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Leadership Skills: Coaching Model
Coaching Salespeople for Success
Copyright 1999-2009 Michael Markette
Coaching may be
the single most important skill development technique any sales
manager can possess. The best coaches are able to transfer their
skill set to their team members regardless of the tenure of the
sales rep in question. Much like a good music or athletics
coach, sales managers must understand the art of selling well
enough to recognize errors, understand what is causing them, and
know what will correct them. This means that the sales managers
must be excellent sales people themselves, but not necessarily
better than their sales reps.. Above all, good coaches have a
mutual respect between themselves and the individuals they
coach.
While
coaching takes on many forms and settings, it all follows one
basic model:
- Recognize
the symptom
- Agree
on the problem causing the symptom
- Teach
the proper skill
- Model
the proper skill
- Apply
the proper skill
- Debrief
and create a plan of action
With
new hires and young sales professionals it is quite common to
sit down and formally go through each step of the coaching
process. With more tenured reps, the coaching process is rather
fluent and if done properly, almost unconscious to both player
and coach. That is, the best coaching is done as a habit rather
than conscious effort.
Let's
walk through each step of the coaching model and how we would
apply it with both young and senior sales professionals.
Recognize
the Symptom
It's pretty easy to recognize symptoms because nobody is
perfect. The key in this step is to recognize the serious
symptoms and surface them to your sales rep. When conveying a
symptom to your rep, you need to be specific and site examples
when ever possible. For young salespeople this may be through
formal feedback sessions (see Sales Mgmt Model: Feedback) or
during the "curbside critique". Speak to them in a
cause and effect fashion, accentuating the effect. You want the
rep to be able to think back to the sales call and recall
exactly what they did and exactly how it impacted their sale.
For
more senior reps, it is best to ask the rep if they recognized a
symptom themselves. Kind of a, "Did you pick up on…"
And see where they go. Often times, you'll be mistaking so work
with the rep genuinely. If you are fairly sure you saw a symptom
with what is otherwise a very good senior rep, ask them to watch
for it on their next call and call them out on it if you see it
again.
Even
the best reps fall in to traps. I have seen serious symptoms
like prospects not returning calls; to mild ones like prospects
having a brief bewildered look on their face during a sales
call. Recognize the symptom and surface it to you rep.
Agree
on the Problem Skill Causing the Symptom
This is a fairly easy step especially for senior reps and
managers. Once you have sold for just a few years, you know
enough to figure out what you did wrong on a call. If you are
fundamentally sound, errors are instantly recognizable. The key
to this step is for both player and coach to agree on the
problem skill. If you are having trouble agreeing on the problem
skill, ask the rep what they think caused the symptom one or
both of you witnessed and continue to work toward an agreement.
If you are still split on the issue, agree on a good third party
to observe. Do not call on a third party to mediate or cast
their opinion. Rather, observe this individual on a call to see
how they handle a similar situation. This will hopefully help
both parties gain agreement on the problem skill.
Teach
the Proper Skill
Once the problem has been agreed upon, it is time to teach the
proper skill. In music, this is done by reviewing music charts.
In baseball, this is accomplished through reviewing diagrams of
body movements and statistics. Teaching is a one-way
communication from coach to player. A "This is how it is
done, step-by-step" approach. The goal here is to convey
the inner workings of the sales skill you are coaching your rep
on. For example, if the subject matter was overcoming
objections, the Teach step might cover the PEPC Objection
Handling Model.
Teaching
is a formal step that is not always needed for senior reps. Most
tenured reps know the right way to perform a skill as soon as
they error. Its common to hear golfers that finish a tournament
strong to give credit to their caddie for pointing out a problem
in their swing. From there, the golfer knew exactly how to fix
it. Sometimes a good coach just calls their rep's attention to a
problem.
Model
the Proper Skill
Modeling is an often-skipped step but truly one of the most
important steps. This is where your rep learns by watching.
Young reps benefit from role-play modeling in the office as well
as live modeling in the field. More tenured reps tend to benefit
most from watching other senior reps in the field. As a good
coach, you need to be smart enough to recognize that you are not
always the best person to model a certain skill or behavior. You
may be good enough to recognize the symptom and problem, but
someone else may be better than you at performing the skill. So
let them do it for your rep. You might suggest to your reps that
they go on a call with a certain colleague and witness closely a
certain step of the call and let them know you'll want to
debrief them upon their return. If you have the fortune to
witness both reps in a close timeframe, you can provide compare
and contrast statements in the debrief section
Apply
the Proper Skill
So far we have told the sales rep how to perform the new skill
and showed them how to do it. The ancient Chinese philosopher
Confucius once said, "I hear and I forget. I see and I
remember. I do and I understand." It's time for your sales
rep to get to work practicing the proper skill. Again, for newer
sales reps, you should have them apply this new skill very soon
after the previous steps and through a role-play with your self.
No one likes role-plays, but like Confucius said, to really get
it, you must do it.
A
good follow-up to the Application step is visualization. Ask
your reps to repeat the desired behavior in their head, much
like rehearsing a speech. Senior reps will opt for this over a
role-play any day, and that's okay. If the skill is a new one,
you should encourage a role-play as well. Otherwise they can
wait until their next call to apply the skill.
Debrief
and Create a Plan of Action
Now is the time where you and your rep can discuss the process
you just went through and what follow-up steps may be needed.
The bottom line here is that this process needs to be repeated
until the rep is as good as they are ever going to be. For newer
reps you may repeat it on the spot. For more senior reps you may
leave the action items up to them.
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