In this article, “Adopt the Sales Methodology or You’re Fired!” We consider the effectiveness of the more direct approach to communicating a sales training programme. What you might call a ‘Gun to your head’ approach.
Learning From Negative Experiences
I got my inspiration for this article from an experience I had working for a multinational software company, before I became a consultant. It was the second large sales transformation project that I had worked on, but the first from a position outside of the sales force. Because of this I had extensive sales experience but only limited training, coaching and change management experience to draw upon. My role was as a trainer only. I was actively excluded from the planning of this project. The planning was done in secret and only by a handful of people at the top table.
The communication was simple. You’re either on the bus with the new sales methodology, or you can get off the company bus altogether. A number of senior sales leaders had just fallen under the axe, and it was a new senior management team in place. With the recent and unceremonious firing of these sales leaders, and a similar cull of sales people only twelve months previous, it was clear to everyone that these were not empty threats.
Since then and as a consultant, I have heard a number of people on sales transformation projects try to use this approach. “If the audience don’t join in the sales training programme and start using the new methodology, we’ll get rid of them. The incentive is that we’re investing in the sales force and the stick is that non-compliant and non-performing sales people will be ushered out of the business. If they do not achieve their targets and have not committed to the new sales methodology, they’ll have nowhere to go.”
An Emotional Approach to Communicating Sales Training
I do understand the emotion behind this, I really do. But ask any learning and development specialist and they will confirm that rarely is learning best achieved with a gun to your head. In fact, it can be counter productive by creating behaviours that reduce effectiveness. Counter to what you might think, you may see a reduction in these behaviours: a consultative approach, an understanding of the audience/customer, building trust, listening, empathy and accountability. However, I agree that you do need to be strong in your leadership style of a sales transformation project, so there does need to be ‘Pain’ as well as ‘Gain’ for some people. But I just wonder if it needs to be this blunt?
In the article, “Communicating your sales programmes for success,” we looked at four different levels of audience in a sales transformation project:
Level One: Heads and Hearts
These people feel that they need sales training. They also intellectually agree with the prescribed intervention. So communicating with these guys is easy. The real key is how do you capitalise on this segment to help pull the others on board.
Level Two: Hearts
We callthese people ‘Hearts’ because their heart is in it. They feel that they actually need sales training. But they do not intellectually agree with the prescribed intervention. That could be because they don’t understand what you’re doing. Or it could be because they think your sales training sucks. Either way, your communications should be around filling the intellectual gap that exists.
Level Three: Heads
These people feel that they don’t need sales training. But they do intellectually agree with the prescribed intervention. You hear these people saying things like, “The sales training programme is a great idea, but can I just have a quick overview? The new people will really benefit from this.” Your communications here should be around challenging the belief about their own capability.
Level Four: Review
These people believe that they do not need sales training and even if they did, your sales training programme would be as useful as a bicycle to a fish. Any sort of general training is not going to work here, so you need to have a more fundamental review with these people.
Using The SCARF Motivation Model
In the article, “Failing to Communicate Sales Training Programmes,” we looked at how we can inadvertently alienate sales people from a sales force transformation initiative. This is particularly so when we fail to understand the audience type and we fail to understand how people are motivated. In the article we used David Rock’s SCARF process to look at how the motivation of sales people is affected by sales training and the communications around it. Let’s look at this ‘Gun to Your Head’ approach through the lens of the SCARF model:
Status
With the ‘Gun to You Head’ approach to communicating, the status of the audience is reduced which is a de-motivator. This is shortsighted given that your level 1 and 2 audiences are actually on your side! With such an approach you may be needlessly alienating half of your audience.
Certainty
You’ve just succeeded in making many of your sales force uncertain about their jobs. Now you could say that if they adopted the new sales methodology, their jobs are secure. But that’s not really the case is it? Your level 3 and 4 audiences will be thinking, “So they will fire me for not using a methodology that doesn’t work? If I use the methodology they will fire me for not hitting my numbers. But it will be their crappy methodology that will make me miss my numbers!” To them it seems like they have been accused of witchcraft and you’re putting them onto the ducking stool.
Autonomy
All of the sales force are now less autonomous because they have been forced down a route that they have not been consulted on. Your level 1 audience will probably be fine with this, but not the others. This approach can potentially drive a lack of accountability, which is exactly what you don’t want. Levels 2, 3 and 4 audiences are likely to point the finger at the time taken off the road or the use of new tools as reasons for them not achieving their sales targets.
Relatedness
There’s nothing friendly about this approach. You’ve just alienated all of your audience
Fairness
Is this fair? To those who see it as fair, perhaps the level 1 audience, they will be OK. But chances are that your levels 2,3 and 4 sales people will see this as unfair due to the lack of consultation. To evidence this they could highlight the fact that you did not use a consultative method to achieve audience buy in. One rule for them, and one rule for us!
Adopt the Sales Training or You’re Fired!
I can understand the emotional pull of communicating in this way. It’s easy and it is straightforward. But ‘Sales Training With a Gun to Your Head,’ does not stack up intellectually as an effective way of communicating a sales training programme. Amongst those who are forced to comply, there are many that will be alienated. We all know that the easy part of any sales transformation initiative is getting people to understand the methodology. Using the methodology as a ‘business as usual’ activity is the real goal. But we all know that using the sales methodology is the harder goal to achieve.
Adopt the Sales Methodology or You’re Fired!
Forcing sales people to comply can work in the short term environment of the sales training classroom, where the environment is easier to control. But can you force them to use the methodology back at work in the real world? Can compliance work there? In most other areas of business we are trying to move away from making people compliant. The steady rise of coaching is testament to this. Instead of compliance we should look to enable sales people to be accountable, creative and proactive. Sales training with a gun to your head is very much out of line with other areas of business. The final nail in the coffin of this approach for me is that it models exactly the opposite behaviours that we are looking to grow in the sales force: a consultative approach, an understanding of the audience/customer, building trust, listening, empathy and accountability.
