Meet Face-to-Face Each Week

If you find our posts useful, don't forget to subscribe to our RSS Feeds or Email Updates

**Note: This is the fourth part in a five-part series entitled, “The Five Principles of Sales Team Leadership.”

Previous articles in the series:

• The Five Principles of Sales Team Leadership.
• Know Your People.
• Spend Time with Your People in the Field.
• Study and Know Your Selling Ratios.

It’s crucial that you meet one-on-one with the members of your local sales team each week. Good communication is important to every person, team and organization. And overwhelmingly, people prefer to meet face-to-face with their supervisor on topics of most importance, rather than receiving written messages or voicemails. And accountability can’t happen via email.
In order for these face-to-face meetings to be successful and behavior-changing, but somewhat efficient, you should discuss:

• What happened the previous week.
• What’s coming up this week.
• What commitments are ongoing.
• What skill development will occur this week.
• Your belief in them.

What Happened the Previous Week.

How did the person perform versus their sales plan? How was their sales activity versus your team or company minimums and targets? What events occurred last week that need further understanding? Who did the sales professional meet with that you’d like to visit personally? How “hard” did the sales representative really work? Is there a trend, from week to week, with Mondays or Fridays or any other day?

Depending on how frequently you collect activity numbers, you can answer most of the questions there. But you’ll also need to dive into specific accounts visited to ask the right questions about the appointments and overall sales process.

What’s Upcoming This Week

Does your sales professional have a detailed gameplan for the current or upcoming week? Is it in writing? Can they convincingly walk you through it? Do they expect to remain over quota, or get over quota, or at the very least demonstrate the activity necessary to start the process in getting back to quota? What is YOUR plan if there’s a big NO to the previous questions? What upcoming appointments are crucial ones that you need to attend? What prospects do you need to begin strategizing on with your sales professional? Can the rep foresee anything that might derail the week?

This part of the meeting is your insight into whether your sales representative “gets it.” If they’re just trudging through their weeks, hoping the magic happens, they (and you) are dead in the water. If they are hoping for a plan to be handed down to them by you, they are only slightly better off, but still dependent. When they know what they need to do and are willing to do it, and can communicate that to you, they’re locked in.

What Commitments are Ongoing

If your sales professional is behind the eight ball, and you’ve got specific activities they have committed to doing to get back on the yellow brick road, make sure you know exactly what those commitments are and how they’re performing. Don’t let a weekly meeting go by without accountability. It’s the missing link in many peoples’ lives, but don’t let it be missing from your sales team.

What Skill Development Will Occur This Week

Whether you’ll be doing one-on-one training, group training, and/or you expect your sales professionals to dedicate a certain amount of time to their own skill development, review that in this meeting. This reinforces your commitment to them and your expectation that they commit to invest in themselves.

Your Belief in Them

Whether you hired them or not, they’re on your team. Believe in them as long as you can. Believe that they chose the sales profession for all the right reasons. Believe in their commitment. Believe in their skills. Believe in their honesty. And let them know you believe in them. Tell them why you do, as you look in their eyes. Give them the confidence, as you close the meeting, they may need to bridge the gap between what they know they need to do and what they feel they’re capable of doing. Of course, all of this flies out the window if you’ve got an uncommitted, flat-dishonest sales rep on your team.

Final Thoughts

There are a host of reasons why you hold these face-to-face meetings each week. Accountability is one. Building a strong business relationship with each individual is another. Teaching your sales professionals how to manage themselves or even to become a proactive sales manager is yet another. If you avoid holding them, you are neither in the loop as to what’s really going on with your sales team nor are you able to define what steps need to be taken to course-correct. If you rush them, you alienate your people.

The value in meeting face-to-face each week is immediately beneficial and powerful.