December 2006

CEO concerns for ’07

What lessons have you learned from your ’06 challenges? What changes are you wrestling with for ’07 to ensure you exceed your growth targets? When it comes to revenue and margin growth, what are your concerns for 2007? According to our ’06 CEO survey, changes that are on the Hit List for ’07 are:

• sales force quality
• creating a sales culture that breeds success

If you have concerns about either or both of these issues, don’t let a strong economy give you a false sense of security—in a strong economy, even mediocre sales people can succeed. Don’t let this dissuade you from resolving these issues now. This is the time to heed the call to strengthen your team by:

• Hiring Right
• Inspiring Success
• Creating Accountability

Hiring Right

When you hire sales people, I recommend that you don’t ever compromise your hiring standards. If you don’t have clear hiring standards in place, you must establish effective standards that identify key attributes. The key attributes that you must be able to identify are the traits and values required sell successfully in your industry, with your products, and to your audience.

One attribute that directly impacts success behavior is a candidate’s belief system—or “emotional intelligence”. It’s critical that you assess Emotional IQ prior to hiring. A colleague, PhD Psychologist with an expertise in Emotional IQ, evaluated our assessment tool for how well it measured Emotional IQ components. He was impressed, and in a true “actions speak louder than words” move, he replaced his old assessment approach with our assessment tool!

Inspiring Success

Once you’ve hired the right people, you can envision their success. When you provide leadership that taps an individual’s strengths and nurtures value-driven dreams you are creating the foundation for a No Excuse Sales Culture™. In today’s world, salespeople—from Baby Boomer to Gen X and Y—feel a need to experience a purpose-driven life. An essential element for engaging employees and creating sustainable performance is Identity Clarity™. The unique, rich, hidden contribution of each person is the basis upon which sales management can coach and inspire each sales person.

Creating Accountability

A No Excuse Sales Culture observes a strict adherence to metrics and if metrics are missed, the blame-game is not tolerated. By helping sales people envision creative approaches that empower them to circumvent obstacles, sales managers empower their people enabling them to rise above a victim mentality that would otherwise rob them of their potential.

Revenue success starts with hiring the right people, those who can and will sell your products to your market at your prices/margins. It continues with an environment that breeds and supports success.

For more information about how to reach your ’07 targets, call 612-267-3320.

Discipline Creativity Results

Danita