Over the past weekend, one piece of news caught my attention. The "prank" action through Tik Tok that publicly exposed the misinterpretation of Data error by the team of professionals that supports Trump's campaign.
For those unfamiliar with it, the facts are that thousands of people had announced their presence at the Tulsa Mr Trump's event, quickly making it "sold out" to then simply not show up. In few words they made of it a “riches to rags” story and a world class failure.
A mistake too often recurring even in business, that of the incorrect interpretation of data, mainly in commercial organizations where sales managers tend focus much on data.They set goals and strategies for their sales forces, relying sometimes on polluted or even inaccurate data, which expose them to looking pretty bad like Trump's team.
According to a recent McKinsey study, published on Salesforce insight, only 20% of Sales Managers know how to make good use of data. While 6 out of 10 companies, that collect data and feed CRMs, say they have no clue about what to do with it.
The real problem, however, is not within the data (although accuracy and discipline in updating CRM are fundamental), but lies within the "method" applied by Sales Managers to lead their teams.
With the exception of a few rare Universities in North America, and some postgraduate courses in Europe, there are no real schools that teach Sales Management.
Most Sales managers are "Sales Super Heroes” raised to the role of manager. Too late Companies realize that their experiences, their ego and some sporadic sales training classes attended, do not automatically make them good managers.
They keep doing what they were doing as “super sellers”. In good faith they invest time and energies focusing on activities that are beyond their direct control, like Results and Objectives (87% of KPIs in war room walls). They simply do not know what to do, how to be effective and how to get the best out of each team member.
In particular, they are seduced and distracted (just like Trump's staff ) from the ”illusion” of data, which not only reflect past results (or future forecasts), but which can be contaminated too. They simply ignore what their real (new) job is all about:
Enable each seller to carry out targeted sales activities that can lead him/her to hit quota.
In conclusion, they need to be trained and armed with a practical sales management method to complete the transformation process from “Sales Super Sellers” into world class sales managers.
High performing companies understood it. They learnt that making leverage on sales managers is the key to elevate sales teams effectiveness. Which method is the best on the market?
The right answer is a sales management method who helps them coaching each sales person's sales activities rather than focusing just on metrics and skills.
Remember! Clarifying the tasks assigned to each individual seller is the connection between the actions you ask him/her to do and the results that you believe he/she can achieve.
If you really want to know more, please contact me at www.Brand2live.com
