The online series to increase your sales leadership effectiveness
MODULE 1 — MEET THE PANELISTS & A LOOK IN THE MIRROR:
You’ll meet our very talented panel of high-performing sales executives and managers, become acquainted with their sales leadership struggles and victories, and be challenged to take a hard look in the mirror to assess what might be preventing your sales team from achieving breakthrough results.
MODULE 1.1 — COMPensation & COMPlacency
It’s very hard to “out-manage” a poor compensation plan that doesn’t drive the desired behaviors and results.
This mini-module looks at three common sales compensation plan problems and will help you examine
whether the COMPlacency on your team is partially being caused by your COMPensation plan.
MODULE 1.2 — YOU CAN’T LEAD A SALES TEAM WHEN YOU ARE BURIED IN CRAP
This mini-module reveals the painful reality that too many sales managers are prevented (or distracted) from
executing their primary job because they’re buried in non-revenue-driving and non-sales leadership tasks and
meetings. You will be challenged to look at which non-essential activities managers must eliminate or delegate
to refocus on higher-payoff activity that moves the needle.
MODULE 1.3 — THE FALLACY OF THE “SELLING” SALES MANAGER & PLAYER-COACH MODEL
The selling manager who carries his/her own quota and is also responsible for leading the team is in an almost
untenable position. This mini-module points out the significant challenges with the player-coach model and
asks if the selling-manager’s primary concern should be achieving their own personal sales goals or ensuring
their people achieving theirs?
MODULE 1.4 — THE PERILS FROM HAVING A VISIONARY, CHARISMATIC, GIFTED SENIOR EXECUTIVE WHO CAN REALLY SELL
Entrepreneurial senior leaders often live perpetually frustrated with their sales teams – typically because
they forget that their people are not as naturally capable as they are! This mini-module highlights the
(counterintuitive) challenges that arise when highly gifted executives don’t provide enough support and
direction to their salespeople.
MODULE 1.5 — AN ANTI-SALES CULTURE WILL DESTROY RESULTS AND RUN-OFF THE BEST SALESPEOPLE
This last mini-module offers strong words and a painful example to execs and sales leaders who may have
forgotten that sales is as much about the heart as it is about the head. Be warned: there are zero
unemployed A-player salespeople and you will never retain top producers if your company perpetuates
an anti-sales culture!
MODULE 2 — THE 1:1 MANAGER-SALESPERSON ACCOUNTABILITY MEETING
The 1:1 accountability meeting is the single highest-value, highest-payoff sales management activity and, when mastered, can transform a sales culture.
This extensive module demonstrates a foolproof “accountability progression” and models how to increase accountability (and focus) without demotivating sellers or coming across as a micromanager.
MODULE 3 — WORKING WITH YOUR PEOPLE – FIELDWORK & COACHING
The best managers are also “coaches.” They work alongside their people to plan, prepare, assist, observe, provide feedback, and strategize.
This module covers fieldwork best practices for the manager’s role before, during, and after sales calls and customer meetings, and also challenges leaders with a revealing exercise to determine if they playing the “hero” on their team or making heroes of their people.
MODULE 4 — SALES TEAM MEETINGS
The objective of sales team meetings is to align, energize, and equip the sales force.
Unfortunately, most sales meetings fail to accomplish that goal. This module looks at common reasons most sales meetings fall short and offers best practices and specific agenda topics to upgrade your team meetings so people leave with more energy and better equipped to do their jobs!
MODULE 5 — RIGHT PEOPLE IN THE RIGHT ROLES
It’s really hard to win when we don’t have the right people in the right roles.
This module contrasts “hunters” and “zookeepers” to help sales leaders understand their perpetual frustration trying to get farmer/zookeeper-wired sellers to secure new business and the opportunity cost incurred from having their best hunters burdened with account management tasks.
You’ll be asked tough questions and challenged to rethink the traditional hybrid, onesize-fits-all sales role.
MODULE 6 — RETAINING & MAXIMIZING THE PRODUCTION OF TOP PRODUCERS
Nothing hurts a sales leader more than losing an A-Player and this module will cause you to ask yourself hard questions about how happy and intent on staying your best people are.
You’ll be pushed to reallocate more time for top producers because the data is very clear that (counterintuitively) the highest-performing managers overinvest in their best people.
We’ll also examine best practices for retaining high performers.
MODULE 7 — REMEDIATE OR REPLACE UNDERPERFORMERS (QUICKLY!)
Too many sales leaders ignore or avoid dealing with underperformance and live as “prisoners of hope” hoping it will correct itself.
That is management malpractice that does significant damage to both sales culture and results, and sends an awful message to the team.
This module builds upon the foundation in Module 2, provides perspective for quickly identifying underperformance and then offers best practices for coaching-up or coachingout salespeople – quickly!
MODULE 8 — RECRUITING
This module unpacks the two iron laws of recruiting, makes the case why it is so important to continually recruit “ahead of the need,” and offers the panelists’ best resources and methods for finding and attracting new hire candidates.
You’ll also get a tip about job descriptions and two killer interview questions to ask every candidate.
MODULE 9 — THE MANAGER’S ROLE TO “POINT THE TEAM”
Selecting “Target Accounts” is the first step in drawing up a successful sales attack and one of the few chances we have in sales to be strategic.
Too many managers take for granted that their sales team members are spending time pursuing the right accounts and this module makes the strong case that managers must be involved in “Pointing the Team” the right direction.
You’ll be challenged to help sellers create finite target lists and identify growable existing accounts and ideal profile prospects.
MODULE 10 — THE MANAGER’S ROLE TO “ARM THE TEAM”
This module kicks off looking at the critical importance of case studies/customer success stories and provides a simple framework and challenge to put a variety of these success stories into your team’s hands.
The panel discusses other key sales weapons and the role managers play in equipping salespeople for meetings and presentations.
MODULE 10.5 — SHARPENING YOUR “SALES STORY”
The “sales story” (message) is a salesperson’s most critical weapon because it is used constantly, and pieces
of the “story” end up in other key weapons (phone calls, voicemails, emails, sales calls, presentations,
proposals, etc.). This entire bonus module is taken from the New Sales. Simplified. Video Coaching Series
and provides comprehensive advice and a thorough exercise to help draft a compelling, customer issue/
outcome-focused, differentiating story. After reviewing this module you’ll want to complete the Sales Story
Exercise with your team.
MODULE 11 — RANDOM RAPID FIRE ROUNDTABLE
I took advantage of having some of the most talented, effective, and high-performing sales leaders all in the same room and asked a series of rapid-fire random questions covering a range of topics from time management hacks, how they use administrative assistants, manage obscene volumes of emails, and even what they’re reading these days.
Enjoy their diverse responses!