Coaching Sales People to Achieve More

7/28/2019 Coaching Sales People to Achieve More

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Sales Management

The Funnel Principle BlogA Breakthrough Sales Performance Ebook

By Mark Sellers


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........................................................Coaching Sales People To Achieve More Than Just Quota 3

.................................Sales Management: Ryder Cup Torment: Would You Re-Hire Jim Furyk? 5

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Coaching Sales People To Achieve MoreThan Just QuotaSeptember 18, 2012

Managers do you want to be a better

coach to your salespeople? Start diving

for pearls.

For thousands of years, the pearl has been

a highly sought after gem. Before the 20thcentury the only way to get pearls was to

skim the ocean floor and gather them by

hand one at a time. These divers in somecountries mostly women would descend

to depths of 40 meters or more to search

for the prize. Divers risked death from

several sources including blacking out due

to a lack of oxygen, getting attacked by

hostile creatures, or drowning from tide

changes. I cant imagine what their life

insurance premiums were like.

When I think of why these women and

men risked their lives performing such a

risky profession, I cant believe they were

motivated only by economics, even

though it is how they made their living.

Its likely they were motivated by pride,

or recognition, or community status, or

carrying on a family tradition.

Whats that got to do with managing your

salespeople? They are diving for pearls. If

you want to be a high impact coach, find

out what those pearls are and help your

people scoop them up.

Knowing what motivates your salespeople

is job one. Its easy to assume its all

about money, since part of the income of

most sellers is based on how much stuff

they sell. If you dig deeper you will

uncover more complex motivations. One

seller told me he was in sales to earn more

money than his father as a way to exceed

his fathers expectations of the son.

Another seller told me that he wanted to

succeed in sales to get a promotion to

marketing a position that he associated

with higher status. I challenged him on the

status thing but that shouldnt matter to

him. With motivation its his opinion thatcounts.

So how do you learn their motivations andhelp them get what they want? Take a cue

from Steve Chandler, an authority on the

topic. Steve says coaching isnt advising

or telling. Its not managing. Its not

bullying people to get what you want. Its

asking questions in a nonjudgmental way.

Its caring. Steve suggests the following:

1. Seek first to understand. Have youever advised a friend or family

member to stop a behavior that is

destructive, like smoking? Im sure

they didnt say Smoking isnt really

bad for me. Then why do some people

still smoke even when they know that

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the habit could kill them? I coached a

veteran rep recently about the bad year

he was having. Last year wasnt that

good either. The first thing I asked him

was how he felt about his numbersbeing so low. I really wanted to know

if he was feeling any pain. Honestly,

Im not sure he is. I can tell him how to

get his sales funnel back in good

shape, but I cant make the calls for

him or do his prospecting.

2. Remove limitations. Usually, low or

plateau type performance in a

salesperson is due to self-limiting

thoughts. If a salesperson thinks shell

never hit quota until her company has

new products, or until she is given

better accounts to call on, help her

see that shes created these barriers

herself and theyre preventing her from

getting what she wants.

3. Suggest possibilities. The goal here isto get your salesperson to see what is

possible. Theres no judgment, no

committing to plans, no tactics to back

him into a corner and deliver some

knockout punch. This is an inspiring

step in the process.

4. Gain agreements. Steve says that

people cant be managed but you can

help them manage what they agree to.

The thing they have to agree to first is

being coached. You cant make themwant your help. If my veteran rep

client tells me he really wants to hit

quota again, Ill remind him of that in

later coaching sessions. If he agrees to

prospect in new accounts Ill call him

out if hes not honoring that

commitment. Ill remind him of the

consequences he told me he would

have if quota is missed.

Some of your people dont want your

coaching now. Youll watch them struggle

and feel helpless. You might take offense

to getting shut down all the time. Its hard

to set aside your own notions of whats

important or valued or reasonable or

logical. But there is no greater

accomplishment for you than to help

someone tap into his or her potential.

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Sales Management: Ryder Cup Torment:Would You Re-Hire Jim Furyk?October 4, 2012

When does experience become a liability

in selling?

If you watched the recent Ryder Cup

matches you might be asking questions

about experience. The experienced

players Mickleson, Woods, Stricker, and

Furyk combined for a total of 4 points

won and 10 points lost. Take outMickelsons performance with youngster

Keegan Bradley and the remaining three

veterans (two were captains picks) won 1

point and lost 9 points. Ouch.

If youre a sales manager building a team,

or if youve ever found yourself having to

complete a team and considered recruiting

people you know very well whats the bestway to make the right decision?

For golf fans in the US thinking of thistopic is not just a therapy session to

recover from the fresh wound of the Ryder

Cup outcome. Soon, Presidents Cup

captain Fred Couples will be making his

captains picks for the 2013 squad that

will compete in Dublin, Ohio on Jack

Nicklauss Muirfield Village course.

Couples is recently quoted as saying he

would love to have Jim Furyk on the

team.

If you were Couples would you feel the

same?

Is this a case of a buddy gone blind or a

buddy who knows his buddy better than

we do?

Youd have to consider experience right?

Lets take a closer look at this word

experience.

Is the experience of our politiciansworking in our favor? If youre a West

Virginian you might say yes as Robert

Byrd carried truck loads of cash back to

your state for 47 years. On the other side

of the aisle sits another long experienced

senator, Orin Hatch. Hes made the

Senate his summer home for 36 years.

Are you an experienced worker looking

for work and too often considered over

qualified for the job?

If youre a school teacher in the Chicago

public system and youre laid off your

experience means youll get called first

when the school needs to rehire teachers.

Is experience the reason the US womens

national soccer team has won the goldmedal at the past three Olympics? In

2012 the roster was made up of 61% of

players who played on the 2008 gold

medal team. In 2008 the team was made

up of 50% of players who had played on

the 2004 gold medal team. The current

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team has seven players who are age 30 or

older, and two of those have a combined

28 years of national team tenure.

Experience defined means comprising

knowledge of or skill of some thing or

some event gained through involvement in

or exposure to that thing or event.

Therefore doesnt it suggest that

experience is useful only when the person

is placed in the event or circumstance

identical or very close to the event where

experience was gained?

Would you put more weight on Furyksoverall career or recent performances?

He has won 16 PGA events including

some big game trophies like the US Open,

The Memorial, The Canadian Open, the

Western Open, and the Tour

Championship in 2010. These events are

played on the toughest tracks in the US

Cog Hill, Muirfield Village, Olympia

Fields, and Eastlake. Hes had some

bigtime wins in past Ryder Cups. In the

1997 Ryder Cup he beat a Goliath Nick

Faldo in the Sunday singles (Europe won).

He beat Garcia in the singles in 1999 (US

famous comeback). He beat Howell in

singles in 2004 (Europe killed US). In

2006 he lost (Europe again killed US) and

in 2008 he sat out the singles matches (US

won).

His record in non Ryder Cup match play

kind of play is not impressive. And his

sudden death playoff record is 3-8 which

looks worse than it is. It means he won 3

tournaments out of the 11 he tied for first.

Would you put more weight on his recent

performances and specifically the Ryder

Cup? At Medinah while he didnt fare as

badly as Steve Stricker or Tiger

(combined winning zero points and losing

7 points), he didnt impress either,

winning just one point. The match he lost

to McIroy and McDowell was close.

Perhaps it was the points he lost thats

causing the bounty. He missed makeable

par putts on the last two holes of Sundays

singles match to lose. This summer heblew his lead in the World Series of Golf

in Akron, making a 6 on the final hole.

Perhaps not as bad as when my good

friend Kenny Perry collapsed on 17 and18 to lose the Masters in 2009. I recall his

comment as much as I recall the pain of

watching him on those holes If the

worst thing that ever happens to me is

coming in second at the Masters then Ivelived a pretty good life.

I recall one manager building a sales team

saying that hiring the people who had

worked for him at other companies was

like devil you know instead of new hires

being the devil you dont know.

Like a lot of management decisions they

never get second guessed when the

outcome is positive. You look like a

genius. But when the outcome is bad

youd better be able to live with the heat.

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Coaching Sales People to Achieve More

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