When faced with declining sales and missed targets, many companies opt to hire a "sales superstar", one whom will do the wonders and rev up sales single-handedly. Unfortunately, most companies almost always end up with mediocre results at best, and sheer disappointment in most cases.
In fact, the notion of trying to hire a "sales superstar" is a mistake itself. Here's why:
The Elusive Sales Superstar
Usually, the term "sales superstar" refers to an ultra-aggressive sales person who simply doesn't take "no" for an answer, and is just fantastic in generating great sales results real quick. This kind of sales person represents only about 1-2% of the entire sales population.
As such they are very difficult to find. But finding them is just the beginning of more challenges. You will face issues such as:
Sales superstars are highly paid individuals, and to entice them to work for you will mean you will have to pay even more, for both fixed and variable pays;
As most sales superstars are currently happily making money with their current employers, and hence that means you will have to proactively reach out to them. The usual employment ads won't work, and even most headhunters don't go around poaching candidates. In worse scenarios, you get candidates who claim to be sales superstars, but are far from it;
The sales superstar you hire may or may not fit into the way you sell, or into your company culture. If that happens, and it quite frequently does, you simply end up with a very expensive dud!
Even when you hire THE sales superstar who's producing good results for you, you'll still face 2 possibilities:
Despite your sales superstar's Herculean effort, you still are not able to stem the tide of declining sales;
Due to your sales superstar's good efforts, you have now seen sales increasing as a result.
Most companies who have hired a sales superstar will eventually find that to increase sales and profits on more sustained basis, you will need a lot more than an individual's effort, and thus diminishing the sales superstar's impact on the bottom line.
However, it is the 2nd consequence that poses the most danger to the company. If you have one sales person who can single-handedly turn the tide for you, then you may have a situation where a significant amount of sales are held in the hands of just one person. If that is the case, your company may be taken hostage by this individual easily, i.e. whatever he/ she demands, you'll have to oblige, or else he/ she will just bring all your major customers to the competitor.
Why Not Build a High-Performing Sales Team Instead
Rather than hoping to find an saviour in the form of a sales superstar, what companies can do is to make sure that all sales persons hired are first equipped and then train in the skills that make them good sales people in your unique sales culture.
While you are highly unlikely to groom sales superstars in your own company, you may actually build a team that collectively produces much more than a superstar ever will. Here's how it works:
Compare the best performing sales person(s) with the rest (the middle and worst performing) in your company. Find out what are the qualities or behaviours that are ONLY present in the best people, which the rest are not doing;
Structure the interview processes where you look for past performance whereby the candidate has demonstrated such ideal qualities or behaviours;
If the qualities or behaviours can be learnt, structure your sales training such that everyone on your team can learn and internalise them.
In doing so, while you may not have sales superstars eventually, but you will get a team of sales people who are performing well above average.
Now, what if you are unhappy with the performance of the entire sales team, and in your view, there really isn't any quality or behaviour that you want your staff to emulate from your best sales person, there's still hope.
The HR Chally Group is a leader in the field of sales staff research, and they have identified the ideal qualities and behaviours that are needed for each of the separate pre-determined 14 sales and 8 management position categories.
The Sales Superstar Isn't Going to be Your Next Sales Manager
Some companies may now be thinking that if they haven't got any good sales people that they want to emulate, then perhaps they can hire a sales superstar and get that superstar to be their sales manager so that all can learn from him/ her.
Unfortunately, the sad story is that only 15% of sales superstars will be competent managers. Here are the reasons why:
Selling is about getting things done through the customer, while sales management is about getting things done through the sales team;
The sales superstar is a highly skilled specialist in the former, but not in the latter;
When the sales team faces difficulties in getting better results, the sales superstar tends to fall back on what she does best, i.e. to take over the sale. In the long run, you'll end up with a sales team of one, the superstar herself;
Sales superstars know that they are good, but they usually don't know why they are good. hence, they will find it difficult to reflect and analyse what makes them successful, and how to make others be as successful as well.
Indeed, sales superstars can be trained to become good managers. However, in doing so you are depriving the superstars to do what they do best, which is closing those deals!
Interestingly, the best candidates to be the sales managers that are required to coach the sales team to better performance tends to sales people who had shown drastic improvements over the course of her career. These people are usually not "naturals" when it comes to selling, but have improved their performances by analysing, learning and applying the skills that make other sales people successful.
As a result, they are more likely to understand the dynamics behind what made them more successful as compared to their past performance, and are likely to flesh out the learning points of others once they settle into a coaching role.
In any case, if you would like to build winning sales teams where each team member is an above-average performer, simply e-mail info@psycheselling.com or call +86-13671902505 or Skype: cydj001 and arrange to buy me a mocha. All information shall be kept in confidence
c.j. is an Affiliate with HR Chally Group in China. Founded in 1973 through a grant from the U.S. Justice Department, the HR Chally Group provides predictive and compliant assessment system for management, sales, technical, customer care, and administrative talents. Unlike other assessment tools that just conducts personality profiles, Chally profiles what is exactly required by specific job descriptions and responsibilities and predict if these talents can succeed in these roles. The resulting effect is you'll get:
* Up to 40% reduction in turnover
* Up to 30% increase in employee productivity
* 85%+ accuracy in identifying effective performers
Prior to this, c.j. was Asia Marketing Manager for a Fortune 500 logistics company, as well as Corporate Training Manager for Ringier AG, Switzerland's largest media group, in China, where he was responsible for sales team development, and helped increase the % of new hires to close their 1st sales within 2 months by 30%, as well as increase overall sales targets by more than 50%. Visit http://www.psycheselling.com for more info.
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