1 Year on from my Blog…
On 1st April last year, I wrote a blog ruminating on what I hoped life would look like a year on - I can’t wait for a year’s time.
Who would have thought we’d still be here 1 year on for starters!!! Certainly not me 😬
Reading it back recently made me smile. At the time I captured my thoughts on the things I wanted to see - it’s funny what’s stuck and what was unexpected.
The Sales Community
1 Year from Now… I hope as a sales community we realise that ‘together we are stronger’ when we look back in a year’s time.
Now this is one I am so pleased to look back on. It has more than delivered over the last year.
The memories, sense of community and how generous everyone has been is amazing.
I have had the opportunity to be part of some amazing things including:
Talking all things coaching with Chris Hatfield, Ali Nutley and Richard Smith
Generous invitations to share thoughts on sale coaching and learn new things on podcasts.
The Pitching Point Coaching Show with Costas, Benjamin & Alex
Amazing discussion with Stefan Funk of SAP on the power of data driven coaching.
A fantastic session with Aaron Evans diving deep into Sales Competencies
There was generosity across the board with individuals and businesses openly sharing their knowledge and experience for others to learn from. Again, a few standouts from me are:
Aaron Evans has been so generous with his time and has shared his knowledge freely on YouTube and through the e4enable platform.
The team at Sales Impact Academy have broken the mould on how to deliver sales training and openly sharing during tough times. Delighted to be partnering with them and delivering their content through e4enable.
The guys at Refract rallied and gave the SDR community a much needed boost by sharing their inside knowledge of cold calling - I know my team got a whole lot of value from it.
Trust
1 Year from Now…Leaders must remember that setting clear expectations and holding their team accountable to this is simply best practice and avoids the need for micro-management.
From the conversations I have had over the last 12 months alongside our growing customer base, gives me a huge amount of hope that the tide is turning on this one. Sales, as an industry, still has a long way to go and time will tell whether the best practices built up over a year of lockdown persist when we go back to the office.
Sales Coaching
1 Year from Now…Organisations should lead with coaching and support for their people. Giving undivided attention to coaching and developing individuals.
I’m impatient on this one and whilst some progress has been made, I’m still dismayed at how haphazard this is. Despite all the proof points and data pointing to sales coaching being the number one factor to move the performance needle, it is still woefully under prioritised. It is the victim of time and pressure, it loses to month end, quarter end and year end pressures. Clearly I am biased but the reason we built e4enable was to build a culture of coaching across sales, to change the way high performance was driven and to provide sales organisations the framework through which they could implement consistent, repeatable sales coaching throughout their sales teams without the associated admin or guesswork.
As a community, sales still has a long way to go on this one but I’m hopeful we are heading in the right direction.
Personal Development
1 Year from Now…every organisation should prioritise and reward individuals who invest in themselves, who want to learn and get better. Time should be set aside, resources made available and learning outcomes tracked to recognise its’ importance in todays fast paced sales world.
On reflection, this mirrors my comments above. Whilst I think furlough and lockdown has encouraged organisations to place greater emphasis on personal development, I hope it isn’t a short term blip and continues to accelerate after lockdown ends.
Motivation
1 Year from Now…organisation should stay tapped into that motivation piece so it doesn’t matter where their teams are working from or how experienced they are, they can have conversations centred around individual AND team motivation.
I think this has moved on leaps and bounds due to necessity during a difficult time. I believe deeper conversations have been had across the board, including the mental health aspect of sales, and this has led to a greater understanding of what motivates individuals and teams. Long may it continue!
So what else?
The video I based my first blog on ends with…
“…that time is coming soon, just like any other crisis before it, this will all be a distant memory…so to you, I know it’s unsettling, but focus on the silver lining, we’re all in this together, and there is so much beauty to see…”
Not sure it got the ‘…time is coming soon…’ bit right but they certainly nailed the silver lining / beauty part.
I’ve had the pleasure of growing our team over the last 12 months and they are a close knit bunch of superstars and I couldn’t be prouder of how they have handled the last 12 months.
I for one cannot wait to see what the next 12 months brings.
