3 MUST-do’s to be a successful Sales Manager - Part 3 – DRIVING EXECUTION

(Co-authored with Tim Ohai )

In our previous articles, we outlined the 3 MUST-do’s to be a successful Sales Manager: LEADING, SETTING GOALS & PRIORITIES, and DRIVING EXECUTION.

We’ve already covered what it takes to be a good leader and the importance of setting clear goals and priorities. Now it’s time to discuss HOW to make things happen…

Is your team doing what they are supposed to? Are they doing it well? How can you hold them accountable?

Let’s start by acknowledging everything your sales reps should be doing to be successful…

• Plan to quota
• Territory Planning
• Account Planning
• Following the company’s sales process and methodology
• Call Planning
• CRM Hygiene

We will provide detail on each of these elements at the very end of this article, but we need to establish three critical points first.

POINT ONE: Driving execution requires clarity AND empowerment.

Yes, you must make your expectations clear. We covered this topic at length in our prior article (Part 2: Being a Leader). However, clarity without the empowerment needed to achieve success is de-motivating at best. Everyone needs access to the people, time, energy, and resources they depend on. If a seller is told to use a certain process, but the people they need help from to complete that process are unavailable, they will not follow the process. The same thing could be said for any expectation.

As leaders, it is our responsibility to scout ahead for gaps in these areas and do what we can to address them or navigate around them so that our teams can execute. This skill is similar to what we did when we were selling a complex deal that required a lot of coordination. The difference is that now it’s a full-time responsibility that is focused on helping our salespeople be successful in THEIR efforts to coordinate – not getting sucked into doing it for each of their individual deals-.

POINT TWO: Define what the strategic priorities are NOW.

We have all experienced going to that annual, grandiose sales meeting where the company strategy was on full display – only to see that strategy shift (sometimes dramatically) in the next 90 days. This is to be expected, especially in an economy that is digitally connected to every part of the world. A hiccup in Asia can become a delay in our supply chains. A market turn in the tech sector can become a budget freeze for our top customers and prospects.

As leaders, we need to make sure that (a) we are hyper-clear on what the company priority is each quarter – everything from a targeted product/service to minimizing travel budget – so that (b) we can make it abundantly clear to our teams. When done correctly, this will change how people define their paths to quota, update territory plans, create account plans, etc.

POINT THREE: Inspect what you expect

Having a constant “finger on the pulse” of what your team is doing is the third key to driving execution. This is often the biggest challenge for new leaders, but if we have done the first two things well (provided clarity AND empowerment, and defined the most up-to-date strategic priorities), the inspection is much, much easier to do because we have proactively addressed most of the obstacles that will be surfaced in the inspection cadence.

Let’s talk about the inspection cadence in greater detail now. An inspection cadence is a consistent schedule of touchpoints with your team (individually and collectively). These touch points will allow you to:

• Understand whether the team is doing everything they are expected to do.
• Understand HOW they are doing it.
• Identify the team’s strengths and coaching opportunities (which should not be limited to just their sales activities).

We recommend that you use the following outline at a MINIMUM. These interactions should be non-negotiable in your calendar because they produce so much impact on your team’s overall effectiveness. While each of these disciplines is worthy of an entire article, we’ll only cover the basics here:

• Weekly 1:1s: Use these meetings to follow up on agreed actions, review everyone’s progress against their quota, and the health of their pipeline and resulting priorities. This is THE space to hold everyone accountable for delivering their results and how well-positioned they are to do so. These conversations should not be longer than 30’. You can cover personal development priorities in some of these meetings too -i.e. monthly-. Be careful not to turn these into a deal review. You should have a dedicated space for this.

Outcome: Agreed priorities and actions for the week.

• Deal Reviews: At the very least, the key deals that make your route to quota should be reviewed frequently. Ensure you have dedicated and blocked weekly slots in your calendar for deal reviews. Investing time in either qualifying opportunities to add to the pipeline and/or strategizing next steps will pay off while giving you confidence in your forecast calls.

Outcome: Qualified opportunities and clear next steps on key deals.

• Call Plan Reviews: Opportunities only move forward (or not) with each customer interaction. Planning for each call is key to every rep’s success. Set expectations for call planning in your team, and invest time in reviewing call plans frequently (i.e. the next call identified in your deal reviews can be a good start).

Outcome: Agreed call outcomes and a robust call strategy

• Joint Customer Calls: Take things to the next level and join the calls you helped plan for. These are great opportunities to see your team in action and a get pulse on the market -just avoid taking over these calls, unless previously agreed with your team-.

Outcome: First-hand observations of the rep’s activities, skillset, and mindset plus solid customer insights.

• Business Performance Reviews: This is the space to review progress as a team. Either monthly and/or quarterly, use this time to look back and reflect on what happened in reference to business goals, and look forward and agree on priorities and next steps. Involve extended sales team members and partners as appropriate, and don’t miss to have fun!

Outcome: Team and stakeholders aligned on business priorities and next steps.

How are YOU driving execution? How do you get visibility into what your teams are doing? How do you hold them accountable?

Are you empowering your team to drive execution?

Leave your comments below and don’t hesitate to reach out to us if you need help addressing these matters.

#salesmanagement #salesenablement #salescoaching #enablingsalesleaders #drivingexecution

(And as promised, here is the detail on what key activities your team should be doing).

• Plan to Quota: Every sales rep needs to have a clear understanding of how they are going to meet their quota and whether they have enough pipeline to do so. This exercise should allow them to balance time spent between pipeline creation and deal execution and serve as the north star to guide their efforts throughout the year.
• Territory Planning: Every quarter (at least), accounts in the territory need to be prioritized to identify the ones that will demand the sales rep’s focus.
• Account Planning: For each prioritized account in the Territory Plan, an individual account plan needs to be created to identify how this account is going to be initially engaged or further developed. Must-haves:

- A Point of View on customer’s business challenges and how your organization can help address them is to be created to generate demand in the account.

- Map of stakeholders that need to be engaged, based on how they relate to the business challenges identified and/or the role they may have in the decision-making process to purchase your products and services.

- List of next steps for the account, and actions with clear owners across the account team.

• Following Company’s Sales Process and Methodologies: These are in place for a reason -they are seen to be the best practices that maximize the odds of generating value for customers and winning new business- and provide the reference to assess the health of every deal (which you cover in your Deal Reviews).
• Call Planning: Every interaction with a customer requires a clear definition of success (i.e. what we are trying to achieve and how we are going to do it). Formally documented or in the sales rep’s mind, they should always be prepared to answer these questions before a call. Call planning can be a powerful coaching topic -if not THE most powerful- for you to leverage in your coaching efforts
• CRM Hygiene: Let’s face it, this is not the most glamorous activity and can be perceived as bureaucratic nonsense. But in a modern high-performance selling organization, data is key to informing decisions and fostering internal collaboration.