In most organizations, sales managers are the essential bridge between the company’s sales goals and the realization of those goals. The rough, day-to-day interactions between sales people and their customers are frequently filtered through the perspective of the sales manager on his way up. And the aspirations and strategies of the company’s management must be impressed by the realism of the commercial manager as they descend from above. Sales managers are the drivers who carefully orchestrate salespeople’s attempted entanglement with their management.
It is an incredibly important and difficult job. Unfortunately, it is often the least skilled job in the entire organization. Instead of providing information on best practices and work processes, most companies hope that their sales managers have learned enough during their days as field salespeople to provide a roadmap on how to do this job well.
Unfortunately, only a small percentage of untrained sales managers actually make it, arriving by trial and error and after hours of study at the best practices of an effective sales manager. The vast majority are caught up in the urgencies of the moment, the tantalizing details of every transaction, and the continual onslaught of crises, and can never establish a systematic plan for their success.
The net result? Few vendors are effectively managed. All parties—executive management, sales manager, and sales staff—jump from one frustration to another. Company goals are often met by chance, salespeople fail to perform to their full potential, and sales managers lurch from one crisis to another.
Certain common mistakes often arise from this unhealthy situation. As a long-time consultant and educator of salespeople and sales managers, I frequently see these three most common ailments that sales managers suffer from.
1. Lack of a focused sales structure.
This is such a foreign concept to many companies that the term itself is unfamiliar. The structure of a sales force consists of all the articulated and unspoken rules, policies, and procedures that shape salesperson behavior. It consists of things such as:
-the way sales territories are defined
-the way salespeople do their job
-the way markets and customers are targeted
-how sellers are compensated
-the methods the manager uses to communicate with salespeople
-expectations of the sales force
-the training and development system of the company
-the expectation of information gathering by sellers
-frequency and schedule of sales meetings
-the sales tools used by sellers
and countless other things like that
A highly focused and well-designed sales structure can be one of the company’s greatest assets, as it ultimately shapes the behavior of the sales force.
However, most sales structures have not been subject to critical review by company management. The structure usually takes shape slowly over time. Decisions are often made with a great deal of input from vendors, almost always in response to a single event. These decisions are slowly encoded in the written and unwritten structure of the company.
As a result, many sales structures are holdovers from years past, the legacy of salespeople who may not even be with the company today.
Why do you have the sales compensation plan that you have, for example? Is it because you put together a strategic plan that directly compensates the sales force for achieving the company goal? Or is it because… it’s the plan you inherited?
Why do some salespeople come to the office every week? Is it because you have determined that this is the most valuable use of your time? Or is it because… that’s how some of them like to do it?
Why are some of your salespeople highly organized, with well-designed file systems and effective ways to track their interactions with your customers, while others continue to get by with scraps of paper and yellow legal pads? Is it because you have invested in a system that helps them be well organized and information savvy? Or is it because… that’s how it worked?
Can you see the point? Many of these structural issues (expressed and unexpressed rules about how the salesperson does work) have been developed by salespeople in response to their own specific situations.
And most sales managers ignore the impact of these decisions on salesperson productivity and effectiveness.
I recently had lunch with a friend, an entrepreneur who had successfully started and run several businesses. As we discussed the pros and cons of organizing a sales force for his latest company, he commented that he had learned how easy it is to gradually relinquish control of the company to the sales force. One decision at a time, made in response to the impassioned plea of an individual salesperson, would, over time, form the structure that would govern the sales side of the business.
I was impressed by his insight. That same observation described the number one mistake sales managers make: They accept the historically evolved status quo for structure and don’t spend time focusing on it to provide the environment for sales success.
2. Lack of regular and systematic direction and feedback for salespeople.
The relentless pull of urgency and the demanding cries of the transaction, like the pleas of a small child, tend to overwhelm most sales managers’ time and attention.
Sales managers often have the best of intentions. For example, they may need to conduct a series of performance reviews by the end of the year. But there is this great presentation in an account to attend. And another account wants to complain about some problem to the sales manager. Yet another needs the manager’s touch to smooth out some feathers etc. And they really need to spend some time in the field with the new vendor. And, and, and… the demands of the urgent once again force regular face-to-face discussions about expectations and outcomes at the bottom of the “to do” list.
As a result, most sellers are left with no direction and little feedback on how they’re doing. Of course, we publish sales numbers, but there are many reasons a set of numbers might be up, down, or sideways beyond seller impact.
What do you expect from this particular seller? And how well is he doing? In most surveys of what salespeople really want from their managers, “direction and feedback” is often at the top of the list. It is one thing to talk about some account or some deal, and quite another to talk about the central issues of “my performance”.
Sales is an isolated job. It’s not uncommon for a salesperson to spend only 70% of the work week. All that isolation often leads to anxiety and self-doubt that often expresses itself through complaining and faultfinding in the company.
All of this negative energy can be prevented by providing the salesperson with regular direction, specific expectations, and regular feedback.
The old saying, “Off site, out of mind,” is all too often the operative description of the typical sales manager. The salespeople are out there somewhere, doing their thing, while the tyranny of the urgent often takes up the manager’s time.
As a result, salespeople aren’t as focused as they should be; they resort to unhealthy thoughts; and they spend too much time expressing negative energy.
3. Lack of an organized training and development system.
No profession in the world expects serious professionals in that profession to figure it out for themselves. Quite the contrary. Each profession has determined a minimum acceptable course of study and usually has some event that marks entry into that profession. That is why teachers, Emergency Medical Technicians and ministers are licensed; that lawyers must pass the bar exam; accountants must pass their certification exam, etc.
Unfortunately, that rarely happens with sellers. Only in leading companies is some course of study required for entry-level salespeople and some event signifying successful completion of that study and entry into the profession.
Even thinking this way is so out of character for most sales managers that I can almost hear half of the readers of this article snickering over coffee. “Any standards to allow people access to work?” Incredible thought. But if you don’t insist on it, you’ll continue to work with an unpredictable sales force where every hire is ultimately a shot in the dark.
No profession in the world expects that once someone has qualified to enter the profession, they no longer need to invest in their own development. And every profession has expectations of the regular need for practitioners to systematically improve themselves. Can you imagine a teacher who never attends in-service training? A nurse who never invests in continuous development? A minister who never goes back to school? A doctor who never attends a conference?
Even if those uncaring professionals could keep their jobs, you wouldn’t want them to have anything to do with your family. You would never put your health in the hands of a doctor who hasn’t been up to speed since medical school. You do not want your children to be taught by the teacher who has learned nothing since graduation. You would never put your claim in the hands of a lawyer who had never bothered to keep up.
The examples can go on and on. But you get the idea. The professional who does not regularly invest in their own continuous development is relegated to the dregs of the market.
So why don’t the overwhelming majority of sales managers require regular and systematic participation in continuous development events for their positions? They may not see their salespeople (or themselves) as professionals. Or maybe they never thought of it that way.
Regardless of the reason, the reality of this disease is that the quality of the sales force is not what it could be, if only sales managers demanded some minimum standard for their entry-level people, and then regular development. and continuous of those who were inside. The wise sales manager will put together a system for the education and development of his salespeople.
While there are as many other management mistakes as there are sales managers, these three are the most common. Reach out to them and you’ll be well on your way to outstanding success in sales management.