4. Reviewed taped sales calls for errors and missed opportunities

5. Took part in and reviewed simulated and videotaped role-play sales situations with a manager, mentor, or colleague

Top salespeople are good at thought process and thought link development, the ability to link one issue to another in a sales call or other customer conversation. Salespeople need to be able to think. Thinking enables them to better understand customers problems and to link these problems to still other problems the customers may have in their companies.

Salespeople require development-some more than others. Regardless of how they develop, its clear that few of the top salespeople would have achieved success without training and development. Jon King, former senior manager with Xerox and later chief marketing officer for Ikon Office Solutions, put it this way: If the majority of people believe that a person is born to succeed, then why dont they go find them and stop investing their money in training? Its just not that simple. Some people may have more raw talent, but what they do with that talent is another issue.

DEBUNKING THE SUPERSTAR THEORY

One reason people defend the either you have it or you dont idea is the superstar discovery. Occasionally, a recruiter or manager will discover a person who seems to have all the attributes of a successful salesperson. He or she is engaging, has strong interpersonal skills, is disciplined, has excellent grades, and always seems to succeed, and the recruiter basically tells the interviewer that what you see is what you get. Admittedly, what one sees is impressive.

Why doesnt the occasional superstar prove that either you have it or you dont ? There are two factors that need to be considered: (1) The individual may have had more development opportunities

along the way than others had, and (2) the individual may not have the drive to be successful once he or she is on the job. For example, I recall very vividly a superstar that the management staff in the local district office at Xerox believed would be sensational. I too strongly believed in this person and his credentials.

Throughout the ninety-day training program, he led his new hire training class. One manager even suggested that this star could become the heir apparent to our CEO someday. All the sales managers wanted him on their sales team. He did turn out to be successful, but he was not considered a top performer after five years. Why did he fail to be a top performer when he had all the apparent attributes of a superstar?

Who knows for sure? Maybe, in the end, he didnt like the job well enough. There might have been too much inside and outside pressure on him to succeed. Perhaps Xerox sales management was to blame for not making him more accountable because they didnt feel that he needed to be monitored, inspected, and reviewed as rigorously as his peers. In the end, Joe Cegala, who headed up the service operation in the central United States for NCR a few years back, probably summed it up the best with his favorite motto, Potential is interesting, but performance is everything.

PERSONALITY TYPE

People incorrectly attribute sales success to personality. Thats the second reason for either you have it or you dont. For example, lets say that an individual with a dynamic and charming personality is a top performer. It is easy to conclude that the person is a top performer because of his personality and interpersonal skills. (This may be partially true. Interpersonal verbal skills may give that person an edge when it comes to applying sales skills.)

What may not be taken into account, however, is that this likable person may also sell more effectively. For example, he or she may probe for the customers needs more effectively than an average

performer. Our hypothetical salesperson with the dynamic and charming personality may also create more value in his or her solutions than an average performer. How do you account for a person who doesnt have a sparkling personality but is nevertheless a top performer? As Susan Woods, a former training manager for a regional bank and now with The Dartmouth Group, Ltd., observed, Why are there people with strong interpersonal skills that seem to remain in a state of mediocrity while other people with average interpersonal skills become top performers?

If you want to get the most out of the best, develop your people. They need it (some more than others). Salespeople are made, not born.

ACTION POINTS

4 Be patient. The Dartmouth Group, Ltd., estimates that it takes nine to eighteen months of dedicated effort to master probing skills (asking good business questions that focus on problems and the value of solutions) and to become unconsciously competent in their use.16 As Neil Rackham says of the SPIN® method, If it were easy, everybody would be doing it. Its hard-thats why the few people who do it well are so very successful. 17

4 Give constructive feedback. Constructive feedback tells salespeople what they are doing wrong and shows them specifically how to correct it. Without feedback, sales performance and sales results suffer for both the individual and his or her company.

4 Give consistent feedback that doesnt exclude anyone. There is a tendency to not provide feedback to your top performers and your heir apparent, but this is a mistake. Top performers like solid, constructive feedback, too. That may be why they became top performers to begin with. Even Michael Jordan sought and received constructive feedback from his coach at North Carolina, Dean Smith, and from his coach with the Chicago Bulls, Phil Jackson.