Five Ways To Fail Your Sales Team
Front-line sales management is the most challenging job in the sales organization. It’s coming at you from all angles. You’re responsible for several reps, which means, at the very least, you’re overseeing several books of business, and you’re probably required to travel a bit. So you’ve got more responsibility with less direct control over the outcome.
Most leaders make less money than their top-performing team members. This can sting a little worse, considering that many managers are promoted because of their performance as individual contributors. To make matters worse, many managers are doing double duty and carrying a bag themselves.
To top it all off, the leader has to be an insulator- managing the messaging and feelings of everybody above and below them on the organization chart. They have to bring the ground truth to upper management, and they also have to manage the downstream message to the reps in the field so that they know what they need to know but aren’t distracted from their top priorities. This means translating, sugar-coating, and often absorbing everybody else’s feelings while hoping for the best. It helps to have a high EQ (and broad shoulders).
In many ways, it’s an unenviable position. Still, the opportunity to lead and help others fulfill their potential is gratifying. The front-line sales manager is the biggest lever in the revenue organization, and getting things right can mean huge success.
I’m going to outline the five most significant ways sales managers fail their teams to help you avoid these common pitfalls so you can more effectively lead your team to victory.
Smother them
Your reps need your support, but they don’t need to be the center of your universe. Spending too much time with a rep, especially on things they don’t need help with, breeds a feeling of distrust. They need a mentor and a guide, not a babysitter.
Reps appreciate the help when a leader steps in, throws their weight and title around and helps close a deal. However, they don’t appreciate it when the manager feels like this needs to happen every time.
During the onboarding process, some hand-holding is appreciated. However, after a while, it’s a terrible use of your time to stay over-involved in anything other than the most important deals.
Ignore them
On the other hand, it’s not good to leave salespeople to their own devices. Reps need space, but they also need to know you care. So show them some love and be interested in what they’re up to, not just what they’re accomplishing, but how they do it.
The hands-off manager also has unrealistic expectations of most of their team. “I want them to take the initiative and invest in themselves the same way I did.” I hate to break it to you, but not everybody is the self-starter you were. They don’t have the same goals or aspirations. That doesn’t mean they won’t perform better with the right nudge and encouragement; you need to provide it.
Be Selfish
One of the most challenging things a manager needs to do is keep their ego in check. This is tough to do when your team’s performance reflects on you, but you have to have strict boundaries around the right thing to do for the team, the rep, and then for you (and in that order).
It’s easy to step in and take control of a deal when the team needs the revenue and your commission is riding on it. But are you short-changing a rep’s development by not allowing them to learn from the potential loss? Acting in your self-interest ahead of your rep’s or your team’s sends a message. It sets a terrible example, damages your credibility, and erodes your team’s faith in you. You’re to a leader if nobody’s following you.
Don’t Praise Them Enough
Yes, you pay your salespeople for what they do. Commission checks reward good behavior, and the beauty of a sales career is that you can give yourself a raise just about any time you want.
Still, sales cycles can be long. While the emotional peaks can be pretty high, the valleys can feel unbearably low. So to help your team keep their swagger, you need to recognize the small wins along the way.
It’s not complicated. Find something each of your team members did well this week, and recognize them in front of the team. It can be in weekly messages to your reps or regular huddles. Can’t find anything? You’re either not looking hard enough or not leading and developing your team very well.
Be Inconsistent
With so much uncertainty in a sales job, reps need to be able to count on their leader, if nothing else. They need to know how you’re going to respond in certain situations. They will need to anticipate how you would approach a customer situation. This is a fundamental building block of trust.
When you play favorites on your team, it sends a bad message. When you ask your reps to pull orders ahead one month and then hold them back in another, it sends a bad message too.
When you’re inconsistent, it sends the message that you don’t have your priorities straight and are not in integrity with your core values. You need to be the stable foundation for your team, not make them feel like they’re on shaky ground.
So what does success look like?
It looks like trust, faith, integrity, accountability, support, transparency, and belief. Be confident in your team, and believe in yourself. Doing the right thing all the time is tough. Quite frankly, you’re not going to get it right all the time. But if you’re doing the work to get the mix of these elements right and actively trying to get better, it will send the right message to your team, and you’ll be on your way to great success.
