Why is change good for the Sales Teams?

Change is the only constant. Everyday world politics, economies and markets experience change and if businesses are resistant to change then they would be at a disadvantage against those who accept change rapidly. The year 2020 was a true test of this principle with the advent of Covid-19. Change was fundamental for survival from nations to businesses to human behaviour.

Covid-19 pandemic showed the human race that business was never going to be usual. The world had changed and with that organisations had to change their operations and the Sales Teams were no exception to this rule. The usual pattern of sales-cycles which involved meet-greet, engage and convert customers into valuable assets to ensure long-term cash flow had changed. 

Savvy Sales Leaders, who understood that Covid-19 was just one such challenge and the market would always throw new challenges, survived and pulled their teams through these unprecedented times. They understood that unpredictability required regular adaptability and change needed to be part of their sales strategy to manage internal and external crises. For example, during the Covid-19 crisis, aggressive changes in sales strategies had to be implemented as people were home bound and social acceptable norms redefined. Sales leaders had to rethink their strategies while understanding, adapting, protecting and growing their customer base virtually. At the same time, Sales leaders had to work assertively to keep their team morale high in the unpredictable markets to keep them geared in finding new opportunities to close sales deals. 

Sales leaders and teams need a growth mindset to consider change as normal and unpredictability a constant. With the growth mindset, sales professionals are receptive to transformational changes. However, the Sale leader plays a vital role in inculcating a growth mindset and outlook among the team members. 

For this, the leader has to do the following to ensure all team members are on the same page:

• Develop a clear Change Vision 
• Clarify the Collective Strategies to be implemented
• Communicate clearly the Goals, targets and remove communication barriers
• Involve the Team in the change process
• Give Ownership to Team members so they believe in the change
• Create Success visible and unambiguous
• Cement the New Changes until the next change cycle. 

With a clear change vision and a growth mindset, sale teams may unlock many potential opportunities which otherwise might never occur. Hence, Change is good for sales teams because it gives opportunity to learn new skills, removes complacency and encourages out of the box-thinking.

1. Opportunity to learn and practice new Skills – Change is perceived as risky as it requires a person to go outside their comfort zone. Neophobia is an incredibly debilitating fear which people have of anything new which requires them to change in order to innovate, deal with a situation or with people. However, if overcome it helps in providing a variety of experiences which support overall growth. Sales professionals also face the “fear of new” but to remain relevant in changing markets and situations, they need to adapt and learn new skills. 

Digital adoption by organisations is underway in a massive way and organisations are building omni-channel strategies to reach out to their customers. This means, implementation of modern IT technologies like Advanced Analytics, IoT, Blockchain, Cyber Security etc is inevitable and will play a key role in business growth of operations in years to come. So, Sales professionals should gain basic knowledge and skills related to these technologies, so that they understand application of these technologies in their industry/business, and remain ahead of the learning curve to make a bigger impact in the outcome of their business. 

Along with the knowledge and application of new technologies, another skill that has become critical for Sales professionals to learn in the online environment is effective communication skill. Sales professionals need to evolve as Digital sales specialists improving their communication skills to be precise and effective. By learning the skill of clear, precise and effective communication, sales professionals improve their productivity and relevance in the organisation. This includes but does not limit to capturing the attention of their customers during virtual meetings or through social media platforms or written briefs, which builds the customer’s trust and confidence and proves as an advantage in closing deals virtually.

2. Change helps to remove Complacency 

Mundane routine gives a false sense of security which mute humans to potential threats or challenges surrounding the fear of uncertainty. However, constantly evolving and facing new challenges ensures that we are better prepared to face uncertainty when they arise. In fact, threats provide positive balance which create new learning experiences. 

Many organisations as part of their policy, routinely practise staff migration within the organisation to break complacency by changing their roles and responsibilities, exposing them to new teams, environments and dealings. Hence, change pushes sales professionals to come out of their comfort zone, and subconsciously adopt the “Corridor Principle”. With corridor principle in the backdrop, sales leaders and team sales teams knock on doors seeking to open new opportunities which otherwise would not be seen if they had not been in the forward motion. Hence, moving into unchartered waters constantly ensures that teams develop a change mindset and defy complacency from seeping in. 

For example, during Covid-19 times, organisations, departments and teams had to be drastically reshuffled to deal with the uncertainty. Sales teams had to move operations virtually. The initial stress from the uncertainty created hesitation in the process during which sales professionals underwent ‘fear of failure’, ‘fear of pain/discomfort/effort’, and ‘fear of criticism’ in the new times. However, soon sales professionals understood that complacency would only risk their position in the organisation. This pushed them to adapt to the new normal and meet targets even in times of adversity. 

3. Change drives out of box thinking

Change propels out of box thinking which pushes people to explore, analyse, experiment, create, learn, unlearn and unleash untapped potential to perform their best and deliver results in the most effective manner. Change makes people explore different domains, methods and partnerships. In recent times, massive digital transformation has taken place and new digital technologies like Cloud, Open Source, analytics, etc have become an integral part of business operations. They provide opportunities for people including sales professionals to continuously upscale themselves to remain unique and relevant. 

Cloud has changed the consumption behaviour of customers and now products/solutions are consumed in the subscription based models. Innovative financial models and procurements are devised to work best in this dynamic, rapidly changing digital world. For example, sales professionals have to apply innovative ways to retain customers for longer predictable periods in spite of subscriptions based commercials which are available in hourly, daily, monthly rates, creating no or very low entry and exit barriers.  

Furthermore, digital transformation has also pushed sales professionals to experiment with new partnership models with customers and other industry players. Innovative partnership models which are outcome driven or built around technology frameworks have benefited in resolving gaps in the industry which would otherwise drain time and resources if done singularly.

For example, continuous innovation by Canonical, the publishers of Ubuntu in the Telco world resulted in Charmed OSM being introduced. The adoption of network functions virtualisation (NFV) technology by OSM provided telecommunications service providers (TSPs) with a generic approach to network functions management and orchestration by reducing cost. This innovative approach generated opportunities and helped close deals with various telecom providers across the globe and acquire customers in newer markets like Russia, Africa and Brazil. 

So to conclude, it is unquestionable that Change is inevitable and has a positive impact on organisations and people. Change may come in the form of leadership or change in vision and mission or from a natural calamity. But Change gives ample opportunity to people to learn new skills, break routine behaviour/strategies and ignite innovativeness. When organisations, sales leaders and teams accept change with open arms they develop a growth mindset. This gives them the eye to see the world of opportunities even in times of adversity.