Never Lay Off Another Employee

T h e C h i e f S a l e s O f f i c e r

Never Lay Off Another Employee

Greetings!

Since the CSO in most organizations is also the CEO, this insight is being delivered to you. This concept builds on two important principles:

"There are two types of people in the world: those who know they are in sales and those who don't." - Chuckism #4
The person doing the job knows best how to do it better.

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Never Lay Off Another Employee

More of the new normal in leadership

If you ever have the privilege of meeting Leo Wells, don't be deceived. The successful CEO of Wells REIT, Leo comes across as a good-old-boy with his easy smile and genuine interest in others. He's a very successful person - however you measure success.

"CEOs dread confrontation." We were discussing the need to reduce headcount during a recession and Leo Wells was explaining why many CEOs know the rule: "Hire Slow; Fire Fast" but have trouble following it. Few people enjoy laying off employees. As the discussion continued, a great idea emerged.

"Whenever two minds come together, a third mind is created"
- Chuckism #27

As Leo talked about how force reductions ultimately lead to productivity increases, it occurred to me that we could use an approach to headcount that has proven successful in finance: zero-based budgets. With this concept, every year each company or department begins with no budget and has to build a case for every dollar it will need.

What if we asked every employee to begin each year by justifying their position? They would lay out how their time would be used, how it would benefit the company/department and, as well as possible, quantify what their contribution would be worth.

Why it just might work:

·      Everyone would at least be conscious of the corporate objective: profit.
·     The best ideas come from the people who do the work - this would encourage creativity
·      Ruts would be avoided or, at least, revealed
·      Employees might be able to take on additional responsibilities freeing up man-hours that could be reallocated elsewhere in the company

Why it might not:

·      There would be a sense of insecurity - especially among the less assertive employees.
·      Less capable employees who happen to be able to sell themselves better than others might outshine (outsell!) other, more productive people.

Some ideas to make it work:

Make it clear that your objective is better use of resources, not reduction in manpower. If additional man-hours are freed up during this process, they will be reallocated elsewhere.
Have departmental brainstorming sessions. (You may need to teach or review the rules of brainstorming.)
Encourage creativity - reward it verbally and frequently. There are no bad ideas.
Teach basic selling skills to everyone so that they will be able to better communicate their ideas.
People who are not performing know it, they are usually as unhappy in the position as the company is and they typically need an incentive to leave. This can do it.

I used this process recently with one of my favorite non-profits. Some of the people at the table had not thought about how their specific activities would benefit the organization; they had only thought about doing their job. Once we laid out the need for quantifiable value, they immediately began offering ideas and suggestions for better utilization of their resources.

Lesson learned:

Early in my consulting career I worked with a CEO in sales improvement and cost controls in his company. One non-revenue generating department had an employee retire and the company was having trouble finding a qualified replacement even though the position paid well. At my suggestion, the CEO approached the others in the department with the offer of either replacing the employee or spreading out the work to the remaining employees in exchange for a pay increase. How did the employees in the department respond, do you think?

Want some questions to ask your team members?

Just email me and I'll give you some ideas to get you started. I'll need to know your web site address and the key issues you believe are hurting your numbers.

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Now It's Really Getting Interesting!

I sent out two proposals last week: one to double the number of salespeople in one organization and one to completely eliminate the sales force though automation in another. Can it get any weirder?

Double the Salesforce

A rather brilliant company (anonymity here) has found a way to combine two of the hottest trends and create enormous opportunity in an industry that has, until now, been a commodity industry. They are combining progressive pricing and selling to the secondary market. They will incorporate Supply Chain Selling to simultaneously protect and grow their core business. I wish I could tell you more - these people are on to something, I believe, as evidenced by the need for more salespeople. Incidentally, they will be able to self-fund the new hires after adding only a few additional people.

Later this week I will be discussing a similar approach for a construction company. Construction, you know, "the industry is on the ropes", "companies are failing". Don't tell these folks; they're out looking for more new opportunities.

Completely Automate the Salesforce

I've been looking for an opportunity like this for years. Obviously all of the stars have to line up to make this one work. First of all, the outside salespeople are not producing and it is a combination of the economy, industry trends (not fads) and their own behavior. The old game is over. Since the role of the salespeople was "introduction" and the day-to-day sales are managed by an in-house team, what we actually did was to automate the introduction:

Creative traditional marketing methods are used to compel prospects to take a three minute online training course. ("The single, most important function of sales is to teach." - Chuckism #26)
After the course, they are handed a calculator to cost-justify doing business with the client.
A single click or phone call puts them in touch with the inside sales team who close a high percentage and up-sell many of them.

Compensation is shifted to primarily commission only, even for me!

Dollars saved: Six figures annually.

New Revenue: Estimated seven figures over 2.5 years.

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Extreme Sales Analysis of Your Organization

Three Month Offer!

You realize something has to change in your sales organization. The old rules are not working in this new economy and you wonder if you need to add or delete salespeople, change your compensation plan or your incentive program and you may be wondering if your current internal and external structures are the best. Meanwhile, you will need to look at pricing options, client prioritization and product mix.

For the next three months I am offering a one-day, onsite sales analysis to look at the aspects listed above and more. We will walk through every aspect of your sales situation and determine whether you need to "fine tune the familiar" or redefine the process. Then we will develop an action plan to make it happen.

Your investment will be $3500 for Vistage members; $5200 for others. This includes the pre-work analysis, the onsite day and the follow-up report and action plan. This is good only through the end of 2009 (there are two open dates in September). Contact me for details.

You don't need to try and figure this one out on your own. Bring in a resource that has seen hundreds of sales teams, turned around scores of them and who already knows where the obstacles are.

Need training? Remember: I'm using Progressive Pricing right now so tell me what outcome you want and what your budget is and I'll show you how I can help.

Whatever you do, seek out the help your organization needs
and do it now.

1.800 MR. REAVES (800.677.3283)

Or email me by clicking on the link
at the bottom of this edition

(Chuck@ChuckReaves.com)

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