How to make your Sales Coaching Program a success
“What’s the single biggest influence on the success of a coaching program?”
We get asked this question a lot and it’s a fair question.
You know that coaching is the key to boost sales outcomes. You know that it improves staff retention. You know that it’s more cost effective than sheep dip sales training. You know that it improves morale. You know that you’ll see measurable results.
But what’s the secret sauce to make sure it sticks? To make sure that it creates long-term change and benefit?
Let’s explore some of the key elements that drive successful long term outcomes of a sales coaching program. How do you really create a coaching first sales culture?
It takes real commitment to initiate a company wide sales coaching program. So it’s understandable that you want it to be a success.
But just having commitment is not the single biggest influence on it’s success.
Having a clear competency framework through which to coach is also essential.
In other words you need to define what good looks like. Think of defining sales competencies as outlining your goal. If you don’t know the destination, how can you plan the journey? If you don’t define what good looks like, how can you develop and coach your sales team to be the best versions of themselves? It’s essential to do this so not only do you know what you’re aiming for, but to enable you to scale, so does everyone else. You need to set the standard, the expectations right from the beginning – it avoids the assumption trap. It also sets the tone and the benchmark for the later stages of your program. [More on that here]
Elia Giovanni, Director of Sales Enablement at Apogee puts is perfectly:
It’s kind of like a “big magnet” that pulls all of the sales coaching conversations, agreements, objectives together – so it becomes easy to manage, and is an enjoyable & consistent process - that’s the way we got these good habits to stick.
But, even though we are Sales Competency Framework super fans, even this is not the biggest single factor.
Frontline Sales Managers are absolutely critical to the success of your coaching program.
They need to be enabled and supported. They need to have a simple framework to follow (see above). They need to be able to translate coaching into action. They need to know what, where, how and when to coach. [More on that here]
They need to be given the time and space to prioritise coaching.
But even they are not the single biggest factor in the success of a coaching program.
To truly create a culture of coaching for success you need to clearly communicate your intentions and gain buy in from every level of the organisation.
Stealth launching a coaching program doesn’t bring accountability and confidence. It doesn’t set expectations and provide clarity to the ones delivering the coaching or to those on the receiving end.
If you don’t clearly communicate the goals and approach then your best intentions will fade when another priority creeps in.
However, whilst clear communication should be high on your planning list, it still isn’t the biggest influence.
Measuring the outcomes is one of our all time favourites! It is like a vitamin boost to your program.
When you set out on your coaching programs, be clear on what you are intending to influence. What’s your goal? Are you looking to decrease attrition? Are you looking to improve conversion rates? Are you looking to impact deal velocity?
Track this back to your competency framework and the skills and behaviours your sales team are focusing on with their coaches. [More on that here]
Then record, share and shout about the wins.
Let your salespeople have a voice - they will build the momentum. Did a new sales methodology or a new skill practiced help win a deal? Has someone gained a new accolade?
But, even though measurement is absolutely key to success, it’s still not the #1!
Let’s re-cap…
So, you’re committed to creating a coaching program, to drive a coaching first culture
you’ve built your sales competency framework
You’re frontline Sales Managers are all geared up
You’re clear on your goals and have the capability to measure outcomes
If you are sceptical, we can assure you, even with all this headwind, your endeavours can still fall short of driving a true culture of coaching.
Drum roll….
In our experience, the single biggest impact on the success of your sales coaching program is LEADING BY EXAMPLE.
What do we mean by this?
If your Senior leadership, your ‘Cs’, your ‘VPs’, your ‘Directors’, are not modelling the coaching behaviours to their reports and downline, why do you expect their reports will flow this down?
If your Senior Leadership are not demonstrating everything they expect of their Managers in their day to day, there is no reason to suggest their teams will stick to it.
As a CRO / VP / Director make sure:
You are committed to building and sustaining a coaching culture
You have a Manager Competency framework you rely on to support coaching your team [More on that here]
You are holding regular coaching sessions with your Managers
You are checking in on how they are coaching their team - dig deep, go into detail… “What are Annie’s goals? How is she getting on? What skills / behaviours is she focusing on? What have you agreed as actions to support development? How are you feeding back? What outcomes have you seen?”
Focus coaching on areas that are needed.
You have set goals and are measuring the outcomes, not only of your Managers but of their teams
Communicate great results and news
Your Senior Leadership team should be your cheerleaders, the models that set the standard. This is not a time for “do as I say not as I do” nonsense.
Go all in and that is the secret sauce (coupled with everything else we’ve outlined above) to a successful coaching program!