10: And What If You're the Boss?
The majority of the book, thus far, has been toward relationships in general, most generally between a salesman and a customer, but there's much that a sales manager can do to coach his people in using the power of relationships to be more effective and take greater satisfaction from their work.
Primarily, the manager must recognize the value of relationships himself. He cannot "sell" the concept to his subordinates if he does not subscribe to it, and it should be something that is an ongoing commitment rather than a temporary concern or passing fad.
In addition to coaching your subordinates directly, there's much that can be done to provide air support: to use your authority and connections within the organization to facilitate their ability to connect with others in ways that will make them more effective.
The Six Drivers of Business Success
The author lists six drivers of success - talent, climate, relationships, coaching, effectiveness, and recognition - and examines each in a bit more detail.
The notion of talent generally pertains to having people with the right skills for the job - recruiting good employees and developing their skills. (EN: the author dwells overmuch on weeding out "inferior" people rather than training and coaching them, which is advice well worth ignoring). A few more stray bits about diversity: the narcissism of a manager who hires people who are clones of himself, the need to have a diverse body of salesmen to work with a diverse body of clients, and the need to have salesmen who are "right" for the product you sell.
Climate refers to the culture of an organization and the community of people who work together. This largely has to do with the nature of internal relationships, which fosters loyalty, unified purpose, communication, morale, etc. A team that pulls together in the same direction is more productive that one that is fractured and competitive with one another, and it's largely the manager's demesne to foster the workplace culture.
Aside of the relationships within the team, the manager is also responsible for attending to the relationship between the company and each employee as an individual. In a very real sense, a "boss" is the face of the company to the employees in his keep. This is important because a manager manages he work of others, rather than doing tasks himself, and must count on the cooperation of his subordinates to accomplish his own goals. And ultimately, a positive relationship that fosters cooperation is more effective than an authoritarian relationship that demands obedience.
Coaching refers to the training, support, and guidance a manager provides. It can be provided directly, or a manager may help establish a relationship with a mentor. It's noted that coaching is a relationship, and the strength of the relationship can support or undermine the attempt to coach an individual: the "player" must respect their coach to accept tutelage.
A manager is also held accountable for the operational effectiveness of his unit - that they accomplish the goals and fill the functions that the organization needs and expects of them. Managing effectiveness is largely a manner of monitoring performance and taking action where performance is not meeting the desired objectives. Positive relationships with subordinates will keep a manager abreast of progress and attuned to obstacles (he will not be blindsided), and enable him to identify areas where more support is needed to bolster the team's performance.
Finally, there is the matter of recognition, which can be formal or informal, and given to employees individually and as a team. The author suggests that there are other books on the subject and he won't "waste time on it here."
Problems With Command and Control
In many companies, management techniques are stuck in the era or rules and reports, and a great deal of attention is paid to the wrong things - such as the number of calls per day, customer satisfaction scores, or other things that are indicators or surrogates for the goals the company really wants to achieve.. and as such, end up rearranging deck chairs on a sinking ship.
Another widespread problem is that managers are often activity-oriented, not achievement-oriented. This leads to misplaced priorities: the employee who makes more calls per day and spends less time "chatting" with clients seems to be doing quite a lot, but may not be selling as much as a colleague who makes fewer calls and seems more leisurely than aggressive in his approach.
The correlation between activities and achievement is often an illusion: divide total sales by total calls, and a "call" is worth a certain amount - therefore success must be tied to the number of calls a person makes. Therefore, make a lot of calls each day and profits will soar. Ultimately, that doesn't work out Success does not come by making as many calls as possible, but calling the right people, giving them the right amount of attention, having the right conversation, building the right relationships.
As a result, organizations that manage by the numbers and overlook the qualitative factors can achieve great efficiency at performing actions, but this does not necessarily lead to greater success - and quite often, means motivating people to do the wrong things.
Job Satisfaction and Dissatisfaction
It's generally accepted that a happy employee is a productive employee, and a loyal employee, so the topic of job satisfaction has been a subject of recent study. Traditionally, it was assumed that all the satisfaction employees sought from a job was the amount of compensation they received. But as more study has been done, it turns out that pay is only one of several factors that contribute to job satisfaction, and generally is not at the top of the list.
In general, the factors associated with satisfaction are achievement, recognition, responsibility, and personal growth. Those factors most harmful to satisfaction are harsh supervisors, poor working conditions, hostile work environment, low job security, and company policies.
While some of these factors have nothing to do with the workplace relationships, the majority of them do - and point to the traditional view of the workplace was fundamentally flawed in numerous ways.
Problems With Sales Training
The author asserts that sales training doesn't seem to "work" for most companies, and this is largely because it is focused on "peripheral or irrelevant issues" and does not actually train anyone to sell the company's products.
The author cites "studies" that indicate how information is forgotten: 30% of what people are told is forgotten an hour later, 74% has been forgotten after two weeks, and 96% ahs been forgotten after a month.
(EN: The author doesn't provide a source of these studies, but I'm doubtful about it, because retention depends of relevancy. A person who memorizes random facts will quickly forget them if they are not relevant to him, or to a task. However, if the information is related to something he knows, and if he must reference it on a daily basis, a much greater percentage is retained over a much longer periods of time.)
The author also asserts that "success" of training, as well as of employees, is measured by their short-term sales, rather than long-term customer value. As a result, training on sales focuses on the immediate sale: sort out people who are more likely to purchase today and neglect the rest, use pressure and manipulation to close the deal. These are behaviors that generate short-term income, but are detrimental to establishing long-term relationships with customers.
On that topic, the author also is chagrinned by overload. If a salesman is responsible for 25 key accounts, he cannot devote time to developing customer relationships. A better number is five key customers (EN: this probably has a lot to do with profitability. If the profit of five accounts doesn't cover the salesman's salary, then that figure is probably too low.)
Selling Is Learning and Teaching
The author characterizes the selling task as a combination of learning (about the customer, to determine their needs) and teaching (informing the customer of how your product/solution meets their needs).
As such, selling is a relationship between buyer and seller: if you ask the right questions, you learn the prospect's need, and can match those needs to solutions. Done properly, this eliminates the need for pressure and manipulation to overcome resistance: the customer recognizes the value of the product to their specific situation.
The "teaching" a salesman does can be compared to classroom education: there are teachers who are effective, and whose classes students most enjoy. Then, there are the teachers whose delivery is exceedingly boring, and students learn little. The same can be said of salespeople - the ones who deliver lengthy and boring sales lectures are less effective than those who are more interactive and engaging with their customers.
Some of this goes back to the principle of making people think - enabling them to discover the answers for themselves rather than being expected to passively accept what they are told by another person.
The author also suggests that salesmen should consider when to back off: if the customer needs something you do not have, then you should not try to push what you have. In the short-run, you might make a sale; but in the long-run, customers seek products and services that meet their needs and value the companies that provide them - and give them their business, not just once, but repeatedly over long periods of time.
What Managers Should Be Doing
The manager should focus his staff on building strong business relationships with a small number of people. This should be a common theme, both just for the front-line managers, but for those on regional/district levels as well - it's even more important at that level because the values and goals of those "at the top" are pushed downward to the organization.
A sales manager should seek to provide his staff with quality leads: information about the key prospects, customers, and clients the organization should seek to acquire and obtain. There is likely an organizational imperative, or at least guidance, about the kinds of customers to pursue, and it needs to be a limited list in any case, because there's not sufficient time or resources to track down every potential lead.
A Coaching Process For Relationship Development
The author describes a coaching method based on four questions:
- What is the situation?
- What do you think must be done to make the sale or move the customer forward?
- What can you suggest to do next?
- What do we agree you will do next?
In terms of the situation, evaluate your relationship level with the customer, what you think of the them, what they can be expected to think of you. As whether the relationship has the potential to be productive. Consider how to connect with this person: gather more information, act on information you have, or seek help from others.
Then, ask the student what they think should be done. This enables them to think through the process on their own, develop ideas, and feel committed to them. Ask what they can do right away, and ask what support can be provided to help facilitate their actions.
After hearing them out, then make suggestions. Your experience can help you to recognize if there are approaches they may not have considered, such as leverage relationships with others (inside or outside the company). Of importance is to make suggestions and discuss possibilities, not to tell them exactly what to do.
Finally, there is reconciliation between what the employee thinks he should do, and what a manager thinks he should do, to arrive at a mutual agreement as to what should be done.