Black In Business

 How do you help a team win. We did this by establishing a higher level of expecations and accountability.Often times when sales are slow or there is a dept. problem, action  and demand is to fire someone. Often times it is the front line worker that is vulnerable to being fired. Personality I look at management and support first.

How is our training? Are our people motivated? Do they know what is expected? Are our managers in touch, are they approachable. can they lead, coach, excite, develop, inspire greatness?As you can see, performance issues can be complicated. All the while, top management will want to see something different. They may want some heads to roll.

My outline for the action plans were as follows:

Review performance, in sales this is actual vs goal % and ranking, along with total sales and margins. Having the meeting in December, should provide a good idea for how the year will close.

Establish a run rate or expected sales verus last year actuals along with any worthy upside. Do a gap review, the gaps between the run rate and the goals for the next year. On a losing team some rare members may be at their goal based on their run rate so higher goals are in order .

Break down how the goals need to be achieved.

A good format is; Objective- tactics- time frame- comments. For sales people this form should be used for all prospects and the tactics should be the steps of the sale needed  in order to do business. This is also where a good leader and coach gives direction to ensure a good strategy is in place. The time frame for each step should include excat dates as targets for completion. Your comments are aspects that need to be known and understood,ie, who the decision makers are, competition, budgets etc

Another page to include in the action plans are any key events that might lead to upside sales or any pending business concerns that need to be communicated.

Group dynamics are key to building a sense of team and my recommendation is for the entire group present  for and to each other.

At the end of the day, the sales mgr can total up the anticapated sales for the year and then communicate how they will help the coroporation reach the utimate goal of building more shareholder value. It is futher suggested some type of bonding activity take place. Beer and pizza seem to work well in setting the environment foe togetherness. Having a team theme or nick name will help build sprit. We had a year where we wore wild ties or scraves and the men grew beards. We were rebels with a cause!

For 07, you can build a stair way to heaven, with each stair matching an important step or goal to lead to heaven which would be the utlimate.

In summary; establish a mission and businessplan for every asignment, have measurable actions steps with timeframes indicated,meet and review as a group, develope a theme or team name, end the meeting with a team building activity, and then make it happen. My last post on this topic will be  how to manage this process to a turn around year. I perfer to lead the process because it will take more leadership than management, if you have the right team. If you don’t have the right team this process will provide objective information in which you can manage your  decision making. Your decision making will be how to make the team better, or does the team need changes.