Sales, Marketing, Wherefore Art Thou Collaboration?
Imagine how productive Verona would have been if the Montagues and Capulets had worked together?
Like in Shakespeare’s tragic tale ‘Romeo and Juliet’, modern businesses suffer from two feuding families; Sales and Marketing. Much like the Montagues and Capulets, senior managers often describe the working relationship between sales and marketing as “unsatisfactory”. The two functions, they say, “under-communicate, under-perform, and over-complain”, according to a Harvard Business Review study.
In reaction to disappointing results, marketing accuses sales for poor execution. In turn, sales complain about prices set by marketing and suggest more of the marketing budget should go toward hiring salespeople or higher commissions. Sales believe that marketers are out of touch with customers, marketing see sales as short-sighted. Each group undervalues the other’s contributions, leading to failures in both.
Years ago, product design and manufacturing realised that working together would create value for the company and for customers, so why not sales and marketing?
Through our work as collaboration specialists for Connecting Perspectives we use simple strategies to enable better organisational collaboration. Using our leadership and management courses we enable trustful collaboration by bridge building, beyond team building, allowing even feuding departments to work better together for the benefit of the company as a whole.
Consider physically seating the two teams close to each other in order to create trust and increase the exchange of information. Regular meetings between those departments and even temporary role exchanges can also help each team better understand the challenges, and value the contributions, of the other.
It’s too late for Romeo and Juliet, but it’s not too late for your business to bring its warring factions together.
Dr Jordi Robert-Ribes sparks effective collaboration within companies. He founded Connecting Perspectives (www.connectingperspectives.com) to enable effective collaboration within companies. His vision has allowed him to help companies in different countries worldwide.