How do you develop and keep your top sales performers?

I use the KASH approach. KNOWLEDGE - Familiarity, awareness or understanding gained through experience and/or study. ATTITUDE - A settled opinion or way of thinking and behaviour which reflects that mental condition. SKILL - The capacity or practised ability to achieve something successfully. HABIT - A consistent inclination to act in a particular way, acquired through frequent repetition. COMPETENCY Competency is the ability one brings to the job. A competency details what the person must demonstrate or explain in order to perform a task under normal conditions to an agreed standard. Competency comprises knowledge, attitude and skill and their consistent application (habit) to the required performance standard - K.A.S.H.

I've learned taking a genuine interest in your rockstars as people is crucial. I'll never forget my star rep, who consistently exceeded targets. Rather than just focusing on numbers, I explored her dreams over coffee. She wanted to start her own business one day. Though I feared losing my top talent, I supported her growth by letting her spearhead new marketing campaigns. I championed her for a promotion to sales manager to develop her leadership skills, and she's now thriving in her management role while still running key marketing projects on the side. By nurturing her entrepreneurial passions, I showed I cared about her unique goals, earning loyalty while enabling their full potential.

To develop and retain top sales performers, it's crucial to provide ongoing training and development opportunities, offer competitive compensation and incentives, foster a positive and supportive work environment, recognize and reward achievements, provide clear career progression paths, and encourage open communication and feedback. Regular check-ins and performance reviews can also help identify areas for growth and keep top performers engaged and motivated.

Understanding motivations, values, and unique working styles keeps top talent engaged. Make space for dialogue around inner passions that fuel outward accomplishment. Gaps show not deficits but unmet needs for support. Listen and build trust that improvement is possible. Take an interest in which skills energize or drain individuals. This comprehension allows customization. Help ambitious souls stretch while structuring stability for those less independent. Your top talent stays when they feel safe to expand at their own pace. Keep assessing not to critique, but to nurture growth right where people stand. Recognize each complex human beyond the surface.

I once had a top-tier rep who wanted sales management. My assessment of him was that this wouldn’t be a good fit for him so I asked him why he wanted to leave his territory and manage a team. He was under the impression that management was where the money was. It wasn’t a passion to lead at that early point in his career. I invested time showing him how he could make as much or more money in his current role with development around some agreed upon areas for improvement. He won President’s Club in each of the next several years. Sometimes the most important thing sales leaders can do is to follow our own coaching to our folks - keep asking questions for a better understanding.

Everyone single person on a team learns differently. We usually take a cookie cutter approach to development - vs knowing our team members and what their unique learning style is. Just yesterday my own coach assesses a skill set that I need to develop and came up with a personalized plan for me that fits my learning style. It’s not one sided fits all - to be an effective manager you have to have a Swiss Army knife of tools to help individuals on your team unlock their potential.

Als Führungskraft im Sales passiert es uns oft, dass wir unsere Top-Vertriebsmitarbeiter vernachl?ssigen, weil wir den Fokus auf die weniger erfolgreichen Mitarbeiter legen. Damals hat mich ein starker Vertriebsmitarbeiter verlassen und ist zum Wettbewerb gewechselt, weil ich mich nicht gut genug um ihn gekümmert habe. Das hat mir die Augen ge?ffnet. Versuche mit deinen Top-Vertriebsmitarbeiter regelm??ig Tandembesuche und Termine zu machen. Du wirst wertvolle Best Practice Ans?tze finden für dein gesamtes Sales Team. Und du kannst deine st?rksten Mitarbeiter noch besser machen durch regelm??ige Entwicklung (10% mehr Umsatz beim st?rksten Gebiet bringt dir mehr als bei schwachen Gebieten). Du bist n?her an dran und verstehst besser.

Celebrating wins doesn’t happen enough! Luckily tech has made it so easy to do so. Slack channels - do you have one dedicated to wins and shout outs? That’s easy to bough to do and helps to create a culture of celebrating even the smallest wins.

As managers we expend so much effort “catching” our people doing something incorrectly and calling it out. It’s much more motivational to “catch” folks doing something well and call that out as well.

Believe them when your top performers give you feedback, especially on barriers to their success. Sales teams can be very competitive, be careful that lesser performing employees don’t push out your top performers to serve themselves.

I believe in both pushing and supporting our top male sales reps. Let's take one of our experienced guys, for example. I give him tough goals to stretch his abilities and encourage him to try new things. This challenges him to think differently and keeps him sharp. At the same time, I'm there to offer him help and advice whenever he needs it. By finding this balance, we create an environment where our top performers can grow and thrive, knowing they have the backing they need to succeed.

APPRECIATE and ACKNOWLEDGE - The stats say that the superior sales persons usually wanted them to be appreciated more than any financial benefit. Usually, they prefer organic growth and appreciation. If we can create an ecosystem where they can grow and contribute more to the organization Vision - they stay with the company. - Acknowledge While appreciating is one form, they would also prefer to be acknowledged as the best performer, they will need everything more than others, be it hike, promotions, benefit etc. this actually helps them go boundaries and their contribution to the company naturally grow.

1 - Realising them that they matter. 2 - Give them additional challenges to showcase their skills. 3 - Make them responsible for managing some of the low performers in a team. 4- Recognise their contribution and always reward them. 5 - Show them the next possible position/promotion. 6- Always communicate with them, ask their point of view. 7- Sone time let them take the lead and you as a boss step back and watch. 8- Always encourage them to over perform.

The most important thing is to get them involved in the overall business development. Their ideas are better than mine because they are in the trenches every day. This includes comp plans, GTM, campaigns, and vision. Just to name a few.