Part 3 - Vision & Strategy
"If you build it, ?????? they will come."
For those not familiar with this quote, it comes from the 1989 movie Field of Dreams starring Kevin Costner (yes, the guy in Yellowstone).
The movie centers around Ray Kinsella, who hears a mysterious voice telling him to build a baseball diamond in his cornfield. Most people think he's crazy, except for his wife and daughter. Eventually, he destroys his corn crop and builds the baseball field, where legendary baseball players, including his estranged father, come to play.
Great movie, but what does this have to do with Vision & Strategy?
As a new sales leader, you have to take ownership of what you're building, whether you're establishing a new team or inheriting a legacy one. Building a team vision and the underlying strategy helps establish goals, expectations, and team values. It also provides a blueprint for where your team is headed. Like in Field of Dreams, you'll encounter doubters along the way. Many won't see where you're going until the field is built and the stands are full. Keep building!!!
As a new sales leader, you have to take ownership of what you're building, whether you're establishing a brand new team or you're inheriting a legacy team. Building a team vision and the underlying strategy behind it will help you establish your goals, expectations and your teams values. It also gives you a blueprint for where you as a team are headed. And just like Field of Dreams, you're going to have people along the way that doubt you and think you're crazy. Keep building.
Let's start off with the Vision Statement:
The vision statement should be short, concise and numerically driven.
For example:
These numbers should be realistic and achievable, with a little stretch. Typically, they are driven by the Executives and the Board at a company level, and you can tailor them for your specific business unit. My guidance here is if your company typically grows 20-30% per year, use that as a benchmark but make sure you're going beyond the standard.
Underneath your vision, create your Strategy.
When creating the strategy, keep it straightforward and memorable, focusing on three key pillars with underlying points.
First Pillar:
A big piece of your Strategy is going to be Growth, decide where you'll get that growth. Typically growth would come from New Logos, Expansion in Existing Customers and Renewals. A key here is to ensure you're providing a great Customer Experience and preventing revenue leakage from churn (assuming you own renewals).
Underneath your first strategy point, this is another opportunity to put metrics and KPI's on areas to show where you're targeting increased growth.
For example:
Second and Third Pillars:
These should focus on how you'll operate as a team and align with your Guiding Principles. If you remember from Part 2...
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"These should be clear and straightforward words or phrases that convey your approach to leadership. For example, some of my leadership guiding principles are: Flawless Execution, Transparency, Collaboration, Win As A Team. Choose principles that you can truly embody and reflect in your daily actions as a leader."
Recently, we picked Collaboration and Flawless Execution as the second and third pillar for the team's strategy. Underneath both pillars, we called out specific actions that aligned with the team's expectations and how we were going to operate.
When rolling this out to the team, explain why these were chosen, the expected actions and behaviors, and how you'll measure them.
Finally, add Team Values:
Blend guiding principles, company values, and desired team behaviors. Pick 4-5 words reflecting the top values and attributes you seek. These will evolve over time. During COVID, we added "Grit" to my team's values as 2020 was challenging both personally and professionally for everyone. Despite these challenges, the reps persevered and continued to overcome obstacles while working to achieve their goals.
Here's what we used recently for Team Values...
Bonus: Current State and Future Goals
Highlight areas for improvement and create a roadmap showing where you are and where you're going. This ensures everyone is aligned and working towards the same goals.
Put everything together on a consumable slide for the team.
Here's a recent one that I used that shows you what I've described above...
Final Thoughts
This should be a collaborative exercise with your team, leaders and executive team. Create the initial framework, gather input from leaders and executives, and then do a working session with the team, especially to discuss and align on Team Values. As you progress in your leadership career, you'll incorporate elements from each team and organization, allowing your approach to evolve over time.
Live the vision and strategy every day. Don't just present it at the beginning of the year and never speak of it again. Embody it on a daily, weekly, monthly, and quarterly basis. Accountability is key.
These experiences and lessons led me to create this series, "Igniting Sales Leadership," to provide guidance and support for new leaders in similar situations.
Next up, I'll focus on one of my favorite topics, Building Community - How to build your team’s culture, with a focus on recognizing performance and celebrating wins.
"Leaders establish the vision for the future and set the strategy for getting there; they cause change. They motivate and inspire others to go in the right direction and they, along with everyone else, sacrifice to get there." - John P. Kotter
Vice President at Visualize - Inc
4 个月Thanks for doing this, Drew...some good insights.