During the last few years, I have been invited to work with a number of companies that described their lack of growth and progress as a ”sales problem”. They were concerned about the quality of the sales people and their Sales Leader and that if “Sales could be fixed” then all with the world would be right again.

In nearly all cases, they were right. There was a “sales problem”, but it wasn’t the REAL issue. It was a number of other things, but because there was no growth, the blame was laid squarely at the door of sales. However, it was just a symptom of a broader problem. A little like steam coming out of the radiator of a car. Yes, the problem is overheating, but what’s the cause? Perhaps it’s that hole in the radiator.

So, when I went to talk to people at the organizations I quickly found a number of indicators that pointed towards reasons for sales not being able to perform because of a broader leadership and culture issue. Here’s are just a few of those indicators.

Lack of Vision

No-one was aware of where the company was going or how they would get there. How big do we want to be? What’s the organization going to look like in three years and what will be my contribution towards that? It’s difficult to sell when the entire team doesn’t know which direction they should be rowing towards.

No Accountability

When roles are not clearly defined and there is no scorecard to track and measure progress, how do you have meaningful discussions about performance, good or bad? Salespeople thrive on results. That’s why they do it. But if they are not being measured and held accountable where’s the challenge and incentive to succeed?

Ridiculous Targets

Many of the companies I worked with had revenue and profit numbers as their targets for the sales dept. What’s wrong with that? They are lagging indicators and were in most instances not achievable anyway. They were decided on by the CEO or owners without any sales input. When salespeople work out that their remuneration is based on unrealistic targets, they stop selling.

Constant Change

When people in the sales dept. churn regularly then clearly there is a problem. Yes, you can make excuses for every individual move, but if 30% of your salespeople leave in a 6-7 month period, is it really a coincidence or is it a sign of poor leadership and a bad culture?

Issues Never Discussed

When valid issues were raised at sales meetings, they were pushed to one side and never discussed. They never went through the Traction process of IDS (Identify the real issue, Discuss and Solve). As such, the same issues kept coming up or worse, people stopped raising them because they knew they wouldn’t be addressed. If the salespeople can’t sell a particular product in the portfolio and it’s the most profitable item to the company, shouldn’t that be discussed and resolved?

Poor Communication

The management chain of command was circumvented. So instead of decisions being conveyed via the management protocol, it wasn’t communicated at all. So, salespeople got news about changes in personnel or sales portfolios second or third hand, which are often unreliable and inaccurate. Being out of the loop or fed misinformation leads to de-motivation.

Any of these familiar? Is there a problem with growth in your organization? Are you sure it’s just a sales problem? Or is it a leadership problem?