Talent

Talent is the first of the 4 Keys to building a peak performance sales organization.  Among many other principles, Jim Collins' book "Good to Great" reveals the best thought out plan with sub par talent on board won't work well, but even a mediocre plan with great talent will succeed.

Talent begins with creating specific PROFILES for roles the go-to-market plan calls for.  Will the sales force be hybrid, specialized for hunter/farmer, segmented by vertical or require various levels of sales reps to call on specific customer demographics?  Will reps sell through an inside sales model or face-to-face or both?  Will there be lead generation or will reps need to prospect heavily on their own?  Does the product or service require technical integration, is it a simpler sale with no switching costs for the customer or is it a rip and replace proposition?  Will reps be reading a script or setting appointments for conducting a full needs analysis?  Will the sales rep sell ROI to executive decision makers or sell usability and function to users of the product?  Will reps be required to sell volume or higher average order size sales with fewer transactions?  What is the length of the sales process and time to close?  The job description and list of rep competencies desired for the role must mirror the answers to these questions.  The interview process needs to uncover skills needed to perform these tasks. Hiring managers need to be trained to interview, ask the right questions and interpret candidate answers. 

Existing talent needs to be deployed to the right role.  I've seen reps thrive when they're positioned correctly in the appropriate role.  Not everyone can crank out loads of cold calls each day.  Reps may be better suited to managing a portfolio of customers and building long term relationships to learn the customer's business intimately.  In early stage companies where acquiring critical mass of customers is life blood, reps with a hunter mind set are necessary to reach as many prospects as possible.  We work hard to bring new customers on board.  We must work just as hard if not harder to keep them.  That means hand holding customers, training them properly to use our products/services and encouraging adoption throughout the customer's organization.  This requires an attentive rep who has patience and networking skills to penetrate the customer account with numerous contact points.

Don't let your reps die on the vine.  Talent development requires a feedback loop.  Front line sales managers are a critical component to any well functioning sales organization.  I find most regional sales managers (RSMs) are good at providing informational feedback but are lacking at two other important feedback mechanisms.  Informational feedback is a list of performance statistics.  "You made 40 telephone calls yesterday"  "Your average order size is $2,400".  You're selling 22 transactions per month, your product mix is 90% "A" Widgets and only 10% "B" widgets, etc.  Where RSMs miss the boat is providing the developmental feedback and motivational feedback necessary to drive their reps upwards to better metrics.  Telling your rep you need them to increase their average order size or make more calls isn't enough.  What does it mean "I need you to be more aggressive on your calls"?  Do you want your rep to punch someone on the nose?  Developmental feedback might sound like this..."being more aggressive means ask for a specific timeline for the next step in the buying process to occur so it is not open ended.  Hold your prospects accountable for their timelines and get back to them as agreed" or "keep your telephone sales conversations tighter and on track"  "tighter means ask the tough questions and get right to the point and ask the prospect for feedback and listen to what they want to do next".  "Don't take too much time with how well the sports team did last night".  These are examples of developmental feedback.  Teach your reps how to do what you're asking them to do!  If you want more telephone calls then something else has to give.  Work with the rep to figure out where they are tripping that's preventing more calls.  The answer could be an ineffective work flow process in the CRM.  You need to find out.  Motivational feedback is encouraging reps who have made partial progress and going in the right direction.  Don't wait until reps are all the way to the goal before patting them on the back.  That could take a while.  You need to reinforce their positive behavior all the way up the ladder.  Clear expectations, constant written and verbal communication and a clearly defined vision of what winning looks like needs to be permeated throughout the organization.

There are many tools to help keep sales talent and employee performance on track.  Publishing daily weekly, monthly and quarterly reports of key sales indicators (to the individual rep level) will provide visibility for reps to measure themselves against and also provide benchmarks for improvement. Performance appraisals and performance improvement plans are tools that provide a regularly scheduled feedback mechanism. In addition, these tools allow an avenue for professional development action plans and are a good standard on which to fairly base merit increases. 

The right talent needs to be attracted, developed and retained.  Remember your people are your greatest asset.  Your technology is certainly important and you should be proud of its creation.  Your people however, are what will take you over the top.

Next I'll talk about the biggest area of revenue leakage...Availability (or Market Coverage)...

Learning to Develop Corporate Sales Strategy

A critical step that is surprisingly overlooked in many startup companies is learning the landscape BEFORE planning sales strategy.  Once sales strategy is developed and actions to execute on that strategy are identified, we can begin to build a go-to-market model that will best carry out the strategy.  It is at that point when the sales force is planned.  In mid to larger companies, there could be a shift in market coverage and different sales roles that will require significant change management to realize. 

There is a comprehensive learning process designed to learn what it takes to make correct decisions on building corporate sales strategy.  Historical perspective, performance benchmarks, people, challenges, opportunities, data and processes are a few examples of input.  Sources of information include internal employees at all levels, customers, hard data, board members, suppliers, analysts and also very important, company culture.

Why then don't many companies follow this evolution of stepping stones?  It's hard work!  Ego's get in the way.  Someone decides they want it done a certain way rather than test their ideas first.  Or, leadership has a singular method and is not versatile enough to design any number of plans that fit the situation.  Time is critical for any size company and making mistakes in strategic development and building out a sales force cause negativity, distrust, turnover, additional cost, lost revenue, loss of management credibility and time. 

Is it worth the effort to learn before you build out the corporate strategy?  You bet!  It will save you grief and put you on a path to success.  Effective CEO's won't ask their new VP Sales hire to pull a strategy out of their back pocket.  The learning process while building sales strategy can take anywhere from 60-90 days if done right. 

4 Key Pieces to Building a Peak Performance Sales Organization

Start-up companies and mid to larger companies require varying degrees of the following 4 keys to building successful sales teams: Talent, Rep Availability (market coverage), Productivity and Field Readiness.  Everything else you can possibly think of is a subset of one these 4 Keys.  However, the 4 keys are about execution and roll out.  Prior to building out and executing on the 4 keys, corporate strategy needs to be determined through heavy collaboration among stakeholders. 

The VP Sales must grasp business drivers that are essential to the company's success.  These business drivers are then peeled to the root and specific tactics created to achieve the metrics designed to support the business drivers. Once these metrics are agreed on by senior management, including Marketing, Operations and Finance (remember collaboration), we are closer to implementing the 4 keys above. 

There is much groundwork done to "learn" what will ultimately become the sales strategy for the company.  This step is where many companies fall short as they focus on buidling sales teams that don't drive the company to success.  I will address the learning process that brings corporate sales strategy to light and I'll delve deeper into the 4 Keys in subsequent writings.