q

You are browsing the archive for Self Development.

← Previous Entries
Next Entries →

Transitioning from the old sales paradigm to the new world of social sales

February 2, 2011 in Communication, Sales Relationships, Sales Skills, Sales Talent, Self Development, Social Media, Social Sales, Strategy

When I began my career as a professional sales person in the early 1980’s we were trained in product and client communication skills focusing on handling objections.  We were given business cards, product brochures, a geographic territory of clients to manage and grow, and a car to get around in.  We did not have mobile phones, let alone smart phones / tablets, laptops, or CRM’s.   There was very little coaching and we were expected to make sales and make it work.

For a while there, let’s say 20+ years, it seemed like business as usual as many companies still clung to the Product Paradigm of Selling – ‘show up and throw up information’, however there were fundamental shifts of seismic proportions happening around us even back in the late 80’s and early 90’s.   The transition from product to solution selling was one significant shift, however, this was just a pit stop on the way to the far more complex selling world we find ourselves in today.

28 years on the sales terrain is a very different proposition – the new world of social media, social selling, the importance of collaboration and the centrality of the customer – we are truly entering a customer focused world.

Product and Solutions (the aggregation of products) no longer offers the competitive edge in the sales process, the shift in value, beyond product and product solutions, lies in ideas, creativity, collaboration, interconnectedness and innovation and means that the types of conversations we have with customers, suppliers, referral partners and the like is at the centre of effective selling and business relationships.
And buyers are way ahead of most sales people.  The conversations they are having about their suppliers, research they do before they buy, the journeys they take to purchase without any sales person’s involvement are important to watch and pay attention to.  And that’s not all – we need to pay attention to what they do and say after the sale, how they talk about us, their points of view, the influence they have over others ideas and opinions and the circle just keeps getting wider.  But are sales people and businesses keeping up.

According to Brian Fetherstonhaugh, Chairman and CEO of OgilvyOne Worldwide, Social media is having an enormous impact on buyer behaviour.  OgilvyOne’s survey of a 1,000 sales professionals in US, UK, Brazil and China reported that 49% of sellers see social media as important to their success and amongst the most successful sales people, over two thirds believe social media is integral to their success.   However most companies are not adapting fast enough.  They are not providing training in how to effectively use social media to sell and nearly half the sales professionals surveyed believe their companies are afraid of letting employees use social media.

Only 9% of US sales people say their companies train or educate them in social media while in contrast 25% of sales people surveyed in Brazil said they received training and education in social media.
This rapid change is unprecedented.  With the rapid rise of social media, the focus on innovation, value beyond product and the increasingly complexity of business networks and communities, I have found myself looking back and looking forward working out what I need to leave behind and what I need to take with me into the future.

For those sales professionals who started their careers in the last 5-10 years this article may not mean much to you, however for those of us who have longer careers in selling we are faced with significant change.

What have found to remain true and I can carry forward from my early days in selling are the following:

  • Keep Prospecting – it is vital to make contact and keep in contact with customers, prospects, influencers, suppliers, partners, etc.
  • Review and Strategic Action– always review where your market, customers and competitors are and check for signs of change so you can adapt and take strategic action.  Most people would call this planning but with change happening so rapidly it’s more like review and strategic action is a constant daily occurrence
  • Prioritisation – even more so now than ever before is the important skill of prioritisation.  There is so much information: emails, special interest groups, new innovations and the like to keep on top it can be overwhelming without some form of prioritisation skills
  • Questioning and listening – always a main stay in any person’s, especially a sales person’s tool box.  The listening acuity we now need means we need to pay more attention to the details of our clients’ conversations, needs and priorities while keeping a keen ear and eye on the broader landscape.  Asking the right questions is critical.
  • Problem Solving and Prevention, Creativity and Innovation – again the idea that product was king is now dead; one of the key skills is to prevent and where necessary solve problem for people, but that is only part of the game now – we now need to generate ideas and create opportunities, imagination and innovation now stand tall.
  • Adapting to different Communication styles – with global reach comes the need to interact with a wide variety for people and adapt to difference, not difficulty
  • Manners and courtesy – despite what people may say about the current state of the world, manners and courtesy are the glue that hold our relationships together. No matter what we call it, courtesy and manners are NOT trivial. Here is how Edmund Burke (1729-1797) described it: “Manners are of more importance than laws. Manners are what vex or soothe, corrupt or purify, exalt or debase, barbarize or refine us, by a constant, steady, uniform, insensible operation, like that of the air we breathe in.”

So what do  I have had to integrate from the new, so far:

  • Digital communication, destinations and New Listening Skills.  The need to look out for the digital footprints of buyers as they trawl the digital world.  Mapping buyers journeys before they talk to sales people and setting up the right forums, websites, blogs, connections, opinions, etc. for them to connect to before we even speak as human beings is critical.
  • Interacting  with special interest groups on the internet – looking to exchange ideas rather selling or blatant  self promotion.
  • Selling is a Team Sport – marketing, sales, and customers are all in it together
  • Prospecting online – the shift from lists, Yellow Pages, etc to avenues such as Linkedin where a rich vein of data, contacts, prospects are available to be researched and connected to.

Much has change in the world of selling and more changes are afoot.  I’m holding on as best I can, trying to get my balance as I transition from the old paradigm of selling to the new world of social sales.  So watch this space.

Remember everybody lives by selling something.

Author: Sue Barrett, www.barrett.com.au

No Comments »

Different sales assessments and how to use them

January 21, 2011 in Attitudes & Behaviours, Call Reluctance, Coaching, Culture, Emotional Intelligence, Ethics & Values, Prospecting, Recruitment, Sales Assessments, Sales Research, Sales Training, Self Development

If you wanted to, you could sit down for at least four weeks and complete 100’s of sales assessments and there would still be more on offer.  This over abundance of sales assessments can be confusing because they are not all the same.  If you do not know what you want to measure it will make looking for an effective sales assessment tool that much harder.  Here are some questions that may help you select your sales assessments with more precision.

  • Why will this person sell? (Motives, Ambition, Goals)
  • Will this person sell? (Attitudes, Mindset, Not Hesitant, Accountable, Energy, Drive)
  • How does this person sell? (Style, Ethics, Behaviours)
  • Can this person sell? (Skill, Knowledge, Mindset)
  • How well can this person sell? (Job match, Values, Perceptive Reasoning, Self Belief, Mastery Mindset)

As stated before, there is no one sales tool that can answer all these questions.  So at risk of offending some test providers and users, as I am bound to leave out some assessments that could have been included in this piece, I thought I would share with you the tools that we and many other businesses have found to be the most useful in helping us predict sales performance especially when it comes to sales recruitment.

Measuring Sales Prospecting Fitness
Research shows that only about 20% of sales people are fully effective when prospecting.  In use for 30+ years, the SPQ*Gold (Sales Preferences Questionnaire) is a well regarded and widely used assessment designed to specifically detect and measure the emotional response to prospecting – Sales Call Reluctance®.  Call Reluctance® is the emotional hesitation to initiate contact with prospective buyers in sufficient numbers to support organisational goals.

40 years of empirical research in prospecting shows the hesitation to initiate first contact with prospective buyers on a consistent daily basis is responsible for the failure of more competent, motivated and capable sales people than any other single factor.  The fear of prospecting can cost an average of 15 new units of business per month per sales person.  Prospecting is not the most important skill in selling but it is the first thing that has to happen before anything else happens.

Assess the Fear of Prospecting
The fear of prospecting, Sales Call Reluctance® and sales hesitation, an individual’s hesitance to prospect and self-promote for new business, can be objectively measured using the SPQ*Gold® questionnaire. The SPQ*Gold® is an attitude and activity based online assessment that identifies how much initiative, energy and drive an individual devotes to proactive sales prospecting and the amount of energy spent on coping with inhibitors such as fear. The SPQ*Gold® is the only tool that measures the prospecting fitness of people in sales, sales management and customer contact careers.  It is best suited for anyone responsible for meeting sales and revenue targets whether you call yourself a sales person or not.

SPQ*Gold helps you answer these 3 business questions:

  1. How much will they produce?
  2. How soon will it happen?
  3. What will it cost you to get that performance out of them?

Applications

  • Administered online via user name and password sourced via an accredited provider.
  • The SPQ*GOLD® can be used for recruitment and development purposes to measure prospecting fitness.  It produces individual selection reports, team summary reports, and development and coaching reports.
  • SPQ*Gold will NOT measure personality, motivators and values, communication styles, emotional intelligence, leadership styles and derailers, or cognitive attributes and abilities (IQ).

Measuring Sales Performance Characteristics and Style
SPI-Q (Sales Performance Insight Questionnaire) is the latest and most comprehensive sales assessment tool in the marketplace.  The Sales Performance Insights Questionnaire (SPI-Q) has been developed in Australia by Performance Insights and focuses on the attributes that are uniquely relevant to sales.  It is the only product in the market that predicts the multi-dimensional characteristics required by today’s sales professionals, and measures the subtle but critical characteristics that differentiate successful sales people.  The questionnaire measures 25 Sales Attributes, clustered into three broad domains:

  1. Compelling Relationships – measures the preferences the individual has when working with clients and developing relationships i.e. Impact, Credibility, Insight, Attentiveness, Initiation, Influence, Social Leverage, Client Engagement and Negotiation.
  2. Perceptive Reasoning – measures how the individual processes information and makes judgments relating to client issues and solutions i.e. Research, Exploration, Agility, Pursues Learning, Creativity, Structure, Quality Orientation, Rational, Specialist and Judgement.
  3. Channelled Energy – measures the motivators and levers which drive the individual to succeed i.e. Authenticity, Resilience, Self Belief, Recovery, Motivation and Sales Drive.

The questionnaire has been designed to be highly pragmatic and user-friendly (requiring minimal training) with standard interpreted report outputs which are adapted based on the individual’s results.   The SPI-Q is a self-report questionnaire and the accuracy of this profile depends on how honest the individual has been when completing the questionnaire as well as their self-awareness.  It reflects their preferred style rather than their ability.  However, research shows that people’s responses to personality questionnaires can act as a good predictor of how they are likely to behave on the job.  There is no one ‘perfect profile’.

Applications

  • Administered online via user name and password sourced via an accredited provider.
  • The SPI-Q can be used for recruitment and development purposes.  It produces individual reports along with accompanying team summary reports, development and coaching reports.
  • SPI-Q will NOT measure values, leadership styles & derailers, cognitive attributes and abilities or prospecting fitness.

These two tools would be my first choice when recruiting sales people.  If you want to measure Culture Fit, Motives and Values, Leadership Style and Derailers, Emotional Intelligence (EQ) or Cognitive Abilities (IQ) then we recommend the following tools, which while they are not sales specific, have been widely used in sales and sales leadership.

Measuring Culture Fit and Values: The Hogan Motives, Values and Preferences Inventory (MVPI) measures ten core values found in most cultures throughout history i.e. Aesthetics, Affiliation, Altruistic, Commerce, Hedonism, Power, Recognition, Science, Security and Tradition.  It is not sales specific, however, it provides vital information to managers about how to coach and manage their sales people in terms of motivators, values and drivers.  The MVPI provides useful data about the kind of work environment the candidate prefers.  Measuring organisational fit is critical to staff retention and cultural engagement.

Measuring Leadership Style and Derailing Behaviours: Most business leaders have coping behaviours they draw on when under pressure.  The Hogan Development Survey (HDS) measures strategies and behaviours leaders have developed over time (even from childhood) to cope with increased levels of pressure whether due to change, high stress, multi-tasking, work saturation, an unhappy environment or being outside of their comfort zone. The HDS is not purpose built for sales leaders however it has a wide body or research on sales leadership with relevant norm groups to refer to.  Research shows that most leaders display at least one coping style.  In measuring extremes of personality then, it is very important to remember that these can have highly positive implications.  There is, however, always a potential downside to extremes because if they are not managed effectively or appropriately they can become problematic.  When business leaders, especially sales leaders, are not managing their interpersonal façade well (perhaps because of stress, pressure, deadlines, etc.) these extremes can emerge unchecked and upset the delicate balance of teamwork and interpersonal relationships.

Measuring Emotional Intelligence (EQ): Emotional Intelligence (EQ) involves a set of skills that define how effectively people perceive, understand, reason with and manage their own and others’ feelings.  These skills are cornerstones to successful selling, as emotions are an inherent part of why people buy and why they do not. The Genos Model of workplace Emotional Intelligence comprises seven specific EI skills critical to successful selling i.e. Emotional Self-Awareness, Emotional Expression, Emotional Awareness of Others, Emotional Reasoning, Emotional Self-Management, Emotional Management of Others and Emotional Self-Control.  Each skill can apply to successful selling.

Measuring Cognitive Attributes and Abilities (IQ): There are no sales specific attributes and abilities assessments that we know of, however, good quality Attributes and Abilities assessments have been around for over 50 years.  They are often referred to as IQ tests.  They are widely available through accredited providers and most organisational psychologists.  They are becoming more applicable because more sales and many leadership roles, especially sophisticated or more complex sales markets, require high level thinking abilities such as:

  • Verbal – verbal fluency, vocabulary and ability to understand and reason using words.
  • Numerical – ability to use and understand numerical concepts, reason using numbers and perceive logical relationships between them.
  • Abstract – the ability to think clearly and make sense of complexity, which is known as educative ability and the ability to store and reproduce information, known as reproductive ability.
  • Critical Thinking – the ability to clarify goals, examine assumptions, discern hidden values, evaluate evidence, accomplish actions and assess conclusions.

We do not use single assessments.  Instead, we combine tools to give us a more complete picture.
Different sales roles in different industries require different attributes for success.  Thus, profiles should be interpreted with reference to a specific role and its requirements.  It is important that the data from any assessment be combined with other sources of information about the individual when making decisions, particularly in selection settings.  Most assessments have a shelf life of 18–24 months and should be treated confidentially.  If there are major changes in an individual’s life or work, this could change some of the attributes in some assessments.  If you wish to use recruitment grade assessments for sales selection, I hope this helps you make a more informed decision.

To order an online assessment today, please call Barrett on 03 9532 7677 or for further information click on this link  www.barrett.com.au/assessments

Remember everybody lives by selling something.

Author: Sue Barrett, www.barrett.com.au

1 Comment »

Five reasons to Mind Your Emotions®

August 6, 2010 in Attitudes & Behaviours, Emotional Intelligence, Self Development, Wellbeing Support Services

“Courage doesn’t always roar. Sometimes courage is the little voice at the end of the day that says ‘I’ll try again tomorrow’.”

This quote more often than not reflects my life as an entrepreneur, business woman, sales person, mother, partner and friend. On those days and nights when I feel overwhelmed and sometimes exhausted by all my responsibilities and commitments that little voice reminding me to ‘try again tomorrow’ keeps me focused on why I am doing what I am doing – it helps me to continue to cultivate my resilience, to continue to put one foot in front of the other, to make decisions and to keep on moving.  If I am ever in doubt, that little voice reminds me of all the other challenges I have mastered and that my track record speaks for itself.  Over the years I have learnt to trust that little voice and I have learnt how to mind my emotions.

However it wasn’t always that way. Beset with self doubt earlier in my career and often searching outside myself for reassurance and validation, I eventually understood that listening to my little voice and working constructively with my emotions, feelings and thoughts were invaluable life skills.  Developing emotional resilience and a deeper self awareness has supported me to better achieve my goals, communicate, work with, and lead people more effectively, as well as spring back emotionally after suffering through difficult and stressful times in my life.

Through much searching, reading, listening, practice, and self reflection I have come to understand that emotions are never right nor wrong, good nor bad, or correct or incorrect.  Emotions are simply pieces of information telling us how we are currently experiencing our world.  However, what we do with the emotions we experience can help or hinder us.

For instance the Cognitive Model is a psychological model that looks at the role of our Cognitions (our thinking) in influencing how we respond to situations in our lives.  Oftentimes, we may feel a situation has caused our feelings. These feelings can be good or bad, positive or negative. However, the Cognitive Model says this is not right.  Rather, it is the way we THINK about a situation and our interpretations of it that cause our feelings and responses. Therefore, it is our interpretation of a situation that triggers how we feel or respond, not the situation in and of its self.   This is not new either here is a quote from    Epictetus, 1st Century AD,  “Men are disturbed not by things but by the views that they take of them.”

Developing Emotional Resilience
The first step to becoming more emotionally resilient is the acknowledgment that there is room for improvement and taking the time to learn more about yourself.  The following behaviours and attitudes are some ways in which emotional resilience can be demonstrated and measured:

  • Have realistic and attainable expectations and goals.
  • Show good judgment and problem solving skills.
  • Be persistent and determined.
  • Be responsible and thoughtful rather than impulsive.
  • Be an effective communicator with good people skills.
  • Learn from past experience so as not to repeat mistakes.
  • Be empathetic towards other people (care how others around you are feeling).
  • Have a social conscience (care about the welfare of others).
  • Feel good about yourself as a person.
  • Feel like you are in control of your life.
  • Be optimistic rather than pessimistic.

Some Strategies to develop your Emotional Resilience
There are many strategies we can use to help us harness the positive power of our emotions. Here are a few for you to consider:

The Big 4:  7-8 hours of Sleep, Healthy Diet, Regular Exercise, Doing Fun Activities

Relaxation: Learning how to relax takes practice however two ways to start is to 1) use progressive Muscle Relaxation or 2) lie still in a warm, safe environment and play quite relaxing music or be in nature – sit quietly focusing on and experiencing pleasant sensory sensations such as the fragrance flowers or the twittering of birds.

Thought Stopping: As you notice yourself saying something negative in your mind, you can stop your thought mid-stream by saying to yourself “Stop”. Saying this aloud will be more powerful and make your more aware of your habit.

Thought Diary: Keeping a daily diary or journal of your thoughts can be an effective tool for examining your inner process.

Positive mantras & affirmations:  An affirmation is a positive thought or statement that you repeat to yourself and implant into your unconscious mind. A positive affirmation can act as the source of direction and inspiration for your present and future actions.  Once entrenched in your subconscious mind, a positive affirmation guides your thoughts and actions in a desired direction and can be used to overcome negative and habitual thought patterns in order to create shifts in your behaviour and actions at an unconscious level.  Positive affirmations can subtly but pervasively change your self talk from negative to positive.

Change Self-Limiting Statements to Questions: Self-limiting statements like “I can’t handle this!” or “This is impossible!” are particularly damaging because they increase your stress in a given situation and they stop you from searching for solutions. The next time you find yourself thinking something that limits the possibilities of a given situation, turn it into a question. Doesn’t “How can I handle this?” or “How is this possible?” sound more hopeful, and open up your imagination to new possibilities?

Meditation & Mindfulness: The purpose of meditation is to heal and transform.  Because meditation is a skill you can practice meditation anywhere at any time. In every moment you can chose to meditate.  The energy that crafts and guides the practice of meditation is mindfulness.  Mindfulness allows us to look deeply and move beyond the busyness of our mind.   It allows us to focus on an object with single pointed attention.  When mindful, we are focused and not distracted.

For ongoing emotional distress: We suggest people consider seeing a professional in psychology, medicine or nutrition to get a correct diagnosis and appropriate treatment.

Sadly, most people have never been taught how to positively harness the power of their emotions, feelings, thoughts and behaviours, however many of the tools we can use to do so have been with us for at least two thousand years.  And for too long business has ignored the positive power of emotions so here are some reasons why you should mind your emotions.

Five business reasons to Mind Your Emotions®:
1.    Healthier, more productive business relationships
2.    Better staff engagement, alignment and retention
3.    Healthy conflict management strategies which address the issues and don’t attack the person
4.    More effective leadership, team work, sales and service outcomes
5.    Less sick leave, stress claims

Five personal reasons to Mind Your Emotions®:
1.    Greater self awareness, insight and personal growth
2.    Ability to experience more positive emotions and less distress in our lives
3.    Ability to develop more productive attitudes, feelings and behaviours that help us achieve our goals
4.    Ability to be an effective leader, colleague, partner, parent, friend, team player, etc.
5.    Ability to better manage the effect of our emotions on personal / team performance, workplace well-being and personal happiness

Learning how to mind my emotions has allowed me to become more emotionally resilient and strengthened my resolve to achieve my goals and live the life I want to live.

If you want to discuss how to develop strategies to enhance your emotional resilience and make the most of your capabilities and the situations your find yourself in, let us know and we will see if we can help you directly or refer you to the best person for your situation.

Remember everybody lives by selling something.
Author: Sue Barrett, www.barrett.com.au

No Comments »

More lessons from MasterChef – Can you take the heat?

July 29, 2010 in Attitudes & Behaviours, Emotional Intelligence, Performance Management, Sales Skills, Self Development, Success

As the saying goes, “If you can’t take the heat get out of the kitchen”.  Once again MasterChef has served up some great life lessons.  Last year I wrote about the great leadership, coaching and mentoring we can learn from MasterChef.  Again Garry, George, Matt and the other guest chefs showed us how to excel in this area of leadership.

On this occasion, I want to comment on ‘Resilience’ and dealing with setbacks and challenges, and how MasterChef gave us a window into how people handle stress and demanding situations.  The time pressures and increasingly difficult tasks set for the contestants showed us how well they were able to manage themselves under pressure and produce the goods.  You could often see the demands of a given situation getting to a number of the contestants.  It was unrelenting at times.  Those who were able to hold it together and ‘manage’ themselves on every level when under added strain performed better.  The constant practice enhanced their skills for sure, but it also taught them how to deal with pressure which is just as important.  Prior to the final episode, we saw Adam, Claire and Callum put under pressure and it was Adam and Callum who held it together better than Claire.  Claire is an extremely talented cook but got rattled more than the others thus affecting her performance.  Unlike Jonathon who survived eight out of nine elimination challenges, Claire had only been in one before and you could tell.  She wasn’t ready for it.

Luckily for the MasterChef contestants they were only subjected to this for about three and a half months.  Working chefs are required to take the ‘heat’ everyday albeit in environments they can control.  This got me thinking about those professions where every action and the outcomes of those actions are scrutinised every day, placing pressure on those to perform at their best.  Professional Chefs and Sports People, Air Traffic Controllers and Surgeons come to mind and I am sure there are several others.  With the exception of weather for both the Air Traffic Controllers and some Professional Sports People, for the best part, all of these professions allow their people to work in environments they can directly control and influence.

Sales people also have the scrutiny of performance in common with these professions however, they are often working in environments that are not of their own making or design.  They need to be able to deal with, and adapt to things outside of their control, i.e variable conditions and new environments, meeting new people, going to new places, uncovering new issues; variables of many kinds.  And unlike recipes, which if executed correctly should turn out like they were intended, sales people are often presented with the ‘Mystery Box’ (same ingredients different outcomes) on a daily basis several times a day.  They have to be able to think on their feet, and create outcomes their clients need and want.  They need to know how this goes with this to that.

How do they handle the stress?  How do they develop their resilience to perform at higher and higher standards every day without cracking?  How do they pay attention and make sure every client feels like they are special and important when you have listened to 5-25 people already that day?

As sales people, our actions are assessed by ourselves, our managers and our clients.  We deal with acceptance and rejection of our offering every day.  Our activities are tracked and mapped.  There are league tables, etc.

Any self respecting, self managed, self aware sales person would be able to tell you where they are at each day.  They will also tell you that they have learned not to take ‘No’ as personal rejection – that’s a fatal mistake made by many a new sales person.  Selling is the ultimate ‘thinking on your feet’ and ‘doing’ job.  Like athletes, we need to be continually exercising and getting fitter, developing our skills, knowledge and mindset all at the same time.

Why don’t we teach ‘How to Build Resilience and a Healthy Mindset’?

A healthy mindset is just as, if not more, important as product knowledge and selling skills.  However, most businesses usually only train their people in business skills, product knowledge and processes.  What we need to do is help people become more emotionally aware, intelligent and resilient in a number of ways.  We need to work with the whole person and provide people with access to a range of tools, processes and techniques which give them insight and teach them how to manage their emotions. We need to teach people how to develop healthy and resilient attitudes so they can take the heat and really excel.

We can’t all go on MasterChef to have our resilience and cooking skills tested, nor do all of us have the opportunity to be elite athletes and learn what it is like to work under obvious performance pressure however, we can learn how to develop resilience every day in small ways.

Higher performers, unlike many other people, have searched for and found tools, processes and techniques that help them develop strategies to enhance their self awareness and emotional resilience, and allow them to make the most of their capabilities and the situations they find themselves in on a daily basis.

Developing a Healthy and Resilient Attitude

The first step to becoming more emotionally aware, healthy and resilient is the acknowledgment that there is room for improvement and taking the time to learn more about yourself.  It’s about honest, constructive feedback and learning not to take things personally.  That is what MasterChef is all about – continuous self improvement and self awareness.  That’s what MasterSelling is about!

Next week we will look at some of the tools, behaviours and attitudes that help build self awareness, health and emotional resilience.  If you want further information about this, please contact us directly.

Thanks to MasterChef for another excellent season – truly inspiring stuff!

Finally, Mary Anne Radmacher’s words sum up for me and probably many sales people and entrepreneurs our lot: “Courage doesn’t always roar. Sometimes courage is the little voice at the end of the day that says ‘I’ll try again tomorrow’.”

Remember everybody lives by selling something.

Author: Sue Barrett, www.barrett.com.au

No Comments »

Is internal competition eating away at your sales results?

July 1, 2010 in Attitudes & Behaviours, Culture, Ethics & Values, Performance Management, Sales Leadership, Sales Management, Sales Relationships, Sales Talent, Self Development, Strategy, Success, Teamwork, Value Creation

Many sales cultures are traditionally based on respect for authority, status and success, and encouraging competitive, challenging and achievement-oriented atmospheres. Although this is not true for all businesses, especially in the 21st Century! There are a growing number of businesses adopting more collegiate, lead team approaches. However, despite different types of cultures, sales performance and results are usually derived from the efforts of individuals. Harnessing those individual efforts to achieve synergy (the sum is greater than its individual parts) is a key task of management, yet so many get it wrong. Let’s take a look at one case study and see why.

What is wrong with the following scenario?

  • Sales team has great products and service proposition and is part of an international business
  • Sales team is made up of individuals who are measured on achievement of individual sales targets
  • Each sales person is given a base retainer but earns the vast majority of their income on commissions made from sales converted
  • There are a couple of high achieving sales performers, some average performers and some new sales people yet to prove themselves
  • Annual staff turnover of sales staff has been about 30-40%
  • Average tenure is 18 months
  • The sales team is a state team all working in the same city
  • Sales performance is purely measured on sales revenue results
  • Sales League Tables are on public display showing who is ‘top sales dog’ each week
  • The sales culture is based on respect for authority, status, success and competition
  • The workplace atmosphere is competitive, challenging and achievement-oriented
  • The sales people do NOT work to specific territories/markets or customer segments to manage and grow, instead it is ‘first in best dressed’
  • The competitive environment encourages sales people to fight over leads that come into the business leading to ‘bullying’ tactics, attempts to ‘outdo’ each other, squabbling and fighting over who got to that client first
  • Sales people ‘sand bag’ lists of clients just to make sure that the other sales people do not get them even if they themselves are not working on those leads at present
  • Management provide no selling skills training, no sales coaching, no sales support, no CRM, no documented sales strategy nor a ‘go-to-market’ plan
  • There are no formal sales management practices in place except for the weekly sales meeting which deteriorates into an ‘I’m better than you are’ bun fight

This is an example of lazy and ineffectual management. Only focused on outcomes with no regard for strategy, team structure, performance quality, clear leadership, staff retention, values or culture, this sales team is not geared for high performance and continues to lag behind its true potential.

Why create competition where it doesn’t need to be?

Why make selling harder than it needs to be?

‘Old school’ sales management said that you had to have sales people competing with each other or they wouldn’t sell. You weren’t a legitimate sales team if you didn’t have league tables. They said that internal competition would motivate people to sell more. Well they are wrong. The scenario above is not uncommon. It reflects an actual real life situation – happening right now.

This archaic approach doesn’t work. It’s outdated and old fashioned. If you want to generate real sales growth, try harnessing the energy, talent and ambitions of your sales people in a constructive way where they can all achieve their individual goals along with those of the company without trying to ‘kill’ each other in the process. Remember the old saying ‘a team of champions will not beat a champion team’?

Remember everybody lives by selling something.

Author: Sue Barrett, www.barrett.com.au

No Comments »

← Previous Entries
Next Entries →