Case Study #1:Sales Management Training Client

Here's a sample from
the "15 Biggest Mistakes" report:

Rule 7: Do they identify enough of the customer's buying criteria before they present.

Studies show that the more buying criteria on the customer's mind, the less important is any single one (such as price) is to the purchasing decision.

Here's a sample from
the "10 Biggest Mistakes" report:

Rule 7: Failure of the 80/20 rule:Spending 80% of your time with the bottom 20% of the sales people.

(key: Spend time with the middle group, "emerging contributors")

Case Study #1:
Sales Management Training Client

A leading telecommunications company with 2,500 salespeople surveyed their sales force and verified they had an issue with poor sales morale. Interestingly, salespeople rated their sales managers very high on "cares about my success", but rated sales managers lowest on "provides the coaching I need to be successful." This lack of coaching was a significant cause of poor sales morale, turnover and productivity decline. So, our client's VP of Sales recognized the need to install a culture of coaching, and refocus sales managers on people development.

The VP recognized that sales managers had never been trained on the importance of coaching, how to make time for it, and it had been many years since the company had examined the expectations and standards for performance of the sales management position. The consequence of this lack of clarity in the role of sales manager was that sales managers were continuing to operate as “super-sellers”, and were not coaching, leading or motivating their teams.

Our first step was to facilitate a meeting of regional vice presidents where we defined the behaviors of their top sales managers, then translated them into a "Standards for Excellence" tool - performance standards and behavior expectations for all their sales managers going forward. Obviously, improving sales coaching and performance coaching, as well as injecting greater accountability upon sales managers and salespeople, played a major role in this job re-definition.

The next step of the VP’s plan was to create a forum to a) communicate his expectations to his field sales management team, b) provide sales managers the training and tools to accomplish their newly defined responsibilities so that he could, c) hold them accountable for their job performance.

TopLine Leadership customized, then delivered our “Leadership Development Program for Sales Managers” to 350 sales managers and Directors in groups of 24 over a three-month period of time.

Results:

99% of our client’s sales managers reported that they “recognize the importance of people development as their #1 priority.”

98% report an improved leadership mindset, and

95% report that they now “work from a clear understanding of (Company’s) specific sales management expectations and standards."

Sales turnover has decreased significantly, and sales productivity per rep is up 20% over the previous year.

[On to Case Two]