Spend 80% of Your Time on These Five Areas and Watch Your Salespeople Excel: Third of a Five Part Series

Mentor: 

Are you committed to the growth of your people? As their leader, you should be. Part of your role should be mentoring them to obtain their goals. Another part of your role is to help your people grow, both as salespeople and as people. As their leader, position yourself so they look up to you as a resource for their growth and development.  Get in the habit of conducting a goal-setting workshop with your salespeople every year.  This should encompass personal goals, not just company goals.  Go through the process of getting them to visualize themselves in the future.  What is it they want?  What is it they need?  Some people want a vacation home at the beach.  Some want to send their kids to college debt-free.  Still others want to be able to slow down and have more time to volunteer down the road.  Whatever their personal goals, it is critical that they have them, that they have them written down, and that they have a goal plan for reaching them.  Counsel your salespeople to understand how their role at the company can enable those goals.  Work with each one individually to establish behaviors and activity standards that will ensure they are able to fulfill their personal goals.  (Set activity goals to enable them to meet their revenue goals at the company in order for them to control their income, thus enabling the fulfillment of their personal goals.)  If you encourage salespeople to dream and establish their own personal goals, you will often find that their financial needs are greater than any revenue goal you could have assigned them. They will likely set higher revenue generation goals for themselves by being intimately involved in the process.

After the goals are established and the activity requirements to reach those goals are understood, it is simple to hold the salespeople accountable to the right behaviors.  All you have to do is remind them of their ultimate personal goal and how these behaviors tie directly to attaining those goals. And, along the way, remember to set goals for yourself as well.  Only 3% of the population has written goals.  Far fewer have a plan of attack detailing how they will reach those goals.  Be part of the 3%.

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