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An old prospector was digging for gold but not finding any, decided to head into town and have a drink to hopefully change his luck. He tied his mule to the hitching post and headed inside.

At the same time a drunken cowboy staggered out of the bar and said, “Old timer, can you dance?” The prospector just stood there.

The cowboy started firing bullets near the prospector’s feet and he naturally started to dance. Every time he stopped, the cowboy would fire again. When his pistol was empty, the prospector went to his mule, grabbed his shotgun, held it under the cowboy’s chin and said, “Hot shot, have you ever kissed a mule?” The cowboy stuttered and said, “No, but I’ve always wanted to.”

The point is that you can force people to do things, but when they are performing under protest, their attitude usually sucks pretty badly.

————Doug, congratulations on your milestones————

Ed Donoghue, VP Sales – Orkin US said recently, “Your message, for the decades I’ve been around you, has always been spot on. The Selling Point blog is one of those emails I open immediately, always has a nugget and truth be told, I often pass it along to the 1,000 strong Orkin salesforce. Wishing you continued success and keep that content coming!” 

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Now fast forward 150 years and watch most managers spend the majority of their time running around at Mach 2 with their hair on fire. They perform activities they think are critical while neglecting the development and fine tuning of their sales teams. When asked why they don’t provide sales coaching for their folks, they typically mumble one of several inane excuses that I will address in a minute.

Without boring you with lots of statistics, suffice it to say that the case for sales coaching is pretty compelling. The bottom line is, sales coaching helps reps reach their potential and close more business. Isn’t that why you hired them?  Now back to the excuses.

The first one that usually pops out is that managers think they are too busy. There is no doubt that sales manager’s work lots of hours, but much of this time is spent putting out fires and solving problems. They think they are providing adequate sales management because they find themselves handling reps requests for help on prospect and customer issues. Needless to say help of this nature provides a bump to sales results, but its short term in nature. What managers really should be doing is helping their sales reps learn to think critically and solve most dilemmas on their own. This type of help provides much longer lasting results for the sales team.

As an example, while managers may be able to “tell” a sales rep what they should do to advance a stuck opportunity, they are sacrificing another opportunity. Managers won’t be able to solicit sales reps thinking on the best options, best practices, or opinions on how to move forward under certain circumstances. Of course, coaching will require more from managers up front but will produce a more motivated and empowered sales team.

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Secondly, although some sales managers certainly have a nose for helping others succeed and maybe even a desire to teach, there is no reason to think or expect them to possess a bundle of coaching skills. Lowest common denominator means they simply don’t know how to coach.

For managers to become great sales coaches takes a lot of time and some serious dedication. It is just not a skill set most managers naturally possess. Fortunately for salespeople, there are many good coaches and sales coaching programs available for sales managers to employ. Yours truly is a blue collar sales coach currently providing ZOOM sales coaching for commercial and residential sales consultants for a variety of service professions. It’s amazing what 30 minutes a week via video chat with a good sales coach can do for your sales budget numbers without emptying your bank account!

Thirdly, if managers really knew how much of a bump in sales results that sales coaching provided, they would all be providing it. I recently saw the results of a five-year study published by the Aberdeen Group that showed that among sales reps with at least a 20% increase in finding new business (prospecting and closing), 82% were receiving ongoing sales coaching. On top of that eye popping stat, turnover among sales reps was 10% less among those being coached. What’s not to like?

The fourth excuse managers’ use for not providing sales coaching is that they mistakenly think that the confidence of their sellers will be diminished. The only time this is a valid reason is if coaching is only to be used as punitive action to inflict pain on lousy performers. Truth be told, coaching rarely works with reps in the bottom third of the pack. It tends to work best when directed toward the mid performers and above; the group that has and exhibits a desire to improve. So as opposed to hurting confidence levels, the real result of sales coaching is enhanced selling skills, which will bolster the confidence levels of this group of employees.

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