Transcript
Intro
Hi, everyone. I'm Ben Wright, successful entrepreneur, corporate leader and expert sales coach to some of the most talented people our amazing planet has to offer. You're listening to the Stronger Sales Teams podcast, where we bring together and simplify the complex world of B2B sales management to help the millions of sales managers worldwide build, motivate, and keep together highly effective sales teams…teams who grow revenue and make their businesses actual profits.
Along the journey, we also provide great insights and actionable steps to managing your personal health. A happy and productive you is not only better for your teams, but everyone around you. So if you're an ambitious Sales Leader who wants to build the highest performing and engaged teams, Stronger Sales Teams is right where you need to be.
Ben Wright:
Welcome back to Stronger Sales Teams, the place where we provide real world and practical advice to help you develop super powered B2B sales teams. Today is a celebration. We have hit episode 50. This is where my three and a half year old will do a dance. She'll do something that is probably more coordinated than I will ever do, but she will certainly get excited, and so am I, because 50 podcasts has taken some serious effort, but we wouldn't have got there without a pretty loyal listening base who have given me some pretty regular feedback. So thank you to everyone for that.
Thank you to my team, Yahweh on the podcast editing, Shaina, my wife, who does a lot of work behind this podcast. And then for those that have been patient enough with me to stick through the journey. I'm certainly really grateful and I'm stoked that we've made 50 podcasts, because as I've mentioned to a lot of people that we work with, grit, agility, and persistence is something that's really critical in succeeding in the modern world. And I think this podcast has taken a little bit of that to be able to reach this podcast Episode 50 milestone.
So, what are we going to talk about in episode 50? Well, for me, I actually wanted to talk about my favorite topic, and we've done one or two podcasts out of this 50 about how to really effectively train people professionally, other leaders, salespeople. But I think for me, sales training is actually a principle and a basis that can be used across anything in life. What I teach in training, I use in all parts of my life, because I know that it works.
But before I start today, I want to share a story about when the bell went off in my head. That bell that went ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. Ben, you must be doing more around training. And I've shared this before, but I don't think I have on the podcast. I've certainly shared it on social media. But I remember we had a training program for one of my teams. It was about five years ago, and the team I thought were getting a bit out of training. It was every couple of weeks we had a program, we'd roll someone in and then we'd go and train about the business. Great, tops, tick in the box. Everyone's happy the team's getting resolved. But I was having a one to one with one of the members of our team, and she was quite outspoken. And I actually enjoyed that about her because it meant you knew you were always getting some honest feedback rather than silence. And I regard silence as active agreement. So if you can't elicit feedback from people, then it's really hard to get that information right and that real time engagement you need to improve. And she said to me, we were talking about training. She said, “Ben, our training program sucks”. And I went, “oh, boy, here we go”. Where are we going to go from here?” And we spent about 15 minutes talking about it. And essentially what she said to me was, you're not training across a varied enough range of topics. It's all very specific, and we're not doing enough of it for us to be able to practice it. So by missing both of those, we're actually only getting very small parts of improvement when with a few tweaks, we could actually be getting a whole lot more. So we actually went through and designed a training program. Well, that was similar to what I roll out today, but certainly not as polished. I have had hundreds and hundreds, if not thousands of people that I've rolled this program out with since then. So for me, I've been able to really refine it. But I remember really clearly that day that for me, the bell went and said, you must be doing this more regularly.
Now, I recognize, and I spoke about this in episode 47. I recognize that a lot of sales leaders, right, we've made the toughest jump from individual contributor to being a leader of others. And we might be one month in, we might be ten years in, but it's still a really difficult job. It's very much results driven. We deal with people, or we lead people who are very strong-willed and generally experts at building relationships, which means a lot of them actually know how to influence a conversation. Right? So you're dealing with intelligent people who are highly driven, often fast paced decision makers. And we need to lead these people. So it doesn't matter if we're in one month or one day or we're ten years in, we are continually needing to learn as sales leaders. However, if we can nail down a training program format and there's a whole lot of resources that will be attached to this that are also available back in episode 16 where we talk really deeply about the mechanics of designing a training program. But today I'm going to talk about some of the traits of those who run really successful learning programs in their business. We are going to focus on training instead of coaching. Right. Coaching absolutely is critical. But today I just want to talk about how we can build a terrific training program. And this is going to be a short, sharp and punchy episode. So let's get right into it.
So, five tips. Everyone who knows me know I generally work in threes and fives because they're so much easier to remember for those out there who are hit with lots and lots of information. And if you don't get what we go through, it'll be in the show notes, so don't worry.
But number one for a training program is it's customised. Those leaders that deliver great programs customise it for their team. Now, I've put probably the most hard hitting element of a training program first so we get it out of the way. To customise a program is not difficult because at the end of the day what ends up happening is 80%, even 90% of the program is the same. But it's the last ten to 20% that we tweak to be specifically about our team. If we are in a small transaction, fast close type of environment, we are going to spend less time on key account management than if we are in deals that take 3,6,12 months to deliver. Same in reverse. If we are in 3,6,9,12 month type of deals, we are going to spend less on fast closing type of discussions versus if we have lower transaction, more regular closes. Right. They're going to be a cleaner, crisper type of conversation around whether or not we've created enough value to work strategically together. So by customising the program for your team, you get far better engagement. And if we get far better engagement, we get more impactful results and everyone learns.
Second part of this is that they are consistent. This is without doubt the easiest part of a training program to get right. And when I mean consistent, I mean weekly training programs that really embed learning are done weekly. So they will have a consistent time and day and period that they train their teams on. So it's an impact session and then the follow up that goes with it, through one to ones through systems, symbols and norms and everything else that they do in their business, right? So for me, if we get the consistency right in training programs, people know what to expect and they're ready to learn. So they come to those sessions saying, help me, teach me. On top of that, I also find that for sales leaders, you get such consistent feedback from the team around what's working and what's not working, that it really helps you grow as an impactful leader as well. So number one is all about having a customized program, one that might be 80% to 90% the same as any other team, but you tweak it for what you need for your team right now. Number two is consistency. So making sure we're running it every week at a time when it works for people.
Number three is all about being concise. I will often so, so often, see training programs that run for a half day or a day, and that's the impact event that I like to call it. But what follows from there is few and far between, or move straight on to another topic without trying to embed it. For me, training that's concise. So this is 30 minutes of content that has no more than three to five takeaways out of that content. Training that's concise gets remembered. It gives the teams a chance to impact it and then you can come back and on train from that. So if we were to take that in the needs analysis stage of your sales process as an example and say, right, let's talk about asking good questions, that would be a session that's very specific, it's very concise. Right. We're looking at asking good questions for our customers so that we can really understand their needs. And the takeaway points might be something along the lines of always be asking a question after the question. Right. So we're training our teams to ask the first question, what's the reason that you'd like to look at our services? And when the customer comes back to you and says, hey, we're looking at your services because we've got a major problem with delivery for our customers, it's being prepared to ask that second question that says, right, can you please talk me through what some of those delivery issues are so that we can create the most value for you?
The second area around asking good questions might be the timing with which you're asking questions. So making sure you're doing it at the point in the meeting when your customer is ready to talk about what they want rather than when they're trying to close the meeting or when you don't have a strong enough relationship. And the third one might be a tip that says something like two ears, one mouth. We need to be listening so that we can provide the cues for our questions to be able to ask. Now, of course, you might have a little bit more, and there'll be a lot more examples around it, but that's a nice, concise 30-minute training session that your teams will be able to remember and action. So that's the third part of a really impactful training program. They're customized, they're consistent, and they are concise.
The fourth one is around being compelling. So great training programs. And when I say compelling, great training programs are delivered in formats with information that people are likely to remember. So that might mean anything as simple as mixing up the speed with which you talk, speeding up, slowing down, having pauses, having a pitch and tone that people will pick through to how you deliver that program. So part of the programs being via video, part of them being instructor-led, group workshops led by really proficient members of your team, other internal parts of your business, suppliers, manufacturers, self learning. Right. Podcasts. The list goes on and on and on as to how you can be compelling in your training. But we need to make sure we're delivering that training program in a manner that our teams are going to engage with. So if we think about that and slow down for a second, I want you to imagine that time you were in a training program when you walked out of it and you'd spent most of that meeting trying not to fall asleep. Right? By the way, this comes back to being consistent. Don't schedule training sessions on a Friday, end of the day, or straight after lunch; you're doomed before you start. But think of that time when you went into a training session and you had the heavy eyelids and couldn't quite stay awake. We've all had those. So for me, if we can deliver a compelling training session, particularly one that forces everyone to be involved, the greatest way to avoid the heavy, droopy eyelids is active engagement. Get people involved in the session. But if we can have a compelling session that doesn't get droopy eyelids and that has everyone there and engaged, people are going to remember more. On top of that compelling piece, I always argue that there is some really strong follow up that comes out of these training sessions. The compelling sessions have not just a great sense of delivery, but they make it compelling for people to act on that training immediately after it's been rolled out. So they find ways to make sure that people have to embed the training skills into their day to day behaviors. Not that it's optional, but they have to. Right. Really difficult, but cheer when you get it right. It's amazing. So we have a customized program that's consistent, concise and compelling.
Now, last but not least, and I very clearly at the start of this podcast said that training is not coaching in this context, that they are quite separate events. However, there are times when coaching and training will come together as one. And where I see great success in training programs is that the coaching principles are applied to training. So it's where we have a framework for coaching. Mine's the G.R.O.W. model. I've spoken about it a number of times. Right. Or we have a different type of coaching framework. There's lots of good ones out there, but we approach training as an ongoing process. So one that has no beginning, no end, one that continues to try to not only transfer knowledge, but enhance it so that we can become better and better at what we do. So that might be something as simple as a training program that has basic through to intermediate and then into advanced skills, right. Or it might be a program that asks the audience, right, the trainees to come back with some really active feedback about what they're liking and what they're missing, what they're understanding and what they're not understanding, what they want to see more of and what they want to see less of. Right. But it also involves having an approach as a trainer that says, how can I maximise the benefits from this session, which generally leads to less of your rote learning and more of your active type of group work, right. So very, very impactful when we can get it right.
And I'd love to say that these five C's are the only parts of getting a training program right. But they are consistently what I see people who deliver good training programs deliver on. So let's go back through those again. Number one is customized. It's there at the right time, in the right place, in the right context for their teams. Number two is it's consistent. So it's every week at a time that works for the teams, often straight after a sales meeting, so that people come ready to learn, their body is ready, same time every week to be learning. Number three is these are concise sessions, short and sharp, 30 minutes of content. Often there's QA time afterwards, and they have takeaways that are easily manageable and impactful for the team. Number four is compelling, so they're delivered in a compelling fashion to an audience that's ready to listen, and they are compelled to act on that training once they finish. And last but not least, they have coaching principles applied, right? So we're trying to make sure that we're really engaging with our teams so that they get the most out of those sessions on an ongoing basis.
Okay? So there's five fantastic impacts for a training program. Those who are not sales leaders, but listen to this podcast. This is where I'd really encourage you to think about how you can apply that to your teams and those people that are sales leaders...have a think today about three things that you can take from this podcast that will help your learning program. Right now, if we take this podcast as a case study before we go, it's a fantastic example as to how we hit those five c's. It's customised, it is specifically delivered for sales leaders. So I spend more time speaking about sales leadership than I do individual contribution. It's consistent. You know, it comes out same day, same time every week. It's concise. We deliver less than 30 minutes and there are always punchy takeaways. I like to think it's compelling, but of course, that's always in the eye of the beholder. We mix up different topics, we mix up having guests on the program, we have free resources, we have social media posts, and we have lots of different ways to learn. But it's also compelling in that I challenge people to take something from this and apply it to their day to day lives. And last but not least, I definitely use a coaching framework. It's what I use across all of my coaching and my consulting work. But for me, it's absolutely about enhancing knowledge. So you'll actually see whether you've recognised or not that the podcast actually builds on certain topics as we go through, for example, training. Right. This is not the first time we've spoken about it, and we like to be able to build and build on those experiences that you're having. So there you have it. Some great tips around building an effective training program.
Okay, before we go today we are back onto our health and fitness tips for any solo podcasts that we have. I love them. I hate when I don't get to roll them out. But for me today, and we are coming into a period where planning is often rolling towards the end of completion or for some businesses, just starting. But I've often experienced a period of flatness when we come out of planning because we know just how much we have to achieve in the year ahead. For those listening, and this is a piece of advice that I received from my coach, Justine, and it's one that's really resonated with me. And that is that when you're flat, if you can acknowledge that it's part of the process, that it's something that happens to everyone at points in their lives, in their careers, in their days, then you are far better equipped to handle it. The challenge is to how you can acknowledge that being flat and then put in certain activities or moments that will help you move through that period of flatness as quickly as you possibly can. For me, it's looking back at my goals and focusing exactly on what I need to do to be able to hit those goals. And it's also avoiding some of the vices in life that actually increase that downward spiral, such as late nights, such as lots of alcohol, such as eating poorly or not spending time with my family. So I know that I can recognize when these flat spots are here. I had one recently. It was a pretty low flat spot, but I was able to turn it around in about 36 hours, which is pretty good. I spent 36 hours in that flat spot and bang, I'm straight back out of it and firing. So it's something if you'd like to talk more about, please, you know where to find me. I really like talking about this stuff because it's so important to be showing up as a leader, as the person that you want your teams to aspire to be.
So that's it for today. If you missed anything www.strongersalesteams.com, you will see all the show notes and lots more information with it. We're on social media on all the major channels. You know where to find us. Or if you're really short, email me. [email protected], and we'll come back to you with anything that you need. If you missed anything, please make sure you jump back to those show notes because there was a lot of information in today's podcast. That's it for today.
Until next time, keep living in a world of possibility and you'll be amazed by what you can achieve.
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The 5 Secrets to Impactful Training
