Sales Fundamentals

Over 75 people interested in learning the latest ideas, trends and innovation in professional selling and sales management joined me recently at Luna Park in Sydney for the sixth and final Sales Effectiveness breakfast event for 2010.  In a fitting end to the series, we discussed emerging trends in the world of professional selling ending with Michael Schiffner and Robin Gibson encouraging us to celebrate the “death” of sales training and to welcome the emergence of sales development as the new performance paradigm.   We’ll be back in 2011 with another series of events to inform and educate the sales community.  Until then, here are some highlights from November 2010 for you.

Giles Rhodes.  “A taxonomy of sales roles: matching performance & reward mix with different sales roles” 

Are you paying your sales people what they’re worth?

Are you paying too much – or too little?

Giles Rhodes gave us some insights into a recent study by consulting firm Aon-Hewitt which looked at over 25,000 sales roles and the pay structure associated with each role.

We know it’s important to get pay right – but with such a variation in sales roles, how is it possible to compare roles?  The study Giles discussed shed light on this by breaking sales roles into their components, and by so doing, a taxonomy of sales roles begins to emerge.

The Aon-Hewitt analysis identified 12 components that informed sales roles.  These included:

• Sales mode – direct or channel
• Sales focus – new business or account management
• Team selling – sole operator or team member
• Product or service selling
• Sales cycle – long or short
• Product focus – single product or product range
• Plus another 6 parameters

This structured approach to describing sales roles by activities informs the pay structures of roles with specific requirements to ensure that managers match appropriate reward structures with particular sales activities.

Find out more by ordering your copy of the DVD of the full presentation:

http://www.saleseffectiveness.com.au/sales-effectiveness-breakfast-event-series-november-2010/

You’ll find more information about the local work done by HR firm Aon Hewitt here:

http://www.hewittassociates.com/Intl/AP/en-AU/Default.aspx

Michael Schiffner & Robin Gibson.  “Why sales training doesn’t work”

Michael and Robyn began their presentation with a quick activity designed to both engage the audience (it’s an early morning event, after all), and demonstrate how our competitiveness can sometimes get in the way of achieving our goals.

Not only did this get the group up and moving – but it laid the platform for an engaging discussion on what is the function of sales training.  Michael’s key point is simple – but has extensive ramifications for how we approach training and preparing our sales teams.

Many of our current training models are mechanistic and more attuned to a time when our people were viewed as cogs in organisational machines.  Whilst this may have worked in days gone by – it doesn’t work in today’s world with today’s people.  What is needed is an organic approach to training – a developmental mindset.

Key to establishing this mindset is the application of the following three frameworks:

Create a sales development blueprint

Define individual development plans

Cultivate a coaching culture – with a focus on field coaching

Michael then shared his six step process for coaching sales people in the field:

Step 1 – Define the coaching objectives for the day

Step 2 – Pre-call Planning

Step 3 – Document your observations

Step 4 – Post-call Debrief and Feedback

Step 5 – Developmental Actions and SMART Goals

Step 6 – Feedback for you as a coach

Find out more by ordering your copy of the DVD of the full presentation:

http://www.saleseffectiveness.com.au/sales-effectiveness-breakfast-event-series-november-2010/

There’s more information about Michael Schiffner & Collective Intelligence here:

http://www.collectiveintelligence.net.au/

 Special Guest – Michelle Newton (Sales Training Manager Fairfax Media/Rural Press) – “Lessons from 3000 hours of sales coaching” 

Over the past 6 years Michelle Newton has co-ordinated the delivery of over 24 sales development programs to a sales force of over 500.  During this time she has personally delivered over 3000 sales coaching and training sessions in all parts of Australia and New Zealand – from Mt Isa to Launceston; from Perth to Auckland.

Michelle gave a wide ranging presentation, drawing on her extensive sales development experience, and also shared some insights to some emerging research about how the sales function differs due to the influence of gender, geography and generation.  Here are just a few of the many insights she presented:

1. A casual approach to the sales function tends to be used by salespeople in the 40s who have resided in a town for 15 years or more
2. Women salespeople like to know a lot about their clients but prefer a distant rather than a close relationship with clients
3. Men talk more than women (really!)

If you missed the event – you can still see and hear the complete presentation set on DVD.  Order you copy here by registering as a virtual attendee of the breakfast series:

http://www.saleseffectiveness.com.au/sales-effectiveness-breakfast-event-series-november-2010/

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Thanks for reading this post – Paul Sparks, Sales Effectiveness Australasia.

“Taking you beyond sales training and keeping you informed about the latest ideas, trends, innovation, research & best practice in professional selling and sales management”

Tagged as: Coaching, Compensation, Leadership, Motivation, Personal Development, Rewards, Sales Fundamentals, Sales Management, Training

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