Successfully Managing a Sales Team
10 January 2014
Read by 2148 persons
FIRST PART: BUILDING A SALES TEAM
Managing and leading a sales team is an art!
It requires specific skills, know-how in communication and people management.
The number of times I have observed how companies promote their salespeople to a manager position…
I have observed several times that companies want to promote their best elements to a management position… however, to succeed in this transition, the salesperson must be helped in their personal development through training allowing them to fully assume their new role and thus become an excellent leader.
What do I mean by that? Let's start at the beginning… Your first task is to build your team. Perhaps you have inherited an existing team, or perhaps you are building your own team. In either case, one of the most important tasks you will have is recruiting the right people for your team.
There are three steps in the hiring process - in my opinion they are all equally important.
1. Candidate selection.
It is important to select the right candidates for the interview. If you schedule an interview with a candidate whose profile does not match, everyone wastes their time!
During your search for the ideal candidate (profile selection), make a list of points to check. Analyze both the resume and cover letter, which will give you a more comprehensive idea of the candidate.
• Did the candidate make an effort to personalize their cover letter to your company? Did they do their “homework”? - Research on your company? Did they learn about the history, culture, and philosophy of your company?
• Is the resume up-to-date? Are all relevant elements included?
• Take a look at their last experience. Have they had a stable career path? If they have had many job/company changes, you will need to check the reasons during the interview.
• What are the key achievements of their career so far? Are they relevant to the position you wish to entrust them with?
Always keep in mind what characteristics you are looking for; what skills are currently missing from your team to achieve your sales goals? The best sales leaders have the ability to hire a team of people whose talents complement each other.
2. Preparing the interview
Successful sales interviews involve a well-prepared, structured and graduated approach.
It might be a good idea to consider whether you will set up a first telephone interview with your candidates before the face-to-face meeting.
Conducting interviews by phone can save you time (and therefore money), especially if you have some doubts about whether or not to receive a candidate.
A few key questions on the phone can confirm or deny any doubts you may have about certain aspects of the candidate's eligibility.
A few tips to prepare for the face-to-face interview:
• Make a list of the questions you are going to ask. There is nothing wrong with having a list of questions on a piece of paper in front of you. Don't think that this will make you seem less professional - on the contrary, a checklist shows professionalism and an organized attitude on your part. For each question, be sure you understand why you are asking it. Consider what kind of answer you expect from the candidate, and how the answer can influence the selection process. Don't ask unnecessary questions just for fun!
• Will you be using role-playing or other tools during the interview? Make sure you prepare everything you need and know what the desired effect of each tool you decide to use is.
• Prepare what you will ask the candidate to bring to the interview. For example, you could ask them to bring a product they have sold before and enjoyed selling. The objective for you is to observe the candidate's motivation and judge the quality of their demonstration of their sales skills. You will also be able to see if the person in front of you is a “passive” or “active” salesperson.
We all know that interviewing candidates for a sales position can become very difficult, simply because most salespeople are very good at “selling” themselves! So you really need to go beyond and create some questioning filters to make sure you get to the heart of the matter. Especially when questioning the candidate about the sales targets they have achieved in the past.
3. The interview on D-Day
This is a crucial part, because this is where you can see your candidates “in action”. On the one hand; there are the questions you have prepared for the interview and on the other hand there are some general points to observe:
• What is the candidate's motivation for taking this position? Are their goals purely financial? Questions around this should be subtle, and not too direct; but it is very useful to know if the candidate has a family to support, or if they simply want to earn money to buy a sports car…
• The key to success: focusing on their sales experience. What do they like to sell, and what don't they like to sell and why? Give the candidate enough time to talk about this. Listen to the language they use - is it technical or not? Do they go beyond product knowledge? They will need to complete their training on your product and understand its technical aspects. But they will also need to be able to adapt to the client's language in terms that are understandable to the client and therefore sometimes forget the technical language.
• Focus on their sales style. Will it be compatible with your product? It is not essential for a candidate to have experience in your particular niche - but you need to be sure that their style reflects the image of your company.
• Observe their interpersonal skills. How will they interact with the client? To what extent will they be able to decipher and interpret the client's different messages? Will they be able to adapt to different buyer styles? This is where the role-playing or other interview tools will be useful.
• Observe their general presentation - their poise and non-verbal language. Do they give a professional impression? Where do they stand on the scale of shyness-respectability-confidence-assertiveness or just total arrogance?
• Ask the candidate questions about their company changes. Their reason for changing jobs in their past career gives an important indication as to the stability of their future career.
Personally, I believe that a well-defined role-playing game can give you much more information about a salesperson and their communication style, as well as their customer management.
Throughout the questioning and role-playing process, you will use your know-how. Your intuition will tell you if this is a salesperson with potential, someone motivated whom you can guide in the right direction. Someone who will be a good return on investment, in whom you can believe and trust and who will integrate into your existing team.
I have seen companies that only hire salespeople with experience in their sector of activity; this is a real shame.
In an ideal world, hiring a willing and experienced person with several years of experience seems to be the best solution, however, selecting only profiles with experience in your niche can lead you to reject very good candidates with less experience but with very strong motivation.
Motivation and attitude are just as important as experience, sometimes even more important - a good salesperson is very often an optimist with a “willing” and therefore positive attitude rather than someone who has a very long career full of experience but who does not show any enthusiasm for the position.
So, now that you have recruited your excellent sales team. This is only the beginning - now begins the hard work: leading and managing your team on a daily basis.
Lucien Seoud.
Etacc.simply-website.fr
Posted on January 10, 2014.
Managing and leading a sales team is an art!
It requires specific skills, know-how in communication and people management.
The number of times I have observed how companies promote their salespeople to a manager position…
I have observed several times that companies want to promote their best elements to a management position… however, to succeed in this transition, the salesperson must be helped in their personal development through training allowing them to fully assume their new role and thus become an excellent leader.
What do I mean by that? Let's start at the beginning… Your first task is to build your team. Perhaps you have inherited an existing team, or perhaps you are building your own team. In either case, one of the most important tasks you will have is recruiting the right people for your team.
There are three steps in the hiring process - in my opinion they are all equally important.
1. Candidate selection.
It is important to select the right candidates for the interview. If you schedule an interview with a candidate whose profile does not match, everyone wastes their time!
During your search for the ideal candidate (profile selection), make a list of points to check. Analyze both the resume and cover letter, which will give you a more comprehensive idea of the candidate.
• Did the candidate make an effort to personalize their cover letter to your company? Did they do their “homework”? - Research on your company? Did they learn about the history, culture, and philosophy of your company?
• Is the resume up-to-date? Are all relevant elements included?
• Take a look at their last experience. Have they had a stable career path? If they have had many job/company changes, you will need to check the reasons during the interview.
• What are the key achievements of their career so far? Are they relevant to the position you wish to entrust them with?
Always keep in mind what characteristics you are looking for; what skills are currently missing from your team to achieve your sales goals? The best sales leaders have the ability to hire a team of people whose talents complement each other.
2. Preparing the interview
Successful sales interviews involve a well-prepared, structured and graduated approach.
It might be a good idea to consider whether you will set up a first telephone interview with your candidates before the face-to-face meeting.
Conducting interviews by phone can save you time (and therefore money), especially if you have some doubts about whether or not to receive a candidate.
A few key questions on the phone can confirm or deny any doubts you may have about certain aspects of the candidate's eligibility.
A few tips to prepare for the face-to-face interview:
• Make a list of the questions you are going to ask. There is nothing wrong with having a list of questions on a piece of paper in front of you. Don't think that this will make you seem less professional - on the contrary, a checklist shows professionalism and an organized attitude on your part. For each question, be sure you understand why you are asking it. Consider what kind of answer you expect from the candidate, and how the answer can influence the selection process. Don't ask unnecessary questions just for fun!
• Will you be using role-playing or other tools during the interview? Make sure you prepare everything you need and know what the desired effect of each tool you decide to use is.
• Prepare what you will ask the candidate to bring to the interview. For example, you could ask them to bring a product they have sold before and enjoyed selling. The objective for you is to observe the candidate's motivation and judge the quality of their demonstration of their sales skills. You will also be able to see if the person in front of you is a “passive” or “active” salesperson.
We all know that interviewing candidates for a sales position can become very difficult, simply because most salespeople are very good at “selling” themselves! So you really need to go beyond and create some questioning filters to make sure you get to the heart of the matter. Especially when questioning the candidate about the sales targets they have achieved in the past.
3. The interview on D-Day
This is a crucial part, because this is where you can see your candidates “in action”. On the one hand; there are the questions you have prepared for the interview and on the other hand there are some general points to observe:
• What is the candidate's motivation for taking this position? Are their goals purely financial? Questions around this should be subtle, and not too direct; but it is very useful to know if the candidate has a family to support, or if they simply want to earn money to buy a sports car…
• The key to success: focusing on their sales experience. What do they like to sell, and what don't they like to sell and why? Give the candidate enough time to talk about this. Listen to the language they use - is it technical or not? Do they go beyond product knowledge? They will need to complete their training on your product and understand its technical aspects. But they will also need to be able to adapt to the client's language in terms that are understandable to the client and therefore sometimes forget the technical language.
• Focus on their sales style. Will it be compatible with your product? It is not essential for a candidate to have experience in your particular niche - but you need to be sure that their style reflects the image of your company.
• Observe their interpersonal skills. How will they interact with the client? To what extent will they be able to decipher and interpret the client's different messages? Will they be able to adapt to different buyer styles? This is where the role-playing or other interview tools will be useful.
• Observe their general presentation - their poise and non-verbal language. Do they give a professional impression? Where do they stand on the scale of shyness-respectability-confidence-assertiveness or just total arrogance?
• Ask the candidate questions about their company changes. Their reason for changing jobs in their past career gives an important indication as to the stability of their future career.
Personally, I believe that a well-defined role-playing game can give you much more information about a salesperson and their communication style, as well as their customer management.
Throughout the questioning and role-playing process, you will use your know-how. Your intuition will tell you if this is a salesperson with potential, someone motivated whom you can guide in the right direction. Someone who will be a good return on investment, in whom you can believe and trust and who will integrate into your existing team.
I have seen companies that only hire salespeople with experience in their sector of activity; this is a real shame.
In an ideal world, hiring a willing and experienced person with several years of experience seems to be the best solution, however, selecting only profiles with experience in your niche can lead you to reject very good candidates with less experience but with very strong motivation.
Motivation and attitude are just as important as experience, sometimes even more important - a good salesperson is very often an optimist with a “willing” and therefore positive attitude rather than someone who has a very long career full of experience but who does not show any enthusiasm for the position.
So, now that you have recruited your excellent sales team. This is only the beginning - now begins the hard work: leading and managing your team on a daily basis.
Lucien Seoud.
Etacc.simply-website.fr
Posted on January 10, 2014.
