How are your core sales values reflected in how you sell?
As head coach of the Golden State Warriors, Steve Kerr has built a team that has achieved great success, including winning four NBA championships.
Kerr has built his teams on four core values: mindfulness, compassion, competition and joy.
The Warriors are known for playing a brand of basketball that is remarkable for its teamwork, selflessness, ruthless efficiency and flat out exuberance.
Kerr and his players believe that their team's success, and compulsively watchable style of play, is largely a factor of the degree to which they all have embraced and bought into the culture defined by Kerr's four core values.
Have you thought about how you could incorporate these values into your sales culture to improve your results?
It would be quite a change from the traditional sales rep focused, "what have you done for me lately" sales cultures favored by many sales managers.
Let’s take a quick look at how Kerr’s four values apply to sales.
Mindfulness. It’s about being present for the customer.
It’s about eliminating distractions and being completely focused on the customer.
It’s about being mindful of your obligations to continuously learn in order to increase the value you can deliver to your buyers.
Competition. Sales is all about competition.
You have to love battling tooth and nail with competitors (and inertia) for the right to serve your customers.
Sales is also a competition against yourself. Every day you have to compete against your fears that cause you to shrink from doing the hard, but necessary, things like picking up the phone and calling a prospect.
Compassion. Compassion starts with empathy for your customers.
This is the ability to put yourself in their shoes and examine their questions, problems and goals from their point of view.
It also requires that you have empathy for your colleagues. What are they struggling with and how could they use your help? How can you help them meet their goals?
Joy. Joy is fun.
Actually it’s one step above fun. Joy is what you experience when you are in total command of yourself, your knowledge, your products and your customers.
Joy is the pleasure that comes from the confidence, competence and purpose you display in how you help your buyers.
It’s up to sales managers to cultivate these values in their team.
It starts with modeling these behaviors with your salespeople. Are you completely mindful and distraction free when you meet with a sales rep?
Have you invested the time to really learn about the individuals on your team and their goals, motivations and aspirations?
Do you give your people the freedom to express themselves, to let them decide how to utilize their skills to best serve your customers?
As Steve Kerr said, "A lot of teams have talent, and obviously we have great talent. But when that talent is committed to the greater good and to each other and they actually genuinely care about each other and enjoy each other, that takes you over the top."
Good selling,
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