Account management and retention is aimed at improving business performance in sales & service through three activities: assessment - conduct a detailed review and analysis of the major accounts and commercial account management functions as well as customer technical and engineering services; analysis - identify opportunities and recommendations to increase efficiency, to enhance working relationships with external and internal entities and to improve customer service and marketing activities; action - plan the implementation of the recommendations.

• three different sources of data are utilized: individual interviews, focus groups and preliminary field observations to obtain the most information in a short period of time
• a thorough review is conducted of accountabilities for major accounts, commercial accounts, technical & support staff
• process inputs and outputs, including coordination points, hand-offs and boundary issues are documented
• existing systems and identified plans for future enhancements are inventoried
• customer research is collected to focus improvements