Today’s Tip for Sales Leaders is from Westlee Tonga who leads an outbound sales development team for CXone, which is a subsidiary of NICE in the USA.

By loving your team, Westlee doesn’t mean being soft or being unclear when someone is not performing or contributing to the team. To Westlee, loving your team means:

Being authentic

Giving them access to your time

Actively listening

Setting clear boundaries and goals

Mutual respect

As Westlee says - People will do things and go greater distances for the things and the people that they love than they will by being afraid or duty-bound.

Check out the rest of today’s episode now!

When your team don’t listen to their calls, they are going to have blindspots. They are going to unaware of what they are saying or not saying to their prospects.

You can give your reps guidance on how to review their own calls and let them reflect on what they have heard.

They then come back with some interesting insight. Even one insight is enough to make this exercise worthwhile.

Sell the meeting not the product

“Many SDRs focus on selling the product too soon.

I think this is one of the key mistakes they make early in their career.

Your SDR has to get the prospect to understand that you are not going to waste their time. You have to focus on the value of the meeting not the features of the product.

If you can get your sales people to shift from selling the product to selling the meeting, you’re going to get better results.”

Trust, Empower and Enable your Sales team

“As a sales leader your job is not to micro-manage but to empower your team members to do their best work.

I find many people thrive on being given ownership.

Your team members were hired by you or other leadership in your company.

“So empower them, guide them and watch your results improve….”

Today’s tip for sales leaders is from Dan Skipp who leads a diverse team of SDRs at Sophos, a security software provider in the UK.

Dan recognizes that it’s hard to detach yourself from all the things that you are proud of about yourself.

Your goals

Your track record

Your view of the world

But - as Dan says- these things can get in the way of you having powerful coaching conversations with your people.

When you can lose your ego, you are to have a much more ‘aware’ and ‘motivated’ bunch of sales people in your team!

Check out the rest of today’s episode now!

You are not the perfect coach. I’ve written a book on the subject of sales coaching and I’m not the perfect coach either.

There is no such thing as the perfect coach and there never will be either.

But none of this should hold you back!

The only way to be better at something is to try it, make mistakes and try harder.

In this week’s episode, you’re going to understand why coaching is a best-effort activity - not a best-every-time activity.

Check it out now!

So thank you for your support and encouragement in making this happen.

I’m making changes to the podcast, the brand and the format of the show.

We’re going to focus on giving you lots more practical tips.

You’re going to hear a lot more from sales managers and sales leaders just like you.

Listen now to find out where I am taking the brand!

At long last, my new book Sales Coaching Essentials is ready for launch!

You can get your hands on a copy at the launch price of $1.29 or £.99p until (and including) May 16th. After that, it goes up to full price!

Mike Weinberg, one of my favourite sales authors has so kindly called it ‘required reading for sales leaders’.

Matt Dixon, author of The Challenger Sale has generously described it as a ‘must-read for any sales leader who is serious about unlocking the performance of their team’.

It has been written to be a practical book so you can prepare for things like deal-review, pipeline reviews, 1-to-1's and more.

In today’s episode, I’m going to give you some insight from the book and what’s coming up!

If you have heard of MEDDIC before, you will know that it is one of the most widely used qualification methodologies.

Jack Napoli, Dick Dunkel and John McMahon come to mind when we think of the people behind MEDDIC / MEDDPICC.

And it’s John McMahon who is my guest on today’s episode.

You’re going to get a MEDDIC masterclass this morning.

What MEDDIC is

Why it was created

What each letter stands for

What you need to be able to master it

LISTEN NOW!