We all have goals and objectives for our jobs. In Sales that usually means we have a quota and perhaps other targets for things like new business or product and service mix. Yet in our day to day activity, these goals often get too little attention? Why? We get consumed by all the “stuff” that comes at us every day: email, meetings, “fighting fires”, doing customer service work, immediately responding to requests from other departments (or our managers!), etc. I’ve heard it for years from salespeople. They know they should be focused on their objectives but complain that they are “too busy” with all the other stuff (i.e. victims of circumstance).
I’m not suggesting it’s an easy situation nor am I suggesting that some of those other things aren’t important. We all struggle with it to some extent. But frankly it’s a cop out. When I hear this excuse, I ask people to tell me how they’re measured and paid (see goals and objectives above), even how they can ensure their continued employment! It’s usually not the number of “fires” they put out, the number of customer service complaints they resolved, the number of non-sales related meetings they attended, the number of emails they responded to immediately, planning the holiday party and so on. It’s about doing the things that drive sales: planning, prospecting, prospect and client visits, territory/account and opportunity management, etc. Yet the percentage of time spent on real sales related activities is abysmally low in too many sales organizations.
So, if we know what we should be doing, why don’t we do more of it? I believe there are a few reasons (you may think of more):
- The REAL work of selling is hard! It requires skills, discipline, critical thinking and doing some things some of us might find unpleasant (like prospecting). It requires being proactive. It’s easier to be reactive, filling our time with busy tasks, sometimes even meaningful ones, that don’t require these attributes. But that’s not what we’re paid to do!
- The belief that being responsive to customers means being subservient to them. A healthy buyer-seller relationship is a peer of equals. As Mike Weinberg states in his outstanding book Sales Truth: Debunk the Myths. Apply Powerful Principles. Win More New Sales.: “Blindly going along with a buyer’s direction simply for the sake of scoring “obedience points” is not going to help you bring in more business.”
- Ineffective sales leadership and management! That’s right sales leaders, it may be at least partially your fault. Are you creating a high-performance sales culture? Are you expecting and inspecting their sales-related activity and results? Are you coaching and developing your people in the skills that matter? Are you reinforcing the priorities that move the needle in planning and review sessions with them? Are you protecting their time from non-sales related “stuff”? You get the idea.
- Lack of appreciation that we have a choice in how we spend our time. Call it empowerment and accountability vs. victim-hood. Unless we’re in prison, every action we take is a choice we make. Time is a finite, non-renewable resource. We can’t do everything. So, we are forced to choose what to do and when (how we spend our time); and what NOT to do. Everything is a trade-off.
Are you making the best choices on how to use your finite time resource? Are you choosing things that will help you succeed? Activities that will move the needle against your objectives? That will make you a better salesperson? Or are your days consumed with reactive “busyness”? The choice is yours!
