This is not one of my recommended methods
You have just been selected to attend sales training; I offer my congratulations or condolences, depending on how you feel about it. One thing is sure, though, you’re not getting out of it, so you might as well get as much out of it as you can. Your company is spending a lot of money to have you professionally trained, but so are you. You’re making a big investment simply by taking time out of the field, so you might as maximize your return on that investment.
Most people who attend any training get far less out of the experience than they could, and since sales training is meant to directly impact your professional skill and performance, you may be leaving a lot of money on the table by being a mere passive attendant. The key point is that you need to take active control of your own learning.
Do you believe it’s important to ask questions during a sales call? How many questions do you typically ask? What do you ask about? How does it work for you? Do you see any downsides? Do you think prospects appreciate your questions or do they get tired of them? Do you have questioning fatigue yet?
No one believes more strongly than I do in the power and usefulness of questions during the persuasive process, and those who’ve been through my sales questioning module might think I’ve gone daft when I say this, but I also believe it’s possible to have too much of a good thing. Asking too many questions can limit the transfer of information and the productivity of the conversation, and foster a defensive and even adversarial atmosphere.
Questions are not an end in themselves; they are a means to an end. Besides extracting information, the ultimate purpose of questions in a sales call (or any persuasive attempt) is to lead the prospect to the conclusion that they need your solution. You do this by guiding the conversation towards gaps in their current situation, exposing the costs of not taking action, and jointly agreeing on an approach. Think of the conversation as a dance, in which you guide your partner; it’s not a wrestling match in which you are trying to impose your will on them.
To mix in another metaphor, asking too many questions during a persuasive conversation is like stepping on the brakes and making a large turn of the steering wheel any time you want to turn the conversation. As with a car, when it’s rolling in the right direction, a slight pressure on the wheel will nudge it back on course without losing momentum. These slight nudges often take the form of simple open-ended statements and brief probes rather than elaborate open-ended questions.
When the conversation turns into a question and answer session, it can limit the productivity of the conversation because the client may turn passive—like a sulky teenager they will simply give you what you ask for (if that) and nothing more. So, unless you ask exactly the right questions you’re going to leave a lot at the table.
How to use “non-questions” to guide the conversation
There is nothing wrong with preparing an extensive questions list before a call, but don’t get so attached to your questions that you have to ask every one as written. Sometimes a very good first question will get the prospect talking and then you can move the conversation along from there. Your open and closed prepared questions are two indispensable tools in your persuasive toolkit, but they’ll work even better when you add these others:
Begin with a value proposition and agenda. Some of the most productive and profitable sales calls I’ve ever been on involved the customer talking for most of the call with very few questions from me. They gave me the information I needed and more importantly said the things aloud that convinced them they needed my solution. The best way to make this happen is by making it clear to them up front what you hope to accomplish from the meeting—for their benefit—and how you will proceed. The value proposition lets them know they may have a problem/opportunity and you have a solution, and the agenda describes a logical topic flow that will get them there.
Another useful tool is a brief “pre-summary” of what you know about their situation, which you can use to prime the pump and let them add or correct as necessary. You might say, “In order to save you time, would it be OK to give you a brief summary of what I’ve learned about your situation and let you add to it as necessary?”
You can also have a nice change of pace by using open-ended statements instead of questions. Instead of asking the question directly, say “I wonder how it would help if you could…”, “I’m curious about…”
A variation of the open-ended statement is a polite command. “Tell me about your…”
There is an entire set of tools under the rubric of reflective listening[1] that comprise a low-key way of guiding the conversation, including:
- Subtle prompts: “uh-huh, hmm, repeating key words”
- Paraphrasing: Give them back a brief summary of what you heard to allow for correction or addition and indicate that you’relistening.
- Emotional reflection: ”You seem concerned about…”, “That has to be exciting…”
- Hypothesis testing: “What I hear you saying is…”, “It seems to me that…”
Simple silence works surprisingly well. Often the best part of an answer is what the client says after their initial answer. When you have an extensive question list you’ll be tempted to note the answer and go on to the next question. But if you leave room at the end of the answer, even just a second or two of silence, you may be surprised what else comes out.
Of course, it’s also possible to overdo the non- questions. Ideally, you want to mix things up so the conversation stays fresh.
Changing something as fundamental as your conversational style is hard, so just try to be conscious of using variety in the ways you gain information and guide the conversation. I wonder what a difference it would make in your next sales call…
[1] Experts in motivational interviewing, which is a process that clinical psychologists use to guide clients to their own conclusions, typically use a 2:1 ratio of reflective statements to questions.
Help them win both the sprint and the marathon
As we saw in the previous article, there are significant advantages to having salespeople with a learning orientation, including more planning effort, willingness to take on difficult challenges, and greater engagement in their work.
This article attempts to answer the next obvious question: what can sales managers do to influence the goal orientation of their salespeople?
First, though, it’s important to clear up a potential bit of confusion. Learning and performance orientations are not mutually exclusive. It is possible to be high in both orientations, for example. You can have a strong desire to master a subject and still be highly competitive, wanting to prove that you are the best among your peers.
It’s also important to note that, while the specific orientation one chooses seems to come more or less naturally, it is not an indelible trait. It can be influenced, and it can be situation-specific. It even changes over time. (More experienced salespeople tend to become more learning-oriented.)
We also need to recognize reality. No one is going to give you or your sales team quota relief just so you can pursue your learning goals. If you don’t pay your “tuition” in the form of making your numbers, you won’t be allowed to stay in school long enough to learn all you want. So, it’s important to balance near-term targets with long term growth.
As we saw, however, a learning orientation provides many short term and long term benefits, so it behooves the sales manager to find ways to foster and/or encourage that. Learning is particularly important in complex sales environment because of the sheer volume of information needed and the rapid pace of change in most markets today.
So, the task for a sales manager is to find ways to reinforce a learning orientation without weakening the performance orientation. In other words, let’s hit the numbers and grow our people at the same time.
How to encourage a learning orientation
The first step towards reinforcing a learning orientation in your sales team is to take stock of yourself and shift your own mindset if necessary. If you believe that ability is fixed and innate, that’s what you’re going to get from your sales team. Your salespeople will tend to rise or fall to your level of expectation. You must believe that ability is limited only by effort, opportunity and learning.
Next, you have to communicate that belief to your sales team, both explicitly and implicitly. Make sure you stress that everyone can and should get better, and set the example yourself. Ways you can do this include:
Provide a climate of psychological safety. Make it safe for people to ask questions, seek feedback, present new ideas, and try different things.
Make it easy to share information. Compile a list of best practices, including how to answer specific objections, best techniques for gaining access to high-level executives, etc. Devote time in sales meetings to lessons learned. Share success stories when someone tries something new and succeeds. These formal methods of information sharing are good, but the best
Conduct after-action reviews (AARs). This tool has helped make the US Army probably one of the best learning organizations today. Every sales call or customer contact is a learning opportunity that should not be wasted. (Bill Russell, one of the greatest basketball players ever, used to grade his own performance after every one of the more than 1200 games in his career; he never once gave himself a score over 65 out of 100.) Encourage your sales reps to spend a few minutes as soon as possible asking themselves the following questions:
· What were our intended results?
- What actually happened?
- What caused our results?
- What will we keep and what will we improve?
Pay attention to abilities, skills and learning. Sales managers generally can pay attention to three areas: results, activities, and abilities. If you pay attention only to results, you’re going to encourage a performance orientation and probably discourage learning. If you pay too much attention to activities, particularly routine activities such as filling out call reports and CRM input, you run the risk of demotivating the more experienced members of your team. You have to devote some time to monitoring, measuring and encouraging learning and growth activities. This means of course that you have to become closely involved with each member of the team. Get out from behind your desk and attend calls, ask questions, pay attention.
Don’t try to teach, try to help them learn. Remember what Churchill said: “Personally, I’m always ready to learn, although I do not always like being taught.” When it’s their lesson, it’s more satisfying and reinforces the pleasure of learning. This means that you must resist the temptation to jump in and save the day when you’re on a call. Or, if you’re asked for advice, try not to immediately answer the question. Use the Socratic method to draw out the answer and understanding from the salesperson.
Set the example—show your own willingness to learn. This can be one of the hardest things to do, especially for newer sales managers who might think they have to be perfect to command respect. There are three ways to do this. First, ask a lot of questions, but make sure that they are phrased as sincere attempts at understanding. Too many managers make accusations or give advice or directives disguised as questions. (Why didn’t you ask her about the problems they are facing?) When you conduct AARs, do as the Army does—“take off the hats” that indicate rank and invite feedback on yourself as well. Finally, if possible attend sales training with your team and attempt the activities.
Be consistent. Be continuously involved in their learning and growth, not just once a year when you do their performance review.
With the right mindset, the sky’s the limit
Recently I wrote an article about the importance of mindset to personal growth and success in life. This article focuses specifically on how mindset can make a significant difference in both the short-term and long-term success of salespeople.
First, a quick recap of mindset: Carol Dweck tells us that people generally fall into two camps in terms of their attitude towards personal ability. Some people think we’re born with a fixed amount of personal ability and can’t do much about it, and others see ability as very malleable and able to be improved through hard work.
Your mindset influences the type of goals you set for yourself. There are two general types of goals that people set for themselves, performance goals and learning goals. Performance goals are about reaching a set target, which is frequently related to how you compare to others. Learning goals focus on learning, getting better and comparing yourself to yourself.
The prevalent quota-based, competitive, short term goal approach of most sales forces is highly conducive to performance goals, but research shows that learning goals actually lead to superior sales performance, both in the short term and in the long run.
In one study, researchers tested 167 medical device salespeople involved in a 90-day sales campaign for a particular device. It cost about $5,000, and salespeople were offered a $300 bonus for each device they sold. The nice thing about this study is that it was real-world, with actual dollars at stake and precisely measurable results.[1]
Before the campaign was announced, the salespeople were given a questionnaire to determine whether they were performance-oriented or learning-oriented. Basically, they were asked to indicate their level of agreement with statements such as, “It is important for me to learn from each selling experience I have,” or “I feel very good when I know I have outperformed other salespeople in my company.” In addition, the researchers also asked participants questions about their personal sales targets, how much effort they planned to put into the campaign (they still had to sell everything else), and how much planning they would do.
The study found that “a learning goal orientation had a positive relationship with sales performance” which is the academic way of saying the learning-oriented salespeople kicked ass.
Based on that study, plus some additional research[2] and my own 20 years’ experience in sales training and consulting, I’ve listed ten ways that the proper mindset and goal orientation make you more successful in sales:
- You set higher goals for yourself. In general, when people set goals for you, you strive for that goal and no further. When they set goals for themselves, those with a learning orientation tend to set goals higher, and higher targets lead to higher performance. In this study, there was a direct correlation between goal orientation and personal targets.
- You try harder and spend more time. When the challenging goal you have is one you set yourself, you are also going to put in greater effort. Learners believe that effort makes you successful; performers believe that trying hard shows you must not be very good to begin with.
- You plan more. This was shown in the questionnaire results. It’s a cliché, but I can’t resist: “Failing to plan is planning to fail.”
- You are more willing to try difficult things and take risks. I’ve seen this in sales training sessions, where some people are very reluctant to role play or present their opportunity plans; others volunteer and don’t mind if they don’t get it at first.
- You stick with it longer in the face of failure and frustration. Performance oriented salespeople see a failure as evidence that they don’t have the ability to accomplish the task, so they are more likely to give up when they hit a rough spot. Learners relish the challenge, and see initial failure as a learning opportunity.
- You are more optimistic. Knowing that you can have a direct impact on your own “talent” gives you a greater sense of control over what happens to you. When change happens, you spend less time fighting it and more time figuring out ways to adapt.
- You become more creative. It’s hard to be creative when you’re tense, because you’re worried about what others think. You’re likelier to find a solution when you believe a solution is possible.
- You are more willing to seek and accept feedback and coaching. When your self-concept is wrapped up in looking good in front of others, the last thing you want to do is ask for advice or feedback. As a trainer, I can spot the difference in orientation right away: some folks respond to coaching by making excuses or explaining why the role play was artificial and of course they wouldn’t do that in an actual sales call.
- You learn more, which carries over. When you’re looking for them, learning opportunities pop up everywhere—maybe it’s the chance remark someone makes, or the “stupid question” your customer asks. You pay more attention to things and process things deeper. Many studies have shown that most professionals reach a certain level of performance and then stay there for the rest of their careers.[3]
- You enjoy yourself more. Okay, this last one is pure personal opinion, but I believe that since life is going to throw challenges at you anyway, you might as well learn to get something out of them. The knowledge that your best days are ahead of you and not behind you should be a deep source of personal satisfaction.
In sum, the right mind-set can give a you sales force of happy, productive, self-starters. These results should lead to two obvious questions: can you test for goal orientation before hiring, and can you teach a learning orientation to those who don’t have it? The answers are yes and yes, but that is a topic for next week’s article.
[1] VandeWalle, Brown, Cron, Slocum: “The Influence of Goal Orientation and Self-Regulation Tactics on Sales Performance: A Longitudinal Field Test.” Journal of Applied Psychology, 1999.
Succeed, by Heidi Grant Halvorson
[3] See, among others, Development of Professional Expertise, edited by K. Anders Ericsson.
