Sales Leadership Accelerator

Are you a Leader or a Manager? There's a big difference. You lead people, you manage processes. Read that again. You do not have to be a manager to be a leader. But if you want to be a manager, ask yourself: Are you ready to put your money in someone else's hands? You cannot work your way to your team's success. Are you ready to work really hard and potentially make less? Because you have to be willing to do both. Because you CARE. And that's the key - CARING. Caring means having tough convos AND being supportive. Caring means working with INTENTION. Ten minutes of intention is better than an hour of attention. Caring means asking ""What's best and why not?"" on every decision. Caring is remembering the person in sales person. Most of all, caring means BEING a leader before you have the title. No gossip. Stay positive. Help others. Be present. And if you realize you haven't been leading right? Be transparent. Hold yourself accountable. And start over. Because leadership isn't a position. It's a choice. It's a mindset. It's who you ARE. So let me ask you again: Are you a Leader or a Manager?

Most managers THINK they are coaching their reps regularly. But... They aren't. When you ask the reps... less than 30% feel like they are actually getting coached. (I think a recent study showed between 18-28% thought they were( But managers scored above 70% in terms of how many thought they were giving regular and good coaching. Why the disconnect? It comes down to a misunderstanding of what coaching really is. Coaching is NOT: 1. Teaching - sharing information 2. Training - engaging with the info and the "why" behind it 3. Telling - giving specific instructions Coaching IS: - Individualized feedback - With the intent of improvement - Active doing and practice This is the missing sauce for a lot of companies. Most leaders and managers are TELLING. 'Go do this' 'Handle the objectiont his way' 'Try this on your next call' All of that is telling. If you are not giving feedback AND practicing, it's not coaching. That is just feedback. And here's the kicker... Most reps WANT MORE COACHING, they just haven't been getting it or the right type of coaching. Now real quick reps - You need to be open to coaching as well. To learn. To improve. To practice. Your manager can't make you better on their own, you have to participate as well. Leaders - Start coaching more. Practice with you're people. Individualize the feedback. Document the WGLL. Reps - Ask for coaching, really ask for it. Then practice it and apply it! Coaches.... how many of us have them?(only my OG's are gonna get this reference) Sales Leadership Accelerator

'What does a good 30-60-90 day plan look like when you join as a new leader?' Got this great question in the SLA community last week. Here was my answer. I actually break it down into 3 key parts. -- People -- Prospect & Performance. -- Process. Day 1-30 - I am doing everything I can to learn as much about my people as possible,. Who are my best? Why? Who are are the bottom? Why. I have everyone do the new rep survey where I learn about goals, comm styles, motivations, etc. I'm having 1x1s with literally every single person I can. I'm going to establish who my superstars, rockstars and others are in these first 30 days. I share my 'working with' doc and ask others to do the same. This is when studying greatness starts. This is also where I'm shadowing, finding opportunities to improve things. Day 30-60 - I am doing everything i can to learn about the prospect. Customer interviews with the 6 golden questions. Listen to as many calls as I can, good and bad, and does the PROSPECT say? But also how do WE perform on these calls. What are the biggest areas of improvement possible. I'm researching the industry, the trends, personas, etc. Buyers matrix and then some. I am going to IMMERSE myself into the prospects world here. This is also where I am starting to identify my number 1 metric, what is the biggest lever I can pull the fastest. I'm looking at every data point, every channel, every measurement, pipeline handling, lead handling, sdr process all of it. I'm looking for 2x levers. Day 60-90 - NOW I can start to drive some change in process. Based on my people, process and prospect knowledge. Now I can really build the right processes. This is where we start to document the wgll. this is where training ramps up. This is where we now start to execute on everything we learned. --- This process has continued to work for me time and time again to truly accelerate results in an INCREDIBLY fast amount of time. The beautiful thing is, you can run this process ANY time at an org, even if you've been there for a while, you can start this process and get after it! Sales Leadership Accelerator is growing every day! Get in there!

Kyle Coleman just put on an absolute masterclass for the Sales Leadership Accelerator community on the monthly Expert Call. His take on AI right now was just so perfectly put. The way to get the most out of AI looks like this. - Human Defined Strategy (aka the WGLL) - We talk about this so much in SLA if you know the WGLL THEN you can get so much more out of AI! - AI Workflows and Automation - Can get it to the 80%, but will be missing context - Human Application of Context and QA AI can't define yet/create yet what good looks like (the WGLL) - That is our job! So if you're a seller or leader that isnt creating the WGLL. If you don't know what the WGLL is. Not only can you not really leverage AI, that is when you are actually replacable by AI. If you are just following someone else's playbook, and not adding any content or context, you're already replaceable. PLUS - he pulled up real life examples of workflows and processes that he personally uses to enrich, research, and create potential messaging use cases that follow that exact process above. Kyle defines what good account research is IN DEPTH like step by step (WGLL) Uses Copy.ai to build the automated workflows and steps. Kyle reviews and then APPLIES the research that was done. Gold ya'll. Gold. Kyle is a living example of the WGLL - Both as a leader and as a human. Thank you for your time and insights today!

Aspiring leaders... If you wanted to get promoted to that next role Whether that is from Rep to Manager. Manager to Director. Director to VP. It. Starts. Now. Too often I talk to people that want to get to that next level and I'll ask a very simple question. 'What have you done to prepare yourself for that role?' I'll often get answers like. 'I've been crushing my number' or 'I've been a rep/manager for X years and it's time for that next step' or 'I've listened to a couple podcasts...' These are the wrong answers ya'll. By the time you get that promotion you should laready have been doing some of the things that next role should intail. If you want to be a manager, you should already have been making those around you better, setting up practice/prep sessions, etc. If you want to be a director, you already should have been taking on ownership accross the rog, creating systems, solving org wide problems, making/developing other leaders. If you want to be a VP, you already should have been helping craft strategies and systems. Ask to get involved in these things. Ask for the additional responsibility before you even have the title. That way when you are promoted, one it's just a no brainer and two you're actually READY. But also... you should be developing yourself. What sales leadership books have you read? (my 3 recs are always Sales Manager Survival Guide, Cracking the Sales Management code and Radical Candor) What courses have you taken? - That's what Sales Leadership Accelerator is all about. But you can also get courses through Pavilion or Pclub or Sales Assembly. What mentors are you working with? Hopefully my point is clear here. If you want to get to that next level, start learning the things it takes NOW to perform at that next role. Don't wait until you're already in it. Also don't wait for people to just give it to you. Develop yourself. Grow. Learn. Execute.... Then EARN that next role.

“Effort issues are often skill issues in disguise” Dropped that line in a Sales Leadership Accelerator training recently. Too often I hear leaders harp on effort and work ethic without addressing the underlying skills. Because you know what’s crazy? When someone is GOOD at something. They are confident and competent. You don’t tend to have to push them that much to do it. So focus on the skill first. Practice it. Map it out. Work on it. Recognize it and reinforce it. Because if you do that, you might be shocked at how the effort increases. But it also works the other direction. If you are coaching. If you are focused on skill development. If you have documented the WGLL. If you have connected it to their goals… And they still won’t do what is required to succeed. Then you truly know where the problem lies. Then you have a will issue. Thats different. I’m incredibly patient with skill. I’m very impatient with will. Focus on skill first. Help you’re people get GOOD at the things you want them to do. You’ll be shocked how often that increases the will.

“What do you do with a top performer who doesn’t follow best practices?” I got this question in a recent AMA in the Sales Leadership Accelerator monthly group calls. My the answer had 2 parts. The first part. “If they are your best, MAYBE that’s actually what the best practice looks like. Your job as the leader is to diagnose what it is they are doing better and different than everyone else and see if you can codify it. To often we try to make the top conform to the rest vs the rest conform to the top. Which one will pay off better?” Part 2 “You also need to truly determine what a non negotiable is for your org. Non negotiable means just that. Non negotiable. So if that’s CRM hygiene then you have to hold the line. Sell the rep on why they need to, how it will benefit them in the short term and long term, and also see if there are ways to make it easier. If they are a true top performer, and they just suck at all the admin, for the love of god get them a VA. But if you’re not willing to fire them over it, pick your battles and move on. But if it’s cultural, if they are brining people down. If they are lacking integrity. That is a non negotiable in my book and I have gotten rid of a top perform like that and watched TEAM performance improve” — This is why I love the group calls because we can go far deeper on topics and get inputs from others as well. The TLDR here is Study Greatness. Codify it and scale it. Hold the line on non negotiables. Pick your battles. We are up to over 50 leaders in the Sales Leadership Accelerator and it’s growing each and every day. Get in there. You might just like it.

Leaderboards don’t work the way most people think they do. Most people look down. Not up We are comparison creatures. We tend to make sure we are better than SOMEONE vs looks up and striving for the people at the top. This always throws people off because they’re like “NO KD IM HYPER COMPETIVE. “ Which only represents a small portion of people… There is a huge difference between the “want to win” crowd (not actually competitive) and the “I want to beat you crowd (actually competitive) The I want to beat you crowd is almost always at the top. AND even competive people tend to look down to see how much they are beating people by. But this comparison thing works against us more than it helps us. As much as we wish it motivated people to do more/be better. It tends to not. In fact people can feel safe in their position, as long as they are better than someone. Or the top gets focuses on the bottom instead of pushing thier performance up. Now I’m not saying “get rid of scoreboards”. Not at all. I’m not in the “don’t keep score” camp Meausrement is important. BUT Don’t expect them to drive performance, that’s lazy leadership (I talk about all the forms of lazy leadership in the Sales Leadership Accelerator) Sellers at the middle and bottom. Target someone 2-3 above you. Go get them. They might be too busy looking down to realize you’re moving up. Sellers at the top - change the scoreboard who IS someone out performing you, maybe in a different company, industry. Chase them! But don’t spend time looking or comparing yourself to people below. Doesn’t do anything. (I have a funny text exchange with ??♂? Scott Leese on this one!) Know the score. Know what’s causing the score. Work with your people to improve it Scoreboards alone don’t and won’t do it.