Of course it does. You really wouldn’t expect somebody who delivers sales training for a living to say anything else would you? Google “is sales training worth it?” and you will be met with a raft of data and stats proving that it is.
So, it must be true!
But rather than this now being the shortest article you’ve possibly read I’d like to explore why it might not always work in the way you wanted it to (and what you can do about it).
I’ll start by asking you to think of the salespeople in your business today: It’s likely you have a mix of experience, personalities, ‘natural’ talent and very likely, varying degrees of sales success.
It’s also possible all of them have had at some point some ‘training’ – be that ‘formal ‘training, ad hoc training, manager-led training, on-line courses, etc. Maybe they have read a book or two on the subject.
Maybe you have a team of people who have all had exactly the same level and amount of training yet, amazingly - even frustratingly - you still have a wide band of performance as a result.
How can that be if sales is a prescriptive, stepping-stone process? Surely it must be a prescriptive process, because that’s what all the books say. ‘Follow these steps. Do this and then this. If they say this, you say that’ and so on.
We know, of course, that the sales process if anything but prescriptive as the variables involved are numerous – the salespeople themselves, the customer dynamic, the business they work in, the products or services you sell, the markets you operate in.
We know that a prescriptive approach to sales training is not going to deliver a prescriptive outcome. Yes, the sales process has recognisable steps to it and that’s easy to ‘train’ people on, but the way that people embrace training and benefit from it changes from one team and one person to the next. What works for one may not work for others. And what worked last year may not be working this.
Having spent too many years than I care to admit to working in sales and sales team development and having delivered 100’s of sales training courses over those years, I have summarised below the 6 key things, in my experience, worth remembering when it comes to training your salespeople – the reasons it (sometimes) doesn’t work and what you can do about it.
When sales training doesn’t work (and what you can do about it)
My Top 6
Why It Doesn’t Work (1) - It’s Not a Pot Noodle
You can’t do some training and expect instant, ready-to-eat results. Training is a personal experience and any skills or tips learned through training workshops and such must be practically applied and become a habit through doing. Practice. Trial and error if you like. It really is like learning a language. Nobody is going to read a book or watch a video and be fluent in that language after a day’s ‘training’. Some will learn quicker than others.
What Can You Do About it?
Make sure any training isn’t just delivered as a ‘quick fix’ but continually reinforced. Review the skills people have learned. What’s working well and what’s not working so well. Is it the on-going day-to-day application of the training that’s not delivering the results? Was it just a one-off that didn’t work (and therefore it has been discarded)?
Consider creating a regular review process (I call them sales therapy sessions), where others in your team share examples of success (and failure – this is as healthy as success) and what they did and how they got results.
Be prepared to re-visit training, even the same subjects, more than once. Maybe even multiple times in order to learn the language.
Why It Doesn’t Work (2) - The training has no ‘meaning’
One of my favourite gripes. The ‘why?’ question. Training for the sake of training is not just a missed opportunity to stimulate but also to make it ‘sticky’ through having a purpose. Quite often, sales training is applied as a ‘tick-box’ exercise, and that is a shame. Alignment of the reason for any training with your team or company goals is an absolute must.
I’ll normally open a workshop with asking people why they are here. ‘I was told I had to come’ is not an uncommon response! Make sure your people know why you are investing in them. And make it about them. Of course you want the business to benefit, but that will only happen if they are successful.
What Can You Do About It?
Make sure when you are thinking about delivering sales training that it is clearly aligned with the sales objectives of the person, the team and the business as a whole and that your people can answer the ‘why?’ question’.
Make sure your people know why you are investing in them and the part they play in it.
Maybe give it an identity, a project name: ‘I’m here because it’s a key part of Project Lift-off’.
To create real meaning sales training should be married to clear goals and objectives – sales growth, pipeline development, new business generation, customer retention, improved customer engagement, advantage over your competitors etc.
Why It Doesn’t Work (3 )- One-size-doesn’t fit-all
Now I do love a workshop. I love the in-person format of a training workshop. The reward of stimulating the ‘I don’t want to be here’s’ to embrace the session; the challenge of ‘managing’ the ‘I know the answers to everything’ into being a part of the session and not the focus of the session itself. I love to see reluctant arms unfold and the spot secret “I’ll just write that down when nobody is looking’ types who arrived with ‘I’ve seen this all before’ mindset. But it’s not the best format for everybody and it needn’t be the only one either.
What Can You Do About It?
Some people thrive better in a different environment to a workshop. Some people will absorb better from on-line learning, others from one-to-one coaching, management-led/on-the-job training, peer-to-peer. Some people really do get the most benefit from reading a book on that subject.
So, mix it up. As much as you can. And apply as many training formats as possible too – workshops, on-line, one-to-one, management-led, peer-to-peer etc.
Why It Doesn’t Work (4) - It takes up valuable time
You often hear this from people who are (currently) delivering a positive sales performance. They are on a winning streak, and this is an interruption to that streak. Likewise, you may hear this from people who are under-performing too - ‘I haven’t got time for training, I need to do X and Y as my numbers are down’.
This mainly occurs when a business regards sales training as ‘turn off an on-able’ and not part of their culture of development. Even worse is when training is only applied when the numbers aren’t great – it can be seen as a consequence of poor performance and not as a benefit to the individual and business through creating a culture of continuous improvement. Which is what it should be.
What Can You Do About It?
Yes, training is an investment of time – yours and theirs – but it needn’t be a disruptor to business. It shouldn’t be. An all-day workshop needn’t be the only answer to training (I can’t believe I’m saying this) – maybe consider shorter half-day sessions on two or three subjects at a time and spread it over a longer period. I love half-day sessions personally and rarely experience attendees saying ‘thank the Lord that’s over’ (to my face at least!).
And please don’t leave long periods of time between training. I know of some businesses, some very big businesses, who haven’t provided training for 2, 3, even 5 years. Think how much will have changed in that period. Customers, competitors, products, services, your customer proposition itself. And even the most stable and established team will likely have taken on poor habits or, worse still, influenced others in the same way.
Sales training, and I don’t necessarily mean outside training companies/providers, should be a constant feature of a business – this can be done be at the end of a sales meeting, once a month/quarter, on-line single subjects or one-to-one sessions. Make it a positive and constant feature and not viewed as an interruption.
When it comes to ‘interrupting’ those on a winning streak, perhaps consider using them in your training. Seek their opinions and advice for you/them to share with others. Peer-to-peer training is very impactful for the trainee and the (current) sales superstar too, building their confidence and status and encouraging them to continue being a superstar - and getting great results – that others continue to look up to.
Another option is to leave out the superstars from the training. A demotivated attended makes it less enjoyable for those who are motivated to learn. Or, my preference, is to make it optional. I have literally never known a superstar choose to miss an optional training workshop (more than once!).
Why It Doesn’t Work (5) - It’s expensive (so we don’t do it much/at all)
As someone who makes his living from delivering training, I would say it’s almost always value for money (I would!) and, possibly, more impactful to engage an outsider to deliver your sales training. An outsider is more likely to be seen as an investment by the trainees and may be taken more seriously and, as I’ve experienced, create a more comfortable place for people to challenge and contribute and share their concerns, weaknesses even. The outsider will also be more inclined to challenge areas that are less obvious to those in the business, and encourage the re-visiting of (and the correction of) a bad habit or two that may have crept in. An outsider is also more likely to get the trainees to be more open minded and ready to engage - I liken it to my teenager telling me his friends dad gave him some great advice he’s going to take on board despite me giving him the same advice 12 times already!
What Can You Do About It?
An outside provider, and the expense of an outside provider, needn’t be the only answer to deliver sales training in your business. Quite often I am asked to teach people how to train their employees to deliver training themselves. I think this is healthy. Having someone in your business who is not only fully engaged in the day-to-day of your business but understands it and the people in it will have great benefit.
And the ‘internal’ person delivering the training will benefit too in the same way the sales ‘superstar’ does above. Maybe consider teaching your internal people training skills.
An outsider doesn’t necessarily mean someone outside of the business either. It could be someone from another department or team or location or division. The only real expense you should continually ‘invest’ in is time. Think of it this way - every time you try and engage with a customer or prospect you are asking for an investment of their time so that you can deliver benefits for them and/or their business. The same thinking really should apply to how you and your team view sales training.
To see evidence if this investment is delivering an ROI then your sales dashboards should be linked to the training itself – preferably a before and after view – so you can track whether the ‘investment’ was worth it or not! If you do it right….it will be!
Why It Doesn’t Work (6) – It was a bit too ‘generic’ for us
Making sales training impactful doesn’t just need a skilled trainer with good content but can be taken up a notch if the content is as -tailored-as-possible to your business and your audience.
Sometimes, businesses will default to a specialist in their sector and that is definitely a bonus; it adds credibility for the attendees if the trainer can demonstrate knowledge of their business or market or customer type, and especially so if they have good experience in doing their job too - in this case ‘sales’.
More often, businesses will engage with a training specialist who doesn’t have experience in their industry and that can definitely work well.
(I have attended many training sessions that were equally as useful even though the trainer had not worked a day in my industry (a particularly memorable one was a management and leadership course delivered by the former CEO of Lufthanser - brilliant).
But to make it less ‘generic’ and more dynamic it takes a little bit of time to properly brief the trainer.
What Can You Do About It?
It’s simple really. You need to provide the trainer with as much of a brief as you can. Ideally, I would seek to understand as much as I can about the people in the room, their backgrounds, the company culture, the sales methodology you use/prefer (if you do), your customer type, the challenges you (regularly) face, any recent notable changes to/in your business/sector before any training takes place.
It is also useful to know about any management traits/behaviours, challenges, experience; examples of ‘what good looks like’ in your business and the general strategic/business goals and objectives (not just the sales ones), and what I like to call ‘internal objections’. Internal objections are the things you hear of in your sales team around why it is difficult to be successful. For example; “I would be more successful if we could only get purchasing to buy better” (an old favourite!), or ‘we spend so much time on admin I don’t have time to sell’. Any kind of ‘it’s not my fault, it’s theirs’ examples are very useful.
Given a thorough brief like this, it makes it easier for any decent sales trainer to tailor their content and/or emphasis of key areas to make the most of the time and make it more tailored to the trainees.
Gary Naphtali
With a 30-year career in sales leadership and senior leadership roles at a regional, national and international level, Gary has worked with, advised, coached, mentored and trained salespeople, sales leaders and sales teams from over 100 different businesses across a variety of commercial sectors, from start-up to recognised market-leaders.
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