Achieving Effective Execution (II)

Execution occurs at three different realms in a sales environment:

  • sales process
  • customer service
  • management

Sales management

  1. Every consumer every time - every customer contact is an opportunity to delight and to offer another product or service. We need to capture every "time at bat" with the customer, and remember that those with the most home runs also had the most strikeouts. There is no excuse for not exploring an additional need with the customer EVERY TIME
  2. Strive for five - there is a direct correlation between the number of relationships a customer has with the bank and their retention. Therefore, each time we open a new account we expect at least 5 relationships with the account: checking, savings, debit card, credit card, direct deposit and overdraft protection. Expecting or accepting less shortchanges both the customer and the shareholder.
  3. FLOYD (follow your leads or you die) - without follow up many of the best leads wither out. Continuous follow up pays - the sale has to be important enough for us to call the customer repeatedly until the customer sees the value we offer him/her or we are confident that we gave the customer every opportunity to fulfill their needs.
  4. Power curve - if you start fast you'll finish first. It also reduces anxiety when the salesperson is ahead of the curve. Therefore fast start is an important emotional and practical management tool.
  5. Billing time - if you think of your ti8me as billable and very scarce, you will use it more carefully. Further, if you take the time with the customer, they owe you for that time; you have the right to ask for their business. Having been in the consulting business I know very well that time is money. Our own people need to learn the same concept and act on it.
  6. Do not sell anything before its time - take your time and ask the open-ended questions that a good profiling process requires. You'll have plenty of opportunity to close later; but if you close prematurely you will not uncover the full set of unmet customer needs.

Customer service

  1. Surprise and delight - it's an old rule, but executing it is still difficult for many. Exceeding client expectations is a very effective tool to achieve retention and satisfaction.
  2. Five minutes to show time - huddling the entire sales team prior to store opening is a great tool to fire everyone up and focus them on today's activities. Like a sports team, the huddle builds teamwork and reminds people of what's important. It's also a great "pick up" tool!
  3. All customers are Not created equal - a tough concept to accept but truth nonetheless. Airlines, hotels, and many other retailers treat their best customers with better service and pricing. So should we!

Management

  1. Confront - if you don't today it will be a bigger problem tomorrow; if you don't then you lose the right to confront. Confrontation is hard on people, but it is an essential and effective management tool, and indispensible for executing strategy effectively.
  2. Create peer pressure - friendly competition is good. So long as people accept the need for the entire team to win, competition within teams, across branches and within stores, adds things fun and adds spice to daily life. Use it!
  3. Model high performance - managers need to be able to show their team mates HOW to do things, not only to tell them what needs to be done. Leadership by example is an essential coaching tool which many managers are hesitant to use because they are not comfortable with the "doing" part. Getting there is a large part of successful coaching and team building.
  4. Training does not change behavior; management follow up does - training is one of the greatest excuses in the business. When asked, many team members say that with additional training they could do whatever we ask them to do. Once the training is over, we are surprised time and again to find that nothing changed. This is because management must follow up on training in order to create on going behavior change and clearly demonstrate that the training was not a fad but an integral expectation of the job.
  5. Manage currently - too many of us manage historically, to old and stale numbers. We then blame systems for our inability to get fresh information. Any manager can develop current information and ACT on it by creating informal reporting systems. While cumbersome, they are critical to timely feedback, both positive and negative, and to midcourse corrections. Of course, information that is not acted upon is more distressing to the field than its absence, so if you ask for information, do something with it!

Effective execution requires consistency, persistency, focus and relentnessness. We hope that the few tips provided above will give you a sense of the relentless execution philosophy we subscribe to, and some ideas about getting it done in your own institution.