Kevin F. Davis

In an exercise I conduct in all of my sales management workshops, I have sales managers identify the coaching needs of one of their sales reps. Almost everyone has an easy time writing down specific ideas for what the rep could do to improve. Then I ask them, “How many of you have already communicated … Read full article

Several months after attending one of my sales coaching workshops, a VP of Sales told me that one important takeaway she’d gotten was that she tended to be overly trusting of others. I was a little taken aback since I talk a lot about the importance of sales managers having trust and being trustworthy (here, … Read full article

Andy Paul, the host of the sales improvement podcast Accelerate!, reminded me in a recent interview about how sales managers are constantly being told to “improve the productivity of their sales team” through sales coaching. Then he asked me whether that improvement should start with the individual salespeople or with the sales manager. My answer … Read full article

Not long after I became a sales manager, I inherited a second team from a manager who was “de-hired” as the saying now goes. On this inherited team, there was one rep who was a chronic underperformer, never reaching quota and seemingly not very interested in improving. Every month, I’d think to myself, “Will he … Read full article

One question I ask in all my seminars is “what is ineffective sales coaching?” Participants have no trouble coming up with lots of examples. They talk about managers who wait too long before addressing a problem, those who do all the talking and no listening, and those who do not attempt to gain buy-in for … Read full article

As I wrote about last week, the majority of sales managers recognize the importance of attitude or “wills” in determining sales rep success. But few have been taught how to identify, evaluate, and coach attitudes. Here are three steps that are essential for moving in that direction. Step 1: Identify the behavioral aspects of a … Read full article

Last year, I delivered a webinar to combined audiences of 295 sales managers. One of the poll questions I asked was “what percentage of your performance problems do you think are due to poor attitude or ‘wills’?” The most common answer by far was “50-75%”— and overall, nearly 3/4s of the audience attributed a significant … Read full article

David Epstein, author of The Sports Gene, devoted much of his career to studying the behavior of elite athletes and champions. In an interview he gave in conjunction with one of his TED talks, he discussed a pattern he noticed in how champions set their goals. The TED program had just had a segment about … Read full article

If I asked you what was the most valuable contribution you could make as a sales manager, what would you say? A client of mine, Jackie, spent years developing into a stellar sales rep for her employer, a tech company. She had a well-earned reputation for producing results far beyond expectations. They duly rewarded her … Read full article

Within a few years of becoming a salesperson, I’d established myself as a top sales producer. So when I sat down with my sales coach for a monthly one-on-one meeting, I had the smugness of a top dog, sure that I was about to be praised. The meeting went quite different from expectations! My boss … Read full article