We get asked all the time, "What does a sales management advisor do?" Well, we could tell you what they do, or we can tell you why companies invest in them.
Sales management advisors are most often invited into organizations when they've plateaued and want to reach a new level of results faster.
A good sales management advisor generally has a proven methodology, point of view, and vast knowledge from all sorts of industries. They are then able to take their previous experience and articulate and implement effective processes and tools to serve you and your organization best.
The knowledge from other industries gives them a well-rounded perspective and point of view of problems you may have encountered or have yet to face.
One reason companies choose to invest in sales management advisors is to gain an outside perspective. Most times, when sales leaders have been with a company for several years or more, they have obtained the company's point of view and almost put themselves in a box by having to defend their previous decisions or results. A sales management advisor will come in and bring their knowledge from what they have gathered from other organizations and ask fresh questions, offer multiple options, and help apply it to a specific situation.
Sales management advisors have different insights and experiences that can help you approach your challenge from a unique angle. Their outside perspective enables you to infuse your strategies with freshness and unexpected approaches. It's natural to see things one way when that's the only thing you've been around for so long. Albert Einstein is quoted as saying, "No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it."
Change happens every day everywhere, and a great sales management advisor will be able to assist your sales leader and their team to push past their barriers and wholly adopt a new method or process.
A sales management advisor can analyze which characteristic of adoption is causing the team to halt. There is:
Not only are they able to analyze the team, but they are also able to set the rate of which change happens. For example, if the current sales leader has a nine-step process, then the advisor will be able to boil those nine steps down to three steps knowing that the sales leader will implement those other steps later. The sales advisor will be able to set the pace for the sales team, so they continue to move forward, yet the team does not get overwhelmed.
The best sales management advisors will work with you and your sales leader to give you the best advice there is. They want to make sure your sales leader becomes the best leader they can, and your organization thrives. The advisor is not there to "show-up" your current sales leader but rather help them reach their full potential.
At Pivotal Advisors, one of our core values is to "treat every organization as if it's our own." That means our Sr. Advisors will not do anything unless they genuinely believe it is what's best for that organization.
There are a lot of interdepartmental walls within an organization. According to The Culture Economy Report, "out of those who had feelings of distrust towards their leaders, 38% said that the reason was that they were too involved in office politics." If your sales team is under the impression that their sales leader is investing more time and energy in the office politics, the team will begin to doubt that their sales leader is focused on goals, objectives, and business growth.
A great sales management advisor will be able to come in and start knocking down all those walls and building trust among the sales department and everyone else at the organization.
There are many reasons for politics in the office, and the sales leader may have already had a lot of the same ideas that the sales advisor has but hasn't been able to act on it because:
In more instances than not, a sales leader will know the messages were right, the messenger was right, but the timing was indeed off. Then the sales management advisor can help the sales leader figure out when the timing is correct, how and when to gain buy-in to put their idea into action.
Great sales management advisors are skilled in the art of communication and will help you. They have to be in countless relationships at the organizational level, in communities and groups, and sometimes on a national or global scale. They then can gather previously expressed ideas, new ideas, and outside ideas to rally the team around a shared goal.
Many people will read a book and understand what they need to do and what to implement, but it's the sales management advisor that helps you put the steps in place and communicates with the rest of the company what needs to be done. Communication is one of the keys to a successful leader.
Investing in a sales management advisor allows for an outside perspective of your company, sets the appropriate pace for your sales team, works with your sales leader to reach their full potential, helps to back up good ideas, and provides effective communication strategies. A great sales management advisor will help your company reach new heights as well as break down barriers for more success.
Interested? Learn more about our Sales Advisory Program and our Advisors.
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