Talent Management is likely on the bottom of the list for most Sales Managers. After all, shouldn’t human resources take the lead on recruiting?
As a Sales Manager, don’t make the mistake of relying solely on HR to navigate the recruiting process for new sellers. In his column, “Stop Bashing HR,” published both in Forbes and in Harvard Business Review, Ron Ashkenas (executive in residence at the Haas Business School at UC Berkeley) makes the case that improving sales talent isn’t only a function of human resources.
While it’s easy to complain about HR not doing the job you think it should, your best bet is to create and take ownership of the talent management system for your sales organization. That includes the recruiting, coaching and retaining of top talent.
Ashkenas writes that the evolution of HR “…does not just concern changing HR. It’s also about helping managers take more accountability for people and culture, and eventually blurring the rigid distinction between ‘HR’ and ‘management’.”
We talk a lot about the importance of aligning across departments within a sales organization. When it comes to talent, Human Resources and Sales Management need to have a consistent method for attracting and retaining top sellers.
Best-in-class companies have clearly defined priorities for managing their sales talent, and consistently use them for managing their sellers. To find the right people for the right job, you should start by defining what success looks like in a sales role at your company.
Recruiting top sales talent should be an ongoing initiative for Sales Managers. You have to own the talent on your team. Ultimately, the buck stops with you. In addition to everything else you do, setting talent management priorities may look like a daunting task. However, think of the people-hours it takes to get someone hired or the paperwork required for reviews.
Your sales organization can greatly reduce the time and resources needed for Talent Management by creating a consistent process to help you recruit, hire, onboard and retain a high-performing sales team. In addition, the ongoing administrative burden can be diminished by having success profiles in place to define seller characteristics, skills, performance goals and review processes.
Creating this alignment isn’t easy, but it can be done. Having consistent talent management processes in place can fundamentally change your sales organizations. A well-aligned process to get the “right people on the bus,” from the very beginning maximizes time and allows you to focus on your bottom line goals, like driving revenue.
