Thinking differently: Federal Sales Teams

Developing a strong sales team is anything but a walk in the park. However, if done correctly, it will bring in millions per year to your company. Let’s walk through the process of #recruiting, #interviewing, #hiring, #training, and forecasting together. These 8 questions are meant to serve as a guide for you to evaluate your already existing #sales team, or help you start one.?

Question 1: How creative are your sales leaders?

Why does this matter? Ray Reed II , our sales team expert, says it this way:?

“I put people into one of two categories: a CEO thinker or a COO thinker.? The CEO is very creative, strong in leadership, and brings vision to the team.? The COO is thinking about how to execute, pointing out potential holes in the plan, and bringing a different perspective. You need both types of thinkers.”

Every person on your #salesteam needs to have different levels of creativity so they can learn from each other and develop the best possible sales model. The following test is a great resource we use to evaluate our own leader’s creativity levels. We highly suggest taking it for yourself and your sales team.

https://www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/faculty/uzzi/ftp/page176.html?

Question 2: Is your recruiting criteria focused on traits or specific experience?

“Some of the best federal sales people I’ve hired were recruited from the private sector/commercial team.”

Sometimes, you need to go out of your comfort zone in recruiting sales people. Being too limited or picky about #federal experience can prevent you from bringing on some extremely talented #salespeople. Instead of trying to look for “good” people who were successful at selling, look for candidates who have good traits to be successful at selling. Some traits to look for are:?

• Good questioning skills
• High energy
• Executive presence
• Sales acumen
• A drive to learn and succeed

?Question 3: Does your interview process include a “role play” panel?

The interview process serves as an evaluation to see how much work it will take to make the candidate a “rockstar”, so treat your #candidate like a project. Really focus on their questioning skills. Are they curious and willing to ask questions? Will they listen more than talk? Can they ask the right questions?

Another thing to note is if your hiring #leader really likes this person. If the hiring person doesn’t like them enough to spend quality time with the candidate, don’t hire them.

And finally, ROLE PLAY. This is an essential part of the interview to see how they will act in a specific situation. This panel is designed to ascertain the candidates questioning skills?

Question 4: Is your sales training program out of date?

How many times have you turned on a mandatory online-training module and just muted it while completing your other tasks? Don’t lie, we’ve all done it. But that is a big mistake when it comes to your training program. An in-person, hands-on training program is essential to developing your sales team.

“The benefits of face to face training is higher retention as well as networking which leads to collaboration once in the field. Virtual works if it is a short session, but nothing greater than 30 minutes and is a small update on an offering or simple tweak to a process, NOT to explain a new offering or major change to a process – the retention rate will be very low, shifting the training requirement to your leaders who already have a full plate.”

Question 5: Do you have an accelerator program for #compensation?

It is no secret that compensation and #incentives are an essential part of developing your sales team. (If you didn’t know that… it might be time to reevaluate) But a lot of sales leaders neglect to really invest in this part of the process.

As a #salesleader, there needs to be an accelerator program for your sales people… and no bonuses don’t count. Specifically, a program with no ceiling for sales over the quota. This is so that your #employees can make as much as possible and have an incentive to exceed expectations.

Having a Total Income, a combination of salary and variable that is paid when your employee attains their quota benefits both the company and the individual.

Question 6: Are you celebrating your losses?

Yes, you heard us.

Celebrate your sales people’s losses by finding positivity in every loss. When someone loses something, you can’t beat them up about it, they’re already doing that. Celebrate it and help them learn from it. You, as their boss, want them to feel comfortable to tell you when they lose. Knowing that their leader will coach/train to prevent recurrence, they will feel confident to tell you as soon as a deal is going south, which can allow action to be taken.?