Is Your Sales Onboarding Process Still Working?

Visiting a company recently, it was being explained to me, what a success the digital transformation was. It certainly seemed to be, revenues were up, profits were up and there was a clear vision of direction of travel for the company.

One thing I always looks for in companies, is what I call the "adrenalin shot". Which is a spike of activity, where management make announcements, which is translated into "better get in the office early and keep my head down, so I don't get fired" by the staff. This impacts on the business, but the results are short term spike.

I once worked for a company where 1,000 people were "let go" and activity and efficiency went up!

Change Management

While you're reading this, do me a favour, take your watch off and put it on the other wrist. So if you wear your watch on the left put it on the right wrist and if you wear your watch on the right, take it off and put in on the left.

Feels odd doesn’t it?

That’s what happens in organisations when they change, we do things because we are asked to. Just like moving our watches.

In fact, I bet many of you have already moved the watch back to your preferred wrist.

Again, that is a great example of change. We might know we need to change but we go back to what we did before, because it feels better.

The New Generation

As companies embrace digital transformation and change, they often have programs to help current staff with change.

At previous companies I've worked at, the staff ability to change was seen as a competitive advantage. Each new Financial Year (FY) was met with a re-organisation and we all moved a different direction. In a fast moving world like today, this can be the key to survival, I blog for another day I guess.

One way that you can embed change is to make sure that new entrants to the organisation are immersed in the new culture, values and working practices. Take Social Selling.

Common Social Selling Mistake

Common mistake we see in companies is that “selling” and “Social Selling” are seen as separate process. Typical question is “How much time do I need to give to social selling?”

The answer being that it should be “baked” into what you are doing. (Before I get comments that I’m advocating “playing on social all day”, I’m not.) There is no "analogue" and "digital" selling, it's selling.. Working in a social, buyer dysfunctional world is what we live in and we need to adapt our behaviours to that. Not one or the other, social selling, is, business as usual (BaU).

In his book, "High-Profit Prospecting" Mark Hunter says that nobody needs to cold call anymore (Page 80), he calls it informed calling. That is where you use social and the internet to research the company before making that call. People shouldn't call into a company "cold", we all now have data about companies at our fingertips.

Look Like a Spammer on LinkedIn get Treated like a Spammer

We see time after time, anecdotal evidence that unless you have a good personal brand on LinkedIn you will get treated like a spammer. Look like a spammer on LinkedIn, get treated like a spammer.

Tim, What Has this Got to do with OnBoarding?

Your new staff are new flesh and blood, untainted with “group think” or views like “but we have always done it like that”. I think we all agree with that.

What we see so many times, is that onboarding is so often ingraining those out modded processes or thinking. For example, does your onboarding process have your social aspirations built in? I’m not asking do you have an analogue course and a digital course, but is the digital change you require baked into the on boarding process?