Who wants to work with accountable, responsible, and self-directed sales people?  Of course we all want these types of sales people in every sales team.  Yet, most businesses do not support this by setting up their sales team to clearly measure and manage their sales performance.

Sales performance management begins with accurate role descriptions and perception, data collection, and measurement in line with set goals and strategy, however many organisations measure only one variable, sale results (outputs measures).

This type of approach leaves businesses and sales teams in the dark about how they arrived at their sales results making it hard to replicate good results and eliminate poor results.

What is needed in sales teams are clearer measures of what constitutes good sales performance and we need to be able to measure and manage the right things.

So, what is performance and why measure it?

Performance can be equated to behaviour, as it involves what people actually do. It is observable, measurable, and can be changed through the learning and application of new behaviours.  It is, however, important to select the right measure in a performance management system as performance measures can influence behaviours and attitudes within the organisation. A good performance measure will reinforce desired behaviours, while a poorly selected or incorrect measure can encourage behaviour that is unproductive and inappropriate.

An effective Sales Performance Management System measures sales results (output measures) and two additional critical variables, input and behavioural measures. The framework means this is done in a consistent and structured way.  The following diagram illustates examples of Input, Behavioural and Output measures for sales people.

By giving sales people access to explicit performance information about how they need to do their job they can begin to align themselves to organisational expectations.  With adequate training and coaching to support them we will now have sales people working consciously in their roles and on themselves to achieve greater, more competent performance.

Take this opportunity to check if, or how well, your sales people know their performance measures and are they on the path to being accountable, responsible, and self-directed sales people.

Remember, everybody lives by selling something.

Sue Barrett is Managing Director of BARRETT

I recently had the opportunity to attend the inaugural Optimising the Sales Force Conference (http://www.osf2009.com.au), along with over 120 high level sales leaders across Australia.  I was privileged to be part of the panel of international and local experts presenting on sales effectiveness where we explored the latest research on sales strategy, leadership, learning and development, sales management, sales people, and current market trends.

This was the first time in Australia we have had the opportunity to come together as a profession and share ideas and discuss important matters moving forward. There have, of course, been industry specific forums held for the profession of selling but not one that brought industries of all kinds together to discuss sales specifically. It’s hard to believe but this was the first time this has occurred in Australia and about time to! It was really about driving a better profession.  Many people are unaware of just how skillful you need to be to run a sales team or lead a successful sales career.

The conference was full of important information and we also had the privilege of hearing from the elder statesmen of strategic selling 78 year old Bob Miller of Miller Heiman fame, who pulled no punches and reminded us of the foundations of our success. We also heard from Tom Snyder who is world renowned for his expertise in creating high performing sales teams.

Over the next few weeks I thought I would share with you some of the insights and findings from the conference in more depth but here is a summary of the topics we discussed and where our attention was focused.  This might give you some insight into where the world of selling is heading.

• Everybody is in sales: there was overwhelming agreement that everyone in business is in sales – You are either selling or supporting someone to sell.  If your people are disassociating themselves with sales then you need to let them know in no uncertain terms we all live by selling something and they had better get with the program or get out.
• New customer behaviours: the economic downturn has changed how customers conduct business and interact with suppliers, while this comes as no surprise there are now new customer behaviours we need to contend with.  In particular, the increase in risk aversion was cited as being one of the most contentious issues.  This risk adverse approach is leading to indecision by clients meaning that rather than losing to a competitor, nothing happens.    So it is critical that sales people are able to work more strategically with clients and challenge them to help them make good decisions moving forward.  This requires a more assertive, confident style of sales person.
• The Challenger Sales Person: research by The Corporate Executive Board Company reported that we need to find and cultivate the ‘Challenger Sales Person’ who is best suited for these markets moving forward.  Some of the key characteristics of these people are that they always have a different view of the world, understand the customer’s business, love to debate, and challenge the customer’s ideas and perspective; in short they are at their best as commercial educators and bringers of new ideas and innovations to help businesses function better.
• Coaching, coaching, and more coaching: At least 40-60% of a sales manager’s job should be dedicated to coaching their sales people.  Yet it still remains an area that is poorly executed.  We were shown excellent case studies which demonstrated the financial return of sales coaching.  Many of the case studies indicated that a blend of competent internal sales coaching by sales managers supported by external experts in sales coaching was very advantageous to their sales teams’ performance and productivity.
• Role clarity and clear expectations: make sure salespeople and sales managers understand their roles and what is expected of them.  Make it explicit and ensure people are adequately skilled to carry out their responsibilities.
• Clear the dead wood quickly: sales managers spend too much time with people who produce too few results.  Focus your attentions on those people who are already showing they want to do well and are actually doing their job.  You have more hope in getting to your better performers to be much better producers than wasting your time on people who will never perform.  As Tom Snyder said “Sales managers are guilty of thinking they can ‘save’ these people from themselves” – his advice is “get rid of them now!”
• Insight and awareness: despite all the skills, tools, and processes around salespeople and sales managers need to be able to develop their own internal guidance and support systems.  The ability to reflect on our own performance, be resilient, show empathy, and work ethically was high on the agenda. Personal insight and making a personal commitment to the corporate objectives is also important for ongoing success.
• Connect strategy to activity: your strategy should translate into practical actions people can apply and see results from.
• Marketing and sales unite: marketing needs to support sales and sales must support marketing.  There is no in between.  Hugh McFarlane from MathMarketing stressed the importance of making sure that all touch points and messages are in alignment.
• Really connect with your key clients: Bob Miller pressed home the importance of being truly connected to your best clients, however he said you cannot have a strategic relationship that is only one way.  Your clients must want it as much as you do and there is mutual agreement on the conditions of the relationship. He stated that most companies are very poor at managing this aspect of their business and it leaves them vulnerable to losing major accounts.
• Corporate assets: today’s reality is that in addition to people, property, plant equipment, and IP some of the biggest and most often overlooked assets are companies strategic accounts.  They need to be on the agenda of the ‘C’ suite i.e. the CEO, CFO, COO, etc.

I hope that this provides you with some valuable information and insights into what is happening in sales today and into the future. I will go into more depth in the ensuing weeks about these and other topics we covered.

Happy selling.

Sue Barrett is Managing Director of BARRETT

You cannot fake real sales experience and sales wisdom.  It is one of the professions that is the hardest to teach and train because without real life sales experience you are at risk of being seen as inauthentic.

To help you make the best choice when it comes to selecting the right sales trainer let’s consider the following:

• What capabilities do you need to be a good sales trainer?
• What attitudes and mindsets can makes sales people and sales results worse?

To sell or not to sell

Without real life sales experience, you will are likely to lack empathy and real insight for the daily challenges of the intricate world of sales.  Those who talk about selling but have never had a sales budget to achieve, prospecting calls to make on a daily basis, or need to meet new people and quickly adapt to their styles while trying to understand their needs, will not be as authentic as someone who has been out there and experienced selling for real.

You can have certain knowledge about selling processes, sales figures, or selling strategy but talking about selling and actually living and experiencing a long-term sales career are two very different things.

Over the years of building my own business I have seen my fair share of good facilitators and trainers, but when it comes to training in sales those trainers who lack genuine sales experience find it hard to tackle sales training. They often don’t stack up when it comes to feedback from participants.

The overwhelming feedback from participants on sales training programs, based on research both locally and internationally, shows they want to be trained by a real sales person who understands them on all levels: the thinking and skills required to sell, the resilience needed to keep going, empathising with the challenges and setbacks and how to overcome them, the ability to deal with different people who are not always welcoming, and the business knowledge and street smarts that come from being in the field earning your way as a sales professional.

Based on this information you may well think that all you need to do is put a great sales performer up the front of the classroom and press play.

Wrong!

Many companies do follow this line of thought without the proper consideration for the other skills involved in being a competent sales trainer.  Here are some of the common traps companies often fall into when trying to deliver sales training:

Trap 1: Motivational speeches

Many companies think that all sales people need is a bit of motivation to make them sell more so they get in a pumped up motivational speaker with a bit of sales experience to tell war stories and how you can be like them if you only do this or that.  The effects of this approach are short lived. It soon wears off.  This type of approach is like a hot bath that soon gets cold.

We get a lot of salespeople saying they are sick of these types of approaches to sales training because they are left with little to show for it – they are given no real skills or tools they can use in the field.  Here is some feedback from one of our training participants, “Your program was very down to earth and engaging.  A wonderful contrast from the loud music, gimmicky motivational speakers we often get.  A very effective style, we learnt real skills and took away real tools we can use.”

Trap 2: Promoting your sales person to sales trainer

Another trap can be promoting your sales people to sales trainer with very little support to become a good sales trainer and program designer.  As a result we have seen plenty of disasters when you let good sales performers loose on sales training.

If your sale trainer has not been properly trained in adult learning principles, classroom facilitation techniques and strategies, and is unaware about how to create practical learning content that works based on good instructional design, then you are likely to get a good sales performer up in front of the participants telling war stories about their experiences and telling everyone to be like them.   That is not training or educating people – at best it may be entertaining but that is about all you can hope for.

This is a recipe for disaster.

Just because you are a great sales person or great motivational speaker does not make you a great sales trainer.

Being a Competent Sales Trainer

The latest research shows that there are 5 competencies encompassing 18 separate skills, associated with being an effective sales trainer.  These include business acumen and communication, instructional planning, effective selling skills and experience, talent management, and teaching capability.

The sales trainer is one of the key factors that can influence the effectiveness of the sales training program.   Sales trainers perform many different roles including talent developer, coach, mentor, sales talent evaluator, sales skills evaluator, and training program design and implementer.

As facilitator lead classroom training is still a key component of sales training we would do well to examine the competencies and skills required to effectively run these sessions.  Barrett have developed a sales facilitator/ trainer competency model that helps us determine and identify skills and performance expectations for new, as well as experienced sales trainers.

Some of the main categories of competencies we look for in a competent sales trainer are:

Sales

• Planning and Organising
• Prospecting
• Building Relationships and Networks
• Consultative Problem Solving
• Results Focus
• Self-Management
• Quality Orientation
• Comprehensive communication skills
• Business acumen and Common Sense

Facilitation

• Create Collaborative Client Relationships
• Design and adapt course content for an effective learning outcome
• Plan Appropriate Group Processes
• Create and Sustain a Participatory Environment
• Guide Group to Appropriate and Useful Outcomes
• Build and Maintain Professional Knowledge
• Model Positive Professional Attitude

Within these main categories of competencies there are also several subsets of behaviours and capabilities.  Being an effective sales trainer takes more than you would expect.

Trap 3: Not passing on the right attitudes and beliefs

Besides skill, experience, and capability, you should also assess for the right beliefs, attitude and values needed for being an effective sales trainer.  Poor or inaccurate perceptions about selling passed on by the sales trainer can damage your sales training efforts on a grand scale.

If you hear a sales trainer say the following:

• “Oh we don’t call ourselves sales people here”
• “We don’t have to sell – we consult”
• “The product sells itself”
• “All sales people are pushy and rude and we aren’t like that here, are we?”

Stop the sales training and find yourself a new sales trainer.

Do your internal and external audits:

1. Be wary of sales people coming to you offering to be your sales trainer.  Check their motives.  Are they struggling with sales or ashamed of being called a salesperson and looking for an excuse to get out and find another role? Are they overly addicted to self help books and motivational pep talks which pump them up to feel positive, only to be in need of more when the effect wears off?  Do they look for or talk about getting ‘quick fix’ answers to theirs or other sales people’s emotional issues about selling?
2. Be wary of external consultants or sales trainers who are unable to accept that they, too, are sales people.  Ask you prospective sales trainer or consultant:  “Are you a good sales person?”  If they say anything that indicates an emotional denial of their sales role like “I’m a consultant not a sales person’ then that say goodbye fast.

You do not want people like this near your sales teams as they often unwittingly pass their negative, jaundiced views about selling on to their unsuspecting peers and course participants.

Think of the saying ‘watch who you let near your mind’ and remember that includes your sales trainers.

So, who’s delivering your sales training?

Author: Sue Barrett is Founder & Managing Director of BARRETT Pty Ltd

It may surprise you to discover that many Sales Managers learn how to be a Manager on their own.

According to the latest international study on Sales Training and Sales Force Effectiveness,  many Sales Managers are given very little or no support when it comes to being a competent, effective Sales Manager.  In fact, many Sales Managers reported that they were given no formal training in Sales Management practices, either before or during their tenure as a Sales Manager.

The study reported that Sales Management training is the category of sales training that is addressed with the least frequency, in fact it is less than annually or not at all.

The study also reported that if Sales Managers were more frequently and better trained and coached then their sales teams achieved higher performance and results.  In no other type of sales training was a more positive correlation found between frequency of training and sales performance.  Interestingly, it also revealed that sales training doesn’t need to be delivered in formal classroom settings.

As with many sales people who follow no logical process when selling, so it is true for many Sales Managers who fly by the seat of their pants.  When it comes to Sales Managers many are left to their own devices.  These international findings further support our 15 years of observations in the Australian market place that Sales Management development and performance is not taken as seriously as it should be.

Would we let a football coach without any experience or formal training in coaching become the head coach an elite football team?  Not likely!  At the very least, we would expect them to do a coaching apprenticeship.  In addition, many of the current crop of elite sporting coaches have also undertaken formal education and training to earn the right to apply for senior coaching roles.

Sales Managers need support if they are to be of best value to your business, your team, and to themselves.

Where do we start?  Let’s look at some of the broad core capabilities they need to be competent Sales Managers in the 21st century sales environment:

• Strategic Action – Understanding industry and organisation; taking strategic actions
• Coaching – role modeling, feedback, trust building
• Team Building – designing and managing teams, creating a supportive environment
• Self-management – fostering integrity and ethical conduct, managing personal drive, developing self-awareness, decision making and management skills
• Global perspective – cultural knowledge and sensitivity, global selling program
• Technology – understanding new technology, sales force automation, customer relationship management

As you can see there is a lot to know and apply in the role of Sales Manager. So, how do we support Sales Managers in their development?  Formal classroom training on key topics is a great start, however it is important that these are spaced at regular intervals – for example, run over a few months with 1 or 2 sessions and follow-ups rather than squashed into a week with no follow-ups.  The formal classroom sessions should also be supported by much more frequent activities which can include local or distance coaching (group and one-on-one), combined with regular access to advice and topics of interest such as talent management, time management, and business trends. This type of support needs to become part of a development regimen for those who are in Sales Management or those that aspire to be Sales Managers.

When formal and informal development is consciously applied and supported in the workplace it can have amazing effects for the Sales Managers themselves and their teams.

For instance, as part of our development work at BARRETT, in addition to classroom sessions, we run regular tele-coaching sessions (monthly 1-hour group sessions with up to 4 Sales Managers) for several companies. In these sessions Sales Managers share and discuss their needs, challenges, ideas, and strategies for effective sales performance in their teams, as well as their own needs and development as leaders. The feedback has been very encouraging.  Some feedback we have received from Sales Managers so far includes:

• it is a collaborative learning environment
• great ideas exchange, learn a lot from each other
• peer support – only time we get to really work with each other and share ideas without another agenda crowding the discussions
• no hidden agenda – feels safe, supportive, useful
• independent view from BARRETT coach keeps ideas fresh and focused on the sales agenda piece while finding ways to integrate with ‘well managed’ piece and other priorities
• keeps the concepts and program we are running top of mind and makes sure we do it and don’t lose it
• makes sure we are really implementing the tools and content properly

One Sales Manager stated: “BARRETT has supported me by providing a consistent frame of reference for all of us to work around. This has been a program that all the staff has been involved with rather than ‘another message from above’…  ‘The best part has been the follow-ups on the phone with the other Sales Managers.  Hearing their experiences and applying some of their takes on the principles has been very beneficial, and the re-enforcing of the principles and the increased familiarity and use of them has added measurably to it being embedded in my dialogue with my team.”

These conversations are not just ‘chats’ they are based on substance and the critical things that Sales Managers need to know and apply.  So, if you think you can solve the problem with a simple, unstructured monthly ‘chat’ think again.

Now that we have discussed the importance of developing Sales Managers, let’s also remember to consider the Sales and Sales Management experience and expertise of the people you choose to support your Sales Managers through training, coaching, and mentoring. A deep subject matter expert will be able to provide both the practical and theoretical support Sales Managers need for them and their teams to succeed.

While a monthly coaching or training session may not seem like much, many Sales Managers are in need of support and help, especially now in these tough markets.  You can make a big difference to your sales results if you take a little time out to develop your Sales Managers.

Happy selling.

Author: Sue Barrett is Managing Director of BARRETT.

Have you ever done the math on how much sales recruitment costs you, especially when you get it wrong?

If you are like most managers then chances are you haven’t.  So let’s consider the costs, overt and covert, involved in sales recruitment.

If you don’t know it already, sales recruitment is one of the toughest assignments around.  I know this firsthand, as I was in this role for over 8 years with a leading consultancy and recruitment company. During this time, I interviewed about 8,000 sales people face-to-face in the technical, industrial, medical, and scientific industries.  Remember, this is not counting all the resumes I screened manually as my experience was pre the internet and we had to do everything manually – no ‘word search’.

My time in sales recruitment gave me a great grounding and honed the skills to select good sales performers but not everyone has had the chance to practice.  It was a fascinating social study on what makes a great sales performer. Upon reflection, it was a catalyst for my research into illuminating and defining the elusive qualities that make for highly successful sales people and the development of IP specifically in the Australian Sales Competency space.

It also led me to map out and demystify the sales recruitment process by putting in place relevant content and a structure people can follow.   What this structure and the right selection content do is place control back into the hands of the managers who are responsible for recruiting sales people for their businesses.   It also made me plainly aware of the costs involved.

The problem is that, for most managers or business owners, sales recruitment happens sporadically and too many managers still use unstructured recruitment practices that are the least predictive of sales performance.  Most are just winging it, relying on gut feel, and never getting enough experience to give them something to fall back on when they need it.

It’s recruitment by hope, recruitment by chance.

Taking this ad hoc approach adds to the cost of sales recruitment because even if you get it right you don’t know why you got it right, therefore making it difficult to repeat the process.

With everyone being so focused on cost management its also important we do the math on the cost of sales recruitment and the cost of getting it wrong.  We do this so that when you look at your sales recruitment you can make sure your actions will give you a better return on investment and that you hire the right sales people.

Any action we do has a cost (monetary, energy, time, etc.) associated with it.  Whether that action propels us to profit from it or costs us more than we intended is the issue at hand.   Getting sales selection wrong can cost you more than you have probably imagined.

What are the OVERT and COVERT costs associated with these issues?

• Keeping a poor sales performer on too long who is not producing and not having a better performer to replace them (Note to self : you should always be on the look out for top sales performers, keep a list)
• Sales territory vacant for too long
• Poor fit: Not selecting the right type of person for your business culture, strategy and task
• Taking too long to make selection decisions thus losing good potential recruits
• Little or no structure to your sales selection process
• Using the wrong recruiters to get you the right people (sadly too many recruiters do not know what a ‘good’ sales person looks like)

All these equal lost revenue, lost profits, lost market share, lost customers relationships, customers business drying up, loss of reputation, internal disharmony, team issues, etc.

Let’s now look at it in stark terms:

Case study: A sales person who earns a base of $60,000 per annum plus extras stays with a Company for 3 months and doesn’t work out:

Overt Financial Costs
(based on a conservative estimate)

• Advertising and Recruitment Agency costs = $10,000+
• Candidate travel costs (if applicable) = $500
• Induction Training costs = $5,000 (in-house and/or formal/external training)
• Salary and benefit costs = $15,000 plus super, work cover, etc.
• Additional costs (car/car allowance, phone, travel, etc.) = $3,000
• Severance pay (2 weeks notice) = $1,600
• Manager’s time to recruit 40hrs @ $60/hr ($100K salary) = $2,400
• Administration costs: $2,000
• Sales lost due to poor performance (2.5 times salary is the average) = $37,500

Estimation of Overt Cost Total for 3 – 4 months = $67,000

Then add:

Covert Financial Costs

• Potential litigation costs = ?
• Lost sales opportunities due to vacant territory = ?
• Manager’s coaching time = ?
• Team morale = ?
• Customer loyalty = ?
• Impact on Reputation = ?

While I may have missed some things or overestimated others, the math clearly shows that getting sales recruitment wrong is very costly.

I suggest you do an audit and check out where you have made the most of your actions and where you may need to tighten up.

Remember that its all in the preparation and execution of the right activities and make sure you act wisely and in your best interest.

If you want further information how to how to structure your sales recruitment practices go to  Getting Sales Recruitment Right

Sincerely, your advocate for selling the right way.