Successful Change Management with Verifiable Outcomes

Last week, I shared how sales organizations can stop driving with their rear-view mirror and turn on their headlights with predictive analytics. At Richardson Sales Performance, we call them verifiable outcomes.

But the sales shoe is not one-size-fits-all. Companies set themselves up for failure when they impose best-in-class sales processes on their reps and managers. Distraction and pushback from the field can stall improvement and create a hiccup in revenue and earnings.

As one sales leader said, ideas drive technology. Technology drives change. And change drives us crazy unless we prepare our A, B and C players for change.

At Richardson Sales Performance, we’ve found it works best to enhance existing best practices with solid, relevant processes that appear native from the outset. Successful and sustainable deployment must navigate multiple situational, cultural and geographical factors in five several key ways. I share three below. You can access the other two in Richardson Sales Performance’s whitepaper or watch this 2-minute sales training video.

Measure the Frequency of Association of Each Verifiable Outcome

The idea is to isolate and substitute your most meaningful metrics for less effective ones. Stop tracking activities. In the first year, we advocate looking at the frequency of association of each verifiable outcome with an opportunity. Over time, frequency equals adoption.

• Further Reading:
  • What’s on your dashboard for tracking sales performance? See Lazarz Consulting’s Top 10 sales metrics for effective sales performance management (SPM).
  • Make better-informed sales decisions with these 8 critical selling metrics
  • Crack the sales management code with groundbreaking research into industry best practices in Jason Jordan’s new book.

Vertically Embed a Leadership Discipline Across the Entire Organization

Most senior executives we speak to routinely travel with field sales professionals and sales managers on key calls to clients. This is an ideal opportunity to ask qualitative questions about verifiable outcomes. Where is the opportunity in the sales process? Being relentless about pipeline quality shows leaders where the greatest opportunity for enduring change lies.

• What we seen that’s worked: Companies success when they implement skip-level meetings between senior executives and the line, as well as direct contact with customers. They gain accurate visibility into their pipeline quality, and alter their strategies to close more deals before it’s too late.
• Further reading:
  • Are you coaching the right reps? Even world-class sales coaching can be useless when you train the wrong people. Find out how you can improve sales performance by 19 percent—The dirty secret of effective sales coaching.
  • Watch this video clip for tips for effective coaching to verifiable outcomes

Track, Measure and Use Data

Change management happens when you know what to change. This insight comes from capturing, analyzing and acting on the right set of data.

It has been our experience that an appropriate number of leading indicators, or verifiable outcomes, is between nine and 12 for a robust, solution-centric sales process. Clearly, it is also important to measure a few essential lagging indicators. We’ve found that many companies challenge their existing lagging indicators after they begin to examine their processes and sales effectiveness metrics.

• What we’ve seen that’s worked: Sales reps sell to their sales comp plans, so companies excel in selling when they incorporate quantifiable goals into their incentive compensation strategy. The most successful enterprises use a robust set of SPIFs and MBOs to motivate the sales behavior they want.
• Further reading:
  • Choose which metrics and SPIFs will be most valuable in your sales comp plans with the article from David Cichelli, The Alexander Group—Get Sales Metrics Right.
  • Find out the three best ways track verifiable outcomes in your CRM system in Richardson Sales Performance’s whitepaper.

Using Verifiable Outcomes Helps You Lead Not Lag

When you have the power to predict, you can course-correct before it’s too late. But sales organizations that don’t swap lagging indicators out for leading indicators will rapidly take the lead in front of their competitors. Sales organizations that don’t will soon find themselves lagging behind.

Why lag when you can lead?