The Sales Management Challenge

As a manager of sales people, your role changes to that of a leader, a coach, a communicator and a decision maker – here’s how to meet that challenge:

Outstanding salespeople promoted into management often receive the title of sales manager as a reward for excellence in sales. Professionally unprepared to meet the challenges of building their salespeople, they revert back to what they do best – selling.

“In most cases, a good salesperson doesn’t make a good sales manager,” says Frank O’Donnell, district manager for Tractor Implement Supply Company. “If you make a wrong choice, you risk losing a good rep.”

Scott Crenshaw, regional sales director of Rich Food Plan of Florida, agrees: “I’ve seen too many reps ruined by being promoted into management.”

Complaints like these from seasoned managers highlight an all too common problem – a poor manager promotes superior salespeople and thus perpetuates poor management.

To identify the essence of effective sales management, PSP interviewed a select group of successful managers, authors and respected scholars of sales management techniques. The major problems new managers encounter and the training they need to survive round out PSP’s report of what it takes to “get your ducks in a row.”

JUGGLING THE FOUR ROLES OF MANAGEMENT

Great sales managers have four outstanding characteristics. They play the role of:

LEADER – inspiring confidence in their sales team, motivating them and getting things done by being a pied piper rather than a bulldozer.

COACH – knowing how to train and what to teach, and understanding that each salesperson has different strengths and weaknesses that demand praise and improvement.

DECISION MAKER – finding a healthy balance between flexing authority muscles and being overly cautious.

COMMUNICATOR – creating connections that lead the sales team to results by setting goals and objectives that are clear, concrete and understood by everyone.

When experts explained their definition of a successful manager, these four characteristics were mentioned over and over again.

LEADING – NOT PUSHING

Joe Batten, an international management consultant and author of the best seller Tough Minded Management (AMACOM, 1978), tells a story about shepherds to explain the difference between leading and pushing:

“Some shepherds walk behind their flocks; others walk in front of them. Sheep who always feel authority, driving, pushing and correctiveness coming from behind, who never have a clear focus in front of them, are always anxious and they produce a lesser grade of meat. Sheep who always have a clear picture of somebody ahead leading them quickly learn trust. They know they’ll be taken to where the grass is greenest and the water is purest. They don’t mill or meander around and don’t have to be constantly corrected. There is a focal point for their energies. They can relax and enjoy life. As a result, the sheep produce a better product.”

People take longer to develop trust than sheep, though, as Danny Paul, executive VP of RMSA, a national automated retail merchandising service, notes: “When you become a supervisor, you become a parent – your people are your children. Well, children don’t always understand everything you do, why you discipline them, or why you’re trying to get them to do things for their own good. It takes time to build that trust.”

You can make the process of creating this trust smoother by using an easy going yet consistent leadership style. Blue Bell/Wrangler’s sales and management trainer, Jack Wilner, thinks that autocratic or bureaucratic management styles are self-defeating. He recommends that a new manager take it easy – “be a little humble, don’t rush in there, learn about your people, and don’t try to tell them everything.” At his company, new managers who want to show off their “corporal’s stripes” end up where they came from – back in the field.

An evenly gruff style is usually overcompensation for new manager’s insecurities, according to Batten. To increase self-confidence, he suggests developing a “strength notebook.” “Sit down with good friends, colleagues and your spouse to brainstorm on your strengths. Write down every strength you can come up with. Then, for the next year, write down one new strength each week. At the end of the year, you’ll have found 52 new strengths.” Batten says that this method alone was responsible for one company moving from number two in its industry to number one, and pushing its sales up over the billion dollar a year mark.

COACHING – LET YOUR TEAM SCORE THE POINTS

Several experts quoted from the book Coaching for Improved Work Performance by Ferdinand Fournies (Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1978). Wilner sums up three main concepts of this management bible: “1) management is getting things done through your people, 2) you get paid for what they do, not what you do, and 3) you need them more than they need you.” He adds, “We pound that into our managers’ heads. I would say that it’s beginning to sink in.”

Frank Barnett, a regional sales manager for Motorola Communications and Electronics, expands on these key principles: “As you move up into management, you have less effect on actually making the sale – you’ve got to motivate your people to do that. If they’re motivated and doing the job, you’ll be successful. If they’re not, you’re in the ditch.”

Once you’ve put together a team with good potential, how do you get them to perform? First, don’t make assumptions about what they know. “Sometimes managers take a new recruit for granted,” says Scott Crenshaw. “They fall back on their experience with the product and think the new recruit should know it as well as they do.” At the other extreme are managers who don’t have enough faith in what their reps do know. “Managers are often hesitant to turn over juicy leads to an inexperienced sales rep,” says Danny Paul.

One of the best ways to find out exactly what your people know is to accompany them on sales calls. Develop a strategy before you enter the client’s office, cautions Wilner. For instance, tell the rep, “If I see an opportunity to increase the sale or if I think you’re going to lose it, let me jump in, but then I’ll turn it right back over to you.” The problem with this technique is that many times the manager doesn’t jump back out. “Sometimes you have to bite your tongue and let the salesperson sell,” says Wilner, “otherwise the salesman loses credibility, and the account starts calling the manager.”

Checking on your reps progress and their paperwork is also an important task for effective coaching. “A salesperson respects what the sales manager inspects,” says Donald Staunton, author of Increasing the Effectiveness of the Field Sales Force (Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1983). Say you ignore expense report deadlines but always go over your reps’ activity reports to be sure they’re making enough prospecting calls. What will you get? Late expense reports and more prospecting.

Jacques Weisel, a former sales manager who is now a full time consultant and national speaker, underlines the need for becoming a “people builder.” “Make your reps feel important by recognizing and praising their achievements. Help them reach personal as well as sales goals. It’s your job to increase their self-worth, their skills, and thus, their income.”

Coaches’ reputations depend on the results of their people. By selecting, training and supporting their reps, managers can reach their own goals for success – but first they must learn how to become decision makers.

MAKING DECISIONS: LISTEN, EVALUATE, DECIDE – THEN ACT

“It can be hard at act,” admits United Airlines chairman Richard J. Ferris in the book How to Manage (Facts on File, 1985). “A lot of times it takes courage. A lot of times it’s not pleasant. For instance, it’s no fun to fire somebody. But as tough as it is to act, afterwards chances are you’ll wonder why you didn’t do it six months before.

“There’s one further step to take after acting. After you act, explain why…so people can understand.”

Because careers are on the line, decision making is difficult for all managers. Frank Barnett recalls the problems he had as a new manager: “I wanted to be fair but at the same time, I had a job to do. I probably spent too much time weighing my choices rather than making the decision and going with it.”

He’s learned a new approach that has cut that “weighing” time. “I give a decision the test of common sense – if it passes, I do it, if it doesn’t, I don’t.” Barnett also tries to put himself on the other side of the desk – imaging what they want to hear, what would motivate them. This helps make the decision process easier.

Many newly promoted sales managers enlist the help of a mentor in their early days of management.

In fact, several managers mentioned that a mentor got them in for an interview or helped them get their present position, Kevin Parry, personnel manager for Georgia Pacific, whose mentor “used to have my job,” says, “In talking with him, I learned what worked and what didn’t.”

What can a manager learn from a mentor to help make better decisions?

A mentor can teach a lesson to an entire team – one that stays with them throughout their own careers. Robert Anderson, chairman of Rockwell International, recalls a distinctive approach to decision making that he learned from an excellent superior. “As a fledgling engineer at Chrysler Corporation in the late 1940’s, I had an unusual boss,” he says in How to Manage. “He believed that you couldn’t be an effective specialist unless you also understood the broader aspects of the business. Routinely, we young engineers were assigned a specialty: power trains, suspension, body materials, electrical systems, and so on. But as we gained proficiency in these primary responsibilities, we also learned how one engineering specialty related to another and, more broadly, how what we did was affected by business and marketing considerations. It taught me a lesson, one that I’ve applied successfully numerous times.”

Regardless of the advice they receive, the final decision is up to the managers themselves. Of all the decisions, the ones about our goals and objectives are the most critical to the success of the sales manager’s career. “Good managers, says Wilner, “accomplish things – they set goals, set objectives and achieve them. These goals stretch them, forcing them to climb and grow.” Effective goals, he adds, are “time bounded, realistic, measurable, specific and attainable.”

COMMUNICATING – YOU ARE THE MESSAGE

“You have to spell out what’s expected of people so they understand,” says Dr. Frederick E. Webster, Jr., author of Field Sales Management (John Wiley & Sons, 1983). He explains the vital role of “expectancy.” “People’s motivation is a function of the value they link up to their own performances with the achievement of those rewards – it’s a perceptual problem. Unfortunately, very often management itself isn’t clear about exactly what they want the sales force to do.”

He goes on to say, “It’s often true that signals come out as vague generalities like, ‘We want to improve our position in the market.’ Well, salespeople will say, ‘What does that mean for me on Wednesday afternoon -what should I be doing? I’ve got a 10 hour day – how should I allocate my time?’ I know companies that refuse to tell distributors about their marketing strategy. They’re afraid they’ll reveal it to the competition. That’s sheer nonsense!” Webster says emphatically. “If you can’t trust your people, you shouldn’t be in business.”

Another stumbling block for new managers is leading a sales meeting. Communicating one-on-one comes more naturally than standing in front of 20 or 30 people. Sometimes this is not a fear of groups but a lack of organization, explains Danny Paul. “I believe in the adage, ‘The better the reps, the worse they are at paperwork.’ It’s a lack of patience. So they have problems when they have to make a very concise statement or presentation in a limited time frame. They just don’t get organized well enough to pull it off.”

Communicating can be unpleasant when it comes to handling people problems. Nobody likes to confront a problem employee, but it has to be done. Wilner and Barnett both use the suggestions found in Coaching for Improved Work Performance for handling difficult employee situations. Wilner describes the process this way: “First, define the problem so that you agree on it, then get the employees to solve it – don’t solve it for them. Get them to give you alternatives. If they don’t select the best one, guide them. Then ask them when they’re going to start – get them to set a time.”

A common sales rep problem that must be nipped in the bud is tardiness. “Say you’ve got someone who’s always getting to work late,” says Barnett. “You agree that there’s a problem, then ask the rep what he or she is going to do to solve it.” Barnett insists that this is for the employee’s own good: “I’d be doing the rep an injustice by letting it slip. If it’s ten minutes one time, the next day it’s 20 minutes, so if I see something wrong, I try to correct it immediately.”

Reps aren’t the only ones who need clear lines of communication. Failure to ask for help until it’s too late gets many managers into trouble. Rudolph Neil Villegas, a national training coordinator for Boehringer Ingelheim Animal Health Inc., advises: “If something is unclear, a manager shouldn’t be afraid to ask senior management for specifics, assistance and guidance.”

Frank O’Donnell sums up his idea of effective communication for sales managers: “Be 100 percent honest with your salespeople.” This is an important message that is best communicated by the manager setting the example.

FINDING THE “RIGHT STUFF”

How do you decide who can handle the switch from sales to management? Usually it’s a combination of a gut reaction, observation of a rep with his peers, and testing.

“You can test until you’re blue in the face,” comments Danny Paul. “I think it’s your emotional attitude toward these people and how they get along with the people they work with.”

A proven track record in sales and a combination of job experiences in both territorial and inside sales are important at Georgia Pacific. Motorola almost always hires from within because of the detailed technical knowledge a manager must have. “When we hire a salesperson, we’re hiring a zone manager,” says Frank Barnett. “We’re looking ahead. If a person hasn’t been promoted in five years or so, somewhere down the road we possibly mad the wrong hire.”

Wilner sends out a 19-page questionnaire to everyone who aspires to be a manager. Each question about some aspect of management is prefaced by an explanation. For instance, the section on decision-making ability uses quotes from Charles F. Kettering, Harry A. Bullis and General George S. Patton. Then the question asks: “How would you elaborate on Carl Sandberg’s statement, ‘There is no agony like that of indecision’?” Other questions relate to self-discipline, leadership, and the function of management.

There are no right or wrong answers, but the responses give Wilner an indication of the person’s communication skills and his viewpoint on management.

TRAINING FOR SUCCESS

Joe Batten estimates that only eight percent of all managers create the right motivational climate for their sales team’s success. Why? “The average manager hasn’t been trained and oriented properly,” he explains, “so such managers compress, repress and depress their people instead of stretching, evoking, lifting and expanding them by their own examples.”

Danny Paul emphasized continued education for sales managers but prefers periodicals and management books, so you can “pick up bits and pieces.” “I think you can digest little chunks better.” Kevin Parry uses a management correspondence course and training in interpersonal skills to help get his managers going.

Frank Barnett describes a training class where the whole region meets for half a day every week for 13 weeks. “That’s where we get together as a team,” he explains. “At first, it’s kind of stiff but before the 13 weeks are up, you’ve got a team that’s willing to help each other, share ideas, and willing to go bat for each other.”

One of the most thorough training programs is offered by Blue Bell/Wrangler. Wilner suggests that all of his managers read From Selling to Managing by Ron Brown (AMACOM, 1968); he sends them to a sales management seminar by the National Society of Sales Training Executives, and personally conducts a four to five day training course which includes running a sales meeting, coaching, recruiting, hiring and interviewing salespeople. Wilner reasons: “If you train your managers correctly, it will flow right down. Your greatest chance to increase sales is through your sales managers, not directly through your salespeople.”

All management education is not equal, though, according to Fred Webster. “People are better off, as they move into the management ranks, if they’ve had a good general liberal arts, humanities and science background as opposed to narrow functional training. The broader education is what makes for an effective, happy and satisfied manager.”

SUPERIOR MANAGEMENT STARTS WITH YOU

To build a superior sales team, you must be a leader, a coach, a decision maker and a communicator. You can only get your rewards through the accomplishments of others. So get your ducks in a row.