I have always had customer-facing roles — for years in titles like Product Management and Marketing, before transitioning to a pure sales career. Now, my view of selling is informed by experience in other functional areas,. Becoming a consultant in sales performance is a natural evolution. It’s time for me to help others on their own journey. I couldn’t be more eager to start work each day.
At the heart of why I love working in Sales performance is people. I love helping people “find a better way” to do what they’re doing.
What Can You Do Better?
In my career, I’ve encountered a lot of sales professionals who are disappointed in their situations. They are experiencing “success gaps”. As a result, they aren’t meeting a variety of personal goals. I see:
- Smart and motivated people who are mysteriously performing below their expectation
- People who succeeded elsewhere, who are struggling after a move…and they don’t know why.
- Sales leaders who are so busy rescuing and closing their sellers’ deals that they don’t get to teach them anything, and aren’t confident that they could even if they found the time.
- Sales leaders not knowing why sales are falling short.
- Executives with that gnawing uncertainty which follows hiring a new sales leader (uncertainty based upon knowing that the average Sales VP last only 18 months)
- Sales leaders not knowing why some salespeople produce a lot of low margin business, while others can produce about as much with higher margins… or what to do about it.
- Corporate executives not trusting the sales function: to deliver results, to sell at profitable prices, to provide meaningful forecasts, or to describe what is going on in the sales organization.
A new client recently shared his vision for our engagement with me. He said that he wanted to be able to show the rest of the company significant sales growth, of course – but he also wanted to de-mystify the sales profession within his company. His ambition wasn’t just for himself, but for his entire sales force to gain stature within his company while improving sales performance. How could I not be eager to help him accomplish that?
Sales is Not an Art
This new client is right: Sales is not a black box, not some dark art. World class sales organizations don’t hire a personality profile and pray. They assess talent, deploy it, then develop it and coach it. They respect personal style, but know which selling behaviors are critical and non-negotiable
Professional sales is partly a craft, partly a science. There is science – real behavioral and social science – behind improving sales performance. Professional sellers are students of buying decision dynamics. There is science around changing selling behaviors; training, reinforcing, coaching, practice, measurement. Building credibility, being sensitive to needs, showing empathy, and enacting customer focus is a craft improved through application of all of the science.
Instilling discipline and rigor into the sales organization accomplishes several things:
- Driving improved, repeatable sales results. Finding more business, winning more business, and keeping/growing your best customers.
- Developing and using processes understandable to the rest of the organization. If sales organizations cannot describe what they do as a process, sales begins to resemble every other function in the company.
- Sales earns a seat at the leaders’ table. Sales leaders have upward mobility, and the entire organization has the means to become more customer focused.
Why I Love Working With Selling Organizations:
In my role, I am lucky to be able to help:
- Motivated people become great sales people
- Great sales people develop into inspiring sales leaders
- Inspiring sales leaders develop new waves of great sales leadership
- Sales leaders graduate into corporate leaders
I don’t sell sales training. I don’t just grow commission checks. Better than that, I grow careers, grow leaders, grow friendships. I’m a lucky guy.
To your success!