There are at least four steps senior managers can take today to ease the crisis in sales management:

 

1) Develop a strategic objective that commits time and resources to developing and enhancing the capabilities of front-line sales leaders.

 

2) Stop the automatic practice of promoting great salespeople to the position of sales manager.

 

3) Stop using sales managers to sell to and supervise important customers, unless extraordinary circumstances require their involvement.

 

4) Develop a modern position description of the sales manager that emphasizes leadership and mandates the development of their teams and themselves.

 

Unless senior management develops and ensures execution of a strategic objective that provides for development of front-line sales leaders who are capable of leading their teams in any economy, the crisis in sales management will not end anytime soon.

 

To be credible to the sales managers, and to the rest of the organization, the strategic objective must be sponsored by the senior-most managers, and it must be specific in its timeline for implementation. Only then will the people targeted for sales management and others in the organization take it seriously.

 

The second step senior managers can take to end the crisis in sales management is to stop the disastrous practice of promoting great salespeople to the position of sales manager. What the psychological profiling experts have told us for years is that when a great salesperson is promoted to sales manager, three things usually occur:

 

1) The company loses a great salesperson

2) The company gains a mediocre or terrible sales manager

3) The company’s customers suffer in the transition

 

I will add a fourth result of this common and defective practice: The sales superstar who fails as a sales manager in the eyes of his superiors and his team, exits from the company at the first opportunity.

 

Senior managers can avoid these unfortunate results by first determining whether or not the salesperson under consideration for a promotion to sales manager possesses the aptitude required for management. Once it is determined that the salesperson can perform the duties of a sales manager, the next step is to determine “if” he or she will perform the duties. Ability without desire will result in a bad promotion decision.   

 

The third step senior managers can take to end the crisis in sales management is to stop encouraging or allowing sales managers to play frontline, active roles in selling to and managing key customers. Too many sales managers today are “managers” in name only.  Their real function is to act as their company’s primary sales point with important customers. 

 

As sales managers continue to perform sales duties, they do not have time to perform management functions. Worse, the sales team is robbed of the chance for high-level sales experience and the successes to be gained from interaction with the company’s most important customers. The best and brightest sales team members recognize this and plan their exit, seeking employers who are willing to help them gain experience and grow as professionals.

 

A fourth step senior managers can take to end the crisis in sales management is to precisely and unambiguously delineate the specific duties, responsibilities and accountabilities of the company’s “sales leaders.”

 

First, the term “manager” should give way to the term “leader.” We observe, far too often, that senior executives require their sales managers to perform administrative work and attend endless meetings. Administrative functions are best left to administrative staff.

 

Front-line sales leaders should instead be focused on coaching the best performance possible from their teams. They should also be focused on continually improving the company’s sales organization.

 

If it is true that the primary work of managers is setting objectives for individuals and teams, organizing priorities and work to be done, communicating and motiviating, measuring performance and developing people, including themselves, sales leaders must be selected, encouraged and trained to do this important management work.

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