What Is The Job Of 'Selling' All About Anyway?

When you begin to explore the topic of setting standards and benchmarking sales performance it is easy to see why many sales managers are put off the idea in the first place. There are so many providers out there, with their own solutions and systems most incorporating huge amounts of paperwork and evaluation process that are, very time consuming, complicated and cumbersome. Most sales managers are pre-occupied and already overwhelmed by the urgency of meeting monthly targets and motivating their sales team, that leaves them with very little room for implementing what they see as a scientific instrument which, has no place in evaluating what they view as an art anyway.

I really don't blame them for taking this view but as I have stated already 'it is flawed and dangerous'. Sales managers I find have cultivated a belief that: in setting-up an evaluation system that reveals possible weaknesses in operational procedures relative to the sales division, is a reflection on them and their quality of management, it is preferable to them therefore to not initiate a process that would ever highlight information of that nature.

However almost every function of business is measured and benchmarked in some way these days and depending on the industry you operate within, standards can be regulated by the industry itself. The national standards association of Ireland states that there are 750,000 registered industry standards in operation worldwide. An example industry standard relating to the security industry will illustrate how this works for installation personnel. The standard itself as you can see states: "Any installer, whose installations regularly fall below the requirement of I.S. EN 50131/1, may have certification revoked by NSAI". There are consequences therefore for the installer and their organisation in such circumstances in terms of business acquisition and customer relations. As it happens there is a definitive wrong and right way to install an alarm system and the process therefore is easily measured.

The question is! Can sales performance be measured in the same way? Sure there is many random and sometimes uncontrollable factors, which affect the outcome of a successful sales encounter but these imponderables, exist in other benchmarked processes also. So the selling process and the inherent performance levels of salespeople cannot be excluded from the benchmarking arena with any sincere degree of justification any longer.

I would be very keen to minimise the process for sales managers, not for any other reason than the one stated above, where I would acknowledge their tendency to avoid anything in documented format that might incorporate laborious dedication to analysis and interpretation. It is simply not in the nature of the beast, who, after all, believes their time better spent in getting out and interacting with the team and their customers in the field. But in simplifying the process, I am not excluding their involvement; they must be involved because of their valuable and unique knowledge of the whole sales set-up. In addition I believe that when setting standards and seeking a point of reference in which to measure performance, there is seldom, if ever, an industry norm established and I do not recommend you use your competitors as a reference no matter how professional and successful they are perceived.

Certainly there are established codes of practice in selling but they are not 'standards' they are simply 'codes of practise' and while very laudable these codes are usually descriptors of say membership criteria to an institute and/or association. Sales managers who state their team's membership of such 'business network clubs' constitutes sufficient evidence of the high standards in which they carry out their activities, have simply, no grasp of the topic and need to think again. You may rightly ask, why there is no industry norm in which to compare your team's performance against? In other words, if there are no established norms how then are you expected to implement an accurate system that will reveal adherence to standards if there are no established 'norms' in the first place? Ask a thousand sales manager or sales representatives 'how they would describe the correct way to sell' the chances are you would get a thousand different answers. Does this complicate matters? yes, of course it does. Does it constitute a valid reason not to implement an evaluation and benchmarking system? no it doesn't! The following are some reactions I have received from sales managers on the topic:

"Look , when it comes to selling, there is no right or wrong way, if the salesperson can sell it will be reflected in their achievements at the end of the month"!

"Our market is different, there are so many unpredictable factors, that our strategies change almost by the day"! Your suggestions are fine, but they won't work for us"!

"You can't regulate selling behaviour, it stifles creativity in our salespeople who need freedom to engage their talents"!

" I don't like evaluating individuals, it interferes with the relationship I have with my team and if I have to offer criticism it will affect overall motivation"!

While these expressions are valid they are grounded in misinterpretation of the topic and are symptomatic of the lack of expertise that exists in the role of sales management today.

As a starting point in evaluating sales performance I would challenge current thinking on the very topical question of: what the job of selling is about in the first place? My own findings reveal a substantial variety of interpretations, but get on the Internet and type ' selling and sales performance' into Google, in 0.29 seconds you will obtain 11 million results. I'm not surprised if there is a lot of confusion out there, but for the moment if you have to measure something it would be useful to know what it is you are measuring? In other words 'what distinct measurable activities are performed by salespeople that can be measured and that irrespective of the industry and/or location they operate within are common to all selling jobs'?

Perhaps you have your own take on this? If so let me know and leave a comment:

I will be back with my own contribution.

Have a great day
Dave http://www.davidquinnandassociates.ie/