Lose a Good Salesperson: Gain a Bad Manager
没有哪个系统是一个完美的预测,但准确地评估每个关键的管理技巧将消除候选人不能计划、组织、分析市场,分析性能问题、作出决策,教练,和开发渗透策略。你得承认,这将大大优于促进那些只有技能是销售。
It s a common mistake. Promote your best salesperson, gain a bad manager, and lose both. Why does this keep happening? Sales were great and his/her top performance attracted attention, but nothing prepared you for the bad manager part. Well, there are some very clear reasons. Reason 1: The Ends Don t Justify the Means Sales are the end result of dozens of mini-activities: personal behaviors, motivations, dealing with customers, analyzing problems, making decisions, working with team members, solving problems, and so forth. Do enough of these mini-activities right and good things happen. Do them wrong and expect failure. In my experience, top salespeople often fake their way to the top by over-promising, underpricing, over-shipping, sand-bagging sales, and so forth. I saw a great example of this firsthand when a salesman always encouraged my company to over-order product and then later permitted us to return unused goods. He was so good at over-shipping and returning, his company eventually made him president (after all, a top salesman is qualified to be a company president, right?). The company tossed him out a few years later when they realized he was nothing but lies and promises. I wonder what that promotion decision cost them? Reason 2: Know One When You See One People naturally make decisions based on personal impact. For example, hundreds of hours of national attention was devoted to a 12-person shooting event in Colorado; meanwhile, in Detroit an average of
29 people are killed EVERY month (source: 2012 Detroit Police Department crime statistics). Bet few people outside of Detroit ever heard of them. The news networks are masters at making a big event seem more important than dozens of smaller ones. So it is with sales. Salespeople are skilled at managing the big event. It s an example of the empty suit syndrome; that is, everything about them looks good on the outside, but there is seldom anything on the inside. Sure, a sales manager needs to know about selling, but management requires more, and better, skills. Don t make assumptions based just on sales. You have to verify whether he/she has skills to coach and counsel, make good decisions, analyze markets, plan strategies, and manage a variety of diverse activities. That s the key to successful management. Reason 3: Past Performance is Only Part of the Equation If you ever took a course on behavioral interviewing you were told past behavior predicts future behavior. But, did they emphasize accuracy largely depends on whether the future job requires the same skills and motivations as the past one? Past performance cannot predict something the candidate has never done or experienced. Assuming he or she was not a total failure, basing a management promotion primarily on sales usually produces a manager whose idea of management is watch me sell. Since new managers are often called upon to analyze more data, make more challenging decisions, organize the efforts of a large workforce, personally coach needy salespeople, and be motivated to do all the above, is it any wonder so many crash and burn? Training to the rescue? Forget the hype. We all know it is almost impossible to train a bad manager into a good one. Why not just hire a skilled manager in the first place? Think carefully about this next statement: a good manager must know what to do, when to do it, and why. In other words, he/she must be fully aware of what to do in every situation and be able to communicate it to others. Many of the top salespeople I have seen run on automatic pilot and that s a sure predictor of a bad manager. Reasons 4, 5, and 6: Faulty Tools Examining past earnings statements? it indicates nothing about how they were achieved Sell me the Ashtray? it indicates nothing about rapport-building; fact-finding, and motivation (the three biggest sales de-railers) Promise top salespeople management positions well, we already talked about that. Solutions If past sales performance has so many problems, what should you do differently? There is no Twitter-level answer. And the most reading a short article can do is raise awareness. It takes years of practice and knowledge to learn job-measurement skills; still, here is a list of things that need to be considered: Be sure the candidate knows and can articulate clearly the entire sales process. He/she does not need to be the best salesperson on staff, just know what to do, when to do it, and why. If the position actually requires management skills (i.e., not an honorary promotion) estimate the importance of each of the following skills: planning and organizing, analyzing markets, analyzing individual salesperson performance problems, decision making, coaching and counseling activities, developing sales, and account penetration strategies. Critical areas need special attention. Next, screen each candidate by examining their past performance using behavioral interview technology. If you are not skilled at BEI, you are at a significant disadvantage. Find a course and send someone to get trained. It will take months of practice to get good. Of course, as we discussed, BEI may work better to disqualify candidates than qualify them. Next, then find tests and exercises that measure each critical skill identified above. NEVER use a training test. Training tests are seldom if ever designed to predict job performance. You might get scores, but without performance evidence, they are generally worthless performance predictors. Incorporate a few one-on-one coaching simulations. Like the tests I mentioned above, hiring simulations are another form of test they are not training practices. They must have all the characteristics of tests: tightly controlled, trained role-players, and standardized scoring sheets. Why simulations? Ask yourself why athletic teams ask players to try out. Tryouts illustrate ability. Management candidates need to do the same. A Final Note No system is a perfect predictor, but accurately evaluating each critical managerial skill will eliminate candidates who cannot plan, organize, analyze markets, analyze performance problems, make decisions, coach, and develop penetration strategies. You have to admit, that will be considerably better than promoting someone whose only skill is selling. 管理新知 您可能感兴趣的文章 Huge Geographic Differences 2013-08-03 Want to Get Paid More? Be Disagreeable. 2011-09-20 Who Has Time to Build an Employer Brand? 2013-05-20 最近文章 TEST 2018年01月15日 嫖娼被抓不属无故旷工，公司解雇赔4万！（法院判决） 2018年01月15日 如何判断你是否具有HRBP胜任力？
2018年01月15日 阿里为什么不去清华招人？
2018年01月15日 因利益冲突，Facebook COO和Twitter CEO退出迪士尼董事会 2018年01月15日 热门文章 嫖娼被抓不属无故旷工，公司解雇赔4万！（法院判决） 2018年01月15日 如何判断你是否具有HRBP胜任力？
2018年01月15日 阿里为什么不去清华招人？
2018年01月15日 2017年度职场出差行程调查，出差最多的居然是他们！！
2018年01月12日 员工在自己QQ空间评论HR经理吃屎，可辞退他吗？
2018年01月11日 扫一扫 加微信【已隐去】 关于沙龙 顾问委员 广告推广 隐私安全 联系我们 申请vip会员 支付方式 市场合作或广告投放 电话：【电话已隐去】 邮件：【邮箱已隐去】 在线QQ【已隐去】 VIP会员 企业VIP会员 机构VIP会员 广告刊例 商务合作 Follow HRSalon