Sales Competency Dictionary
Background
For many years businesses have been using generic competency definitions for profiling, development and succession planning of their people. However our research revealed that these generic competency definitions were often too generalised and not relevant to specialised roles such as sales. This diminished their usefulness in performance development, recruitment, coaching, talent management and so on.
As a specialist in Sales, BARRETT found that specific competencies for salespeople and sales managers were needed to tighten up and improve outcomes in recruiting and developing all levels of sales professionals. Research into competencies of highly effective salespeople have generally identified 3 or 4 broad categories; Selling Skills, General Management or Business Skills, Technical Skills and Interpersonal skills, and more recently, Emotional Intelligence.
Interpersonal Skills were historically identified as an important category of competencies needed by highly effective salespeople. Their importance reflects the significant contribution of the salesperson's ability to form and develop a relationship with their client to creating profitable and productive relationship for both parties. However, Emotional Intelligence is a psychologically more complex process than Interpersonal Skills, involving a deeper process of analysis, reasoning and responding.
Emotional Intelligence
BARRETT's own research involving over 300 interviews has found that superior performing salespeople demonstrate significant competence in the area's of Emotional Intelligence as identified by Goleman (1996). They display well developed Self-Awareness, Self Regulation, Motivation, Empathy and Social Skills. A recent Australian study also found that sales performance and Emotional Intelligence are positively related.
The BARRETT Sales Competency Dictionary has been purpose built for sales and sales management roles across industries and designed to compliment most competency models in use today. The competencies can be easily mapped back to generic corporate wide competency models.
It has been desgined to take into account the very specific competencies (skills, behaviours, attitudes, EQ & values) needed in the complex and diverse world of selling today. It is idealy positioned to be used of for Sales Force Modelling
Five levels
It is mapped across FIVE levels with 7 Major Categories, 42 Sub Categories, providing very specific behavioural indicators at each level. Level 1 contains the foundation level competency often observed in a sales support or junior sales roles. Whilst Level 5 applies to senior sales management roles.
7 Major Categories
- Understanding & Managing Self
- Relating to others, forming & maintaining fruitful relationships
- Knowledge, understanding & addressing business drivers & needs
- Understanding & effectively applying selling techniques to achieve mutually beneficial goals
- Strategic Thinking & Action
- Organising & utilising resources effectively
- Sales Management
The multi-level nature of the dictionary provides the information needed by senior management and HR professionals to support career progression and succession planning. It is exclusively positioned to profile the qualities needed for successful sales performance and sales management across many sales environments
Applications:
- Competency Framework
- Recruitment Framework
- Performance Framework
- Learning & Dwvelopment (Fitness) Conetent & Framework
- Coaching Framework
- Management Framework
- Reward & Recognition
- Retention & Succession Planning
- Sales & Company Culture
Benchmarking Research
Using BARRETT's extensive Sales Competency Dictionary, research is currently being conducted by the BARRETT research team into the importance of competencies related to EI in sales performance. EI is being compared with the importance of competencies related to the Selling Process, Business & Organisational competencies, and Technical knowledge and skills. This empirical study is important in increasing the body of knowledge and understanding of what to look for when recruiting potentially effective salespeople, but also in their development plans.
Participation in the Benchmarking Research
If would like your sales team to participate in this Benchmarking Research Project then please contact Fiona Fouvy, BARRETT's Organisational Development Manager for further information see contacts.
Assessment Tools
