Craig Wortmann

Craig Wortmann General Information

Description

Mr. Craig Wortmann serves as Operating Partner at Pritzker Group Venture Capital. He is a Clinical Professor of Innovation and Entrepreneurship at the Kellogg Graduate School of Management and the Founder of the Kellogg Sales Institute. He designed, developed and teaches the award-winning course called Entrepreneurial Selling, recognized by Inc. Magazine as one of the "Top Ten" courses in the U.S. He also teaches a communications course that helps people 'show up, stand out, and break through' in all forms of communication. Prior to Kellogg, he also developed Chicago Booth's Building Leadership Capital course, a four-day, in-depth executive education series he has brought to senior executives worldwide. At Chicago Booth, he was the recipient of the 2012 Faculty Excellence Award, given to the professor who has had the greatest positive impact on the students. He is also the author of "What's Your Story?", a book that looks at how leaders and sales professionals use stories to connect, engage and inspire. In his book, he demonstrates the powerful impact stories have on the three most common performance challenges - leadership, selling and communication. His writing efforts also involve his work as a regular columnist for INC.com on the subjects of sales and entrepreneurship. He has been a sales person and entrepreneur for more than 25 years. From IBM Corporation as the #2 performer in his year-long classical style sales training class, to a Dean Witter company covering three-quarters of the country selling to large retailers, he is an expert in all things sales. After earning his MBA from Kellogg in 1995, he joined the Forum Corporation and quickly became the firm's new product launch and client recovery specialist. In 2000, he was recruited to join start-up WisdomTools as its CEO which he sold to a larger firm in 2008. He founded Sales Engine Inc., a tools and services firm based on the belief that a company should treat sales as the engine of their business. As a professional speaker and sales advisor, he helps to develop the knowledge, skills and discipline necessary to build a successful sales engine. In 2009, the venture backer's behind interactive marketing and web strategy firm, ClearGauge, sought him to become CEO while running his Sales Engine firm. He executed a turnaround by building a sales engine, cutting significant costs and developing a new web presence. ClearGauge was then acquired by a larger agency. In addition to running Sales Engine and teaching full time, he has partnered with the Pritzker Group helping to advise its portfolio companies on growing sales. He also sits on the board of Innovative Health, a Phoenix-based reprocessor of medical devices.