first step is identifying the gaps in your performance potential and execution. On a scale of 1 to 3, rate the following pains as they apply to your organization:
| Sales Effectiveness Gap Analysis (1 = Not a pain; 2 = Somewhat a pain; 3 = Major pain) | |||
| Sales Pain | |||
| Unclear sales process, no common language | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| Missed forecastsвЂHappy ears, surprises | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| Qualification, chasing bad deals | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| Selling too lowвЂWe can't sell high enough to execs | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| Lack of effective messages, no differentiation | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| CompetitionвЂLost sales opportunities | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| Commoditized pricingвЂWe need to move up value chain | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| Selling to the wrong peopleвЂPolitics and relationships | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| Silo selling, poor team selling | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| Account selection/segmentation investment | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| Poor deal coaching | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| Poor discipline, no consistency | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| Other pains: | 1 | 2 | 3 |
| 1 | 2 | 3 | |
| 1 | 2 | 3 | |
| 1 | 2 | 3 | |
| 1 | 2 | 3 | |
| 1 | 2 | 3 | |
| 1 | 2 | 3 | |
| 1 | 2 | 3 | |
vision is important, but the last thing that we suggest you do is organize a committee and spend several months thrashing out a vision statement. It shouldn't be that hard.
Jeffrey Pfeffer of Stanford, in his excellent book, The Knowing-Doing Gap, describes mission statements as one of several substitutes for action, and they can be if you dwell on them too long. Lou Gerstner, when he took over IBM, shocked everyone when he stated, "The last thing we need right now is a vision statement." He knew that the company had to stop the bleeding first.
Bill Hybels, who has grown Willow Creek church into a megachurch near Chicago, says that "a vision is a picture of the future that produces passion."
When we work with sales organizations in this area, we simply ask them for descriptive statements about their organization as it is now and how they would like it to be three years from now from the point of view of (1) customers, (2) competitors, and (3) the sales force.
After talking about each one and eliminating some, the usual revelation is "Why not?" Good visions are usually achievable, but a stretch. The next step, of course, is to translate this into goals, objectives (which are measurable and date-driven), strategies, and, finally, action items and owners.
The greatest vision statement of the last century was John Kennedy's declaration in 1961 that the United States would have a man on the moon and back by the end of the decade. It happened on July 20, 1969.
The purpose of this book is to help you create a vision of what you could achieve by sharing best practices of other great sales organizations, as well as the process for making it happen and a process for making it stick.
And you can't go in and fire everyone immediately. You have to fight the battleship while you fix it. But if you don't have a firm resolution and change things proactively, the organization can absorb you like a bullet into butter.
If, on the other hand, your company is a public company and the CEO is managing the company to the analysts' expectations, or if venture capitalists are involved, don't believe for a minute that you can avoid showing quarter-to-quarter improvement. When financial strategy drives sales strategy, the result is usually short-term thinking and sub-optimization of full sales potential. This is a reality of life.
When we were selling to PeopleSoft in 1998, we met with their executive team just as a period of rapid growth was beginning to slow.While the meeting was about sales effectiveness, we gave them this warning: " Next year, you'll grow by 50 percent, but your stock price will fall in half. And there is nothing that you are willing to do about it." They were stunned.
The reason we could make such a bold prediction is that we had seen it many times in the software industry.
The previous year, they had grown by 80 percent, but competition had finally matched their technological advantage in their core products. But PeopleSoft had planned on an 80 percent growth again and had planned expenses accordingly.
So, as predicted, sales grew 50 percent, expenses grew 80 percent, profits took a hit; the stock fell hard.
Most companies would die to have a 50 percent growth in the coming year and would make a lot of money. But who in an organization is going to go in and tell the analysts that their growth is going to slow next year? The hit on the stock price was twice as hard as a surprise than it would have been earlier.
Letting the analysts set your sales goals is a prescription for new horizons on your career path.
executives we've worked with who have made dramatic improvements in sales effectiveness are able to prioritize the gaps in their performance and balance short-term quick-win initiatives with longer-term infrastructure changes.
Although sales improvement initiatives obviously can be conducted simultaneously rather than sequentially, in general, they approached their priorities in the same order.
You may choose priorities differently, but we share the experiences here of three successful executives who have achieved significant sales improvements as a benchmark.