4 Quick Wins for Sales Managers

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Four Areas that Make a Real Difference on the Floor:

34:19 Video (160 MB) HD Video (524 MB) Audio (31 MB)

What we're gonna look at today is I'm gonna break one on one coaching into three separate areas, preparation, execution, and follow-up. So I'm gonna start with preparation. And this is a part of the the the coaching process that I encourage you to plan to spend maybe an hour doing, preparing for the activity, preferably a day or so before the meeting. And when I go through the key points, they're not necessarily in chronological order or of order of importance. So first of all so when I think about coaching and in the the information that you've responded to in signing up for this, one of the things that came up in that content in those posts were that this is not just about the numbers because it really isn't just about the numbers.

And the more prepared you are for the meeting that you have with them, the numbers will be part of what you talk about, but it won't be all that you talk about. I would suggest that when you're for for most of your sales associates, especially those that are tracking to goal or pretty close or just above, you probably don't need to meet with them more than once a month. And if you have people who are tracking below that, you can get all the way down to once a week. But what we're going to be looking at today in one on one coaching is we're not talking about critical care coaching, where someone is really struggling, but rather someone who is developing and maintaining their skill as they develop. So consider creating if you haven't already and you don't have it as part of what you do, consider creating a development plan for each associate based on metrics, observations, their input, and evaluation of all of it together that aligns with their goals and with the company's standards so that over time, whether it's a quarter, half a year, full year, over time, what it is that that person's actually looking to develop.

So schedule, I would say, you have one on one meetings regularly, and we're gonna for this conversation, we're gonna have it as once a month with a a performer who's tracking pretty well, That I would be scheduling that appointment with repeat functions to keep the time consistent. Like, you might meet the first Tuesday of every month at 10:00 with that particular person, And then you can you can do that for the whole year and and hold that time as sacred. And then, of course, you can send them a calendar invitation so that they have it on their calendar too, and they can do what they need to do, which we'll talk about in a second, to prepare for that that meeting with you. I'm gonna show you a sales associate performance format and a handout. I'm gonna show you three stages of filling that out today so that you can see how that tool is actually used.

I would say that when you're gonna have a meeting with a team member, as your preparation, I would look at the statistics for either the period that you're in, the period that just proceeded, like what's what August was, for instance, as well as maybe we're we're in the third quarter. So I would maybe looking at the quarterly performance and then against the yearly goal. So you wanna look at that that kind of data and how it shows, probably how it shows some development. The other thing that I would include in the statistics is I would include notes notes from my observations, and I'll talk about observations in a little bit. But notes from observations that you've been doing with your team members, which if you're not doing them, you really need to do them, and and other data that they're gonna bring to the meeting with them.

Namely, they're gonna bring their calendar. They're gonna bring their sketches. And I would probably collect set the latest Saturday traffic log data to see what actually happened with your busiest day of the week and where that information and where those opportunities went to and are going to if they didn't close. I would look at what their goals are overall, as well as take a you wanna be looking for and having them prepare for what's happened since you last met at your formal meeting. What were the actions that were supposed to happen over time and what actually did happen?

Alright. The next one, I wanna know what their disc style is. So that should be in part of my file with that person. But if I know what their disc style is, then that's going to impact how I set up and prepare for the meeting. It's going to impact the environment, like where I set it up.

Does it have to be in my office? If it's in my office, does it have to be on two sides of the desk, or can it be on the same side? If I'm if I am coaching someone who's a high steady, I probably would have it sitting on a sofa or sitting side by side on the desk. If I'm meeting with a dominant, the time's gonna be a lot less, but I would I would leave an hour for the meeting.

But with a dominant, you're probably gonna have that meeting finished in about fifteen minutes, and you could probably do it standing up just like a huddle. Just because that's they're great with that. They're in here to find out what they need to find out, and then they're back to what they do. So I would absolutely make that the the part of preparation, the structure, and how I'm gonna communicate with them in the environment that I'm gonna do it in. I'm also gonna look at the what the structure for the meeting is and to actually use that form and to copy that form and and give it to them as a as part of their preparation. So I'm gonna show you that form. I'm gonna share my screen with you and show you that form.

This is how I would start with that form. And the form, I would just fill out the top and give it to them. So you can see Sarah, meeting's gonna be on the October 6. Her disc style is influence steady.

Her goal for the year is $7.50. She's at six thirty six. With 76% of the year in. She's at 85% of goal, which is awesome. Her monthly goal is 84,000.

She's $176.50 with five days into the month. And at 19% of the month, she's at 21% of goal. And then the rest of what her statistics are. You'll notice here that the her her year to date, her close ratio success rate is thirty one percent, but I made a note of it that it's actually for September seeing that this is gonna be an October meeting. For September, her close ratio was 36%.

Right? So I'm gonna show you the rest of this as blank. So the next part with the unsold quotes and what's happening with those, what the observation notes are, which would be what I would fill in as the coach, actions from last meeting, which we might fill in together. Focus for the meeting is probably gonna be what is what they wanna get out of the meeting and then what some of the activities are. Thinking with a pencil or sketching, how many were done, what kind of sketches were they, what did you notice about them, and then what are the results.

And the same goes for appointments. How many did you have? What kind were they? And what happened? Actions to practice either from last session, and then actions to practice from this session, and what the follow-up actions in next meeting are gonna be.

If I filled out the top and then gave it to them, they could fill this out. What they're sitting on in terms of of quotes that are in the system, what the objection was to closing when they were here, and then what the next what the next action is going to be. You'll notice on this, for instance, that the next action for both quotes that are in the system is that there's an appointment scheduled a couple of days from now. And focus of the meeting, what this person wants to get from the meeting is they wanna close appointments quicker than they're closing them. So well, I don't know what that's gonna mean, but we'll figure that out during the conversation.

And then their activities in September and the beginning of October, had 19 sketches. What they noticed about the sketches, a lot of notes on them, they didn't all have sketches, but they all had a lot of information, and of the 19 that they did, they closed 14 people. And the same similarly went for appointments. They scheduled six appointments, they had two be back appointments, two phone three phone appointments, and one house call appointment. I think that adds up to seven, and they closed five of them.

So this is good information about what they're working on so that they can come in with their head in the game for what they want to get out of the meeting and what has happened that they can have a discussion with. And then the last thing I'm gonna show you is in looking at the this pretty much completely filled in, that the observation notes that you have is that they kept their sketch with them in all three observations that you did, and that they have been using the sketch to add more ask more questions with the customer. So I wanted to show that to you so that you could see how the sheet would actually be prepared and then to be used in the meeting. So I would give them a copy, leave it in their in their mailbox, and then communicate whatever they you want them to bring with you. Sketches, quotes, calendar with appointments, outreach actions or results, what they want to get out of the meeting.

And then lastly for preparation, I would let the the office know that I'm gonna be in a meeting at that time, what time that meeting is, and then I really don't want to be interrupted. When you look at this list, there are probably things on this list that are more things than you're currently doing. You may not have a structure for your appoint for your meetings that's this this formatted, that has this many steps. You may not be doing observations. And If you're doing observations, I really encourage you to use the seller to schedule a checklist so that you can objectively observe them, and at least do three of them.

The only way that you're going to be doing meetings that have this kind of juice is if you schedule time to prepare a day or two before the meeting, and if you schedule your observations, and if you keep those schedules, keep those sacred, do what you put in your calendar. Because that's what makes all the difference in the world when you go into this meeting. And so consider that as sales managers and sales coaches that this coaching session is the equivalent for a sales manager of a salesperson being on the floor with a customer. Like, this is your time to do what you do and do it well. If it starts with the the preparation and you see, yeah, there's stuff in there that I'm not doing.

I don't know that it has value. Even if I think of it, I don't know if I have time to do it. Like, really work through some of that stuff so that you can you can make yourself do some of these things in preparation that you haven't been doing yet. So the next section is execution. So this is the actual meeting itself. So I would just like salespeople, I would consider that you want to listen more than you talk and really seek to get their input.

One of the things that comes up in that program is that I take seller to schedule it, and I break it into the seven steps, but I break it into three silos. That as a salesperson, would you execute this? As a sales manager and coach, how would you coach to help that particular step be improved? And then the last one is as a leader, how would you use this information to better communicate and better lead your team using the the communication skills of seller to scheduler?

And this execution and and this part of the coaching engagement is really how you get to do that. So that we know as sales coaches that our salespeople should be creating more of a collaborative engagement with the customer, should be asking questions and listening for more response from the customer that the more engaged the customer is in the discovery process in creating a solution, the greater the likelihood that they're gonna buy from us. We know that. We know that there will be fewer objections. We know that it will be easier to get a commitment.

We know that. But the deal is that the same thing applies as coaches and sales managers, that the more that we ask questions and build and develop that not just the connection, but the relationship of coaching that they they share with us, they trust us, they believe us, they'll they'll do what we create together because what we have built with them and because they truly believe that we have their best interest at heart and we want to help them to develop. And so in order to be that person, what are the things that we need to develop to be able to deliver that? Because that's, you know, everyone's not Ted Lasso that you come out like that, you know. And even Ted Lasso's a real good model of how do I bring courage and compassion to each and every conversation that I have in my coaching relationships?

Courage and compassion. And that's straight out of Stephen Covey's Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. If you haven't read that for a while, you could dust it off. All right. So when it comes to executing the meeting, so number one, start on time. Just start on time.

It sends a message that if you have a one o'clock meeting, be ready at 01:00. Next, thank them for the meeting and for preparing and taking the time to do that to prepare for this meeting. Thank them for the value that they put in their time and their engagement with you. As coaches, acknowledgment costs nothing.

And someone doesn't have to be a top producer to be doing some things that should be acknowledged. And those behaviors that get acknowledged build into habits that when repeated, that habits that become second nature skills that people have. And that's what our job is, is to help them be that. Ask them if they've had time to review the numbers and if they've brought that work with them. Did they really get a chance to prepare so that they can fully participate in this meeting?

Because this is a participation meeting. It's not a lecture. Next, ask them what they want to get out of the meeting. And then I'd make a note of it because this is really the primary focus of what the meeting is. I know that and I'll tell them this is what I'd like to see us do in the meeting. But whatever we want to do, and you'll watch yourself with this, that when you have an agenda, you just want to watch where your ego and its desire to have our objective satisfied really might shortcut someone else's sharing or what someone else is going to get out the interaction.

Just watch when that happens. It's just ego and it's just a gremlin, and you can tell it to be quiet. Next, I would review their statistics, their sketches, observations, and ask for input. One of the things that I like to do with sketches and I real and sketching is a requirement for me.

So it's not like, well, some people do it, some people don't. In my world, it's the the perfect demonstration of our desire to help a customer satisfy what they came for. So sketches is just part of it. But to have someone put their sketches out on the desktop, side by side on the desktop, and stand up and look at them and see what they notice over a span of eight sketches on your desk or on the dining room table that you're sitting at in the store. It's like, holy cow. I'm I am I think I'm asking the budget all the time, but of the eight here, I don't have the budget down once.

Right? So take time to look at that and let them discover things on their own. Give them opportunities. Ask directing questions and questions that help them to think about things, to look at, and to engage in. It's not about telling them what to do, it's about asking them what they see, what they think, what's what for them.

So and then with that, I would ask what actions do they think would impact the result to change the results, to improve the result? What do they think? And and they might say, you know, I don't really know. If I knew I would be I wouldn't be here.

It's like, well, like, let's speculate. Then you don't have to be right about it, but just don't answer all the questions. Let them work for it. Because if they work for it and they hit on something, if they come up with an action that they think might work, even if you don't agree with them, and especially if it's early, go with the action. Even if you have a better action that would produce a result, go with their action. Let them win.

Let them try it. Let's participate in it because let them see if they could be right. It might actually work.

So our salespeople sell to customers. We sell to salespeople. Like, they are our customers as sales managers, and we really wanna understand and help them. And in order to do that, we gotta give them room in a directed facilitated way, and that's what this will do. If you do come up with an action that's gonna improve something so let's say that in the in what I showed you that Sarah wanted to have her, her appointments close quicker. So in asking, so Sarah, what do you think might help that? So what's happening now?

And she says, I closed the ones I closed, but some of them still need to go home and think about it. Or, when we make an appointment, they either don't come in or they put it off or something. So some of those things might be how she's setting up the appointment, how she is organizing it, if she's sending calendar invitations, if she's giving them homework. Like, you wanna dig a little bit deeper into what are some of the elements of what's already happening with appointments that is contributing to them not closing quickly enough.

If you have 10 appointments and you close four of them the next at the appointment, but six don't close, that's kind of something to look at. That's something to look at. So they're what they're asking for is it's valid. Like, how do we close them quicker? So that's what you would speculate on, and then pick one action, one thing to do that might make a difference. It might be structural.

It might be behavioral, but pick it. And let that be consistent. Like, that's something that they're gonna practice with every single one of them. If you determine that there is an action like the action that they're gonna take is that they're gonna introduce the at the first objection, they're gonna say that's your homework at the first objection, and they'll say, and we'll talk about what we need to do with that before we finish today as to what the next steps are gonna be.

So what they've done is actually two things, given homework and introduced the concept of meeting again. But they've they haven't been doing that before. So it would be a great opportunity now to be the salesperson, role play that, demonstrate those actions so that they can see them, ask what they get out of it, and then switch. Switch and have them be the salesperson, you be the customer, and let them practice that and discuss what that feels like. You've allowed an hour to do this.

Don't let the statistics take up that whole hour. This is the kind of thing conversation or practice is what you wanna take up. And I probably would go for thirty to forty five minutes. I'd leave it for an hour just in case. But you probably would get through this be in thirty to forty five minutes without having anyone feel rushed about that.

Alright. So the next thing is that when you pick an action like those two actions, we're going to use homework and then and then say and before you leave, we'll talk about next steps as ways of leading into the appointment. It will give you a chance to say, let's just experiment with that. I like using the word experiment with sales associates because it's like, we're trying. That's not you have to do this.

It's not dogmatic. It's not, well, I'll try. It's not that either. But it's something like we can bring a sense of wonder to an experiment instead of a sense of defensiveness or I'm already doing it, and it can't be me. It must be the customer. Any of that other stuff that follows being told what to do.

Alright. So make sure that you double check the next that you're gonna have. It's on the bottom of that form. On that case, it was eleven one.

And before they leave, thank them for their partnership and contributions. Thank them for being coachable, and acknowledge something specific that happened in the conversation, happened in the role play, either about an action or an insight that they had or the courage they had to address some things. And these you really wanna watch these because this is an authentic, personal, relevant, and specific conversation. That that's what you really want this to be. Right? And then lastly, end on time.

So the last part is follow-up. So in your calendar, you want to be scheduling some times to be doing whatever you said you're do, whether it's checking in with them once a week or no communication or that you're going to be observing their experiment and they ask if you would give them feedback right away versus waiting, so that they can sort of sit with it and maybe play with it opportunity that they have. If you're doing observations on the floor and sharing information with them, and this is not in the world of every participant gets a trophy. This is in the world of we don't acknowledge effort enough.

We're not giving prizes for effort. We're acknowledging the action that they took. So this really is where it goes back to one on one coaching isn't about the statistics, it's about the human connection and what we regard and give regard to and acknowledge in what they're trying to do. Unless we are, as adults, actively involved in learning something like learning how to play golf or learning another language or learning something, then we aren't as close to the discomfort of something unfamiliar.

As adults, we tend to do the things that we're good at. After a while, we don't do things that are new and uncomfortable. And yet we're asking our sales associates to do that all the time. Our sales associates are a reflection of us. So if you never engage in trying something new and learning something, if you never engage in the discomfort and the wonder and the courage that it takes to learn something new, It's really difficult to have real compassion for what it takes for somebody else to do it. But if you are doing it and you set yourself up to be a clearing for experimenting and making mistakes and trying something and getting out there on that doing the hard stuff, then your team is absolutely going to get that from you and they're going to follow that with you.

So when you when you are in that place, then it's not difficult to acknowledge someone's effort because you get what it's like to take that effort too. And the small wins that you get that want that keep you wanting to keep going because it's easy to give up when you're not producing any results. What it really takes is it takes a lot of courage and focus on the goal and fortitude to keep going when you're not getting results even though you ultimately will. So really watch that. See if you're doing it enough.

To get feedback from them on their performance, like what did they think? Whether they produced a result or didn't, what did they think? If they win, what contributed to the win? If they missed it, what contributed to the miss? So that by doing a lot of this, we are going to help our team build a different relationship to failure.

So that you probably have people on their team that have a relationship to failure that means they're one. When they don't meet meet goal, they're a failure instead of they fail to produce an outcome. Right? And if we and our relationship to failure has a real relationship to what we're willing to try and not try. And when we want our people to try the hard stuff, they've got to have a different relationship with the others. So let's be a catalyst for that so that they don't fear it and stop themselves from doing things.

So get feedback about their performance. You might ask them if you can share that in the huddle because there are other people in the team that might be working on some of the same things that really could benefit by knowing what someone struggled to do and did it and it actually produced the desired result. And then I would say as part of follow-up, to put all of your observation notes in your notes for your next meeting. And if you if it means sending cards or sending someone an email or or, I don't know, Starbucks gift cards or something that really acknowledges the results and the effort that they did, then do that stuff.

Because those are the small actions that are going to build your coaching player relationship and have them trust you. And the more they trust you, the more they're going to tell you because they know that what they tell you and share with you is not going to be shared in an ill way or used against them. And all of that really builds to building a team that will continue to try new things, to practice, and to produce, and that's what it's all about. What has worked about the coach the interactions you've had? What is it that had you say yes to coming here because there are things about your one on one coaching that are either not happening, not happening as well as you'd like them to, you're not getting the results that you that you expect from them, your structures aren't in place for that. What is it what creates the pushback?

Is it individual? Is it team? Is it collective?

Is there commonality among it? When in doubt, ask for a a description or an example. Because when you've had when you've had two ups and no one bought anything, then traffic is all you know, all of a sudden, advertising isn't working and blah, you know, all that other stuff. When you've got those rabble rousers or the ones that the pot stirrers or the ones that you might have more people on the fence, but only one that really likes to stir it up or resist. I think those are conversations to have independently and to really find out, like, what's what's at the core of that? Like, what are they really looking to accomplish with the team?

And I remember a team that I was coaching of independent designers, and there was one or two of them that would be the little pot stirrers. And there was a point in the meeting, this tipping point, that I could not get the meeting back. I could not get the meeting back no matter what I did. They would be off to the races, and it would just and so one of the pot stores I had a meeting with, and I said, I don't know if you know that you do this.

Said, but there we have a couple of people that when they start going down the, you know, the pity Pot Road or they're starting to just be crabby about whatever, and it's really not the time to do that because we're talking about performance. We're not talking about other things. Said I don't know that you know how impactful you are in joining that conversation and what happens after you do. And she said she didn't. I said, okay. So now that you know that, do you want to continue to contribute to the downfall of a meeting?

And she said, no. I said, great. Let's create a little code that when I see you going down that road, you're gonna stop talking. And we did. So we created a little signal that when she would get on that on that horse, she had to stop, and she did.

And it changed the meeting because the rest of the team stayed on the fence. We could I could pull them back. I could break them into groups. I could do something, but there was that tipping point that I would lose them. And it it was this, you know, the number of people that hopped on together.

So I would also maybe use the individual time if they're for their for the ones who are most resistant, I would really wanna get to the bottom of it. What's what is it that they're resistant? Are they resistant in general? I don't think we can ever underestimate how, you know, the damper that one person can put on a team.

And, you know, it's and depending on what their disc style is. Like, some people you can have straight direct conversations with, and some you have to sugarcoat it and go, you know, all around the cape of good hope in order to, like, get the point across. But but to get a commitment to to do things differently and for someone to see the impact that they that they're having on their own performance as well as on the rest of the team. Because it is frustrating when you think, you know, my team's got a lot of talent. Why aren't they operating at a higher level? Like, what is in the way?

What is it about one on one coaching for you that you would like to take to the next level, get another slice of, improve your outcomes and performance? Because they really are, you know, the evidence of your performance and outcomes. With our company, you know, we're newer to the one on ones. Would Would you you alter the first approach or really anything about it as reverse introducing it?

Maybe. If they've not had one on ones before, again, depending on the DISC style, I would probably do, you know, what that would impact the the roll up time to when we're gonna start having them, what they can expect, what they need to do to prepare, why we're doing them. And it would be helpful prior to if their goals and stuff are written. Because then you have something to be working toward achieving, and they're not happening in a vacuum. These are the things that we're gonna be doing. I'm gonna be learning stuff.

We're gonna be doing some things differently. We're gonna reinforce some of the things that are really working. And so I'm gonna be learning right along with you. So, like, it just puts you in such a powerful position that they get a heads up of things to expect that are gonna change even though they may not know where they are right now.

Right? And then as you go, introduce some of the concepts, like we're gonna be doing one on one coaching meetings once a month. We're gonna be doing training meetings twice a month, and we're gonna work on goals as a team and improving metrics together and individually. And when they start directing their actions to making goal and making goal for a reason that benefits them, like a new car or something, then then that's gonna have even greater appeal. As you look at the success of your team, as it relates to your ability as a coach to drive your team to higher performance and greater results. If you'd like to join us, please reach out and ask for more questions.

So I wanna thank you for your commitment to your team. You took time out of your busy day to look at something that might help you to be a better coach. I hope this information was helpful.

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