The Miraculous Transformation - From Sales Executive to Sales Manager

The transformation is magical. John Smith, the star of the sales team leaves work Friday evening. John Smith arrives at work Monday morning and over the weekend, he has seen the light, received magical powers and is ready to deliver great results. What is this magical scenario? Simply, John Smith has been promoted from sales executive to sales manager. Over the weekend all sorts of new skills, behaviours and knowledge have been magically acquired. Ridiculous? Of course. However, in many organisations, there seems to be a belief that a successful sales executive will be a successful sales manager without any specific development or preparation. “…they confuse a talent for sales with a talent for managing people -- they encourage the promotion of the wrong people. The best managerial candidates are not always the people who attain the highest sales.” Benson Smith Co-author Discover Your Sales Strengths, 2003 Star sales executives achieve their results because they have great sales skills and apply appropriate behaviours to get the job done. They love the thrill of the chase the wheeling and dealing, the autonomy and the recognition of bringing in the deal. As a manager their role is different. However, letting go of old behaviours is sometimes difficult. This can cause problems for their direct reports, for their bosses and for the organisation as a whole. Successful sales people are driven and know how to get things done. When their reports have problems, a new manager’s natural behaviour is to jump in and solve the problem. This can mean 2 things. The direct report doesn’t get the opportunity to learn how to solve the problem himself. If this pattern is repeated, the direct report may feel disheartened by a constant interference in what is their job. A manager’s job is to coach and support not to do, the majority of the time. A sales manager who insists on selling is like a football manager running onto the pitch to score a goal. Organisations that promote people on the basis of past performance and not on potential and/or matched abilities, aspirations and values are asking for trouble. “…despite these frequently one off, training based interventions, many IT organisations still report difficulty in building a robust pipeline of next generation leaders. …(they are) lacking a set of repeatable processes to ensure responsive and ongoing IT leadership development for the long term” Strengthening The IT Leadership Bench. Working Council for CIOs 2003 So how can organisations spot future sales managers, groom them for that role and support them to deliver? Senior executives and those that make recruitment and development decisions need to go through a fundamental mid shift. There are different sets of skills, behaviours and outcomes required of a sales executive than of a sales manager. Until this is recognised, any recruitment and development programme will not sustain a successful management and leadership pipeline. The Leadership Pipeline Charan, Drotter Noel 2001, identifies 3 core areas that first time managers need to be proficient in; Defining and assigning work to be done, enabling direct reports to do the work and building social contracts. In Portrait of a Star Sales Manager, Sales Executive Council 2004 again 3 core areas are highlighted; planning and strategy to deploy their teams to best effect, coaching and mentoring their reports and supporting the most important parts of the actual sale (initial presentation and deal closure) There are 4 steps to consider 1.Identify organisational expectations for your sales managers i.e. what are the results, behaviours and values expected, irrespective of whether they are sourced internally or externally. 2.Develop a management pipeline process i.e. a way of identifying potential managers 3.Create a learning pathway for aspiring sales managers (see article on Learning Pathways in November 2004 issue of Salesforce) 4.Create a learning and development culture within your organisation though the provision of resources e.g coaching programmes, to support aspiring managers, managers in transition and aspiring senior managers or leaders. Make people accountable for their own and their teams’ development Step 4 is crucial to ongoing success. The creation of a learning and development culture for all employees offers numerous benefits vEmployees feel they are cared for and supported vEmployees can plan their own development and make appropriate career choices vLeaders can see their internal, growth potential and therefore better plan the business strategy and resource needs vLeaders can manage planned departures of key individuals and know replacements are ready to go >From a sales perspective the manager activity most closely associated with sales team success is coaching. Sales teams that report having 3 or more hours of coaching per month, achieve 107% of target. Sales teams that report having little or no coaching under perform, reaching only 90-92% of target. Portrait of a Star Sales Manager, Sales Executive Council 2004. To summarise, successful sales executives do not automatically make successful sales managers. The skills, behaviours and values are different. Organisations must recognise this and recruit, train and coach sales managers against different criteria. Sales managers play a vital role in the success of any organisation. Do you want to leave the development and therefore success of aspiring and new managers to some magical transformation?