Comments on: Sales Management Doesn’t Have a Clue

By: Live Life to Fullest

Live Life to Fullest — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 13:58:28 +0000

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By: Steve Clark

Steve Clark — Fri, 16 May 2008 16:19:41 +0000

Roxy,

If you have sales people lying to you there are bigger issues than time management. Usually, it means that the sales people don’t trust management and don’t feel that management gives two hoots in hell about them personally. You may not be like that, but I assure you there are a lot of managers that would be guilty of this.

That being said, the purpose of having sales people do a time log is so that they discover for themselves just how horrible their time management skills are. It is a personal development exercise that the open minded and motivated sales person will be willing to engage. If they are not willing to engage in this exercise in introspection then perhaps you have the wrong people on board.

By: Roxy

Roxy — Fri, 16 May 2008 16:02:26 +0000

There’s no debating the time managment issue. I see it all the time…the thing is that when you ask/force a person to account for their time there is a good, no great, chance that they will lie. No sales person is going to admit they took a long lunch so they could run a couple errands–yet we all know it happens. People will put down on paper what they meant to get down, what they plan to get done.
I think that instead of managing time, we should be managing goals. Example: On Monday I will make 5 cold calls. I’ll follow up on clients X, Y and Z. I’ll complete paperwork task A. etc.
Then on a daily (or weekly) basis you can track what you’re doing and more importantly, what you’re putting off. Now you can see what you have to work on without feeling like Big Brother is watching.

By: Wes Schaeffer

Wes Schaeffer — Fri, 16 May 2008 03:09:06 +0000

As usual you hit the nail on the head, Steve. The scary thing is that this is not a “small business” or a “corporate” problem. It is systemic across 98% of the companies with whom I come into contact regardless of the industry, region of the country or size. That is why there are so few “great” companies and it’s also why the “great” ones become so dominant and memorable. The good news is that most people in sales and sales management can raise the level of their games with a little investment of money and/or time. The traits the great ones all have in common is ambition and a drive to continue learning.