How much time should I spend coaching new sales people?

by Dave Kahle

Question:

I have three new salespeople and a handful of more experienced reps.  I find myself spending a disproportionate amount of time with the new guys, and, therefore, ignoring the others.  Is this OK?  Or should I spread my coaching time around to be equally available to all of them?

Answer:

Let me give you a short answer as well as a long answer. The short answer is this:  Yes.  It’s OK.  You’re doing fine.

Here’s the long answer.

As you work intently with the new salespeople, hopefully, you are helping them to understand how to do their jobs well.  You are educating them on the principles and practices of successful sales in your field.  Not only that, but you are also, I hope, helping them to create positive habits which will be repeated numerous times over the next few years.

Sales Leaders - A rare and real opportunity to UP YOUR GAME

Take it to another level. Multiply your influence, success, knowledge, and confidence, with our Sales Management experts.

A mix of live training combined with videos, audio, and written material.

Since a new salesperson is, as a general rule, much more open to learning than a more experienced person, your efforts will return better than average results.  If you only had one hour of coaching time to allocate, for example, that hour would get more payback if you invested it in a new person than if you invested it in a more experienced one.

     Now let’s look at the other side of the issue – your more experienced salespeople.  Let’s start with an observation that I have made over the years:  Just because a salesperson has the experience, that does not mean that he/she knows how to do the job well.

     You cannot count on all your current salespeople to know how to do the job well.  You can count on them having arrived at ... CLICK HERE TO READ FULL ARTICLE