Sales Leaders Should Plan, Prioritize, and Stick to a Realistic Routine

The following is adapted from Fearless by Tim Kintz.

We all have 24 hours in a day, and as much as we might not want to, we have to deal with it. That means making the most of our time.  

As car dealership sales leaders, many of us think we can cram 36 hours of work into a 24-hour day; it’s not a healthy or productive attitude. Worse yet, it’s impossible. In fact, at least two-thirds of that day should be spent with family, resting, or doing something you actually enjoy besides work. So, be realistic about your time investment!

With your time spent at work, you’re going to feel overwhelmed and like you’re not making progress, unless you do one big-picture task first and foremost: Create a realistic daily routine that you can actually stick to. It might sound uncomfortable or just plain unrealistic, but let me explain how you can do it for real.

Good Intentions, Bad Results

I live in a glass house when it comes to planning, prioritizing, and sticking to a daily plan. It’s not my natural strong suit, and I’m not alone. It’s challenging to many of us in a dealership position. However, that weakness can be overcome with a little focus, discipline, and having the right priorities in place.

If you don’t manage your activities closely, you’ll find yourself doing a little of this and a little of that until you leave at the end of the day, wondering what the hell just happened and why you didn’t get to any of the things you really wanted to do. It won’t feel natural to manage your day this much—and I can speak to that personally. 

I can’t tell you how many times I came into the dealership with good intentions, fully expecting to have a great day, but almost immediately got bogged down into the weeds. I answered some emails and took a couple phone calls, then I handled a customer, got online to buy some cars at the auction, started working through a deal, and did an appraisal. Finally, I looked at the clock and realized the day was over.

I didn’t get anything done that I needed to get done. There was no training; there were no one-on-ones. And worst of all, it’s those days that feel the most exhausting. I felt dead tired from doing nothing of consequence all day long.

Sound familiar?

I bet it does, but with some planning, you can work more efficiently and free up whole hours of your day. 

The People Part of Your Day

 We all get the same amount of time in the day; it just comes down to what you do with it.

The first three hours of your day should be a routine that you can stick to and duplicate, no matter what. Since people are the most important part of your work, this should be the people part of your day, when you take care of leading, training, and coaching your team toward a shared vision. During these three hours, you’re going to organize and prioritize the day ahead of you.

Here’s what the people part of my day looks like:

The first thing we do every morning at our dealerships, from 8:30 to 9:00, is hold group training for everyone on shift. From 9:15 to 10:00, we have a daily success meeting with managers to look at pending, potential, and problem deals. Then, from 10:00 to 11:15, we hold one-on-ones with our salespeople, meeting with each individual. These three points of connection with our people set us up to go into the day with a clear plan. We write it down, and we stick to it.

Once those hours are wrapped, everything else is free to come as it may. Most likely, all hell will break loose in the dealership—but with a plan in place, it’s controlled chaos. We finish the day feeling energized, knowing we’ve achieved a whole lot. 

With no plan, no organization, and no training, the purpose falls through the cracks. You end up just running around, putting out fires all day long. Time isn’t the issue. It’s what you do with the time. 

Develop Your Plan of Attack

To formulate your plan of attack, start by listing everything you actually do, every day for a week. Then, list the activities that you need to do, and set priorities from there. By the end of the week, you’ll have formed a pretty clear picture of your typical day. Once you have this picture in mind, you can ask questions to see what stays and what goes. 

• How many of these activities add no value? 
• Could any of these activities be done by someone else? 
• What are my main priorities? 
• What are the activities I must do every single day, week, and month?

My daily tasks include group training, one-on-ones, checking in with the service manager to ensure the used cars are getting pushed through reconditioning, and so on. By prioritizing my activities, I ensure the most important tasks get done and less prioritized activities are left for the end of the day. That way, if I run out of time, the big stuff is already handled.

Once you know what your daily, weekly, and monthly goals are, you can turn those into a written plan. Why does this matter?

Many managers, similar to many salespeople, are “organized” in a disorganized manner. They have notes on legal pads and sticky notes, the customer relationship management (CRM), and desk logs. Their desks are piled with papers, but they don’t have one set system. It’s inefficient. It’s a whole lot of fuel for unnecessary fires, and if this describes you, you’re going to have to put them all out.

Are You Busy Being Busy?

When prioritizing your activities, keep these categories in mind: what’s urgent and important, what’s urgent but not important, and what’s important but not urgent at all.

Urgent tasks are critical and need to happen immediately, even if they don’t have a higher importance on your priority list. If a customer walks into the dealership, someone needs to start talking to that customer right away. Basically, anything having to do with a customer should be considered urgent. 

Non-urgent important tasks need to get done but may not need to happen immediately. For example, if the service manager asks for your help in getting something done, it’s important but may not be urgent. 

Important is a distinction that will change depending on your employees’ different jobs and responsibilities. From a managerial perspective, important tasks include your first three hours: training your team, having one-on-ones, and establishing goals. Outside of that, everyone will need to identify what their own “important” tasks are. 

Unfortunately, non-important tasks can easily suck up an entire day but don’t actually count for much—they keep us busy being busy. Although some tasks, like managing processes and procedures, managing leads and factory programs, and vehicle reconditioning, need to get done, they may not need to be done by you immediately.

Have a plan, ensure you’ve delegated tasks well, and use those first three hours to set your people up to be successful in carrying out that plan. Don’t procrastinate on the tasks you don’t enjoy. Stick with the plan and do what needs to get done.

Maintain your momentum by planning for tomorrow, today. Before you leave the office every day, write out the key things you’ll need to do tomorrow, and once again, prioritize. 

Everyone Has a Plan Until...

There will always be unexpected fires you can’t avoid and can’t plan for. However, if you have a plan in place with clear priorities, it’s easy to get back on track after putting that fire out.

As Mike Tyson said, “Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face.” The question is, when you get punched in the face, is your plan good enough for you to get back in the fight?

It can be if you stay organized. Stay focused. Keep your big goals in mind, and get back into success mode where you belong. Stop trying to cram a million hours worth of work into the same amount of time we all have to spend on work. Make a realistic plan and stick to it. 

For more advice on how sales leaders can plan, prioritize, and stick to a realistic routine, you can find Fearless on Amazon.

Tim Kintz is the author of the Amazon bestseller, Frictionless, and president of The Kintz Group, the automotive industry’s premier sales and management training company. A graduate of the NADA Dealer Academy, Tim has worked in almost every position in the dealership. He delivers hands-on coaching, workshops, and presentations throughout the world, teaching universal sales and management strategies that have proven effective in every business sector. As a strong believer in the power of a great leader, Tim helps managers anticipate change, adapt to challenges, and focus on the individual.