What Happens When Salespeople Don't Meet Expectations?

Guest post by: Dave Kurlan
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Salespeople Must Stop Snorkeling and Start Scuba Diving - By Dave Kurlan

There was a tremendous amount of hype surrounding the Red Sox-Yankees opening day game. Two ace pitchers were to take the mound when Josh Beckett, pitching for the Sox, would face CC Sabathia, hurling for the Yankees. Two of the best pitchers going head to head against two of the best offenses in baseball. What a pitching duel this could be! Well the opportunity to watch a pitching duel never materialized as both teams hit better than they pitched. The game itself was fun, but the pitching matchup failed to meet expectations.

Yesterday must have been an incredibly slow news day. The 11 PM News had a brush fire in Boston (a brush fire?), Josh Beckett's contract extension, Tiger Woods' first day back to the PGA, The President throwing out the first ball at the Washington Nationals' Opening Day Game, and two women who, while walking in their neighborhood, were struck by pellets fired by bicycle riding teenagers. I kid you not. For the Beckett, Woods and Obama stories to be included as part of the news instead of the sports shows just how slow a news day it was. Yesterday's news really failed to meet expectations.

Yesterday, one of your salespeople learned that their opportunity with that nice large account is not going to develop. While they were simply out kicking tires, your salesperson got excited about the potential. In the end, the prospect decided to stay with their incumbent vendor. This opportunity failed to meet expectations.

What's the difference between a baseball game or the news failing to meet expectations versus one of your salespeople's opportunities failing to meet expectations? (Rick was writing about the same thing this morning!)

The game and the news are quickly forgotten and don't impact your life unless you bet on the outcome of the game or happen to be the leading story on the news. When your salespeople focus too much of their time and resources on a large opportunity and it doesn't materialize, you can lose 6-12 months of productivity from them. Not only that, your forecasts fall short, your budget goes to hell, and you could have a frustrated, demotivated salesperson on your hands. The worst part is if you have a long sales cycle, say 8-12 months, and the salesperson devoted most of his time and energy to this opportunity for 8-12 months, it will take an additional 8-12 months before the pipeline will produce new, meaningful revenue.

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Salespeople Must Stop Snorkeling and Start Scuba Diving - By Dave Kurlan

About the Author: Dave Kurlan

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Dave Kurlan is a best-selling author, top-rated speaker and thought leader on sales development. He is the founder and CEO of Objective Management Group, Inc., the industry leader in sales assessments and sales force evaluations, and the CEO of David Kurlan & Associates, Inc., a consulting firm specializing in sales force development. Dave has been a top rated speaker at Inc. Magazine's Conference on Growing the Company, the Sales & Marketing Management Conference and the Gazelles Sales & Marketing Summit. He has been featured on radio and TV, including World Business Review with General Norman Schwarzkopf, in Inc. Magazine, Selling Power Magazine, Sales & Marketing Management Magazine and Incentive Magazine. He is the author of Mindless Selling and Baseline Selling – How to Become a Sales Superstar by Using What You Already Know about the Game of Baseball. He created and wrote STAR, a proprietary recruiting process for hiring great salespeople, and he writes Understanding the Sales Force, a popular business Blog and is a contributing author to The Death of 20th Century Selling (Dan Seidman), Stepping Stones (Deepak Chopra and Brian Tracey) and 101 Great Ways to Improve Your Life, Volume 2 (David Riklan).
Click here to visit Dave's website.

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