Gone Are the Days-Revitalizing Sales Reps for the New Century

Gone Are the Days-Revitalizing Sales Reps for the New Century
By Rick Johnson
Article Word Count: 1607


It's the new millennium - has selling really changed? Is the evolution of change something we as sales people in distribution really need to focus on? Is sales in the New Century really so different that the concept of pioneering a territory and then servicing the customer as a life annuity has gasped its final breath? The answer to those questions is yes. So, now what do we do to prepare ourselves to pass through this time warp and become "A" players in the New Century?

BEING AN "A" PLAYER IN THE NEW CENTURY

As an "A" player in the New Century you must build business-to-business relationships through channels that other team members can service. The special buyer/salesman relationship isn't dead, golf is still allowed, entertainment is still acceptable, but the degree to which these tools are used has changed. Certainly, the focus and the gray matter behind the sales planning process must contribute more to the long-term goals of the organization. The sales representative in the New Century ensures that their products, their services and their company becomes the channel of choice. The primary objective is the same. "First Call and Last Look," but the methodology has evolved to a higher level. Transactions are no longer managed by the field sales representative.

FOCUS HAS CHANGED

Focus must now be on planning for the development of new customers and increased penetration of current high potential customers. The main responsibility of the salesman in the New Century is NOT TO INCREASE SALES, but to systematically and consistently increase the number of customers that call you D.O.C., (Distributor Of Choice). If you truly practice solution medicine for your customers, if you find their pain and make it go away, you will become their D.O.C. That means you'll always get the first call and the last look.

THE REALITY TEST

How do you know if you made it through the time warp? How do you know if you are or can become an "A" player in the New Century? Answering the following questions should give you a clue.

• Do you know the 5 largest customers of your 5 largest customers?

• What are the 3 largest sources of pain in their lives?

• What are your customers' key profit and growth drivers?

• What are you doing with the knowledge?

• How would the customer describe your efforts to improve their business?

THREE BASIC COMPETENCIES OF THE "A" PLAYER IN THE NEW CENTURY

"A" sales people in the New Century learn to develop Achievement Competencies, Influence Competencies and Thinking Competencies.

1) Achievement Competencies

Achievement competencies focus on results. They help you understand the concept of planning and creating strategies with effective action plans that support corporate objectives. They help you target high potential customers and lock onto that customer's growth objectives with laser-like clarity. They promote creativity empowerment and initiative.

2) Influence Competencies

Sales people in the New Century no longer hit the road trying to meet a quota for the number of calls per day. The "A" player of the New Century focuses on multiple contacts within an account, seeking to match his company resources, including people, to his clients' needs. He targets his persuasion techniques, maximizes his personal impact and works hard to improve organizational awareness on both sides of the sales equation. The "A" player in the New Century promotes Tier Level Selling in his customer's organization as well as his own organization.

3) Thinking Competencies

The New Century Salesmen is a quick thinker. When he shoots from the hip, it's from a knowledge base that doesn't expose his company to undo risk. He can think outside the box and practices scenario planning within his own territory analysis to prepare himself for the future. He is a short-term planner and long-term strategic thinker.

"A" PLAYER RESULTS AND HABITS

The "A" salespersons in the New Century are always striving for improvement. They gain the majority of their targeted customers' business. They increase market share. Transactions flow through a well-managed relationship that they have established. Their time is focused on growth rather then transactional service (the team and the system do the servicing).

The "A" player of the New Century constantly seeks to enhance their selling skills and the knowledge base of the industry they serve. They no longer focus on product knowledge. They focus on their customers' products and industry knowledge. They have fine-tuned the basic habits of success.

• The habit of prospecting

• The habit of planning

• The habit of using a professionally prepared sales presentation

• The habit of goal-setting

• The habit of record-keeping

• The habit of efficient time control

• The habit of self-development

• The habit of continuous development of their industry knowledge

• The habit of self discipline

GONE ARE THE DAYS

Salesmanship in the New Century has changed. Gone Are The Days of selling features and benefits. Today you must understand how your customer makes money and match the benefits of your product to his profit-making activities.

Gone Are The Days of developing a personal relationship as the key to success. Selling in the New Century still requires that personal relationship but it must be expanded upon. You must become a business consultant and an advisor to your customer in this century.

Gone Are The Days when your focus was on your product and services. You must now focus on industry knowledge. You must become an expert in the industry to provide real value to your customer in the New Century.

Gone Are The Days that you dribble from the mouth creating rambling conversations and making unsolicited scripted presentations. "A" players in the New Century listen more than 80% of the time. I mean really listen and understand the customer's real concerns. They look for opportunities to solve problems, to take the pain away.

Gone Are The Days of salesmen being high paid apologists. Sales in the New Century require quality and service as a given to enter the game.

C2 = SALES SUCCESS

C2 means knowing and understanding your customer's customer. To become an "A" player in the New Century you must get involved with your customer's customer. New Century Sales requires that you strive to bring your customer more customers. It requires an understanding of their capital structure and suggestions on your part to make them more efficient. It requires your help in introducing them to new markets.

Gone Are The Days that you compete with price, service and quality alone. Sales in the New Century depend on your understanding of the difference between price and cost. More importantly, sales success in the New Century depends on your ability to educate your customers on the difference between price and cost.

Gone Are The Days of "Three Bids and A Buy." The purchasing mentality of your customers has changed. Innovations in their purchasing practice forces innovation in your selling practice. Today you must seek, document and get signed agreements from your customers on cost savings. You must focus on working capital reductions, direct expense reductions, indirect expense reductions (redevelopment of personnel), system reliability, inventory management and logistics solutions that contribute profits to their bottom line. Reduction of Your Gross Profit Is Not An Acceptable Cost Reduction.

MUST I BECOME BIONIC?

"A" players are not super humans. They simply focus their efforts on success. Ask yourself the following questions.

• What are your Customers' Key skill sets? (What are they really good at?)

• What would your customer's customer say they really value from your customer?

Ask these same questions of your own company. Remember, in some cases "Loser Customers" deal with "Loser Distributors." They often form a mutual admiration society. "A" players in the New Century quickly learn to recognize Loser Customers and refuse to waste valuable time on them.

Take the time to really understand value added selling. Recognize its power in generating much more volume than the Old Century approach. The key is to completely separate selling goals from being genuinely helpful and understanding your customer's business. Real value added selling focuses on helping customers solve their problems, without trying to make a sale. Remember that Value Added is defined by the customer, its goals and its business.

BEAM ME UP SCOTTIE

This may all sound Inter Galactic, overwhelming and you may even think, "What's The Use?

I know how to sell. I'm good at it and I've been doing it for years."

Well, chances are you may be absolutely correct. You see, things didn't change overnight. When the clock struck 12:01am at the turn of the century, there wasn't a Big Flash, a Sonic Boom or a Major Revelation on how we as distributors are to change our practices or the way we go to market. The truth of the matter is that we have been going through an evolutionary process throughout the nineties, accelerated by improving technology and information distribution. The point is, if you were an "A" player sales person in the 90's, then chances are you have learned and practiced many of the techniques discussed in this article. Now, all you have to do is to continue to learn and refine your skills. If you haven't changed your style, learned new practices based on improved customer intelligence, and if you still believe in the sales model developed in the old century, you are probably struggling to maintain market share. Seek out additional training and advice. Look for a mentor. I'm betting that the majority of the readers fall into the first category. You have been involved in the evolutionary process and you are eager to face the challenges of the new century.

To paraphrase Wayne Gretsky, "You want to skate to where the puck's going to be."

I'll add, "Seek to arrive with an attitude - an attitude of success."
http://www.ceostrategist.com – Sign up to receive “The Howl” a fre*e monthly newsletter and get your choice of "CEO Strategist's Hiring and Interview Guide" or "The Guide to Effective Training Sessions", valuable resources for all levels of management. The Howl addresses real world industry issues. – Straight talk about today’s issues. Rick Johnson, expert speaker, wholesale distribution’s “Leadership Strategist”, founder of CEO Strategist, LLC a firm that helps clients create and maintain competitive advantage. Dr. Eric “Rick” Johnson (rick@ceostrategist.com) is the founder of CEO Strategist LLC. an experienced based firm specializing in Distribution. CEO Strategist LLC. works in an advisory capacity with distributor executives in board representation, executive coaching, team coaching and education and training to make the changes necessary to create or maintain competitive advantage. You can contact them by calling 352-750-0868, or visit http://www.ceostrategist.com for more information.Need a speaker for your next event, E-mail rick@ceostrategist.com.

Best Bosses
Five leaders who use innovative strategies and rewards to motivate employees.
By Elaine Pofeldt, Fortune Small Business senior editor
July 1 2007: 6:38 PM EDT


NEW YORK (Fortune Small Business) -- You can offer all the benefits in the world, but the one that matters most to employees is a piece of the action.

Of the 18 honorees in Winning Workplaces' fourth annual Best Bosses competition, 14 run companies partly or completely worker-owned.


That reflects a broader trend. The National Center for Employee Ownership estimates that 9,225 companies were offering stock-option plans, stock bonus plans, and profit-sharing plans as of July, up from 7,600 in 1999.
How good a boss are you?

Winning Workplaces is a nonprofit in Evanston, Ill., that helps small-business managers improve their communication skills to make workers more productive and happier.

It assembled a team of respected judges, who culled the 80 applicants by looking at factors such as employee satisfaction ratings and by interviewing workers. The result? Eighteen Best Bosses - 17 from commercial companies and one from a nonprofit.

From companies that offer free gourmet dinners during crunch times to a boss who lends top performers the keys to his convertible, see five of the winners and what makes them stand out.

http://money.cnn.com/2006/09/25/magazines/fsb/betterbosses.fsb/index.htm?postversionfiltered=2006092817
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How good a boss are you?

For a complete list of winners, go to winningworkplaces.org.

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How good a boss are you?
After 34 years in the attitude-survey business and thousands of employee polls, David Sirota knows what your subordinates want. Do you? Check this out, then take our quiz.
By Anne Fisher, Fortune senior writer
September 28 2006: 5:49 PM EDT

NEW YORK (Fortune) -- "A large part of what a good boss does is expedite things for employees - that is, help them get their jobs done by removing obstacles. This is not at all the same as 'making sure' they get their jobs done by raising the anxiety level. Most people are anxious enough already." So says David Sirota, head of Sirota Survey Intelligence, a research firm headquartered in Purchase, N.Y., that has surveyed millions of employees in Fortune 500 companies since its founding in 1972.
See the winners of Winning Workplaces' Best Bosses competition

Along with two co-authors, Sirota has summed up what the firm has discovered in a new book, "The Enthusiastic Employee: How Companies Profit by Giving Workers What They Want" (Wharton School Publishing, $26.95). We recently spoke about how to tell whether you're a good boss or a bad one. Some excerpts from our conversation:


To start with the most basic question: What makes a good boss, in employees' eyes?

All of our research consistently shows that people in general have three goals at work. First is fairness. They want to feel that they're being recognized and rewarded fairly for what they contribute. Second is achievement. People want to be proud of the organization and of their place in it. And third, camaraderie, meaning good working relationships and a sense of belonging to a team. If these three goals are met, you have enthusiastic employees.

The trouble is that, in most companies, morale among new hires is high and then, by about the six-month point, it has dropped sharply. Management has destroyed it. One thing bad bosses do is to deliberately make people feel insecure about their jobs. Another is, treat employees like children or criminals instead of like responsible adults.

A sign of a really bad boss is micromanaging, which I define as devoting punitive amounts of attention to minutiae. We've seen workplaces where people have to raise their hands if they want to go to the restroom. Another sign of a bad boss is when you hear employees say that they get no positive feedback at all. A common complaint is, "If we make a mistake, we hear about it, but for doing our jobs well, there is never a 'thank you'."

Just to play devil's advocate for a minute here, let me ask you this: Why should companies care whether employees are enthusiastic or not, as long as the work gets done?

Well, there is plenty of persuasive evidence of a direct link between employee morale and the overall performance of the company, including its stock price. That correlation seems to be a result of enthusiastic employees treating the company's customers particularly well. All of us at one time or another have dealt with an apathetic or even hostile customer-service person or salesperson and, by contrast, with someone who's enthused about his or her work. Enormous difference! A good or a bad direct boss is most often responsible for that.

And it can make or break a company's reputation. We recently did some work with the Mayo Clinic, whose prestige among patients and fellow practitioners comes partly from its employees' enthusiasm. We met nurses there who come in on their days off, just to check on their patients - not because they have to, but because they want to. But it's not just in the life-or-death medical profession that enthusiasm matters. We also worked with Keebler, and there was tremendous dedication and high morale there. People are pleased to be making a product that customers enjoy.

Don't most bosses - even rotten ones - think they are doing the right things? If you are a manager, how can you tell if you're a good boss or a bad one?

The surest way is to ask your people for feedback. How do they think you're doing? This is why 360-degree evaluations are so useful, because they give people the chance to offer you some constructive criticism. If your company has no formal 360-degree program, you have to seek out people's opinions yourself, and you may be glad you did. But you have to be careful how you ask, because people often are afraid to be honest with the boss. So you may need a bit of training in how to open the discussion so that you can actually learn something from it.

See the winners of Winning Workplaces' Best Bosses competition

Richard Caturano

Company: Vitale Caturano, Boston
Strategy: It's not unusual for employees of accounting firms to spend more time at work than they do at home during tax season. To ease the stress on the 300-member staff of his public accounting firm, president Richard Caturano offers workers free gourmet dinners and Saturday lunches during the busy season.

For those who don't have time to fuel up at home, there is a year-round, complimentary breakfast buffet with free espresso. A concierge service handles staffers' errands, such as picking up dry cleaning, laundry drop-offs and visits to the auto shop.

And when employees do have spare time, the company makes it easy for them to give back to the community. It provides free or low-cost access to charity events. Perhaps it is not surprising that the company is so generous to its team. It is 100% employee-owned.

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Paal Gisholt
Company: SmartPak, Plymouth, Mass.

Strategy: While many CEOs rely on Monster.com, Paal Gisholt prefers to find employees for SmartPak, a maker of equestrian products, at horse shows and university equine-studies programs.

Since he founded the company seven years ago with his wife, Gisholt estimates that he and his HR team have attended 85 horse shows and built relationships with 15 equine-studies programs.

Ashley Wener, 22, who received a degree in animal sciences from the University of Vermont, sent her résumé to SmartPak after a professor recommended the company to her. She joined SmartPak in June and now works as a product specialist in the sales department.

Her 3.67 GPA helps, she says, but Wener has expanded her knowledge of horses since Gisholt hired her. "I'm constantly learning," she says.

Sales at SmartPak grew from $15 million in 2004 to $23 million in 2005, and the company recently expanded into selling prepacked daily helpings of all-natural dog food.

Don't be surprised if Gisholt starts scouting for talent at the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show.

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Mellody Hobson
Company: Ariel Capital Management, Chicago
Strategy: Ariel prides itself on its slow and steady approach to investing. The investment firm, which runs three mutual funds and has $17 billion in assets under management, uses the same strategy to advance its social mission: educating African-American kids about investing.

Its 97 employees reach out to Chicago children through Ariel Community Academy, a public school that the firm helped the city found and that it supports with help from two financial firms: John Nuveen and Lehman Brothers.

Each first-grade class receives $20,000, which Ariel invests equally in its Ariel fund and the Nuveen Rittenhouse Growth fund.

Hobson, the company's president, gives regular lectures at the school to both students and their parents on topics such as saving and investing, and she came up with the child-friendly statements that each student receives on the $20,000 investment.

Says Hobson: "Ariel Community Academy allows us to attract like-minded employees who have a sense of community."

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Graham Weston
Company: Rackspace Managed Hosting, San Antonio
What's the best way to keep a young company in the fast lane? Weston, co-founder and CEO of Rackspace Managed Hosting, based in San Antonio, hands top performers the keys to one of his cars, a BMW M3 convertible, for a week. Finding creative ways to recognize the stars on his 1,000-employee staff has helped Weston grow annual sales to $139 million at seven-year-old Rackspace, which hosts web applications for other firms.

"I think it's one of the biggest bargains in business," Weston says. "If you gave somebody a $200 bonus, it wouldn't mean very much. When someone gets to drive my car for a week, they never forget it."

For extra recognition, he offers workers the use of a guest house he owns on the Comal River in New Braunfels, Texas, where the water is 72 degrees year round.

"You know if you work hard, Graham sees it and will take care of you," says David Bryce, 34, vice president of customer care at Rackspace. "You don't have to worry about fighting for yourself to get what's 'due' to you. It's not a lot of fun working for a boss who doesn't give you a raise unless you ask for it."

Weston also offers flexible arrangements for employees working through personal problems. When Bryce, who joined Rackspace in 1999, was struggling to cope with a divorce, Weston offered him several months of paid leave, which he gratefully accepted. "I would do anything for Graham," he says.

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David Williams
Company: Merkle, Lanham, Md.
It's just as tough for employees to stay competitive in the marketplace as it is for companies. To help his 850-member staff keep their skills sharp, David Williams, CEO of this database marketing agency, requires them to take classes on subjects such as computer programming, business writing, public speaking, and best practices in their field at the firm's The Merkle Institute of Technology, founded in 1990.

Classes are taught by their colleagues, offering lots of opportunities to cross-pollinate ideas with folks in other departments. Classes don't cut into employees' personal time, because they are scheduled during business hours.

To make sure the firm's commitment to employee-education is clear, Williams requires each member to earn a certain number of credits and, in some cases, to teach a certain number of hours to be eligible for an annual raise. The firm, which is 80% employee-owned, holds him to the same standard.

The Curious CEO: Four Keys to Becoming a Great Leader

The Curious CEO: Four Keys to Becoming a Great Leader
By William J. Holstein
November 27th, 2007 @ 8:01 am

In my interviews and meetings with hundreds of CEOs over the years, I’ve noticed that the best ones have a burning sense of curiosity. I think it’s one of the most important differentiators. Here are the ways they manifest that curiosity:

Reading Outside Their Industry. It’s easy to immerse yourself in one vertical area of business knowledge. But the best CEOs read books and magazines outside their narrow business focus. They’re trying to find trends that are going to hit their company in coming years. And they’re looking to adjacent fields to find tips on how other industries are coping with a particular problem.
Exposure to Networking Groups. The best CEOs expose themselves to other corporate leaders in non-profit settings or organizations like the Young Presidents Organization. And in those environments, they are constantly hungry for best practices.

They Don’t Wall Themselves Off.
The most curious and therefore best CEOs make sure that they have exposure to people in their private and social lives who can speak the truth to them, even if it’s uncomfortable. They don’t fall into the CEO Trap where the only things you hear are the things that people beneath you want you to hear.

Avoiding the Arrogance Trap. A corollary is never becoming arrogant, never assuming that he or she knows everything. When a whole organization knows that a CEO is curious and is open to learning, that shapes the culure of the whole company. But when a CEO projects arrogance, the whole company shuts down and stops learning. The personality and behavior of the CEO is so crucial–it cascades throughout the organization.

The CEO as Chief Performance Officer

The CEO as Chief Performance Officer

Top executives may be so preoccupied with specific functional responsibilities that they can’t state why customers buy products and services from their company rather than its rivals.
One CEO, who understood this problem, wanted an aggressive new growth strategy but feared that the organization didn’t recognize its wide-ranging implications. He therefore assembled top managers for workshops exploring them. The team’s members quickly learned that developing a common perspective is hard.
After six workshops (described in detail), they realized that excellence in one key function is no longer enough. All activities count, particularly their role in creating customer value. This broadening of the performance challenge directly affects what CEOs do.

Tips for Thriving In Hard Times

Tip # 1: Focus on your opportunities not your problems.

Last week I met with a client, the CEO of an impressive and successful company who is one of the best managers I know. He has recently been recognized as such by a prestigious organization of his peers. During the past couple of years the company has more than doubled sales to about NIS 450,000,000 - roughly $130,000,000. The company has been nicely profitable and has always scored near the very top of its category across numerous parameters.

Then came the sliding dollar.

Like most good leaders, he and his management committee are working hard to be a bulwark between the hard financial reality and the company’s many employees. They really hope that their loyal employees (and in surveys their employees have self-reported to be amongst the most satisfied and committed in their industry) won’t have to absorb the brunt.

Now, not every company will be able to protect their employees. However, here’s something he shared with me that every CEO and executive can implement immediately:

“Dov, at our last management meeting we realized that we’ve been spending so much time dealing with problems and not enough time on our opportunities. We decided that beginning with our next meeting we will begin with the opportunities and spend the bulk of our time on those.”

I don’t believe he has studied Peter Drucker, but this is one of Drucker’s classic refrains: Focus on your opportunities not on your problems.

It sounds so simple, yet we often fail to do it. We can all do this, no matter what size our companies. We MUST all do this. We should all be investing at least as much time on opportunities as we invest in our problems. (In my view, Drucker’s genius was in spotting what was blatantly obvious and articulating it in a way that everyone can see it.)

Problems act on us and won’t go away. The opportunities require discipline and a decision that “We are committed to find the opportunities in our world and exploit them.”

We all know that there will be companies who thrive – even in the harshest economic realities. There are always limitations. There are always problems to solve and fires to put out. But no one can stop us from turning a big part of our focus to our opportunities.

DOV GORDON’S TIPS FOR THRIVING IN A RECESSION:
Is your management committee more engaged in dealing with problems than in pursuing opportunities? How about your average manager and employee?
For nearly all of us, the strong shekel is outside our circle of influence. What is WITHIN your circle of influence? You can:

· Increase sales efforts to non-dollar economies.

· Find US based subcontractors so that more of your expenses are in dollars.

· Innovate so you can command a premium price. Successful innovation is the result of good management.

PS – Many companies find it exceedingly difficult to pry their attention away from their problems and focus on their opportunities. If your company could use some help, give us a call.
PPS – I am about half way through a new white paper on strategy. Would you be interested in reading the almost-final draft when it is ready and providing your feedback? If yes, please reply.
PPS - Here are a couple of recent articles you might enjoy. Feel free to share them.
--Lessons from Those Who Predicted the Housing Bubble - and from Those Who Didn't.
--For Every Thousand Hacking at the Leaves of Bad Management, there Is One Stricking at the Roots.

DOV GORDON helps senior executives make better, wiser decisions and quickly get things done. He is sought after for his perspective and advice on formulating and implementing strategy, developing an innovation culture and cultivating superior team work. Dov can be reached via his websites www.GordonGroupEC.com and www.IsraeliCEO.com or via email at dovgordon@gmail.com.