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August 5, 2012
Talent Management: Are You Missing Your New Product Sales Quota?
By: John Staples
A Talent Management article in the McKinsey Quarterly cited this statistic: 54% of senior managers interviewed agreed they didn’t spend enough time on talent management.
The July-August issue of the Harvard Business Review indicates that the competencies of the top 20% of the sales force have adapted to changes in buyer behavior. To help determine which competencies are most important to your sales team, get a copy of the competencies list.
Success in the sales force is 50% the result of talent and 50% the result of performance conditions. If you’re not addressing changing sales talent requirements, you’re missing half the opportunity to improve.
I recently interviewed a VP of Sales at a Fortune 300 company; let’s call him Dave. Dave has demonstrated success year-over-year in a legacy sales environment even when his peers were struggling. Dave said when he first took over the group he assessed the sales team utilizing a sales competency approach. Dave based his assessments on the requirements (or competencies) required to sell the new products coming to market. What he found was 65% of the sales force didn’t have the skills to make the change.
Dave made the following decisions to support his Talent Management Program:
For Dave, missing quota on a new product launch would typically result in weekly meetings with his boss. He would need to explain the current status of every deal in detail. It would also mean a future promotion to SVP of Sales would go to one of his peers.
On the other hand, the ability to exceed new product quota would positively impact Dave’s success. Doors would open up. Dave also knew being micromanaged by his boss every week would be a waste of valuable time (“I’d rather have root canal every week” was the quote).
Let’s face it; dealing with talent related issues is difficult for every manager. In many cases these are the sales reps that got you where you are. Unfortunately you get paid to make the tough decisions and this is one of them. By starting with the revised set of competencies you’re determining the gap between your team’s current skills and the ones they need to develop. The next steps are developing a virtual bench of talent, upgrading the team, and training those that have the ability to make the transition.
Dave made those tough decisions and is reaping the rewards. Have you struggled with a legacy sales force? What have you done to overcome the gaps? Your peers would be interested to hear from you, Share your successes below in the comments.
Key takeaways:
If you’re the VP of sales, like Dave, don’t wait until you miss the first year new product quota before assessing your sales team. The process of developing a solid Talent Management Program is continuous one, especially in companies that release new products on a frequent basis. If you’re not sure where to start, review the list of sales rep top competencies.
John is the global leader of SBI’s account management business unit. As such, he and his team help clients across 19 verticals drive top line growth and operational efficiency in sales and marketing.
John’s marketing, sales and product expertise span a multichannel strategic approach. He has an unyielding focus on strategic and key account development, which enables strategic alignment between all functional team members in order to reduce acquisition cost and increase lifetime value.
His broad experience in sales, marketing, product and engineering allows him to bring a unique problem solving approach to his team and clients. As he has discovered through decades of experience, clients are often distracted by the symptoms of a larger problem and overlook the root cause of it.
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