Where to point the flashlight?

Summary: Holding effective sales meetings is critical to achieving sales success. While some sales leaders today would rather conduct hurried gatherings of recited laundry lists — or not meet at all — regular, well-run sales meetings are the communication engine that drives a cohesive, informed team. Sales meetings give team members a chance to check in, voice concerns, get valuable advice, share insight, and, yes, report on (and qualify) new prospects. There’s an essential process to holding such a meeting, including 5 key items that should be on your agenda. You also need a mindset focused on building trust, showing you care, and developing your team. Read on to learn more.

Leading a great sales meeting

I read a statement somewhere recently that struck a chord: The primary task of leadership is to direct attention. I agree with this.

And that made me think: How does a sales leader effectively direct attention to — and get the most out of — a sales meeting?

Sales meeting. Two words that, for some, conjure up a feeling similar to indigestion. Yet it’s a vital component of your growth playbook. I bear witness to good and bad sales meetings when I start working with a client. And the goal is always: How do we design and run a great sales meeting?

Let’s unpack that here.

The meeting mindset

Your mindset for the sales meeting is crucial, not only when you’re conducting the meeting but beforehand when you’re planning it.

You need a focused mindset, with clear objectives.?

To start, you need to make the meeting worthwhile for everyone who’s going to be part of it. I don’t know about you, but I place a lot of value on my time. Time is a precious commodity, and we can’t get it back once it’s spent.

To that end, you want a sales meeting in which you and the participants learn what’s going on with the pipeline and all the other agenda items, but you also want the meeting participants to have space. Space to digest, provide feedback, ask questions.

Because, as the leader running the meeting, you should be listening 70% of the time. Listening is a highly underrated skill, and one that’s key to building trust with your people.

A second important aspect of mindset has to do with the statement, People only want to know how much you know once they know how much you care. In a similar vein, I suspect you’ve heard the saying, Praise in public and criticize in private. Those two statements matter here. Show you care.

Thirdly, you're approaching the sales meeting as a logical forum in which to develop your team. So put the time and effort necessary into making it meaningful — and ask that team members do the same.

Structure and rhythm

A lot of folks don’t like meetings. I get that. Apparently, meetings are especially unpopular with Shopify’s leadership these days.

The fact is, however, that some meetings are necessary. Without them, you can’t hope to set and maintain a communication rhythm within your management system.

Rhythm is key. To ensure good rhythm, your meetings must be structured: They should happen at the same time, with the same frequency and agenda. They should also start and end on time.

Doing the above pays a lot of dividends. Building trust is at the top of the list. We’ve all had that knot in our stomach heading into a meeting that (a) has been recently scheduled and (b) has an unclear (or no) agenda. Anxiety is an action killer (and conversely, the confidence that comes from feeling informed is a great performance driver). Not to mention the fact that you want well-prepared attendees sitting around you, providing you with meaningful metrics and insight.

"A lot of folks don't like meetings.... The fact is, however, that without them, you can't hope to set and maintain a communication rhythm within your management system."

The 5 key agenda items

Building on the concepts of rhythm and structure, there are 5 essential items that should be on the agenda of any effective sales meeting.

1/ Good news and personal check-in

Take 5 (maximum 10) minutes and have everyone around the table — or screen — check in. What good news, personal or otherwise, does each participant have to share?

2/ Scorecard review

One of the things I see most in my work is leaders trying to manage outcomes. We don’t manage outcomes, we manage activities. The sales scorecard is where you keep track of those activities. Want more revenue? Then ask yourself: What set of activities in the sales process leads to increases in revenue?

3/ Tasks/actions completed from the last meeting

We all need to get things done. These are the hits, assists, and goals that lead to winning.

4/ Top 5 focus??

Sales people need to put in time not only on new opportunities, but on the right opportunities. That means focusing on having an effective process for how you rate the quality of those (top 5) prospective deals. What’s the compelling event for the customer that ensures this deal closes when you expect it to? What happens to the customer if they miss your compelling event date?

5/ Issues and to-dos

Though issues or challenges vary by business and industry, everybody has them. The leader's job is to help define and remove those issues that can get in the way of performance.

The 1% rule

It’s really hard to make massive shifts in performance — or talent — overnight.

But it’s relatively easy to make small, incremental changes every day. We have coined a phrase here at Navisant: high-performance incrementalism.

It’s a mouthful, I know. But the principle behind it is simple: Reverse-engineer your goals into achievable steps that are completed daily, weekly, monthly, and quarterly. As I’ve said before, it’s about playing the long game.

One last thing: Keep score. Every few meetings, ask the team for a 1-10 rating on the meeting. 10 out of 10 is your goal.

What do you think your score would be today??

The more intentional you are about your sales meetings, the more effective they’ll be. At the risk of sounding campy: Keep that flashlight beam sharp and defined, and focus squarely and attentively on what’s within it.

If you’d like to hear more on holding effective sales meetings…

Keep an ear out for my interview with business strategist and performance advisor Purdeep Sangha — I’ll be posting it here on LinkedIn soon.

If you like this article and are reading it in your inbox, please take just a moment to pop over to the LinkedIn post and like it. And if you really like it, please share it!