Do you know why your sales team can’t gain traction?

Across the industry, sales organizations have been losing ground for almost a decade. Quota attainment is down, win rates are down, and turnover is up. Sales leaders complain that they just can’t seem to get ahead. A changing sales environment is partly to blame, as is the shifting role of technology in sales.

But top performing sales organizations continue to pull ahead of the pack and ahead of their own goals and records. How is it that some organizations thrive, while others don’t? Gino Wickman, in his highly acclaimed book, Traction: Get a Grip on Your Business, sets out a six-component plan for businesses to gain traction. These same six principles can be applied effectively to sales. They are:

1. Vision
2. People
3. Data
4. Issues
5. Process
6. Traction

1. Vision

In the book, Wickman claims that no organization can reach its potential without a clear, and clearly communicated, vision. Vision refers to the organization’s purpose, its niche, its core values, its goals, and its strategies.

A sales department’s purpose may seem simple: To generate revenue for the organization. But Wickman says that an effective vision cannot just be about money. It must also define the markets you serve, your goals, and how you will achieve those goals. Importantly, an effective vision also includes the organization’s core values, such as integrity, helpfulness, collaboration, or pride. Without clearly articulated core values, he argues, you will never be able to put the right people in place.

2. People

“Have you ever noticed that great leaders frequently credit their success to having ‘good people’?” inquires Wickman in the introduction to the “People” section of the book. This is just as true in sales as anywhere, but in sales we often get this wrong. In our search for the “right people,” we seek out naturally high performers, high rollers, and big hitters.

Unfortunately, these high rollers are hard to find, and even harder to keep. They are notoriously susceptible to being lured away by a better offer.

By Wickman’s definition, the “right people” are not necessarily the most highly naturally talented individuals in their area. Rather, he focuses on core values, and abilities. The right people will exemplify the organization’s core values (as communicated in the vision), and they will have or be able to learn the right abilities for the seat they’re sitting in.

For sales teams, this means that your “right people” may not be those who come from a hard hitting previous job where they outperformed all their peers. If that person doesn’t exemplify your core values, then they may perform well for a while, but they won’t contribute to the overall health and growth of the organization. For example, if they worked for a large corporation with a strong brand, they may not be a good fit for your family-owned business where you challenge the status quo.

Instead, organizations should look for individuals who naturally exemplify their core values and who are willing to learn the skills necessary to succeed in their job. A well-functioning team will be more effective overall and gain more traction than one that is made up of a few high performers amid a bunch of mediocre performers, and/or that experiences frequent turnover and turmoil.

3. Data

To illustrate the importance of data to gaining traction, Wickman tells a story:

Picture a small plane flying over the Atlantic Ocean. Halfway across, the captain announces, “I’ve got bad news and I’ve got good news. The bad news is that the gauges aren’t working. We are hopelessly lost, I have no idea how fast we’re flying or in what direction, and I don’t know how much fuel we have left. The good news is that we’re making great time!”

Unfortunately, this is exactly how many sales departments operate. Imagine this quote from a sales director: “The data in our CRMs is a mess, we don’t know the health of the pipeline, our forecasts are hopelessly off target, and we don’t know whether we’ll meet our goals or when we’ll lose our next salesperson or how soon the new folks will be up to speed. But the good news is, we’re spending lots of money on training!”

Wickman recommends a company scorecard linked to very simple KPIs, which is tracked routinely by everyone in the organization. The solution in sales is exactly the same: Know which KPIs matter, clean up your data, and track those KPIs religiously.

4. Issues

The mark of a well-run organization is not a lack of problems. Every organization has problems. The difference, rather, is that the right people solve their problems. They don’t let them fester and grow.

Wickman recommends a systematized approach to issues resolution, starting with a list. The initial issues list should contain every issue that anyone in the organization can think of. Once the list is created, then the leadership can determine which issues can and must be solved within the next 90 days, and which issues can be shelved temporarily. Then it sets out a plan to resolve those top issues, and checks in on a weekly basis for progress.

Sales departments can adopt a similar approach during weekly meetings and deal reviews. It is my strong conviction that only by reducing simple mistakes made during sales cycles, most companies can increase their sales performance with 20-30%.

5. Process

“Nothing can be fine-tuned until it’s first consistent,” Wickman says. Marksmen know this quite well: Before you learn to shoot where you want to shoot, you must learn to shoot consistently, meaning that your shots all hit within a short distance of each other. Only then are you ready to begin learning to make the shots go where you want.

This is as true in sales as it is in any other area. Most sales departments are woefully inconsistent. High performers are generally left to their own devices, on the theory that since they’re doing well, they shouldn’t be interfered with. Low performers are generally offered spotty coaching and assistance at best. And middle performers are often left to struggle along as best they can, doing whatever works for them.

Top performing sales organizations, on contrary, utilize a dynamic, optimized sales process that is consistent across the organization, know their metrics, coach their people to higher levels of success and continually captures and improves what works best.

6. Traction

“The ability to create accountability and discipline, and then execute, is the area of greatest weakness in most organizations,” says Wickman. Yet without accountability and discipline, you cannot gain traction.

Wickman lays out a system for establishing the organization’s largest goals (called “rocks” or “big rocks”), and then outlining each of the smaller tasks that have to happen in order to achieve those rocks. Tasks and rocks are assigned to individuals within the organization, and are tracked and held accountable in weekly and monthly meetings.

Sales organizations can adopt a similar methodology, identifying the big goals they want to achieve, outlining the small tasks that need to happen, and then assigning those tasks and holding each salesperson accountable.

This approach also works on the process and deal level, by starting with the goal–a quality sale–and then understanding each of the stages and milestones and activities that need to happen in order to reach that goal. When the salespeople are held accountable to this process, the sales team can begin to gain traction.

Technology

Wickman doesn’t include technology in his list of components, but for sales teams it is key to gaining traction. The right technology helps organizations connect their big goals with daily activities, and hold salespeople accountable. It can also help you clean up your data and get out of it what you need.

Membrain is designed specifically to support consistent process, provide useful data, identify issues early, encourage coaching and enable accountability. We’re proud that we help our clients achieve traction on their sales teams.