Transforming a Long-Standing Sales Team
With the rising complexity of selling in today’s marketplace, many companies retain long-standing sales teams that have been in the role for 10, 15 or even 20+ years. They do this to retain their knowledge, experience, and expertise, although often as the role of sales has changed – the sales team has not adapted or transformed how they sell.
A 2024 GDI Research study of over 1,10 industrial manufacturers showed that over 67% define their greatest asset as the experience of their sales team and their #1 challenge was getting long-standing salespeople to change and adapt how they sell to perform.
The Challenge – Sales Leadership
Today, many sales leadership teams do not want to lose long-standing team members who hold the knowledge and expertise of the industry, customers, and the products and services they offer. The problem… they have all this experience but seldom do they get to use it if they aren’t developing new customers. However, in a Growth Dynamics’ study of over 1,300 leading North American manufacturers, 43 percent noted challenges with an aging sales organization that is struggling to adapt and change how they sell, and is not performing. As the team worked over the years to build their territories, they now have established strong customer relationships or “friendships” resulting in too much time spent supporting current customers NS mining new accounts or developing new customers.
So, what is getting in the way of the sales team changing how they sell so they can be successful developing new business and new customers?
The reality is – very few sales teams want to develop new customers… but top performers find a way to make the time, establish the right strategies and focus on supporting the “right” key accounts for growth, while developing new accounts.
Helping a Sales Team Transform
More often than not, underperforming sales team wants to change…they just don’t know how or are unsure what they are supposed to do differently. And, as leaders want them to improve as well, they too often fail to know what to do to drive improvement or are unsure how to lead the team in the right direction.
Research proves that the best means of creating change is engaging the sales team in the process… explain what is not happening, asking for their insights, giving them a “voice” that defines challenges or obstacles they face, and assuring they realize that the role of sales has changed, customers have changed… and to succeed, the sales team needs to adapt and transform how they sell. Engaging them in the problem helps them realize they are not alone… but assures the message is clear… this drives buy-in, awareness and a foundation to start the process of change.
While many companies still seek to generalize the role of sales, top sales leaders realize they must constantly re-define the role of sales, and define top performance metrics that align with customer expectations. At Growth Dynamics, we call this a Sales Team Benchmark. A well-defined top performance benchmark establishes a proven methodology for developing the current team while defining targeted selection strategies to hire the right people who FIT.
With top performance defined, leadership is armed with the tools, processes, and metrics to effectively choose the right people, show the team how the role has changed, get buy-in, and lead measurable accountability in shifting how they sell.