With collaborative missions like USF’s, we can be confident that they are getting great preparation to join us—and yes, they’ll be ready to make cold calls.
Editor’s note – Arizona State University’s W.P. Carey School of Business is attempting to shape a mindful framework for artificial intelligence through its Center for AI and Data Analytics for Business and Society. Dealers in the U.S. Southwest: ASU seeks corporate partners for fall and spring semester projects. To learn more and collaborate, visit the research university’s business school website or email https://wpcarey.asu.edu/.
