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Here are
the six steps. For an explanation of each step, simply
click on the step or scroll down the page. 1)
Hire or have the right people 2)
Make sure that the team has a common goal or
purpose 3)
Develop and foster trust between team
members 4)
Recognize and reward individual initiative and team
accomplishments 5)
Provide leadership and opportunities for participation by
team members 6)
Provide inspiration for commitment and
perseverance You have
all the right things in place. You've hired the best
people you could find, the systems are working and the
products or services are excellent. Yet something still
isn't right and you're not sure why. The problem may show
itself in various ways: the product gets to the customer
late, the customer who has a service complaint can't get
a speedy and easy solution or you feel as if you are the
only person who can make decisions and keep things
running smoothly. What could be the common source of
these difficulties? It might
be that the people in your organization don't work
effectively as a team. Too often, there is no specific
attention paid to the need for and benefit of teamwork.
People are just expected to work together naturally. But
championship level teamwork is not an accident. It
results from a plan and from actions which support the
plan. That plan must also anticipate the things that can
go wrong. There
are six building blocks for creating effective sales
teams. 1)
Hire or have the right people. Not just those who are
qualified to sell, but people who work well with others
and who do so willingly. When you hire the highest
producer, he or she may be the person who prefers to go
it alone. When you want to foster teamwork, this person
may be a roadblock. The same thing is true when support
team members are hired: look for people who are good
workers and effective team members. If you're fully
staffed, so you have the best people - people who not
only sell well but are able to and want to be part of a
team. If you find you too frequently need to patch over
problems caused by a team member, either that person
needs to change his or her behavior or you should
consider getting someone who is a better fit. 2)
Make sure that the team has a common goal or purpose.
Each person on the team will have their own goals, but
they also need to have a common focus. It can be to
provide a certain level of customer service. It can be to
introduce new or advanced features that meet changing
customer needs. It can be to resolve customer problems
more quickly or with more satisfaction. While the goals
need to be developed by the team to suit their particular
situation, the purpose is the same: to make sure the team
has a compelling reason to work together. When
developing team goals, the same rules need to be kept in
mind as when individual goals are developed. Goals need
to be exciting and challenging. Boring goals get boring
and mediocre results. Goals need to be measurable. The
team also needs to be aware of the potential results or
benefits of these common goals. The stronger and more
apparent the payoff, the more incentive each person will
have to work for the good of the team. 3)
Develop and foster trust between team members. Trust
takes time to develop but can be destroyed quickly. Here
are examples of ways to foster trust: * Open
communication plays a vital role. When everyone on the
team knows what's going on that develops commitment to
the team. * When
everyone knows what their role is, but at the same time,
knows when to step out of it to help the team or the
customer, that develops confidence. * When
there are no favorites and all people are treated fairly,
that will lessen resentment and back stabbing. 4)
Recognize and reward individual initiative and team
accomplishments. Too many times, while teamwork is the
stated goal, only individual contributions are rewarded.
If the salesperson is only rewarded for individual sales,
what's he or she going to concentrate on? If the service
rep is only paid based on what's done for the boss,
what's he or she going to worry about? Reward needs to
include something for what the person does to help the
team. Without this incentive, the team will be less
effective. 5)
Provide leadership and opportunities for participation by
team members. Everyone on the team can contribute ideas
to help better serve the customer, to save money or make
working on the team more fun. The salesperson who is
closest to the customer may know precisely what new
features the customer needs but may not be asked. The
secretary may know a better way to speed up customer
correspondence. Service may know how to save money and
still satisfy the customer. The sales team needs to be
able to give each person a chance to make a
difference. 6)
Provide inspiration for commitment and perseverance.
Inspiration is a key word for the nineties. People have
become more skeptical. They want proven, practical ideas.
Yet to go beyond our everyday capabilities, we need to be
inspired. We need role models and examples. The
idea that teamwork is necessary more today than ever
before may seem contradictory to the technological world
we live in. Sales people are armed with more automated
equipment than ever before. So why do we need higher
powered sales teams? There are several
reasons. One
significant reason is that the demand for quality
products and services is sweeping industry. A chain is
only as strong as its weakest link. So too it is with
sales teams. Delivering a quality product or service in
an organization is typically not the act of one
person. It
requires that everyone on the team pull together with the
same goal of providing exceptional service to customers.
It means taking the basic step of identifying and
including people who are on the sales team, such as
support staff and service personnel. Companies have
updated the concept to include even outside people, such
as contractors, suppliers and customers. Many times they
have insights that insiders won't. Another
important reason is that the time for transactions to
take place is collapsing dramatically. Twenty or even ten
years ago, it took months or years to make decisions that
now must be made in days or weeks, or sometimes in hours.
Access to information and the flow of information is
becoming nearly almost instantaneous. Salespeople
can communicate via personal computers and modems, faxes
and cellular telephones. If your company has a
competitive edge, it doesn't last long. Others quickly
become aware of it and don't just duplicate it, but leap
frog to an even more advanced position. So you
must be able to get and act on input quickly from your
field people, service reps or customers. If only one
member of the team isn't included or doesn't follow
through, it can destroy your competitive
advantage. A third
reason is that the nature of sales has changed. In
earlier times, salespeople could rely more on planned
scripts. Customers' needs were more similar than they
were different. Today, customers' needs change quickly
and they are diverse. This
means you need people who will think "on their feet" and
who will quickly and clearly communicate the customers'
changing needs to other team members. Adaptability is
key. The team must be able to respond in "real-time" to
customer problems or opportunities. For your
organization to survive and prosper, it must be able to
capitalize on all opportunities and deliver high quality
products or services that meet and exceed the customer's
requirements. This takes teamwork. Teamwork
can be something as simple as taking a customer call even
if it is not within the person's area or of helping
someone else on the sales team to ensure that the team
meets its goals. It means that members of the sales team
must listen to each other, take responsibility for
resolving customer or team problems and then work
effectively to develop and implement
solutions. Every
sales team, even one that works well, should "take
inventory" periodically to ensure that it continues to
function at the highest level and to see if there are
ways that it could work even better. ©
1990, 1992, 2001 James A. DeSena, Performance Achievement
Systems, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Need an
engaging and energetic speaker for a meeting or event you
have scheduled? For free information or to find out how
Jim can customize a program for your meeting as he's done
with over 100 other clients, call us at
800-4321-WIN. Back to
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Six
Steps to A Super Sales Team
James A.
DeSena, CSP