Grant Crawford

Senior Management Associate, Spearhead Training, U.A.E.

Grant is a New Zealand national, who began his career in 1989 with Fuji Xerox (New Zealand) in a Business Development capacity. In 1992 he transferred to the United Kingdom to join Xerox U.K. Over the following six years he successfully progressed through a number of Business Development related roles, achieving the prestigious ‘Xerox Honours Club’ award for consistently outstanding sales results.

In 1998, having developed a keen interest in training and development, Grant moved into a Training role with Xerox in the U.K. Shortly afterwards, an opportunity arose for a Training Management position in the Middle East, and Grant moved to Xerox Saudi Arabia in September 1998. His key responsibilities in this position were to develop and implement an effective, measureable, training skills programme within the Middle East and North West African region. During this time, Grant delivered a wide range of Selling Skills courses to hundreds of Xerox employees throughout the region. The subsequent business results included an increase in profitable revenue, and a marked decrease in employee turnover rates.

In 2001, Grant was appointed to manage the Xerox U.A.E. Commercial Sales team. He was responsible for overall bottom line business results, as well as the mentoring and development of the team. During this time he also continued to run soft skills training courses for the company. Over a five year period, Xerox Emirates achieved consistent growth, including significant penetration into the five star hotel market sector, with relationships based on successfully differentiating Xerox quality in both products and after sales service, from its competitors.

In 2005, Grant moved to a regional Business Development role with Xerox, working strategically with General Managers and Marketing teams to achieve financial targets measured on gross profit and revenue. Part of this role was to create strategic plans and develop strong management practices that would result in consistent, improved performance. In 2008, the Xerox MENA region reached a landmark of $U.S.100 million annual turnover, based on several years of double digit growth.

In 2009, Grant was offered a senior management post with Sharp Electronics, Dubai, where he initially created a process for measuring the performance and relationship between Sharp and their distributor network. In addition, he managed a new Renewable Energies team. An energetic focus on creating awareness and establishing new relationships resulted in a qualified ‘pipeline’ of several hundred millions of dollars worth of opportunities being won by the company. Grant also instigated a forum for non-competitive companies to share information and ideas on the future of the industry in the Middle East and African region.

In 2010, having reviewed his highly successful career to date, Grant made the decision to return to his real vocation – training. He joined Spearhead and worked on a six month consultancy project for Dubai International Airports developing, designing, delivering and assessing the effectiveness of their internal training. He also conducted in-depth training needs analysis during this time, working with senior management to identify the business training needs for the 3,500 staff at the Airport.

Grant is delighted to have the opportunity to share his extensive sales, management, training and business experiences with others. He believes passionately that training and developing others is a career to which he is most committed, and from which he derives the greatest satisfaction. He believes that the combination of his extensive experience, his practical ‘hands on’ knowledge, and his ability to impart that knowledge in a dynamic and enlightening way, creates a powerful combination for the effective transfer of learning to take place.

Grant's key areas of expertise include:

Management & Leadership
> Coaching For Optimum Performance
> Counselling Skills
> Creative Problem Solving & Decision Making
> Developing Management Skills
> Planning & Organizing Skills
> Leading High Performance Teams
> Senior Management Programme
> Supervisory Management Skills - For 1st / 2nd Level Supervisor
> Change Management
> How To Conduct Effective Meetings
> Developing A Crisis Management Strategy
> Developing World Class Customer Service - As A Competitive Strategy