Categories: Sales Leadership
Driving organizational transformation is no easy feat, whether it’s your first initiative or your 10th. Force Management President, John Kaplan, answered timely questions during a webinar on sales leadership, sharing the tactics leaders are using now to achieve critical outcomes. Here are some of the most relevant questions answered, along with valuable resources to help you be successful.
If you want to watch the full discussion, access the on-demand webinar here.
1. What are recommended best practices to increase organizational adoption of your initiatives and ensure what you train on is used across field offices?
We’re seeing company leaders put an immense focus on constant communication, especially as SKO season approaches. During the webinar, John Kaplan touched on the fact that communication and involvement from sales leadership is imperative to organizational success. A great place for you to start, provide your sales organization with the “Why”. Why are you asking global sales teams to make changes to their daily rhythms? How will this shift benefit each of them as they face specific territory challenges? Etc….
Once you provide the “why”, getting salespeople to execute the “what” and the “how” is much easier. Find ways to ensure your sales team feels informed and included in the plan to support them next year. Consider what you may need to be communicating to your team right now.
Here are resources you might find helpful:
- Don’t Let Your Sales Initiative Fail: Lead from the Front
- An Easy Way to Drive SKO Participation and Success
- Critical Concepts Sales Leaders Must Communicate
2. How do you prioritize initiatives when leading enterprise sales teams with different goals?
It’s critical that your entire sales organization has a mechanism to drive numbers up and repeat success, despite that different teams may have a variety of revenue goals. At the core of all sales success is the ability to drive a buyer-focused sales conversation and attach your solution to your customer’s biggest business challenge. Consistency around this approach serves all revenue goals. You’ll need a messaging framework that’s consumable for your entire organization, but can also be tailored to different buying audiences and enterprise teams.
Here are resources you might find helpful:
- The Most Powerful Mechanism for Your Sales Team: a Value Framework
- The Story Behind Intercom's Rapid Growth, Told by Their Leaders
- How Sysdig Solidified Buyer alignment and Drove Company-wide Benefits as a Result
3. How are leaders driving alignment and adoption of initiatives across worldwide organizations?
When working to drive front-line accountability and consistent execution of your sales initiative, you've got to be thinking about your managers. Your managers have a significant impact on new sales behaviors, but they need company support to execute. Do they have the skills, tools and resources they need? Consider how you can enable your managers to make a bigger impact. One of the most critical alignment areas that a sales leader can influence is the alignment between sellers and their front-line sales managers. Help your front-line managers understand what good will look like as they drive adoption and coach their teams.
Here are resources you might find helpful:
- Front-Line Manager Coaching Resources
- What Good Looks Like When Sellers and Managers are Aligned
- How to Equip Managers to Drive Lasting Results from a Sales Initiative
Best Practices for Leaders Driving Change
If you’re launching a transformation initiative, save this checklist. Sales leaders leverage it to align their initiatives behind sales and company growth goals and determine what’s needed to make them stick. Bookmark it today and share it with other leaders who may also be interested in these proven actions.
