JD Stewart MD (magic dude) | Category Archives: CommunicationCommunication Archives

How Sales Contests Destroy Your Sales Staff

Sales contests are often used to motivate sales people. It is assumed sales people are naturally competitive. Therefore, giving them an opportunity to compete amongst themselves will be fun and improve both morale and productivity. In actuality it has the reverse effect. There may be a temporary boost in productivity. But there is a long term loss of both morale and productivity.

With most sales contests there are winners and losers. The winners tend to look down on the losers because they are losers. And the losers are jealous of the winners. The result is a division within the sales team. Animosity is created between team members. In addition, the winners generally tend to be the same set of winners. Therefore the losers tend to be the same set of losers. The result is poor morale within the team which causes reduced productivity. If only one person can win then the others, even though they are good sales people, resent the winners. They would have won but the contest was rigged or, if only the timing were different, or the winner just got lucky, or the winner had been in their territory longer, or the engineering staff had sent Jim rather than Joe for sales support, or any of a thousand other things. In addition, the sales team learns not to share with one another or help each other because they want to win next time. The thinking goes, “Why would I want to help my competition?” This type of sales contest creates dysfunctional teams.

Some sales managers realize this and therefore create contests where winning the contest does not automatically create losers. The contest is won by achieving a specified goal or sales level. Anyone who reaches a specified level wins the prize. That is theoretically better but in actuality, unless everyone reaches the specified level you still have winners and losers. Winners tend to look down on the losers and the losers are jealous of the winners. And the sales staff is still competing with each other.

I know of several sales managers who either think this is fine or do not care. Their thinking is like this, “I don’t want a bunch of losers on my team, anyway. If they can’t hack, too bad. I hope they quit so I can hire some winners.” The problem is they do not quit. They are just de-motivated. And besides that there are many more average sales people than super stars. So the probability is the sales manager will hire another average sales person and loose additional productivity while they are learning the ropes.

I am not against competition. I think competition is great. I believe that, not only is competition a good thing, it is vital to any business. You just need to be sure you are competing against a true opponent not an artificial one. So ask this question, what is the purpose of a sales contest? Why have a sales contest at all? The ultimate goal is to have a motivated sales staff that consistently improves sales revenue. A sales contest with winners and losers fulfils none of those goals. You may motivate a few sales people. You may have a temporary boost in sales numbers. But the team has not improved. And if the sales numbers improve, they are not sustainable.

Would it not be better to have the entire sales staff improve their sales revenue? Would it not be better to have the hot shot sales person motivated to share his tricks of the trade with those who are struggling?

Instead of creating individual rewards. Create team rewards, a common cause if you will. The individual wins only if the team wins. If everyone is working for the same goal then they work together. The stronger help the weaker become stronger. The result is an over all stronger team. The skills developed during the contest are now sustainable. The team has long term improvement. Rather than individuals working against each other. Everyone’s goals are now aligned with not only with the sales manager but with the business as a whole.

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Dealing with Unfair Criticism

Responding calmly and rationally to unwarranted criticism

Recently I was leading a discussion over how to teach fairly some complicated concepts. When all of a sudden the individual on my left burst out in anger with accusations about my motives which were completely untrue. All eyes were on me. What would I say? How would I react? I am proud to say I followed the step below and came out of the assault unscathed.

You may have experienced something similar. Maybe you gave a presentation at work, outlining a new marketing plan, or an idea for a new product. You think all is going well when one of the participants delivers a scathing critique. Each point you believe is either completely incorrect or a simple misunderstanding of your position. Everyone one now looking at you. What will you say? How will you react?

How you react in these situations have a tremendous impact on your career and relationships not only with the one who has attacked you but, if there are witnesses, every one who witnesses the attack and everyone who hear about the exchange.

When you are unjustly criticized emotions run high and therefore it is not the best idea to trust your instincts. Your initial reaction has the largest impact on how things will turn out. It alone has the ability to make things better or worse. Here is my recommendation on how to fight against the urge to strike out.

1: Remain calm
The most important thing to do is remain calm. Remaining calm and respectful, particularly if the other party does not, will help defuse the situation and can even rally support. Give the impression of taking the comments thoughtfully and respectfully. Even if they are blatantly false. Ask why does this person thinks you are such and such or you have done such and such. Regardless of how off base and vicious the attack, the attacker believes they are justified in the attack. Try to find out why?

When we receive negative criticism anger or feelings of inadequacy well up in us. If we expressing these emotions we only dig ourselves a deeper into a hole from which we may not be able to crawl. Have your response be courtesy and take the higher ground. So just pause, taking couple of deep, quiet breaths through your nose will help calm you down.

2: Asked to have the point repeated or clarified
Give yourself some time to think. You do not have to develop a response on the spot. One way to get some time is simply to calmly repeat the criticism back to the individual in your own words. And then ask if you understand correctly. Make eye contact and in a non-aggressive non-threatening tone, say: “So, if I understand your correctly you’re saying…,” and put his criticisms in your words. The goal is to take the focus off of personalities, and place it on the issue at hand.

When you put the criticism in your own words, do so accurately, do not over state you case. Simply reword the point to the best of your ability. If he claims your proposal will not bring the results you are claiming. Do not say “So what you are saying is this will destroy the company.” Exaggerating the criticism will make you appear defensive and looking for a fight – rather than being the cool, calm and rational one.

If you do not understand the point or can not make the connects your assailant is making. Simply asking for more information can help A simple question,”Can you tell me more,” works wonders. If what is being said is truly ridiculous. He may sudden realize he is in an untenable situation.

The goal is to take the focus off of you and your reaction and put it on the his criticisms.

3: Examine both perspectives
The goal is not to have either one of you leave bloody and beaten the goal is to identify and address the issue. So once you have taken the focus off of the personalities place the focus squarely on the issue at hand. This is a good time to open a real discussion of the critique. Depending on the situation you can start off with phrases like: “I can see how you might get that idea, I probably haven’t properly explained that;” “I understand what you are saying and that is why…;” “That an interesting perspective. I understand how you feel.” The idea is to establish a rapport and showing respect is key even if you have not been shown any. Once you have demonstrated respect give him the opportunity to return the favor.

4: Politely Move on
Even in the best of worlds with the best of tactics, things do not always work out like we would like to have them work out. You can have executed the first three steps flawlessly and you are at an impasse. You have remained calm and demonstrated respect, as you reworded the criticism in your own words. You have calmly and without shame shown you understand their perspective. Even after all this your critic holds firm. This is time for a graceful exit. You can say some thing like: “That’s certainly something to think about going forward;” “I appreciate the feedback;” “We definitely aught to consider that in the next version.” You have just positioned yourself as someone who is genuinely trying to do the best job possible. It also places the focus on the future actions and allow you to move on.

Leave a comment Communication, Leadership

Fixing Communication Problems in the Workplace

Just because we speak the same language does not mean we understand what we each other is saying. Let me give an example from my childhood. When I was in the 5th grade, I had a teacher try to teach us about rocks and geology. For a project everyone in the class had to build a rock collection. One day, I found a rock but could not identify it. So I asked my teacher what it was. She said, “It’s nice. Keep it.”

I did not understand. “OK, but what is it?”

“It’s nice. Keep it.”

“But what is it?”

The rest of the class started laughing.

She was starting to get exasperated, “It nice. Keep it!”

I too was frustrated. I understood it was a nice rock. And she wanted me to keep it. That meant I needed to put it in my rock collection. I also knew my collection would be marked down if every rock was not labelled. I thought maybe I could just throw it away. But she had already seen it and told me to keep it. So I could not just throw it away. I was stuck. So I asked again even more emphatically, “But what is it?”

She finally reached the conclusion I was not going to get it. She said, “Just keep it.” And walked away.

Later I realized she was saying, “gneiss,” not “nice.” Both are pronounced the same.

This is a classic example of saying what you mean but not communicating. Simply repeating the same words to each other was not helping us communicate. It simply created frustration.

Language is an imperfect tool. Just because something it is plainly stated does not mean it is plainly understood. And without understanding there is no communication.

Problems in communication are costly to any business or enterprise. Without efficient communication, your company expends time, and money, which could and should be used for more productive activities, fixing problems. I am going to share a technique that has worked well for me in avoiding communication problems.

A few years ago I had a friend who could not understand why he would have these long conversations with his boss and agree on a course of action. He would then execute what was agreed upon only to later have another discussion with his boss as to why what was agreed to was not done. The problem was while there was agreement there was not understanding. There was no true communication. Here is what I suggested to my friend that solved the problem. At strategic moments in the conversation when understanding is important repeat back what you understood the other person to say. This needs to be done in your own words with your interpretation of what was said, not simply what was said, What you are trying to do is communicate the meaning of what was said.

I cannot tell you how many times this techniques has saved my bacon. When I start working with a new person my conversation goes something like this. “Let me tell you what I heard you say. I am not saying this is what you said, simply what I understood you to say….”

Give it a try. I think you will be delighted with the results.