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Investing in your staff, looking for knowledge and supporting individuals as they develop their mental skills can ultimately improve your company's performance. The post How do you Learn, Innovate and Compete in Today’s Knowledge Economy? appeared first on .

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Keep Me in the Loop Tableau 9.1: My, That’s Some Enterprising Data By Ryan McShane Sep 14, 2015 Heads up, data lovers. Tableau 9.1 is here. Get ready to analyze all of your web data with the new Web Data Connector. Enterprise IT departments, rejoice. Tableau 9.1 also has enhanced enterprise security capabilities and improved proprietary connections to cloud data technologies from Google, Amazon, Microsoft, and SAP. Read moreRead more about Tableau 9.1: My, That’s Some Enterprising Data 3 commentsAdd new comment

Less Information, More Behavior Change:  Avoid this BIG mistake in your sales training With the world awash in information, there seems to be a disturbing trend in sales training - many programs are focusing on breadth instead of depth.  Specifically, many sales training programs emphasize too much information across a range of topics and not enough practice on a few key behaviors.  Too often the assumption is made that more content leads to more behavior change - this assumption is dead wrong.  Consistently, as the level of information increases in sales training, the amount of time dedicated to practicing skills and getting feedback on key behaviors plummets.  This results in training that superficially touches on numerous topics without driving mastery of key behaviors.  There is a simple solution to this fundamental mistake; do less in training.  Help your participants to focus on a few key behaviors by including enough practice and real-time coaching so that when salespeople leave training they are well on their way to mastering these key behaviors.  Better still, this focus helps their managers to reinforce a few key behaviors back on the job, making coaching much more manageable (for the coach) and relevant (for the salesperson). Why People Assume (Wrongly) that More Content Leads to More Behavior Change This fundamental mistake, including too much information and not enough targeted practice and coaching in sales training, seems to be spreading fast.  Here are the three likeliest explanations for this dangerous trend: Lack of Understanding About How To Get Behavior Change - Some training and development professionals fundamentally misunderstand what it takes to get behavior change.  It is possible that these professionals simply are not familiar with the research on behavior change, which conclusively states that information alone does not create behavior change.  Anyone who knows a smoker knows this simple truth.  Even though smokers understand the terrible health effects of smoking and that this habit is likely to shorten their lives (i.e., they have the information), most persist in smoking (i.e., they don’t change their behavior).  Giving smokers more information does not change the fact that they smoke. Solution:  It is important for training and development professionals to apply research-based best practices to drive behavior change.  There are many good resources about behavior change available online from the American Society of Training and Development (ASTD), the International Society for Performance Improvement (ISPI), and Prosci™ Change Management. There are Too Many Needs for a Single Training Program - Frequently, training and development professionals usually have to satisfy many different needs and, frequently, many different sales leaders.   When leaders have a wide variety of perceptions about what the sales people need, training and development professionals can get draw into the political cross-fire between competing points of view.  The easiest way to meet as many needs as possible or reconcile competing leadership agendas is to put favored topics and additional information into the training.  In this way, multiple sales leaders feel that they have put their "seal of approval" on the training.  Unfortunately, this leads to more information in sales training and less skills practice. Solution:  It is important for training and development professionals to find ways to objectively prioritize and rank key behaviors based on salespeople’s known skill gaps and share this data with sales leaders.  Front-end analysis is well worth the additional time it adds to a training initiative, especially if it helps to base training on common knowledge gaps instead of on personal or political agendas. Underappreciate Salespeople’s Challenges - Many training and development professionals don’t inherently understand the salesperson’s daily experience.  Most salespeople are on "information overload" keeping track of: multiple opportunities, contacts at various clients, colleagues at their own company, and internal and client processes, as well as charged with the completion of administrative tasks.  Layering more information on top of this load makes many salespeople throw up their hands and say, "I am just going to do what I have always done," which results in little or no behavior change.  Salespeople are action-oriented; they want skills that help them sell to clients, not additional information. Solution:  When delivering programs, training and development staff should look at time allocation in a training program with a critical eye.  A good rule of thumb is the 20/30/50 split.  This means that 20% of the training should focus on context setting to establish relevance and summarizing to reinforce new knowledge.  Thirty percent of the training is spent on introducing new concepts, behavioral models, and processes.  And, 50% of training time is dedicated to practicing key behaviors and receiving feedback on these key behaviors. Training is expensive.  That is why it should focus on mastery of a few key behaviors that will drive sales results instead of a broad swath of content and information.  The very best training and development leaders know that their investment in sales training should focus salespeople’s attention, time, and effort on mastery of a few key behaviors to drive success with clients. ————————- Complimentary Webinar  Making Learning Stick: How Building a Continuous Learning Environment Can Improve Learner Retention http://bit.ly/16DQV62 The post Less Information, More Behavior Change: Avoid this BIG Mistake in your Sales Training appeared first on The Richardson Sales Excellence Review™.

Managing Sales Force Change - Factors You Need to Consider for Successful Execution It’s hard to believe but the end of the first half of the year is only a few weeks away. As you reflect back on where you are today versus where you need to be, you might be considering some minor adjustments or major changes to your sales organization. If so, you need to determine if you are prepared for change.  To provide you with some additional insight on sales force change, Richardson recently underwrote a benchmarking study, Managing Sales Force Change,  by The Sales Management Association to determine: The frequency and intensity of sales force change initiatives The amount of expected future sales organization change Organizational perceptions of change efficacy Key areas targeted for change Management practices in directing change initiatives Leadership’s priorities for implementing sales force change Here’s what we found: A significant number of firms have undergone greater change in the past 18 months than they expect to enact in the next 18 months. Larger firms anticipate more organizational changes in the future than smaller firms. Sales training represents the area requiring the most change, yet companies are less likely to make changes to sales training than they are to the sales coverage model or sales headcount. Salespeople believed their organizations were changing far too much; heads of sales too little; and sales managers somewhere in between (though clearly on the "too much change" side). Your company holds a dim view of your organizations’ ability to implement change. The following is a list of questions within the survey along with a summary of the data points: 1.      How would you rate the intensity of organizational change your sales force has undertaken in the past 18 months? Wow! 89% of participants indicated that their sales force has undergone some form of change in the past 18 months, where either moderate adjustments were made or in some cases, everything was completely restored and rebuilt. 2.      How would you rate the intensity of organizational change your sales force expects to take in the next 18 months? As participants contemplated future changes in the next 18 months, 93% of them responded with an expectation of moderate to extreme change showing slight variation from what has been experienced in the past 18 months. 3.      In order for your sales organization to be highly successful in the next 18 months, how much should you change the following things? The top response received across the board was Sales Training. Sales Training is said to make the difference between success and a series of unfortunate events in the next 18 months. Runners-up were Sales Headcount, Coverage Model, Performance Measures, and Technology. Interestingly, product or service offering came in at the bottom of the barrel, placing responsibility on the sales force to capitalize on each opportunity, but as demonstrated with this response, they must first know how. 4.      How much will your organization change the following things in the next 18 months? Although Sales Training is believed to be the most needed change made to be successful, it is not expected to be implemented by your organization. Participants indicated that Sales Headcount and their Coverage Model will be first in line for change, above Sales Training, in the next 18 months. There is a clear disconnect here. 5.      Are sales organizations changing the right things? The Difference in need vs. Expected Change Ratings. There is a lack of correlation between what is needed and what is expected across many functional level s in an organization. High variations between the two point us to draw upon the conclusion that sales organizations are not changing the right things. If you are trying to change your sales force, you must first know what is needed. 6.      How is change perceived in your organization by salespeople? The majority of salespeople believe there is slightly more than enough change going on in their organization. Interestingly, nearly 20% of salespeople believe there is just the right amount of change while nearly 20% of salespeople believe there is far too much change. 7.      How is change perceived in your organization by salespeople, and sales managers? A higher percentage of sales managers vocalized that there is far too little change occurring within the sales organization. However, still about 40% believe there is slightly more than enough change happening. 8.      How is change perceived in your organization by salespeople, sales managers, and your senior sales leader? Contrastingly, 59% of senior sales leaders believe there is far too little change within their sales organizations, while only 14% believe there is far too much change. These results are almost polar opposites from the responses received from salespeople and sales managers. 9.      When our sales organization undertakes a significant change initiative… When asked to agree or disagree with nine change capabilities, it is clear that participants seem to hold a dim view of their organizations’ ability to implement change. Out of the nine change capabilities rated, the lowest were 1) We are able to quantify the impact of future changes using accurate performance modeling and data; 2) We support the change with sufficient resources, staff, and training; and 3) We make sure the sales organization is able to effect change, or adopt a new program, before asking them to implement it. How effective can your organizational change be if your sales force does not believe in your ability to implement it? Download our Complimentary Sales Force Change Report Managing Sales Force Change             To learn more about the Managing Sales Force Change study, please click here to download the full report. The post Managing Sales Force Change - Factors You Need to Consider for Successful Execution appeared first on The Richardson Sales Excellence Review™.

Video Interview with SellingPower: Managing Change in a Sales Organization Today’s BLOG, Managing Change in a Sales Organization, appears Courtesy of SellingPower Magazine.  If you are having any difficulties viewing this video, please click here We most certainly live in an age of accelerated change. In this interview, President and CEO of Richardson David DiStefano shares with you Richardson’s view on change management. Change is often tied to chaos and uncertainty, which makes implementing change difficult. Richardson responds with a change model outlined by A.D.K.A.R. - Awareness, Desire, Knowledge, Ability, and Reinforcement. These components help to build a process and a platform for leading a successful change initiative. As stated by DiStefano, when a company is in sync with change, the outcome is a smooth, continuous course toward achieving greater operational effectiveness. Watch the interview here to see how you can facilitate change across your sales organization. At the Boston Sales 2.0 Conference on July 15, Mr. DiStefano will reveal how sales leaders can introduce, execute, and reinforce strategic initiatives in a way that takes the chaos and uncertainty out of change. Register now to join us in Boston; special discounted rates expire June 24.  Follow David DiStefano on twitter and LinkedIN ——————————————————————————————- Download our Complimentary Sales Force Change Report Managing Sales Force Change To learn more about the Managing Sales Force Change study, please click here to download the full report. The post Video Interview with SellingPower: Managing Change in a Sales Organization appeared first on The Richardson Sales Excellence Review™.