The lack of personal accountability is the most costly disease in sales.
Developing personal accountability is the most critical "sales training" you can provide your sales team.
No sales training, regardless of how amazing it is, will make up for a lack of personal accountability. Before you offer sales training, make sure each salesperson is a role model of personal accountability.
There is no more powerful trait your sales culture needs than personal accountability.
“Salespeople who practice PERSONAL ACCOUNTABILITY never blame their manager, the marketing department, the competition’s pricing, their family of origin - or anything else - for their numbers. They simply say, ‘I own my results. No excuses.’” - John Miller - author of QBQ! - The Question Behind the Question
Consider your most recent coaching challenges. How frequently is a lack of personal accountability a contributor to poor sales performance? Salespeople who do not model personal accountability, tend to blame others, play victim, and procrastinate, all of which can be insanely expensive.
What is the lack of personal accountability costing your company?
What are you going to do about it?
What does personal accountability looks like in sales?
Salespeople with personal accountability speak a language of possibility. Instead of talking about what cannot be done, the focus is on what can be.
Salespeople with personal accountability do not blame others, play the victim, nor procrastinate. Salespeople with personal accountability get the right things done.
Energy is high.
When this energy is maximized, good salespeople do what comes naturally to them. They solve Client problems.
How to maximize personal accountability in your sales team.
If you want to maximize personal accountability in your sales team, there are three essential conditions you must create:
- Hire the best salespeople in the first place.
- Train for personal accountability.
- Expect and model personal accountability.
Hire the best salespeople in the first place.
Salespeople who are not meant to be salespeople will quickly blame everyone but themselves, will play the victim, and will procrastinate. Salespeople who are not "wired" for the particular sales role they are in will not bounce back from setbacks. In fact, setbacks often turn into increasing anxiety for low job fit salespeople. This is a universal truth that cannot be overcome. Hire the best salesperson for the sales role in the first place.
Conversely, when the best salespeople are hired, then personal accountability becomes a highly-learnable skill and an accelerant.
No one can undo through training what God and nurture have shaped through DNA and years of conditioning. The right salesperson for a particular sales role requires awareness of the needs of the position and the correct combination of Behaviors, Motivators, Acumen, and Skills of each salesperson to fulfill those needs.
Train for personal accountability.
Training is easy when you use the powerful QBQ! - The Question Behind the Question personal accountability program developed by John Miller.
QBQ! is a powerful eight-hour learning program that can be self-facilitated if desired. This is the kind of training that should be completed annually to ensure personal accountability remains strong in your sales team.
Expect and model personal accountability.
If you seek to consistently win, then you must make personal accountability a core part of your sales team's culture. Personal accountability is modeled through language and action. It begins with sales management and leadership. When you expect and model personal accountability, your sales team will as well.
Salespeople who are unable or unwilling to model personal accountability must be set free to work for a competitor.
Decide.
If you are serious about maximizing sales, then do what it takes to make personal accountability a core value.
If you would like to learn more about how to improve personal accountability in your sales team, give us a call.
