7 Tips for How to Manage a Remote Sales Team

We have a number of customers who run globally and are managing a remote sales team. They manage a team of people whom they don’t see on a day-to-day basis, with some even in different time zones. Sometimes they only see their teams from month to month, and in some cases, they’ve never met face to face. To be successful managers, these sales leaders adapted their management strategies for a remote work setting.

We interviewed our customers to learn their tips on how to manage a remote sales team. We've compiled a list of the actions and processes these customers use in their work environment:

Have a Daily SCRUM

A SCRUM is a term usually reserved for agile developers, but this works just as well to stay connected with a virtual sales team. These team meetings should follow this premise:

Make it the first video call of the morning. 8:30AM or 9AM, whatever your start time.

• Keep it to 15 minutes - this is the golden rule!
• Have a theme - top 3 deals for rolling quarter, project updates, learning paths.
• Include everyone and ensure they have a voice, whether they’ve been there for 5 days or 5 years.
• Have everyone summarise what they achieved yesterday and what their key goals are for today.
• If there’s a challenge to overcome (e.g. I didn’t manage to achieve x yesterday), encourage everyone's input, but take it outside the call.

Set Clear Expectations

Everyone works better when they know what’s expected of them.

Clarify this and ensure that objectives are SMART while holding individuals accountable for the outcomes.

Keep your performance expectations, but review them to make sure they are suitable for the current situation.

Empower People to Share

Have a platform for people to share the good news and tasty titbits they would normally do in an office environment. At Richardson, we use Slack channels for this. It encourages team engagement and community learning at a distance. Think about Win Stories, use cases, industry news, and external learning from experts.

Don’t forget mindset advice and guidance. This is essential when people are isolated for long periods of time.

Short Sprint Games & Competitions

Gamify activities in short bursts. Power hours for calls, and such the like, and stay connected throughout. Announce achievements either on a call or through your company network. Have scoreboards and make them visible to all.

You can also have TEAMs, Zoom, or something similar continuously on in the background so everyone can feel part of it.

Carry on and Keep Coaching

Just because the person you used to coach is not sitting next to you does not mean you stop helping them grow. Transition your approach.

Make sure your weekly 1-2-1 is sacrosanct—nothing should ever trump coaching time with your team.

Prioritise video conferencing. Research has shown that they are way more effective than just a phone call.

Set and track development actions in between 1-2-1s. Make sure you are clear on these. You’ll realise how often you ask someone if they’ve gotten around to doing certain activities yet.

Make sure you clearly share feedback on what worked, what didn’t work, and what was missing. This allows sellers to work on sales processes they need to improve, giving you and them a reference for the future. With a clear outline, these coaching conversations eliminate ambiguity and misunderstandings.

Practice, practice, practice! Never give up on encouraging people to practice.

Share the best videos with the rest of the team and encourage peer feedback to promote continuous learning. This helps build trusting team members that hold themselves accountable and strive for growth.

Transition Group Training & Onboarding to Online

Don’t let your remote teams miss out on formal learning if it was part of your culture beforehand.

Richardson builds customised training programmes made to reflect your unique selling environment. We offer these programmes both virtually and in person. We make sure sellers learn through a digital and blended learning journey. This journey helps reinforce, sustain, and certify desired behaviours.

For onboarding, think about the essentials and the resources you already have to hand:

• If you’ve had a demo recorded for a customer or the pre-sales team would be willing, build that into the programme. The same goes for pitches.
• If you have YouTube or Vimeo videos, use them to help new recruits. These videos can cover the basics and introduce them to the business. This will create a programme for their first few days.
• Put all those usual HR documents in a single location and build that into your Day 1 Onboarding programme.
• Whenever possible during this time, record what you are doing so you can reuse it later.

Read The Playbook for Onboarding Sales Professionals to learn more about building a strong onboarding program.

Remove the Fear and Desire to Over Compensate

If you’ve recruited well and if you’ve built a good team, it’s reasonably safe to say they won’t deteriorate just because they work remotely. By making these adjustments and following this guide, you can effectively manage your remote workers. You won’t need to be phoning them every 10 minutes just to make sure they are doing their job.

Be clear about expectations, set SMART objectives, and measure the outcomes under your normal operating rhythm. Trust that in doing this, your team will continue to thrive in a remote setting.

Remember, do not be tempted to revert to micromanaging. Be the coach your team needs you to be.

Learn how to manage a sales team remotely and transform your leadership skills with Richardson's Sprint Coaching programme. Download the brochure today for more information on the programme.