The Sales Archaeologist

One of the managers I was working with in China shared an interesting story and life lesson with me related to what we can learn from the Chin Dynasty. Apparently in Chinese history the Chin Dynasty became pretty arrogant and started to think they needed no advice or help. The emperor started making rash decisions and when others tried to help he shut the door. His pride ended up being pretty disasterous for him and his people.

Sales organizations today are also in need of advice and help. Many managers will say that they would like to see their sales force improve by "X" percent over the next 90 days or so - this economy it seems has everyone focused on a more short term development model. That's fine but the one thing that people often neglect to understand is that in order to improve "X" we need a real benchmark to start with. That real benchmark is usually your sales people - so rather than focusing on Revenue or Profit as being "X" if management could focus on their salespeople as being the "X" factor they might have a shot at some pretty quick results. Our studies show that a mere 10% improvement in the sales persons skill can add up to a 33% increase overall.

So if you want quick results come up with a plan to improve your own management ability and the skills of your sales people by just 10% over the next 90 days and you should see some drastic improvement. Of course the first step is to evaluate the group and yourself to establish a starting point.

That said some will still allow pride to get in the way and they will continue to say that they want their sales force to improve but in reality - maybe not. Why would someone say they want to improve but then not take the steps to do so? Look again at the example of the Chin Dynasty. When you rely only on your own opinion growth is limited. If you are too proud to see that limitation then only bad results are left.