Categories: Front-line Managers
During any sales training program, a leader is faced with varying levels of enthusiasm. You likely have new sales reps who are still trying to establish themselves at the organization. This group is often extremely keen to learn and grow their own professional development forward.
The challenge often lies in getting buy-in from your veteran salespeople. They’ve probably seen more sales training initiatives fail than succeed during their careers. They’ve been there, done that. They don’t have time to waste with flavor-of-the-month initiatives. Even with the likely skepticism that’s in place, good training can help reignite and refocus an experienced sales team. Done right a sales initiative can be the lynch-pin that reinvigorates a veteran sales team, giving them the tools, processes and content to go from experienced to elite.Here are three steps that will help reinvigorate a veteran sales team with your next sales initiative.1. Define the Why
Your experienced sales reps need to understand the why. Why are they participating in this initiative? What’s in it for them? Will this training help them position the company’s new subscription offering? Will this training help them get broader in an organization with a new product line? Often, veteran sellers fail to engage with training because they don’t believe it will drive needed results. Clearly defining the why for the initiative will help build engagement and increase the potential during training.
2. Make it Relevant and Practical
Set up expectations at the start of the training. Clarify the kind of things that they will be learning and what new skills they will learn during the process. And then make sure that your training program delivers.
Working with live opportunities can make any training more relevant and practical. Applying a new sales lens to a current opportunity can help even the most experienced reps identify gaps or new ways to approach challenges they may be having with a prospect.
3. Reinforcement
Your most experienced reps can easily fall victim to old habits post-training. That’s why an identified process and owner for adoption and reinforcement is key. Remember, people do what you inspect, not what you expect. How are your leaders driving reinforcement on a daily basis?
Remember, eager learners make for great training sessions
Regardless of experience level, eager learners always make for great training sessions. The three steps above can help ensure your veteran reps are just as engaged as your new team members
