1. Who are you, coach? – What makes you unique? How can you use your personal and professional experience, skills, and education to challenge, direct, and inspire your team? How do your favorite professional sports coaches’ attitudes, personality traits, and skills manifest themselves when their teams win on the playing field? And how can you emulate those same attitudes, personality traits, and skills to help your team win?
a. Define and learn the basic Coaching Skills you need to succeed
b. Beat your fears by honestly confronting and overcoming your weaknesses
c. Differentiate between coaching and training and coaching and counseling and know when to use the appropriate technique to achieve specific coaching goals
d. Don’t kid yourself . . . know how and when your personality traits can help or hurt your ability to coach effectively . . . and do something about it before it’s too late!
e. Know your limits. You can’t be everything to everyone. Select one or more Assistant Sales Coaches to peer coach and help you achieve your overall Sales Objectives on a realistic timetable
f. Remember that persistence pays – Once you define team performance goals, don’t back down or let up . . . if you do, you’ll lose credibility and your team will struggle
g. Build meaningful relationships with Sales Players by focusing on communication, credibility, and trust
h. Walk your walk and talk your talk: Although this book presents a viable set of plans, built on three decades of successful selling experience; it still needs to be sold, not delivered, to your players. After all, before they’ll take full advantage of Sales Coaching, they have to believe in Sales Coaching
2. Make the most of your coaching time – There are only so many hours in a work week and you’ll want to make the most of the time you can devote to Sales Coaching. If you manage your schedule wisely, you’ll find that you have the ability to focus on some neglected long-term aspects of your job, such as strategic planning, long-term market analysis, etc.
a. Analyze how you currently use your time on the job and adjust your schedule to realign your workload with Sales Coaching priorities
b. Determine what percentage of your time should be devoted to Sales Coaching
c. Set-Up Team Sales Practices in lieu of traditional Sales Meetings – Keep them short (30-45 minutes) and to the point – Always leave Sales Players wanting more
d. Schedule early morning 15-30 minute Individual Sales Player Practices to monitor each Player’s progress
e. Considering that your ability to Coach effectively is directly related to your ability to evaluate Sales Players in action, set up a schedule of one-day field trips with individual Sales Players
f. Make the most of your coaching time by knowing when to coach, when to counsel, and when to sell
3. Evaluate your current sales force – Before you can build a winning Sales Team, you need to evaluate each Sales Player’s strengths and weaknesses to determine where, when, and how to coach each individual through to success
a. Objectively evaluate individual Sales Players’ strengths and weaknesses – Caution: Put your ego away for the duration, get rid of any old baggage (conflicts, disagreements, etc.), and start fresh with each individual
b. Identify individual Sales Players who will benefit most from Coaching; Top Performers won’t need as much help as others, so be prepared to devote as much of your time and energy on coaching the less effective, less experienced, less confident Sales Players
c. Establish an individual coaching plan for each and every Sales Player
4. Field Sales Coaching and review – After all the talking finally fades away, take a road trip. Invest a full day on the road with each Sales Player, calling on former, current, and prospective customers. Evaluate the following aspects of each individual Sales Player’s capabilities:
a. Appearance and Body Language
b. Overall Organizational Skills
c. Call Preparation Skills
d. Advance Knowledge and Understanding of each prospect’s needs
e. Relationship Building Skills
f. Listening and Communication Skills
g. Closing Skills
h. Sales Call Follow-Up and Follow-Through Capabilities
i. Telephone, Computer, and Email Skills
j. Ability to Prospect and Generate New Leads
k. Territory Management Skills
l. Ability to Develop and Work a Viable Territory Marketing Plan
5. Team evaluation and goal setting – One of the most challenging tests you will face as you become a winning Sales Coach is the test of your ability to adapt to change. Because you have to build your team to fit your players, not the other way around, your first and perhaps greatest test will be to adapt your Coaching Style to take advantage of the collective strengths of each and every player on your team.
a. Consider each Sales Player’s attitude, personality, potential, skills and talents to determine precisely how much Peer Coaching and Direct Coaching is necessary to achieve specific increased Market Segment and Territory Sales Goals
b. Define and Benchmark key performance standards for Individual Sales Players and for the Entire Team – Weekly, Monthly, Quarterly, Annually
c. Identify Typical Sales Cycles by territory and establish team progress benchmarks to move efficiently through each cycle
d. Assess and prioritize the resources – facilities, equipment, time, supplies – you’ll need to build a winning team over the next year
e. Establish and Publish a Specific Internal and External Sales Training Calendar for the entire year
EPILOGUE
Winning Sales Coaches live by winning principles. Consider, if you will, the winning principle of the three Ds: Desire, Dedication, and Determination.
Desire is what motivates you to become a winning Sales Coach. The good news about desire is: If you really want to be the best Sales Coach you can be, you will.
Dedication is a measure of how much you are willing to sacrifice to satisfy your desire. You may want your company to be number 1 in sales in your territory, but so does every other person in your position. The key difference is how badly you want to be number one. Are you willing to pay a higher price than your competitors are willing to pay? Will you actually apply the lessons learned in this book? Will you do whatever it takes to build the finest Sales Team anywhere, no matter what it takes?
If Desire motivates you and if Dedication is the measure of the price you’re willing to pay, Determination is what keeps you in the game . . . no matter how tough it may be, no matter how long it may take!
So, how determined are you?
There’s nothing new here.
This is the same old stuff we’ve heard . . . from mothers, fathers, teachers, and coaches . . . all our lives.
Nevertheless, is there anything untrue about what we’ve just said?
No?
Then, what are you waiting for?
Stop managing and start coaching . . . now!
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