“Start to analyze the business in terms of what the data is telling you and where you should focus.” – Richard Cogswell in today’s Tip 1778
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Transcript
Scott Ingram: You’re listening to the Daily Sales Tips podcast and I’m your host, Scott Ingram. Today’s tip comes from Richard Cogswell. Richard is a people-first sales leader and author of the new book The Cultural Sales Leader. He is an organizational team builder who believes that people, vision, values, and behaviors build winning sales cultures. Living and working in Singapore, Richard is currently working in Fintech and card issuance. Here he is:
Richard Cogswell: When you’re newly promoted to a sales leadership position, there can be a real temptation to launch in and get busy being busy. And that temptation can be there for a number of reasons. You may well feel that you owe something to your management for promoting you and therefore feel that you have to prove something. But it could also be that you’re actually fearful of the situation and feel a little bit out of your depth.
All of this happened to me because I, like many people, was promoted to my first sales leadership position without any training, and also from within the sales team that I was contributing to as the top performer at the time. And whilst I was certainly successful, I was really not attuned as to why those qualities had garnered me the promotion in the first place. And that actually meant that I was nervous and unsure of myself when taking on the role, and I did not fully appreciate the change of perspective needed to lead the team. I was also very conscious of the change of relationship with my peers, and I was most certainly acting in a real sense as opposed to fully inhabiting my role. And in retrospect, I just threw myself in and brought more energy than I did critical analysis to the job.
I fell into something of a comfort zone because I was expert in selling complex solutions and adopted a coaching approach to helping the rest of the team better prospect and convert winning customer opportunities. But we were living one financial year to another. Prior to my appointment, and I have to admit, post my appointment as well. I was also managing at the time some of the most singular individuals I’ve ever experienced in my career, and it took me well over a year to actually ask my management for any training to support my development in my leadership journey. And again, this was because I felt I had to earn my stripes, particularly before asking for any investment, and particularly any investment in myself.
So the dangers of launching yourself into a role are that, firstly, you will not materially transform the environment for the better. And secondly, you won’t be attuned to listening to yourself or understanding your emotions in order to be better at enhancing your leadership development.
Now, the truth of the matter is you probably have more time to think critically about the direction you should be taking the business in than you realize. As the chances are, you probably got promoted halfway or deep into your current financial year. So there may be pressure on the numbers, but you can also consider this to be something of a free hit as you prepare your sofa the next financial year which is when you’ll really be judged. And there should be something of a honeymoon and supportive environment, especially if you’re an internal hire. And let’s be honest about it, you’re also inheriting someone else’s plan or perhaps the truth of the matter is there was no plan at all. Simply a focus on the budget.
So that means you actually have time to consider. And I would counsel that opposed to jumping in, what you should start to do is manage people’s expectations of when you will set and communicate a direction. And instead, focus on analysis, including analysis on yourself and whatever emotions you might be feeling. And do bear in mind that a number of those might be negative, like imposter syndrome or fear or concern that you do not know enough about certain aspects of your business. Or it could even be concern or fear of conflict.
Now start to analyze the business in terms of what the data is telling you and where you should focus. You could have problems with prospecting, or you may have issues with execution. You may need to instill a focus and finish attitude to a current opportunity, or you may need to consider plans to land and expand existing customers, for example. Start to gather these inputs, and you can start to set a direction and a vision, and start to inform your go-to-market with defined winning use cases. Then build a communicable plan, which you can then share with your team, with your management, and with your fellow departmental leaders. It is at this point that you can start to build a sales environment that begins to unleash the potential and creativity of your people, including yourself. Align to a mission which then starts to sever yourself from a financial year to financial year type of survival and into something that can be a little more transformational.
Scott Ingram: For links to connect with Richard and buy his book, The Cultural Sales Leader, just click over to DailySales.Tips/1778. Once you’ve clicked over there, be sure to click back here for another great sales tip. Thanks for listening!