Sales Management Misconceptions: Why the Most Popular Techniques Don't Work

Intro VO  00:06

Welcome to revenue rehab, your one stop destination for collective solutions to the biggest challenges faced by marketing leaders today. Now head on over to the couch, make yourself comfortable and get ready to change the way you approach revenue. Leading your recovery is modern marketer, author, speaker and Chief Operating Officer at Tegrita Brandi Starr.

Brandi Starr  00:34

Hello, hello hello and welcome to another episode of revenue rehab. I am your host brandy star and we have another amazing episode for you today. I am joined by Rene Zamora. Rene is one of the original fractional sales managers, founding sales manager now way back in 2006, after a 25 year corporate career in sales and sales management in 2018. He authored part time sales management, a guide written for small business owners who manage their sales teams. He has consultants working for him, his business is growing, and he loves to give and share. Rene, welcome to revenue rehab, your session begins now.

Rene Zamora  01:24

Sounds good after watching the intro, he also likes to dance and you

Brandi Starr  01:32

that is my jam. Anytime I'm having a rough day I will crank up some music and have just a 1616 second dance break. And it just it lifts the mood so much.

Rene Zamora  01:45

Oh man. I know. It's fun. Thanks for that.

Brandi Starr  01:49

Awesome. Well, before we dive into our topic, I like to break the ice with a little woozy moment that I call buzzword. banishment. So tell me what industry buzzword would you like to get rid of forever.

Rene Zamora  02:07

I don't lose forever. So I'm just gonna go with something that's my pet peeve. buzzword right now is when I get messages that everyone wants to partner before they even know me. You know, we're going to partner so we'd like to partner what they're really saying is like, I want to sell you something, you know, just tell me.

Brandi Starr  02:27

That's like, why are we pretending like you want a partnership like you want me to buy from you? Like let's let's just be open.

Rene Zamora  02:39

So that, unfortunately, it kills what things the meaning meds before, you know. So now it's like your diluted kind of like when 18 T says I'm part of their family, you know? Okay.

Brandi Starr  02:51

I will not get on my telecom soapbox. Like as? Don't I have some pens up aggressions for the cable and phone companies?

Rene Zamora  03:06

There you go partner.

Brandi Starr  03:07

Well, awesome. Now that we have gotten that off our chest, tell me what brings you to revenue rehab today?

Rene Zamora  03:16

Well, you know, I, I want to explain and share, you know, some of the misconceptions about what a sales leader or a sales manager should do. I mean, the role obviously is different in different organizations. So I don't want to put it in a box so to speak. But I do, I guess I want to say what, what I've kind of discovered over my career, or what the ultimate goal is, you know, as a sales leader, sales manager, are what you should be working toward, because we're all going to be at different places in our evolution in our career working toward that or what your organization allows.

Brandi Starr  03:56

Awesome. Well, I believe in setting intentions, it gives us focus, it gives us purpose, and most importantly, it gives our audience an understanding of what they should expect from our conversation today. So I'd love to hear what is your intention? What do you hope will be different or changed for our audience? Once they've finished hearing our discussion?

Rene Zamora  04:21

I would hope that the sales leaders, managers, chiefs, whatever they call themselves, would see that their role is about doing less. And their people's role is about doing more. So they would find comfort in doing less and to be effective. And that's what I've done with my business.

Brandi Starr  04:46

Awesome. So my first question is going back to how you framed the problem. You talked about getting across and helping people to understand what the goal of leading sales is. So I'd like like to start there and hear how do you see you know that role? And what do you think the main goal is?

Rene Zamora  05:07

I think the main goal is I mean, lead leadership is important. So I don't care what you again, I don't care what your title is, if you have people that are following you, so you want to lead, which it goes to other buzzwords, I hate all that stuff. You're not this, you got to be this. And there, everyone's achieved now. And so anyhow. So knowing that your job is to lead others to do the the role of sales, our job is not to sell. So understanding your your job is not to sell your job is to empower direct, provide inspiration to others, so they can just be awesome at their job. So it's really providing tools, removing a roadblock. So just owning that, because a lot of us that have come up being really good salespeople tend to want to go back and show how good we are as a way of helping others get better.

Brandi Starr  06:08

Yeah, and that's honestly what you see a lot. And I think, you know, as a consultant, we work with companies of varying sizes, mostly mid market to enterprise, I know you work a lot with small businesses, and I have in the past as well. And that career progression to sales leadership, most often looks like I was the top salesperson, I moved to like the higher end sales, and I nailed it there. So I moved into sales management. And I think that's where a lot of the problem comes in. Because someone who is really good at selling, and what motivates them to sell is not necessarily going to be good at leading, and is not always going to be motivated by you know, not being a doer. And so why do you think that the career projection or progression is what it is, when it's actually counterintuitive to the skill sets of people who are great salespeople?

Rene Zamora  07:21

I think because everyone just looks at the look at sales differently. It's like, and so we're salespeople are a little bit different. So you know, we need someone who knows has been really good at that. So, and it is important, you know, I mean, it is important to be able to identify weaknesses, and others or strengths if you have the experience, but it's not 100% required, because again, there is a crossover. You know, many of the, if we talk for those that enjoy watching the NFL, many of the coaches on the sideline, the head coaches, they weren't all the best players, they became the best coaches of other coaches have other people in, they see their team differently. And so as a manager, so your question was, how do we how did we get there? It's just natural, I think in in any discipline, you know, you're good at doing the work, and you promote. But then there's a point there where our weaknesses is when we're selecting someone, we don't shift to say, wait a minute, what have they proven as a manager? What are what are we looking at to see that they've managed? You know, if it's projects, if it's clients? If so, how did they manage clients? How did they manage communication? You know, all that expectation, manage expectation? Are we really evaluating that? Are we just saying like, alright, they say they're ready to be a leader now. So let's roll.

Brandi Starr  08:53

Because if we think about it, most of your top salespeople are going to be very money and recognition motivated. Correct. And if you look at sales leadership, who is not selling? It's like you take away that main, I mean, not that there's not steal money in recognition, but it's not the same. And so like, that does seem to be at conflict with the natural person.

Rene Zamora  09:23

It absolutely it absolutely is. And, you know, that's way some people say like, so is should you not bring this, you know, your top salesperson to be the manager? And I say, no, there shouldn't be a rule against it. It's just, there's percentages, say it doesn't work for the point that you just made about the motivation. I said, if that person cares more about developing people than about closing business, then yeah, go with them. Okay.

Brandi Starr  09:51

And I'm gonna put a pin in that for a second because I do want to come back to this because I have some thoughts that that I think are interesting. You But I don't want to take us in another direction yet, I want to back up a little bit, because I know that one of the things that, you know, I learned from you just as we were getting this conversation set up is that you see a lot of misconceptions in how people are leading sales, and that there's a lot of popular techniques that you feel just really don't work. And so I really want to dive into that a little bit. You know, I've been in marketing my whole career, you know, unless you count retail sales back in, you know, my teens and early 20s. And so for me, I've never led a sales organization. So help me to understand what these misconceptions are. And these techniques that you see that don't work.

Rene Zamora  10:52

The number one in its a, I don't know, if it's a misconception, I just think it's a practice that isn't really identified to change. And that is that since you've been good at something, you should, should demonstrate and show others and make this help people make decisions by unfortunately, deciding for them. So I'm not explaining it well, when I tried to say is, like, basically doing their work for them, you know, to make them look to make them seem better. Not sometimes it's as far as closing a deal. Other times, it's when they come to their leader and manager and say, you know, are what should I do on this, rather than the manager being effective? being effective at saying, Okay, well, what are you thinking, you know, what do you know, what we, so rather than teaching people how to make decisions, the misconception is this leader will go in and help and make decisions for these people. So I think this is so big, it was a big change in my, and how I approach to sales management was not making decisions that I hired someone else to make.

Brandi Starr  12:09

And you know, that like thinking about my own experience, because in my role, as a consultant, we work with a lot of the technology vendors, and we're often involved in the sales process of a client purchasing a technology. And I see what you're talking about happen all the time, especially since a lot of clients that pay us to be a part of that process. do so because they know they've got some complex requirements. And so, you know, the typical salesperson, song and dance doesn't work on me or my team, because we're trying to dig in. And so that is where I will often see the sales manager, kind of jump in and almost take over and drive that opportunity. And the original salesperson almost becomes like an admin. At that point,

Rene Zamora  13:03

they do. And I think we think that we're showing them, you know, what to say and do, but what we're not allowing to happen is for them to think through the process of what decision to make, because it's different in sales is dynamic, and you're making decisions, and you're managing their decisions. And if you don't exercise your decision making or improve your decision making, you're always stuck at a level and then you're always going for help for your manager. And if we allow that it just continues.

Brandi Starr  13:38

And you know, I think an industry that has an example of kind of the right way to do it, is you think about car sales, many sales manager is always this like omnibus person that's in, you know, another room that you never as the customer never talked to, but whenever the salesperson gets stuck, they're like, let me go talk to the manager. And you know, they go into this room, and then they come back with some plan. And you know, it's awkward in sales, but, or in car sales. But if you think about it, like what you're saying is, that is almost the right concept, in that, you know, you are more asking the questions, enabling them so that they can then still go manage it.

Rene Zamora  14:24

And I think it's clear, it's, I'm kind of kind of with you, and kind of not so I'm trying to get on that same page as the but so how I would support that is that car sales was very clear about what the salespersons decision making should be, and what the manager's decision making should be. So so as long as you clarify that, and they're clear. And so, the salesperson, we want to make sure you've qualified you know, they're probably really tight about this. Like, when you come into my room, tell me all the things that you found out, so I could do my job. My decision or my coaching view, whichever way it is, you know, it's probably different in those scenarios. But there's a clear line of that. So I think that's another piece, there's, again, is setting the clear expectations of what everyone is expected to make decisions on. So I'm gonna I'm gonna stay on this theme of decisions, because Can I share a little bit about how that came to be? Yes, definitely, there was an article that someone sent me called McGregor. And it was about this manager. So this young man was going to interview this manager McGregor as company. And he goes into his office, and he's just sitting on, you know, sitting back in his chair, and he had all this time on his hands. And so he started asking him, so you don't look like you're that busy. He goes, like, I'm not, you know, I just have a weekly meeting, I meet with my managers, and they inform my team, and they inform me of the decisions they've made and the goals they've hit now, you know, and so I just cuz he's set everything up. So basically, he kind of showed me, you know, what, you can be the most effective manager and leader by putting your feet up. That's why I said, Do we less, right? The problem is corporations don't like that. Let them see. Right, yeah, you can create a video that you're working somewhere else, okay, doing something. But what they do like in stockholders, shareholders, like is results. So if you can read the results oriented function, and so you know, if you can get other people producing the results, which they should, because they get paid for that, then work towards that, in my business as a fractional Sales Manager for small businesses, the only way that I saw that I could be more profitable as a business, being a manager wants to be more efficient in how I lead teams to be effective. So I've been on this pursuit of how do I, you know, manage more effectively in to spend less time with my people and see better results? That's what I do. And so that's what I'm trying to share with others in. That's where this whole decision, the this manager McGregor said, I won't make decisions for, I won't make the decisions I hired other people to make. So the biggest piece to learn here, the takeaway is like, make sure you're clear about which decisions you're you're hiring someone to make. And we don't usually think about it or describe it that way. We think about responsibilities, tasks, duties. But if you also think about what decisions they should make, should they decide on which territory? Or is that decision, women should decide on how the conversation goes, she does decide on the qualifying criteria, or do we decide on that, you know, those are all little things that we kind of just take for granted, and it stays a little gray. If you get tough on that, then it's really clear. And then the and as we know, when we set clear expectations with any employee, they can be that much more effective. And it's easy to know if they're doing the job. Well.

Brandi Starr  18:15

I love that focus on what decisions need to be made. Because the responsibilities then come really naturally. Like if I you know, think about as a leader, one of the things that's always been hardest for me that I hate is like writing a job description of what should someone do. But if I think about what decisions do I want them to own? The, then what do they need to do? becomes really obvious, yes, if I say, they need to decide how they're going to approach a call, well, then the expectations and responsibilities are clear, you got to know how to manage that on your own. I'm not giving you a framework, you know, that kind of thing. So I really liked that. It's an interesting way to think about I mean, no matter what department you're managing, in thinking about how you enable your people

Rene Zamora  19:10

I've seen I seen a byproduct that I didn't expect also because when I when I started working on that discipline for myself as a leader, and again, there's the focus, right? How am I focusing on me being a better leader and manager, not just help not just being a sales coach, you know what I mean? Okay, what let me get what I was thinking that what I was thinking, the sale, as you know, the sales process, from the marketing to the closing is all about the buyer making decisions. So if you're really focused in on decisions, then it also improves our vision of where the buyer is in the decision making process. And you can have that conversation, because sometimes we're trying to help them, you know what the term is closing to Early write? Probably because there's about 10 or 20 other decisions they need to make before they even consider that one. And so by staying focused on what's their next decision, what's our next decision? How long make I mean, the decision is easy. Your business with the email? Should I open it? There's a decision, right? And then how much time should I invest in reading it? And then, you know, should I click our salary plan? Those are decisions that someone makes through the process. And I am, you know, I have to imagine through your work, you're, you're trying to manage those decisions to make it as easy as possible for people to move forward with our intention in our messaging.

Brandi Starr  20:46

Now, awesome. So I know you said that was your first misconception. I'll let you give me what your others are.

Rene Zamora  20:54

Okay, what are my other? I don't get on I just start rambling here. If I told you earlier, tell me. So some of the what are some of the other misconceptions? You know, I think that's the biggest one, but I think that, if I was to think about it is that what is it this, hey, people would say about this? I'm filling, I'm filling in effective right now. I'm so passionate on the other one.

Brandi Starr  21:27

Oh, no, as I say, I've got a different question. If there's not another, go for it, um, the concept of doing less, so that your team can do more. This is a really interesting one to me, because, as I've talked to leaders about their career progressions, you know, it, there is a perception whether accurate or not, that the further up you move, the more you're doing. So, you know, most people to think about their first job in their career, you know, you kind of had some really basic things that you did, but it usually is, you know, fairly low stress all the way up to you know, you get to the C suite, and you start asking like lunch, what's that like? And so, this concept of as a leader that you should be doing less is very counterintuitive. So I'd like to hear you dig into that a little more, because it is one of those things, that just kind of sounds too good to be true.

Rene Zamora  22:31

And I think it's probably more of less of what you've been doing and start doing more of what you could be doing. Okay. Okay. So, especially in the corporate world, I mean, yeah, because you do have to be keep doing work. And so push, you know, find ways to increase responsibility of your team. Okay. So your team, you know, they have the responsibility of whatever you've described, as far as their sales roles, but their numbers are the ultimate, but then you have people that are like, you know, strong leaders in there, give them some of your responsibility, let them have, you don't have to give a raise every time or a bonus every time. And maybe sometimes you will, maybe you'll find a way, because it keeps people engaged with their job, when any employee feels like they're being asked to do be a bigger part of the whole solution. Feels good. Feels good, you know?

Brandi Starr  23:23

Yeah. And that that is, you know, one of the things as I moved up in my career, that was a hard lesson for me, because I am naturally a type A personality and want to, you know, have my arms around and keep control of things. And what I had to learn were that there were certain things that were my responsibility that I dreaded doing. But someone who is earlier in their career gets excited about doing those things, because it's an opportunity to learn and grow. And so where I didn't want to ever be in a situation where I felt like I was just like, passing off my responsibility, learning to delegate in that way. I started to recognize how much more my team grows, yes. And then I also don't have the frustration of the stuff that I hate doing. And so I do see what you mean, in the do that do less it is the less of what you use

Rene Zamora  24:24

just to do and be looking at what you get hoping your boss is gonna give you some are you ask, Hey, I like to do that. I like to work on that committee. I want to work on this, but it's not taking you away. Usually, it's because people are asking us to do more and be in more meetings, but we haven't let go of anything that we could, you know, we haven't done less of that. And so then it just feels overwhelmed and we're working 70 hours a week or whatever it might be. I love having salespeople lead sale taking rotating, leading the sales meeting. It also just shows me how they're facilitating and little bit how they might be managing when they have more complex sale, and they have more people in the room? How do they facilitate that? Are they just being the showman? Are they are they facilitating a buying decision? You know,

Brandi Starr  25:15

and I know, so I know a lot of your clients are small businesses. And so as I'm thinking about some of what we're talking about, you know, I see it as a little easier. In my opinion, when you're in a larger company with more people more of a team to manage than when you're a smaller company, whether it's, you know, super small, or, or startup where you're still in that kind of scrappy space, how does this differ in terms of the advice,

Rene Zamora  25:49

if you're leading, or if you're the owner, or a manager, it's the same if the company has a vision to grow at whatever pace or to size, then you need to develop people. The reason, you know, money, or leadership is what's going to keep you from, from growing. And so so you can use these things. So that way, you know, as an owner, if your baby, so you hold on to it, those owners that are quicker to understand, I need better people around me, you know, you they need to pay more or develop them provide tools, they can be developed, because the owner can't always develop people. So you need to bring in other resources like you and other consultants or coaches to help bring that teaching in. So that's how you can use it there. Or you hire a fractional sales manager like us, because then we do it, we do develop the people. And we you know, we are focused on that results and development. So we, we help teams grow sales teams, grow sales and grow the people, we are really focused on those two things. Okay. And at the end,

Brandi Starr  27:01

as I say, at the end, I'll make sure we squeeze in a shameless plug so that if there's anyone listening, that is in need of that, I'll make sure that they get your information. So the thing that I wanted to put a pin in earlier. So, you know, we wrote the book, cmo to CRO, the revenue takeover by the next generation executive. And the big concept that we're leading to in the book that, you know, for those that haven't read it is that there should be a single leader over all of revenue. And so that includes sales, marketing, success, you know, different organizations, sometimes its products. And our belief is that the head of marketing, so CMOS today, are best positioned to lead revenue. And what you talked about at the beginning really aligns to that. So I want to bring this up and kind of put you on the spot a little bit and get your thought, because I think the biggest pushback we've gotten on the book is like, yeah, that sounds great. But most, you know, marketing leaders, most CMOS VPs of marketing, have never led sales, and therefore, you know, they could take over the other parts of revenue. But they couldn't do that. And what you talked about is that the leaders job is not to sell, it's to empower, direct and inspire. And so to me, that further supports the point that we make in that head of marketing can take over all of revenue, and be able to lead and have you know, those great salespeople. And so I wanted to get your thoughts like, do you see this as a feasible idea? Or are you on team you know, Tegrita is crazy. And this is not the future.

Rene Zamora  28:58

I would say that you're not crazy. And a marketing leader, or a sales leader can be in my opinion, can be in charge of sales and marketing. I am on the same page with you that if you can have one leader over both, you're we're gonna get we're gonna get to that place that most companies want to get to, is that we're, we're collaborating, we are actually creating synergy instead of argument. I mean, we don't need to get into that. So we know that it exists out there in everyday so working together. So yeah, I don't I don't care which way which place a person comes from I don't need someone that has sold to lead me. I need someone who understands what I need as a salesperson and could give me the tools and remove the roadblocks from me getting my job done. So someone can listen and understand. Oh, I see you need Okay, great. What is it if it's electronic tools if it's a have better communication in the organization? If it's training, if it's you need it, if we do need to get a sales coach in here, Fine, let's do that. That leader can, they just need to listen and not assume?

Brandi Starr  30:14

Awesome. And, you know, you talks about the marketing and sales alignment, you know, and breaking down some of those silos. So for anyone listening, who hasn't listened to Episode 31, after finishing my conversation with Rene, I encourage you to back up and go back and I had someone from marketing someone from sales. And we kind of debated out, you know, we fought it out in terms of how do we get that proper alignment, so, or that was 38. So 38, and 31. Those are the two that you should go back to as your next revenue rehab episodes to listen to

Rene Zamora  30:51

where they got a bump. And real quick here and say that, you know, there's no mystery to getting things done. It's, we sometimes we think we need to create new ideas and new concepts to do it just normal, like talk, communicate, what do you try? What are we trying to achieve? Let's agree on that. All right. Who's got what roles? Okay, what are you going to do? If there's any problems, let's talk. If we have conflict, let's conflict, but let's commit, keep a commitment. It's just, it's just relate communication and understand direction. It's like, it's too simple, really, sometimes we come?

Brandi Starr  31:28

Yeah, there are so many reasons, it gets complicated, but we won't go there. So talking about our challenges is just the first step and nothing changes, if nothing changes. And so in traditional therapy, the therapist will give the client some homework, but here at revenue rehab, we like to flip that on its head and ask you to give us some homework. So I'd love for you to give all of our listeners their one thing. So what is the one action item that they can take, if they are managing sales to be better sales leaders,

Rene Zamora  32:08

if you want to improve? Take the concept we talked about today and turn your awareness on yourself right now and start just if you took one week, and kept a notepad said decisions on it, and just started listening to yourself, which decisions are you making for you know, others, and you know, in you didn't correct yourself, so basically, be aware of it. Okay, so I'm gonna give you two, you can either do it that way, keep the log, or go ahead. And because I think that'll help you better to do step number two, which would be review and see if you really have defined which decisions your team should be making, and that you should stop making, in which decisions you should be making that maybe you're allowing your boss to make.

Brandi Starr  32:57

I love that, you know, I've done that with food before, like to figure out which foods weren't working for my body keep the food log. So doing the same thing with decisions? And what decisions are you making, you know, day in and day out for a week straight? And then doing that self evaluation to say, Were these mind to make like, you know, are there muddy lines. And even potentially having your team do the same thing?

Rene Zamora  33:28

We do it first, first for yourself, so you're aware of what you're going to be asking. Because if it's a new concept, it was a new concept. And it is different, you know, again, like he talked about job descriptions, we there isn't a decision category on there. It's you know, responsibilities, objectives, duties, tasks, but the decisions are in there. It's just another way to look at it and grind, you know, just to make it more complicated.

Brandi Starr  33:55

Well, Renee, I have enjoyed our discussion. But that's our time for today. But before we go, I'd love to hear how can our audience connect with you, and would love to hear just your shameless plug right here for anyone that may be looking for a fractional sales manager?

Rene Zamora  34:16

Well, as you mentioned, at the beginning, I love to share and if, if I have something that's I've learned in, in my life, I want to be able to pass it on, I can only live so many days and if something gets left behind, that's more valuable. And so if any, there's any leaders or managers out there that just want to get a little bit of my time and just have me poke around in your world. You can just go to Sales Manager now. And that's my website and you'll find all my contact information there. And you have you'll have some of my time just mentioned brandy and you heard us here and revenue rehab and give you some of my time. As far as my client types, small businesses that don't have a sales manager have a few sales people I usually say if you're thinking Do we need a sales manager now? Okay, just type it in sales manager now, and then you'll find us, okay? And we'll happily discuss and see if we can help you out. And we'll provide a sales manager for you at a fraction of the cost that you would hire a full time manager. I like to say we're the easiest to hire, and the easiest of hire will still make you.

Brandi Starr  35:25

Well, awesome. And I mean, honestly, that's a natural progression, like at some point, you have a fractional manager. And when you do your job, well, you almost fire yourself, because then they're ready for a full time manager. Awesome. Well, Renee, thank you so much for joining me today. And thank everyone for joining us. I hope you have enjoyed my conversation with Renee. I can't believe we're already at the end. We'll see you next time.

Outro VO  35:59

You've been listening to Revenue Rehab with your host brandy star. Your session is now over but the learning has just begun. join our mailing list and catch up on all our shows at revenue rehab dot live. We're also on Twitter and Instagram at revenue we have. This concludes this week's session. We'll see you next week.