Frontline sales leaders are the key to performance.
Senior leadership doesn’t always remember this, but when growth slows, and times get a little tougher, they are reminded how critical these managers are to success. However, companies are finding that their sales managers have been neglected for too long. They have been running to keep up with the pace of the business and a flurry of shifting priorities, but don’t have the focus or skills they need to truly focus on sales performance.
As more companies recognize these gaps in their middle ranks, it is important that they provide them the structure and tools they need to get back to supporting their sellers effectively.
Our team focuses on four main areas:
- Role clarity – Sales leaders get dragged into too many issues. Review their job descriptions and see if they match up with the things they are doing now. Emphasize that they need to prioritize time in the team and commit to keeping them out of other company “fire drills” that don’t produce results.
- Coaching skills & plan – Coaching is for sales performance what brushing your teeth is for personal hygiene. It is a must. It is a basic building block for proper execution. Most frontline sales managers say they are coaches but have never learned the proper skills to do it effectively. If they have been trained, it has usually been a while. Refreshing your sales leaders’ coaching skills and putting a framework in place for how they run coaching sessions is critical.
- A structured schedule – Sales managers need to budget time for the things that drive sales performance. Coaching reps, ride-alongs or joint sales calls, team meetings, and feedback sessions are all keyways to engage the sales team. We advise clients to determine the appropriate frequency for those activities and to have their sales managers make a schedule every 90 days to ensure the time is protected. We like to call this an “accountability framework” because it keeps the managers from getting sucked into lower-value work.
- Tech & tools – Sales teams are being given more and more software tools by the day. The challenge is that many sales managers are drowning in all the platforms, rather than getting the true value they offer. Auditing and prioritizing the technology your leaders have is critical. What should be their “go to” tools to evaluate their team’s performance, better understand their customers, save time, etc.? Our team is working with more AI conversation analytics platforms, as an example. Many of the tools out there can evaluate a reps effectiveness and skills, and all the manager has to do is review and provide input to the reps. It is quicker and more effective, but only if the tool is used effectively. Sales managers are moving too fast to do this on their own.
By equipping frontline leaders with clarity, proper coaching, and tools, organizations can unlock their true potential and drive sales performance where it matters most on the frontlines.
