- Right Management (2006)

Developing the Right Team

What would it mean to performance if you had more superstars on your team and could retain them longer?

Selecting the Right People

Selecting the right people for your specific sales and sales leadership positions is a challenging and critical task. Research tells us that the majority of our revenue comes from our highest performing reps and managers. We also know losing high performers significantly impacts our results. However, many companies continue to hire based strictly on work experience that has been outlined in a resume combined with a handful of interviews. This approach makes it very difficult to determine whether somebody has the work habits required to succeed at your company. Likewise, a resume or interview cannot tell you if the person you are hiring will thrive or struggle in your culture.  There are better ways to insure a higher success rate. Job-matching using a variety of tools and interviewing techniques increases your chances of hiring a successful team member by 400%.

Successful On-boarding

Once hired, getting new hires up to speed and productive as quickly as possible is imperative. However, most companies put their reps through a few days of "product" training and expect their new reps to be effective. On-boarding of new reps should incorporate all the elements of the sales process and the proven formula that will allow the rep to be successful.

Retaining Key Performers

Retaining key performers is an extremely important part of a high-performing team. Sales leaders need to focus on how to keep these people engaged and producing, how to manage their performance when they are successful, not just when they are down, and how to take their best traits and qualities and infuse them into the rest of the team.

Developing the Team

Finally, and most importantly, a sales leader must know how to develop their team. The higher the quality of your team, the better results they will produce. But sales reps will not get better on their own. Sales leaders must know how to identify the areas where reps need help, then provide clear direction for how to improve those areas. Sales leaders must also determine when someone is not going to make it and take steps to replace those people with better talent.