The following job promotion ritual is repeated in numerous sales organizations each year:
Step 1: A sales manager position is vacant due to growth, attrition, or termination of an existing sales manager; Step 2: The main sales representative of the organization (or department) is selected to fill the vacancy; Step 3: The best salesperson doesn’t like (or can’t) manage other people’s sales performance, so he stays focused on personal sales initiatives, but by doing so, he’s failing in his role as sales manager ; Step 4: The cycle repeats.
Although sales representatives and sales managers work in the sales arena, many of the strengths required for success in the sales manager role differ from the strengths required for success in the salesperson role. Therefore, few top-performing salespeople will become top-performing sales managers. This is important to know if you are looking to hire a new sales manager at your company and expect this person to be successful in that role.
This is not a phenomenon exclusive to sales. There are many highly qualified and successful physicians, for example, who cannot effectively manage a staff of other physicians. There are many prized athletes who cannot successfully coach a team of other athletes. There are qualified kitchen designers, plumbers, and attorneys who cannot manage respective groups of other kitchen designers, plumbers, and attorneys.
Before offering support for my thesis, let me confess that there are two situations in which I will not argue with the individual who says that the best salesperson in an organization will become a successful sales manager:
(1) The first is where the new sales manager retains responsibility for personally generating sales revenue. This individual is, in effect, a part-time sales manager or title sales manager only; (2) The second is when the sales manager’s role is to be almost exclusively a rainmaker (a generator of new business opportunities). That’s a selling role that some sales managers play, but it’s not a management role per se.
The following is a list of strengths (skills) that are required to achieve phenomenal success as a manager of a sales team (or any team, for that matter). However, none of these skills is substantially necessary to be phenomenally successful in front-line sales. This does not mean that a top performer in sales will never be a top performer in sales management, but it does mean that the strengths required to fill the two roles are substantially different.
Force #1. Delegate.
The sales manager certainly cannot do front-line sales activity for his entire sales group by himself. Meeting a sales quota requires the contribution of all members of the sales team. The successful sales manager must possess the ability to delegate responsibilities to others so that the group can achieve its goals. Delegating is quite a different skill than, say, the closing skill, which is required of the best salespeople, but the skill of delegating is not a skill typically required for the best sales performance.
Strength #2. Willing to give up first place.
Top salespeople who become sales managers must be completely willing to give up the top-performing position in a sales organization. For those who can’t, disaster awaits. Sales managers must be willing and able to put their best salespeople on pedestals so that their egos can be properly fed, while also keeping their own egos in check for the sake of advancing their team. In a larger organization, there is still the opportunity for several or many sales managers to compete, but a top sales manager must be able to point to her top performer and give her credit for being the best salesperson in her group. She also has to encourage others who are not top performers to become top performers. Since many salespeople have been ego-driven in their successful sales careers, this transition from achiever to cheerleader is critical. The ability to let someone else be the boss is not a skill required for sales success and, in fact, may be the antithesis of it. Many sales managers who have previously been superior sales performers and have been pushed throughout their career to achieve “pedestal” status will not work tirelessly to put someone else on this same pedestal.
Strength #3. Focusing on others.
Sales management requires an external focus on the sales performance of others, while successful selling requires an internal focus on one’s own sales performance. Being in control of your own sales is one thing; but it is impossible to have control of the sales of an entire team. Therefore, a loss of direct control of the sale is required in favor of a focus on the members of the sales manager’s team.
Strength #4. Supervision.
Sales managers must possess first-line supervisory skills. They need to know how and when to intervene to discipline or change an employee’s behavior. They must possess wisdom about when to support subordinates and when to discipline them. Top salesmen don’t need supervisory skills to achieve top dog status.
Strength #5. Manager.
The key skill of the manager is to use the special strengths of each subordinate to achieve the goals of the sales group. Weaknesses exist in employees, but putting together a group of team members who have strengths in the right areas and knowing how to put those strengths to work is not a requirement for the best salespeople. However, it is required of sales managers who want to achieve the best sales performance. These management concepts are outlined by Marcus Buckingham in his book “The One Thing You Need to Know About Great Management, Great Leadership, and Sustained Individual Success” (Simon & Schuster, 2005).
Strength #6. Coaching, training, mentoring.
Successful sales managers must be able to persuade salespeople to improve their performance, both in one-on-one training events and in classroom training settings. Although some of these elements may be present in all top performing salespeople, these elements are crucial to superior sales management performance.
Strength #7. major.
According to Marcus Buckingham, again in “The One Thing You Need to Know,” successful leaders have two key attributes: (1) They have the ability to create a vision for the future; and (2) Have the ability to align subordinates within this vision so that the efforts of individuals support, not hinder, the progress of the group. Successful sales managers have these leadership attributes. Leadership skill is not necessary for the best salespeople.
Strength #8. Filtering Guidelines.
The sales manager will receive many directives from his superiors. To be effective, he must know when to filter or adjust these directives and when to assume them with reckless abandon. This is a delicate balance, and not knowing when to do which can wreak havoc on a sales organization. The wisdom of knowing when to embrace senior management directives and when to subtly give them secondary attention will help determine the success of the sales manager’s team, and therefore the success of the sales manager.
Strength #9. Hiring and firing.
High-performing sales managers must be able to accurately predict sales performance during the interview process, and they must leverage that ability in hiring subordinates. Without this capability, sales performance will suffer. The best salespeople don’t need this predictive skill. The successful sales manager must also know how and when to remove an employee from the sales team to minimize negative repercussions.
Strength #10. deciding
There is no doubt that making good decisions is important to sell successfully. But in a sales management role, all decisions are magnified because each decision affects more than one individual. The sales manager’s decisions affect an entire team of sales professionals and their customers. This means that decision-making skills are vital for the sales manager.
There are many skills required for sales success. These include the ability to prospect and create business opportunities, the ability to identify prospects’ needs, and the ability to close the sale. But the sales management qualities listed above are not substantially necessary for individual sales success.
While there is some overlap between the required skills of the top-performing sales manager and the top-performing sales person, here’s my advice: If you’re looking for a successful sales manager, hire one who possesses the strengths of a top-performing sales manager. sales Manager. (the strengths mentioned above). Many top-performing salespeople don’t possess those strengths.
