How does leadership drive sales innovation?

To drive sales innovation, I, as the Sales Head, emphasize setting a clear, SMART vision. This concise yet powerful statement communicates what we aim to achieve, why it matters, and how it aligns with organizational goals. This vision serves as a motivating force, inspiring the team to embrace change, focus on desired outcomes, and overcome challenges on the path to sales excellence.

Leadership must articulate a compelling and clear vision for sales innovation. This vision should align with the company's broader goals and be communicated effectively to all team members. By setting a clear direction, leaders can ensure that everyone's efforts contribute meaningfully towards the innovation objectives. For example, a tech company might set a vision to integrate AI in its sales processes to personalize customer experiences. This clear goal helps teams focus their efforts on specific, impactful areas.

A vision should be something the entire org is behind. It should be the final destination that can be broke down into achievable milestones. For example; I want to help everyone in sales development have a fair shot at being successful. It’s never ending but it’s also easy to apply goals to it to measure progress.

Leadership drives sales innovation by fostering a culture that values creativity and adaptability. Effective leaders articulate a vision that emphasizes innovation, inspiring the team to explore new sales approaches. They encourage risk-taking, creating a safe space for experimentation and learning from setbacks. Cultivating a learning culture and supporting creativity through resources and collaborative problem-solving sessions are crucial. Leaders advocate for innovative sales technologies, rewarding and recognizing innovative thinking. Leading by example, they embrace change and empower the team to make decisions, fostering autonomy and quick adaptations.

I find it very helpful as a leader to utilize OKR methodology to set clear targets. It is simple and focused; to have a limited number of OKRs, which are razor-sharp aligned with the company's direction. That also helps to track the performance accurately.

I love to collaborate with my team by embracing the "Servant Leader" model. That helps me to create an engaged team by all means and also reduces possible frictions of misalignment. A servant leader can easily fetch information, contribute to necessary actions, and be seen as a regular player in their team.

The sales leaders that I coach usually set up buddy systems in the SDR roles. Where one more senior SDR gets paired up with a new one. One of the ways for the more senior SDR to get promoted is to help their more junior SDR to succeed. This has been a successful way of increasing collaboration!

Team work makes the dream work. A sales org is only as strong as all of its parts (including marketing)! Anything that contributes to the final number is important to consider getting a strong cross collaborative working relationship with.

Foster an environment where collaboration is not just encouraged, but is a cornerstone of the sales process. This involves breaking down silos between departments, encouraging cross-functional teams, and creating opportunities for employees to share ideas and insights. Collaboration fuels diverse perspectives and approaches, essential for innovative solutions. For instance, at Google, we often see collaborations between technical and sales teams leading to innovative features in ad products, driven by real customer needs and technical feasibility.

To propel sales innovation, the second step involves fostering collaboration within the team and across functions. Collaboration, a collective pursuit of common goals and problem-solving, sparks creativity and synergy by combining diverse perspectives and skills. Establish cross-functional teams, provide communication platforms, and facilitate brainstorming sessions to instill a culture where collaborative efforts become the driving force for unparalleled innovation.

Experimentation in cold calling is a great way to introduce the "What if's"? Do a ride along with your salesforce individually and combine curiosity with a challenge. For the next sales call, "What if" I lead with a challenge. I will ask if both of us can make a 2 minute introduction and explanation of why we are here. And we let the prospect decide who pays for lunch. Now we have 2 chances to discuss our purpose, the prospect is fully engaged, we have secured a longer non intimidating discussion over lunch and the company will pick up the lunch on the expense report in case the manager happens to win. Another team building, teaching, fun approach where the employee is allowed to critique the manager.

We started with "F*ckup Fridays". Each Friday everyone brings one failure from the week. It's important that I, as the leader, bring transparent and real failures myself to cultivate the right environment. This has increase the psychological safety, but mostly the experimentation and will to try new things have exploded.

Embracing experimentation is a critical skill for a sales leader in today's landscape. A successful sales leader is open to learning, experimenting, and taking calculated risks. While some leaders hesitate to invest in initiatives for fear of potential setbacks, others who take such calls often experience significant career growth. This holds true, particularly in the context of experimenting with sales processes, tools, and the overall go-to-market strategy.

Sales innovation thrives in an environment where experimentation is welcomed. Leaders should empower their teams to try new approaches, take calculated risks, and learn from failures without fear of retribution. For example, a team could experiment with a new social media platform for customer engagement, tracking the results and learning from the outcomes. This approach not only fosters innovation but also builds a resilient and adaptable sales force.

To propel sales innovation, the third step is empowering team experimentation. This involves systematic testing of new ideas, methods, or solutions to discover opportunities, validate assumptions, and optimize performance. Providing resources, creating a supportive environment for learning and failure, and establishing clear criteria for evaluation are key elements in fostering successful experimentation within the team.

Here is how I like to embed curiosity within a sales team. The most rewarding curiosity is the curiosity around our prospects' business, metrics, strategy, targets, and industry. I act very curiously in my face-to-face client meetings, and that triggers a great lead-by-example case where this curiosity radiates within the team very rapidly, which brings great clarification, qualification, and negotiation strength.

Everything with sales is curiosity! However, most sales leaders only want their members to be curious in their sales meetings. x places where curiosity shines: 1. LinkedIn A rep connects with a non-decisionmaker, non-champion etc sparks a conversation. A rep can get TONS of knowledge about a prospect and I've had times when we changed up our sales strategy because of it. 2. Negotiation Finding new ways that would have a commercial value for the prospect that isn't in the standard contract. I've managed deals where we have used our LinkedIn presence or even set up a webinar (which was a win-win) so that we didn't need to decrease the price. These are cases that doesn't show up in the KPI's except the results!

To drive sales innovation, the fourth step is cultivating curiosity in the team. Curiosity, the fuel for learning and exploration, sparks innovation by prompting problem identification, information-seeking, idea generation, and assumption-challenging. Foster curiosity by posing open-ended questions, sharing compelling information, encouraging feedback, and rewarding curiosity-driven behaviors. This intentional cultivation not only perpetuates a cycle of continuous learning but also propels the team into a heightened state of intellectual and motivated innovation.

Promoting curiosity is pivotal in fostering a dynamic sales team. Cultivating a culture of continuous learning and exploration fuels innovation. Open-ended questions, information sharing, and recognition of curiosity-driven efforts create an environment where teams actively seek solutions, generate ideas, and challenge assumptions, propelling sales growth through inventive approaches.

The biggest success as a leader is when your team members shine. That's the indicator of a great leader. A small but effective way is to let the best salesperson present the sales numbers for the company, management team och the board. If presentation is something they like to do, it's a great way to give them this recognition.

Recognition is always very personal. A leader must know how the team members like to get praised. Then it is very important to praise accordingly. If all team members know each other's preferences, it is always easier to find a common ground to boost morale together, with spontaneous empathy cultivated.

Leaders should acknowledge both successful innovations and the learning derived from less successful attempts. Implement an innovation rewards program. For example, rewarding a salesperson who developed an effective new sales script or a unique client presentation format.

Acknowledging and rewarding innovation is pivotal in fostering a positive sales culture. Recognition, whether through verbal praise or formal programs, fuels team morale and motivation. It communicates value, respect, and support, creating an environment where sales teams are inspired to contribute their best and drive continuous innovation.

Sales people need to know that it's OK to fail. Good leadership creates and fosters an environment of coaching and improvement.

In the culmination of driving sales innovation, the sixth and final step entails leading by example. This practice involves embodying the behaviors, attitudes, and values expected from the team, serving as a guiding force. Leading by example has a profound influence, inspiring the team to emulate standards and embrace the shared vision. To lead by example, express enthusiasm, passion, and unwavering commitment to innovation. Share personal experiences and learnings, actively seek and implement feedback, and celebrate and showcase the team's innovations. In this way, leadership becomes a catalyst for a culture that not only values innovation but actively propels it forward, marking the pinnacle of a dynamic and inspired sales team.

"Walk the Talk" is what Leaders should live by. Leaders can't just impose or implement something and expect everyone to follow but exempt themselves. As a Leader, your subordinates will follow if they see you do it as well. By doing so, they don't see you as a Leader but a role model. Another thing here is when you do this, consistency is a big factor because it help your team see in clear view that you just don't do what you preach but rather do it on a regular basis as well.

In the realm of sales innovation, leaders should advocate for new strategies and actively engage in their implementation and execution. This involves more than just overseeing projects; it requires leaders to demonstrate their commitment through direct involvement. For instance, a senior leader might personally engage in a new digital marketing campaign, using innovative tools and analytics to understand customer behaviors and preferences. By doing so, they not only gain firsthand experience with these new tools but also show their team the practical applications and benefits of embracing new technologies. This approach can have a ripple effect, inspiring the sales team to explore and adopt similar innovative practices in their work.

One of the most simple things to lead by example is to join the team and do the dirty work yourself. I join the cold calling sessions, prospects, and all of the other things. Even if I didn't have a quota myself. It's important to show that everyone's quota is our quota.

We started cold calling sessions and I would join as the leader. Sometimes I didn't book anything. Sometimes I booked the most. The result doesn't matter. It's the behavior that does!

My last sales manager consulting role I helped their Inside Sales team increase their outbound meetings by 185% in 60 days. What we did was: 1. Increase the amount of calls by 75%. 2. Started with weekly sales training sessions. This was focused on fundamental sales skills. Such as objection prevention & handling, cold calls, sales psychology, time management etc. 3. Implemented "F*ckup Fridays". To increase both the psychological safety and the will to try new things these weekly sessions was crucial. Everyone brought a "f*ckup" from the week and talked what we learned from that failure.

It's important to frame your relationship with the salespeople. What I've done is to be extremely transparent when I frame. I say: To succeed we have to be transparent with each other. That means if: 1. You're happy where you are and you like your role I want you to say that to me. 2. If you want to proceed into a new role here at our company or another, you tell me. I'll do anything in my power to make that happen and be honest with what you need to do. If you want to move to another company I'll try to save you if I think you have more to give here. 3. If you want to start your own company or side hustle. I'll help you out! And I'll do the same thing. It has created a great foundation for trust.