Transcript of Video:
You hold a big “RAH, RAH Training” for all of your Sales People. Everyone is super pumped and excited. You even have everyone write down the three things they will implement immediately.
The first week back, the sales manager touches base with everyone to see how it is going and what they can do to help. The excitement remains palpable! Optimism is high. Activity is high; everyone is making phone calls to follow up to schedule sales appointments. The sales manager and leadership are right there in lockstep to support the sales team. But what happens after that?
By Week 2, the usual routine has started to creep back, and we are getting busy again. We went through our roller coaster dip where we ramped down for the training and now we ramped back up afterward. But now, the reality of the day to day routine is starting to set back in. The Sales Manager goes back to administrivia, office meetings, dealing with customer issues, and budgetary concerns. The sales team was left to fend for themselves, meetings with the manager got canceled, salespeople scheduled customer meetings over the top of the time they were supposed to do a Planned Encounter with their manager… The division leadership schedules their normal meetings, a customer needs assistance, and on and on it goes. Everyone is too busy. This is where the breakdown begins.
The key here is allowing yourself and your team to go back to the madness, just the way it was before the training, and thinking that everyone needs a week to catch up is exactly the wrong decision to make at this point. You just spent all that money and time on training, if you creep back (or fall full force back) into the way things were before, you have wasted your efforts.
By Week 3, everyone is saying, “What training? Was that just three weeks ago? It seems like an eternity. Old habits are now fully back in force. Nothing really changes. What can be done to break the cycle?
I know this is a crazy thing to hear from a Sales Trainer, but training by itself does not work! We cannot just have training. What we need is a plan for what happens after the training session. That plan must involve someone to hold everyone, including the leadership of the company accountable. Accountability starts at the top. If our managers go back “off the rails” dealing with the administrivia, customer demands, the budgets, weekly leadership meetings and all of the important-urgent things that demand our attention every day at the expense of a sales focus, then our sales team will start to do the same things because they are taking their cues from leadership. If you don’t prioritize the commitment, then why would you expect them to do otherwise?
Training is expensive. Not training is EVEN MORE EXPENSIVE! You have to have a plan. Week 3 is where the opportunity to break free from the old cycle is. Week 3 is where we must push through to form those good, new habits. Week 3 is the most critical time to have the plan, stick to the plan, and hold each other accountable so that by the time we get into Week 4 the good habits are fully engrained.
Planned Encounter Meetings for both the sales team and the sales manager are a must to ensure success. Without consistency and support from leadership, how can you expect consistency and support from your team (much less success)?
For more information on Planned Encounter Meetings and Formats and how those can help propel your sales team, please reach out to me directly.
Kimberly Mackey is the founder of New Homes Solutions, and has the reputation as someone with real-world SOLUTIONS in a competitive and rapidly changing sales environment–SOLUTIONS like “50 Sales per Year before Any Walk-in Traffic”. She is a keynote speaker and published author of many Sales and Leadership articles with 20 years of experience as an executive in the residential home building and real estate industry. She has a proven track record working with Builders and Developers of all sizes –from the local/regional companies to the publicly traded nationals. She also works with Brokers from across the country and is the architect and director of the highly successful Preferred Builder Partnership with Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices Florida Properties Group where she works with 32 builders, 22 offices and over 650 agents.
For more information, or to book Kimberly for your next event, visit www.NewHomesSolutions.com, or visit Mackey at LinkedIn,www.linkedin.com/in/kimberlymackey; Twitter,www.twitter.com/KimberlyDMackey; and Facebook,www.facebook.com/NewHomesSolutions or on YouTube, www.youtube.com/c/NewHomesSolutions
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