Literature, including autobiographies around ‘high-performance' teams, systems and individuals, usually contain this common thread : ‘FOLLOW THE PROCESS, AND THE RESULTS WILL APPEAR’.
This is widely used by special forces, military aircrew, and in my experience, high performing sales leaders.
When military aircrew conduct night missions, they face heightened risks due to the loss of visual cues. To combat this, crews are trained and practice drills to fly utilising instruments such as altimeters, speed and directional indicators and the like. Crews are trained to trust their instruments over and above what they see or feel; to follow the process. Whilst night flying, gut instinct is useless, it is the instruments that tell the crew the true positional orientation of the aircraft.
So what instruments are your sales team utilising? ERS, CRM, pipelines? Are they scanning them? More importantly, are they trusting them?
We can often be lured into the next ‘shiny thing’ or ‘system’, but unless we systemise the way in which we train our salespeople for the sales process, they will be doomed to trust their gut, and not their instruments.
As an ex-Navy aircrew member, now business owner for 13 years, I use and teach the following military planning process for sales teams to adopt. If followed, this process will enable the sales team to identify and trust their systems, clarify communication issues, learn and be coached and most importantly, allow them to follow the process to hit their targets. As they say in the business world, there are 2 ways of conducting sales planning; the right way… or …again.
‘8 -Step High-Performance Sales Process’ at a glance:
1- Pre-Brief (strategy) - the teams must review the new target company/industry/client that they are wanting to pursue and outline key ways to attract that target’s attention. Review what systems (a.k.a instruments) are to be utilised, come up with the plan, and ensure that the information can be trusted.
2 - Plan (tactics) - Outlining who, what, where, when and why in relation to the stated strategy aims above. This is the ‘nitty gritty’ around what the meeting or correspondence will look like pre, during, and post meeting. Identify what systems you are going to use to lay out the correct tactics.
3 - Systemise - this is where we use ‘chunking’ and ‘immediate action drills’ to allow us to take large processes that we may say, write or outline, and turn them into ‘bite-sized’ chunks for easy recollection under pressure. Pilots use these during high-pressure emergencies, as should salespeople during meetings. The type and frequency of data from your systems will play a key role in this.
4 - Simulate - this is where we take the strategy, tactics and systems that we have delivered and simulate these to the point of failure. When I say ‘to the point of failure’, most times when aircrew enter a simulator, they are overloaded with so many tasks, that in some instances they crash. This task saturation is undertaken in a safe environment so the aircrew understand their breaking point. This should be the same in sales teams. Simulate meetings, resistance, negative buyer attitudes, and whatever the team needs to feel that they are at capacity. Simulation reduces fear and allows the salesperson to hear, see and feel what it is like to be under pressure (in a safe environment). They will then be better prepared when the meeting is real.
5 - Execute - as the name suggests, this is the point where simulation is complete, and the salesperson enters into the ‘battle’. They should have practiced and re-practiced all of the ‘what-if’s’ and stress points during their simulation phase, and will be ready to react in the same manner in the real environment.
6 - Post-Mission Brief - this is conducted immediately after the meeting or campaign and is there to capture all of the positive and correction points from the meeting, whilst it is still fresh to mind. List all of the main points of improvement, with quick ‘in the minute’ potential solutions, and outline what went well.
7 - Celebrate The Wins - too many times we focus on what we could have done better, or what went wrong. We should maintain morale and learning by celebrating and communicating the wins as well.
8 - Close Feedback Loop - this is where we integrate all of the corrections and wins and we enter the 8-Step High-Performance Sales Process again from the beginning. We refine our strategy. We change our system and simulations accordingly and we document this all into a training manual to be disseminated (in case study format preferably) to the rest of the sales team. This way we all learn from others.
It has been proven time and time again, high-performing teams and high-selling sales teams follow the process and trust their instruments.
By following this 8-Step High-Performance Sales Process, your team and business can integrate a military-like process that will support your sales team, smash your targets and boost profits.
