Sales Management Leadership and Supervision

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Sales ManagementLeadership and Supervision

• Module Seven

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The Importance of LeadershipAn Experts
Viewpoint
Regan Lancaster, vice president of global sales
at i2 Technologies uses conventional and
unconventional tactics to lead his salespeople.
He offers substantial incentive-based pay and
promotion opportunities. In addition, he has
dressed as a superhero and staged a mock battle
against competitors, motorcycled through a brick
wall, and repelled down a four story building to
inspire his salespeople.
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The Importance of LeadershipAn Experts
Viewpoint
Lancasters leadership is paying dividends.
During his first seven years at i2, revenues have
increased more than 750 percent. In 2000, i2 had
a record-breaking year for e-business with
revenues of 1.1 billion.
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What is the Difference Between Leadership and
Supervision?

• Leadership
• The use of influence with other people through
  communications processes to attain specific goals
  and objectives
• Supervision
• The day-to-day control of the salesforce under
  routine operating conditions

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Sales Force Socialization (Revisited)

• Task-Specific Self-Esteem
• The extent to which an individual believes s/he
  can perform a task competently
• Organizational Commitment
• The extent to which an individual feels a bond
  to the organization
• Formalization
• The extent to which work activity is directed by
  rules, regulations, and commitment

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Sales Force Socialization (Revisited)

• Work Alienation
• An individual's psychological separation from
  the activities of the job
• Job Involvement
• An individual's psychological attachment to the
  job itself

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Contemporary Views ofSales Leadership

• Leader-Member Exchange (LMX) Model
• trust (salesperson and customer)
• Transformational Leadership
• change agents, charismatic
• Behavioral Self-Management (BSM)
• self-control, self-discipline by the salesperson

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Key thoughts on sales leadership

• Build a strong, trust-based relationship with
  individual salespeople
• Be an active stimulus for change, and work with
  sales people and others to accomplish the mission
• Expect salespeople to take an active role in
  managing themselves

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Leadership Model for Sales Management
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Power and Leadership

• Five types of power which may be present in
  interpersonal relationships

George Bush has which types of power ?
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What makes an effective leader?

• Trait Approach (not very useful)
• Behavior Approach (not very useful)
• Contingency Approach (situational)

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Needs and Wants of Salespeople

• Important when coercive power is not being
  utilized
• Realize all needs and wants cannot be met
• Not all leadership directives need to be based on
  needs and wants
• Consider each salesperson as a unique individual
  (requires a lot of the manager)

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Goals and Objectives

• Leadership is easier when personal goals and
  objectives of the salespeople are consistent with
  those of the organization
• Sales managers strive to seek balance and
  consistency between organizational goals and
  their salespeoples goals.

Either hire people with consistent goals or
educate and train them to have consistent goals
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Leadership Skills

• The ability to anticipate problems
• The ability to seek and obtain substantive
  feedback
• The ability to diagnose problems and opportunities

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Leadership Skills

• The ability to select an appropriate leadership
  behavior and match it to the situation
• The ability to communicate effectively

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Communication SkillsInfluence Strategies

• Threats (coercive power)
• Promises (reward power)
• Persuasion (expert or referent power)
• Relationships (referent or legitimate power)
• Manipulation

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Coaching
The continuous development of salespeople through
supervisory feedback and role modeling.
Suggestions for affective coaching include

• Take a we approach
• Address only one or two problems at a time
• Dont focus on criticizing poor performance,
  reinforce good performance
• Foster involvement
• Recognize differences in salespeople and coach
  accordingly
• Coordinate coaching with more formal sales
  training
• Encourage continual growth and improvement
• Insist salespeople evaluate themselves
• Obtain agreement with respect to punishments and
  rewards
• Keep good records

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Planning and ConductingIntegrative Meetings

• Keep technical presentations succinct
• Use visual aids and breakout discussion groups
• Keep salespeople informed of corporate strategy
  and their role in it
• Minimize operations review

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Planning and ConductingIntegrative Meetings

• Set a humane schedule . . . allow time for
  sharing and adequate breaks
• Set and communicate the agenda (when?)
• Ask for input from the salespeople
• Generate excitement with contests and other
  rewards

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Approaches to Management Ethics

• Immoral Management
• Intentional and consistent management activity
  conflicting with what is moral (ethical).
• Exploits opportunities for corporate gain. Cut
  corners when it appears useful. ENRON
• Seeks profitability and organizational success at
  any price. ENRON
• Selfish. Management cares only about its or the
  companys gain. ENRON

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Dell's Higher Standard

• Dell's success is built on a foundation of
  personal and professional integrity. We hold
  ourselves to standards of ethical behavior that
  go well beyond legal minimums. We never
  compromise these standards and we will never ask
  any member of the Dell team to do so either. We
  owe this to our customers, suppliers,
  shareholders and other stakeholders. And we owe
  it to ourselves because success without integrity
  is essentially meaningless.
• Our higher standard is at the heart of what we
  know as the "Soul of Dell" - the statement of the
  values and beliefs which define our shared global
  culture. ..we want all members of our team,
  along with our shareholders, customers, suppliers
  and other stakeholders, to understand that they
  can believe what we say and trust what we do. Our
  higher standard includes several key
  characteristics that both underpin the Soul of
  Dell and provide the foundation for our Code of
  Conduct
• Trust  - Our word is good. We keep our
  commitments to each other and to our
  stakeholders.
• Integrity  - We do the right thing without
  compromise. We avoid even the appearance of
  impropriety.
• Honesty  - What we say is true and forthcoming -
  not just technically correct. We are open and
  transparent in our communications with each other
  and about business performance.
• Judgment  - We think before we act and consider
  the consequences of our actions.
• Respect  -We treat people with dignity and value
  their contributions. We maintain fairness in all
  relationships.
• Courage  - We speak up for what is right. We
  report wrongdoing when we see it.
• Responsibility  - We accept the consequences of
  our actions. We admit our mistakes and quickly
  correct them. We do not retaliate against those
  who report violations of law or policy.

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Approaches to Management Ethics

• Amoral Management
• Management activity that is neither consistently
  moral or immoral . . . Decisions lie outside the
  sphere to which moral judgments apply.
• Give managers free rein. Personal ethics may
  apply but only if managers choose. Respond to
  legal mandates if caught and required to do so.
• Seeks profitability. Other goals are not
  considered.
• Well-Intentioned but selfish in the sense that
  impact on others is not considered.

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Approaches to Management Ethics

• Moral Management
• Management activity conforms to a standard of
  ethical or moral behavior.
• Live by sound ethical standards. Assume
  leadership position when ethical dilemmas arise.
  Enlightened self-interest.
• Seeks profitability within the confines of legal
  obedience and ethical standards
• Management wants to succeed but only within the
  confines of sound ethical precepts.

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Meeting Ethical andMoral Responsibilities

• Sales managers should be aware of three
  particularly relevant types of unethical acts
• Nonrole
• Role Failure
• Role Distortion.

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Meeting Ethical andMoral Responsibilities
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Meeting Ethical andMoral Responsibilities
Type
Direct Effect
Examples
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Problems in Leadership

• Conflicts of Interest (NYSE specialists)
• Chemical Abuse and Dependency
• Problem Salespeople A Disruptive Influence
• Lone Wolf (high sales)
• Corporate Citizens (low sales)
• Institutional Stars (the best)
• Apathetics (fire them)
• Termination of Employment
• Sexual Harassment

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Sexual harassment

• Zero tolerance means?..a good policy?
• California law sets a zero tolerance policy,
  holding employers automatically responsible for
  any supervisor who sexually harasses an employee
  regardless of whether the company knew about
  the offensive conduct. 2003
• California Supreme Court ruled in Nov. 2003 that
  the employee must complain promptly.

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the employer is strictly liable for all acts of
sexual harassment by a supervisor.

• However, the Court announced that an employer can
  raise the defense of "avoidable consequences,"
  which will not eliminate liability, but can be
  used to reduce a plaintiff's damages. The defense
  will apply if the employer can prove three
  elements
• the employer took reasonable steps to prevent and
  correct workplace sexual harassment
• the employee unreasonably failed to use the
  preventive and corrective measures that the
  employer provided and
• reasonable use of the employer's procedures
  would have prevented at least some of the harm
  that the employee suffered.