ASSEMBLING the winning sales team
Jul 1, 1998 12:00 PM, Alan Kruglak
There are sales management tools that need to be applied to create a highly productive and desirable sales environment. This article supplies some tools that can be used to create the right environment for your sales staff.
Good salespeople are Type A personalities who want to win. The good ones know that if they win the race, the prize money will follow. Everyone likes to be stroked, especially salespeople. At my former company, GIC, we provided more than money when one of our salespeople closed a big sale by, for example, taking the sales representative and his spouse to dinner. Being acknowledged by the boss is one thing, but including spouses lets them know their partners were doing a good job and helps justify the long hours spent away from home.
Another way to bolster a repre-sentative's ego is to publish his victories, thereby providing peer recognition. We identified recently won projects on a monthly basis and posted them. We also personally congratulated each staff member responsible for a new win and generated a daily report on new sales bookings. I acknowledged the staff responsible for the sale, usually with a handshake. To your sales staff, recognition can be nearly as important as the sale itself. Glory is important-something a boss should never forget!
Another critical requirement is to provide reliable products and service. If a salesperson worries that a system will not meet client expectations, he will be less productive and may seek employment elsewhere. Good sales representatives view themselves as professionals and do not want to lie to prospects about the products or services they represent. If you claim a product or service fulfills certain requirements, be sure your claims are true. If not, both a dissatisfied client and an unhappy salesperson may move elsewhere.
Standardize product lines in each discipline to two major lines. Standardization makes it easier for all parts of your company-installation, service, engineering and sales-to understand how to install and support each system properly and deliver a quality product. Then, increase reliability by investing in the right technical infrastructure to deliver and support your systems. Most integrated systems need support around the clock, so your service program should cater to this critical need.
While their primary objective is to sell your products and services within your economic, operational and ethical guidelines, salespeople can be like children in a candy store. If you let them run loose without supervision, the results can be disastrous. When sales representatives are not managed properly, they can do irreparable harm. I know a company that allows their salespeople to sell in any territory with few guidelines about sales margins. The only number the owner looks at is total revenue. A good accounting system would probably show that many of his contracts are low margin or money-losers, which can kill a company. Another firm takes an opposite approach. Every proposal has to be reviewed by the production manager, the project manager and the sales manager and signed by the sales manager and the salespeople. Their sales representatives spend more time doing paperwork and getting approvals than selling. Treat salespeople carefully and establish reasonable limits.
GIC made it easy for sales representatives to do their jobs. We gave senior sales representatives the discretionary authority to propose projects of up to $100,000 without prior approval, unless the margin fell below a proscribed level. In those cases, they had to rationalize why it was important to win the job-a large upside for additional revenue over the next five years was a frequent justification. More often than not, we went along with the sales representative's recommendation because he was closer to the deal and had a better perspective. Over time, faith in our sales staff became increasingly justified.
Discretionary authority for salespeople in your firm will vary. As a rule, a senior sales representative should have the authority to propose a system that represents 1% of your firm's annual revenues without obtaining prior management approval. As a last resort, our management always retained the last right of refusal on our proposals. With that safety valve, if a signed contract came in with major economic or design flaws, we could always refuse to accept it. Because of our ability and willingness to set reasonable limits in the selling process, our salespeople could focus on selling. Our staff appreciated the freedom, and our limits and guidelines minimized exposure to abuses and mistakes.
Avoid placing a real or perceived ceiling on what a successful sales representative can earn. This means not using planned earnings requirements. Let salespeople reap what they sow. Setting artificial limits reduces productivity and results in lower sales. Smart salespeople will devise elaborate plans to control earnings and defeat any system. It is more productive to motivate them to focus on selling. Additionally, avoid ceilings on income. Our attitude was the larger the commission check, the more money the company was making.
Acquiring and building a strong sales force is difficult because good sales personnel is a rare commodity. You have to treat your sales staff like clients and make an effort to meet their needs. Recognize their egos and massage them. Develop secured territories and demand accountability. Invest in a strong infrastructure, so you can deliver reliable products and services. Give salespeople peace of mind and support them in a way that makes them believe in the company they represent. Establish reasonable guidelines and limits to maximize selling time, and let the sky be the limit on income. Using these approaches will minimize costly turnover, make your sales force happy with their employer and pirate-proof your organization from its competition.
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