Practice, Practice, Practice then Play

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Practice, Practice, Practice then Play

December 12, 2008 in Brain Science, Coaching, Mindful selling, Sales Management, Sales Skills, Sales Talent, Sales Tips, Sales Training

In the sporting world it is expected that athletes make the time to practice, practice, practice and then go and compete or play the game. Through regular practice they hone their skills, behaviours and attitudes to ensure they are ‘match fit’ and ready to compete at the highest standards.

A sports team needs to make sure that when they are in the thick of the game they can draw upon those skill drills and practice sessions to perform well as a team and perform well under pressure.

When an individual athlete is neck and neck with a competitor racing for the finish line they need to know how to dig deep and draw upon their experiences, skills, and mental and physical reserves to cross the finish line first. This cannot happen without lots of conscious, purposeful practice.

I know this to be true. As a former competitive swimmer we constantly practiced our starts, turns and finishes as well as doing lots of race practice and skills drills to prepare us for competition. This was in addition to doing the km’s of laps to build up our fitness and stamina.

Sadly, today in the business world, and especially in sales, all we seem to do is play, play, play the game and rarely put in the time to regularly review, practice and refine our skills.

What we are left with are salespeople who are given little time to reflect on how they went and what they need to do to build their sales capability. They often lurch from one customer sales meeting to the next.

While they will know whether they won or lost a sale, very few will know ‘why’ or ‘how’ they won or lost sales to how to get fitter and be more effective.

In our experience fewer still take the time out to work on their sales businesses to create viable ‘Go-to-Market’ action plans which keep them focused and on track.

For instance we are in the process of training over 300 sales people in sales planning, prospecting, selling and sales communication process. Many of them have said that this is the first time they have had to really work on themselves and their business.

For instance, as part of the program we run a sales simulation exercise which tests the robustness (or not) of people’s sales skills, behaviours and attitudes. It gives sales people real insight into how they actually perform as sales people. For many people this is the first time they have ever had the chance to reflect on how their skills measure up to what is consider effective sales performance.

Simon Madden, former VFL/AFL Essendon player, qualified teacher, experienced sales person and one of BARRETT’s sales facilitators lamented that businesses are very poor at letting our salespeople take time out to practice and apply the skills, behaviours and attitudes they need to use in the real world. All they do, he says, is play, play, play.

I have to agree. The number of times we meet sales people attending our sales programs who have never had any formal sales training is staggering. And even those who have been on sales training programs before, comment on previously attending ‘training events’ which either did not reflect real life situations and were more ‘rah’rah’ in spirit and as it turns out a waste of time, or had no follow up back in the field which meant much of the training content was lost and not applied. If they have had any form of regular training it was usually product based which is not the same as proper sales training.

Given Selling is such a critical function in any business, even more so now, we cannot leave our sales people’s fitness to chance. If you are going to invest in anything this coming year invest in your sales people’s development.

Please do yourselves and your sales people a favour, and take the time to give your sales people some time to practice their sales skills in proper learning environments. It doesn’t take much time or money to give them the proper processes and training around the essentials such as sales planning, prospecting, selling and sales communication process.

Any sales training you choose should be logical, easy to follow, feel natural and easy to apply for your people and uses a behavioural competency based approach. It should be spaced out over a minimum period of 3 months to allow for behaviour change and growth.

If you are looking for effective sales training I recommend it follows these guiding principles:

Interval Training: When training is implemented over a period of time is facilitates behavioural change and skill development that become habitual and the new ‘ way of life’. This approach progresses in incremental stages and helps to maintain a focus on manageable tasks, ensuring earlier stages are successful before the latter stages are attempted.
Discovery Learning: Results from an interactive environment where information is given, principles are practiced, questions are asked and real-life situations are created to enable people to learn for themselves.
Evidence Based Competency / Behavioural Learning Outcome Approach
Responsibility and ownership for embedding a sales culture is given to the management team: Sales managers should be trained in in-field sales coaching methods and be taught how to run mini sales skill drill sessions they can implement over time to keep their sales people fit and focused.
Relevant content: make sure the program is relevant to your sales team and your customer markets.
Documentation of requirements: sign-offs and quality controls that define objective measures for assessing quality throughout the development process.

Investing in the right sales training can give you much greater returns very quickly:

Sales Manager of a division of a Financial institution comments after targeted 3 month sales fitness training program:

My team sold $55m in the half I arrived as Sales Manager. This half we are on target to sell $150m.

My 2 lowest performers when I arrived finished last half 3rd and 7th in Australia out almost 200.

80% of my Sales People made budget last half when traditionally less than 20% achieved target.

The combined ages of my best 3 performers is 154.

Many people can learn how to lead successful sales careers. Just give them the chance to learn and some time to practice. And while not everyone can be the ‘’Ian Thorpe of Selling’ many can learn to apply successful sales processes, skills and strategies which will keep them sales fit and producing sales results.

For many industries, other than retail, the next few months are a little quieter on the sales front and are the perfect time to do some sales training and practice, practice, practice.
Happy selling.

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The Dark Side

September 3, 2008 in Assessments, Attitudes & Behaviours, Brain Science, Coaching, Emotional Intelligence, Neuroscience, Neuroscience in Sales, Sales Leadership, Sales Management, Self Development, Uncategorized, Wellbeing

How well can we manage ourselves, our teams and businesses in a crisis or tough times?

Are our actions and behaviours putting us, our people and our businesses at risk?

As leaders and managers we are on show and our actions often speak louder than our words. In challenging times this is even more evident. Under pressure cracks may appear and our leadership is put to the test.

How do we cope under pressure? What happens to us when we crack? When placed under high levels of pressure, most people will rely on coping mechanisms or their strengths that help them manage in day to day activities, but due to the pressure they can actually become counterproductive tendencies. We refer to these as “risk factors” and they can emerge as our dark side. These coping mechanisms can become detrimental to our ability to build trust based relationships and impact on our leadership and sales style.

As each leader is an individual, they must find their own way to manage and lead. However, when we are assessing and understanding our own and others’ behaviours, we often refer to personality style as a key reference point. While certain personality assessments can provide accurate and reliable predictors of performance, there is more to a person’s capability and satisfaction or a team’s interactions than meets the eye.

As a starting point we can take a look at three key areas when taking into account an individual’s potential contribution to a role and workplace performance.

Out in the open: Personality
Beneath the surface: Motives and values
Under pressure: Coping strategies, derailers and the dark side

This does not exclude other important factors such as technical competence, experience, knowledge or cognitive ability. These play a critical part in a role or team, however given technical competence, experience, knowledge and appropriate levels of intelligence are sound for the task at hand, what else can impact the performance of you, your team and the business?

Although the personality or ‘out in the open’ component is a crucial one, increasingly businesses leader are also wanting to look at people’s ability to cope under pressure. They want to know about your coping strategies, derailers and the dark side.

I find people are fascinated with the “Dark Side” so I thought I would provide you with some insight into this topic and share with you some of the work we do.

The Dark Side: Derailers & Coping Strategies

Sales leadership or any people management role involves building and maintaining a high-performing team. Anything that detracts from our ability to build a sales team also detracts from our performance as a sales leader.

Coping strategies are the behaviours that we have developed over time (even from childhood) to cope with increased levels of pressure. This pressure can be due to change, high stress, boredom, multi-tasking, work overload, unhappy environment, or finding ourselves outside our comfort zone.

When placed under such pressure, most people will display certain counterproductive tendencies. We usually refer to these as “derailers” or our potential “dark side.” Under normal conditions these characteristics may actually be strengths, but when the demands increase, our reliance on these mechanisms can impede our effectiveness and erode the quality of our relationships with customers, colleagues, and direct reports.

When confidence turns into arrogance
A specific example of when a strength can become a derailer is when confidence turns into arrogance. It is a fair assumption that confidence can be one important contributor to a successful career in business and sales. To be ‘confident’ means to have courage, to be bold, to be self-assured, and people are more likely to follow or believe in a confident leader. However, this strength can become a derailer when we are under pressure as our self-assured nature goes too far and we stop listening to other people, become condescending, egotistical and make ineffective decisions.

This is not to suggest that all confident sales leaders will demonstrate arrogance, but this is one of several potential dark sides that could have an impact on our careers.

The other potential derailers are: Excitable, Skeptical, Cautious, Reserved, Leisurely, Mischievous, Colourful, Imaginative, Diligent and Dutiful.

It is very important to note that these characteristics can have highly positive implications and which we can master and turn onto our strengths. By identifying and being made aware of our leadership coping strategies or potential dark sides we can take the ‘right’ action that allows us to develop further as leaders.

Gaining insights (by whatever trusted and validated means) into and applying corrective strategies about behaviours that could potentially undermine or inhibit your performance and ability to effectively build trust based relationships will assist you to lead people and your business more effectively and help you avoid putting you, your people and your businesses at unnecessary risk.

The research consistently shows that elite sales professionals engage in self appraisal and continuous learning. They are always looking for ways to be better. So in your quest for high performance don’t forget to look at the Dark Side.

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Daring to be Different (part 2)

August 6, 2008 in Assessments, Recruitment & Sales Recruitment, Sales Assessments, Sales Management, Sales Skills, Sales Talent

Here is the second of two articles about recruiting top performing sales people and daring to do so from outside of your industry.

Even though I have not worked as a traditional recruitment consultant for more than 14 years many of my long standing clients still talk about those ‘out of the box’ placements we made. Was it just the recruitment approach that made the difference. Well NO. What these savvy mangers is did was make sure the culture and the business could accommodate these ‘new’ types of people.

They took their current team along on the journey to the new as well. Sure it wasn’t all smooth sailing but they knew what they needed to do. As we know when we bring in difference we can often cause the current people to feel uncomfortable and if not addressed they can kill off the ‘new’ way.

So be aware.
If the overall culture of your business is not set up for excellent sales performance, all your efforts could implode. Here is an example of what I mean. A key client came to us saying they didn’t want to hire people from their industry because they just weren’t competitive in the current market. They wanted to refresh the gene pool and bring in fit sales people who were not tarnished by the industry and its way of doing things. They knew that in this over commoditised marketplace that their sales people where their competitive edge. They were on the right track but didn’t know where and how to start. So here is what we did to help them find elite sales performers:

Reviewed sales strategy and path to market
Defined Sales DNA & ‘ideal’ role/person specification
Built a structured sales recruitment process and kit
Targeted the industries the new breed of sales people could come from
Built and implemented the induction company sales training process
Implemented a sales management support system
Mapped & measured sales metrics

The results were fabulous from a sales initiative perspective:

The new breed of elites sales performers achieved a sales closing ratio of 4:3 within 2 months and sold annual sales budget within 5 months.

Now wouldn’t you think everyone would have been jumping for joy? You’d like to think so but sadly the new team was a small part of a very large business that had been operating in an entirely different manner (i.e. slow, internally focused, transaction product selling). Rather than embrace the new ‘fitter’ sales way of life and find more success across the board, the broader business killed off the team because it was too successful just so they didn’t have to change.

Sadly this is not an isolated incident, many a successful competent sales person or sales manager with new ideas, a healthy can-do attitude have been passed over for promotion or eliminated from the team because they were too different and too good. They did not fit the often buttoned down, compliant thinking, follow-the-rules-or-else culture that many larger business can have.

And what I still see, all too often, are senior managers and sales mangers recruiting from within their own industry sector recycling the same old people getting the same old ideas and the same old results. Relying on ‘industry experience’ as a major determining factor in your sales selection process can severely limit your potential to develop a competitive edge in your industry and find elite sales performers. This strategy has left many businesses vulnerable today as they now struggle to transform existing transactional product focused sales teams to savvy business people how can sell.
Which raises key questions:

How we can we find top sales performers to refresh our gene pool and revitalise our culture, our bench strength, our results, etc.?
How does an organisation create and the promote transparent sales performance in the field and at leadership level?
How do we encourage diversity, innovative thinking and outsiders into our thinking, our team and our business?

I encourage you to challenge the prevailing views and attitudes of your business and industry and really examine what your sales strategy needs by way of talent now and into the future and select and develop those people how meet your business needs accordingly.

If you do it can really pay big dividends.

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Daring to be Different (part 1)

July 31, 2008 in Recruitment & Sales Recruitment, Sales Management

Here is the first of two articles about recruiting top performing sales people and daring to do so from outside of your industry.

When it comes to assessing sales and sales leadership capabilities in your business do the lines blur between the cultural morays, views and perceptions, gossip and politics and the real capabilities needed to be assessed against your actual sales strategy?

In my line of work I am often requested to sit on senior management interview panels for clients because of my background and expertise in assessing sales leadership and sales performance and the issues around of internal and external assessment of sales people and leaders. They request my presence based on the following criteria:

My 15 years working in the sales competency, assessment and development space
My eight years as a recruitment consultant interviewing approximately 8,000 sales people and managers face-to-face.
My independence as a 3rd party
My willingness to speak up and challenge prevailing views and attitudes as I am not likely to carry the internal company prejudices and paradigms that influence current thinking and culture into the interviews.

Sales recruitment and assessment is not for the faint hearted and is one of the hardest areas to get right in any business, and it doesn’t help if politics, nepotism and inaccurate perceptions of what constitute effective sales and sales leadership performance prevail. I get to see this, especially when we are looking at internal candidates.

Just recently I was in shock at the extreme contrast between two internal candidates who were two of several internal candidates vying for sales leadership roles on a newly formed senior management team:

One sales leader was rated highly be their manager and endorsed by certain peers in high places but in interview it was clear they had no idea about sales leadership, strategy or process and no substance what so ever. They were a ‘fraud’ as far as the role was concerned. Yet their manager and other allies were clearly trying to position this person as a top performer which they clearly were not.
Next rolls up the complete opposite. Clearly a highly competent candidate. They had the complete package, it was obvious from our investigations and we were impressed yet they had been previously rated poorly on key criteria and the lobbying by certain internal stakeholders to deposition them was astounding. His comment, when asked how he felt about being invited to participate in the interview process, was very telling. He said ‘Relief. Relief at being actually able to present his capabilities honestly, clearly and fairly without bias or prejudice.”

My client, relatively new to this division and whom I shared the interview panel with, had very little direct dealings with any of the candidates which was good on one hand, however, most of his information about the candidates was coming second hand via comments and lobbying from peers and managers and performance data ratings which may or may not have been accurate depending on who had assessed the individuals. He wanted a transparent, evidenced based approach used which is why he called me in. And our approach unearthed a whole lot of issues and raised questions around:

The formal performance assessment criteria and process of sales individuals (not just $ sales results)
Those who were doing the assessment ratings on staff and what perceptual filters they are using in addition to the standards provided i.e. biases, prejudices, etc.
The political lobbying in place to keep top performers from making it to influential positions
The actual criteria used to assess effective sales performance and leadership. Is it up-to-date and able to deliver our sale strategy?
The consequences of political, inwardly focused, biased culture and its effect on the organisation’s success in sales, staff performance and retention.

If the sales capabilities and performance requirements needed are properly assessed against sales strategy then what we can go looking outside of our comfort zone for top performers who can thrive and deliver I our culture. What is good for one industry may also be good for another.

I can honestly say for a fact that my best placements were people outside of the industries I recruited for. The clever sales managers recognised this and took a risk. So dare to be different.

Part 2 next week.

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Preparing for your 2008-09 Sales Year

April 24, 2008 in Business Acumen, Sales Management, Sales Planning, Sales Strategy, Value Proposition & Value Add, Vision, Mission & Purpose

If you haven’t already it may be worth your while to hold a formal review and business/sales strategy planning session with your team before the new financial year kicks in. Many markets have and are going through major changes and this requires us to be on our toes and ready for action.

The challenge for any business, especially those of us who run a small business with limited man power and resources, is to take the time out to work on our business and plan for the future rather than stay stuck in the day to day of our businesses. This is a vital part of our job and can set us up very well for the future. If we stop and look to review and reassess our strategies, plans and actions and take into account what the market is doing, we in a better position to note the vital signs and opportunities that can help us secure our business future. Ideally this type of process should be done on a regular basis at least formally twice to three times per year.

So with that in mind my team and I are putting aside Friday 2 May to come together and work on our business strategy for the next 3 years and our sales strategy for 2008/09 and beyond. My business has gone though many iterations over the years and my long term goals are now coming to life. I now what to ensure that we are on the right track and I thought I would share with you the process we are going through to help us put in place the best and right strategy for us to realise our goals and fulfill our market potential and expectations.

Now I confess that I am not the most detailed person and ‘planning’ is one of my challenges so to keep me focused and on track here are some of the questions we will be preparing to address and answer as part of our planning and strategising. Ultimately our aim in going through this process is to make sure we have a profitable and viable business.
Our vision and mission for being in business

WHAT do we stand for?
WHY are we in this market space?
WHAT do we want to best known for?
WHAT are the values the guide us in our work?
WHAT are our goals for the next FY, 2-3 years, 5+ years?

Our Customers

WHO are we specifically targeting?
WHY are we targeting them?
WHAT does a viable ‘ideal’ customer look like?
HOW do we find them?
WHAT do they specifically want or need now?
WHAT problems do we currently solve for our customers?
WHAT products/services to we use to solve their problems?
ARE our products/ services/ solutions solving their problems effectively?
WHAT might they want or need in the future?
WHAT can we offer them in the future?
HOW do they want to buy?
HOW do we need to sell to them?
HOW do they want our products / service delivered?
WHAT is our customer acquisition & retention strategy?
WHAT are their expectations of us?

Our Competitors

WHO is our competition?

Current Competition
Peripheral Competition
Emerging Competition

WHAT markets are they operating in?
WHY are they in this market space?
WHAT is their primary objective / goal?
WHAT do they do well?
WHAT don’t they do well?
HOW are we positioned against them?
WHAT is our competitive advantage?

Our Value Proposition & Service Standards

WHAT is our unique selling proposition (USP)?
WHAT is our promise?
WHAT is our sales expectation?
WHAT is our service level standard?
HOW effective are we?
WHAT do we do well?
WHAT do we need to be better at?

Marketing & Product

HOW effective have our current marketing activities and tools been? (i.e. PR, SEO, Brochures, Events, etc.)
WHAT marketing activities and tools do we need to keep on using? & WHY?
WHAT marketing activities and tools do we need to stop using? & WHY?
HOW effective is our current product mix? What are the most profitable areas? What are the least profitable areas?
WHAT is the $ value of our average sale?
WHAT product mix do we take to market?

Steps to ‘Yes’ (Sales Process)

WHAT is our current sales cycle? (how long does it take to make a sale?)
WHAT is our current ‘prospecting : sales’ ratio
WHAT are our current sales activities and HOW often did we do them to achieve our current revenue? (Prospecting, Sales Meetings, Account Management & Networking)
HOW effective have they been?
HOW often do we need to prospect to make enough sales appointments with viable prospects to make enough sales to meet our goals?
HOW effective is our current sales process?
WHAT do we need to change to be more effective as sales people? (Structured sales communication process & skills, human relations, motivations; values, behaviours & attitudes; problem solving & decision making; self management, planning, etc.)

Sales Inputs & Outputs

WHAT are our current Performance Expectations & Rewards
HOW do we need to allocate customers? (by territory, industry, size, etc.)
HOW do we set targets? (revenue allocation, profits, phasing, etc.)
WHAT levels of responsibility and authority do each of us need to have?
HOW do we currently manage revenue & profit?
HOW do we forecast?
HOW effective is our current CRM system in terms of capturing the right customer, marketing and other sales data?
HOW effectively are our people at putting in the right data into our CRM?
HOW effectively do we use the data we capture?

I hope this helps.

As many of you may be aware, putting together a business strategy and associated sales / marketing/ operation plans is all well and good, however they will remain intellectual abstractions until we put them into action. Good luck with your business and sales planning process.

If you want a Sales Planning template for your business call us on (+61) 03 9532 7677

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