The 88% Team
Posted by mike - 08/18/09 at 06:08 pmIf you are in sales, then this article is not for you. And by the way, I’m with you in that excluded group. Yet, this is about sales. Confusion on my part? Hardly. Let’s just identify ourselves as the 12% team that wished we were the battle-chargers of the 100% team, more potent and insurmountable to our competitors and more valuable to our customers.
So here is to the rest of you - the non-sales group. I don’t care what profession you are in - law, medicine, government, etc. - it doesn’t matter. Without one critical element you don’t even exist as a business. That’s right, sales. Statistically, 12% of companies are classified as the sales department. 100% of 12% is 12%. Not much strength there in those numbers - at least not what it could be. But that is how most companies operate. So what’s the solution? Hiring more salespeople to up the percentage? Possibly, but probably also not necessary. But as the saying goes, sales is a numbers game. The greater the numbers the greater the sales. Common sense dictates that that applies to the salesperson’s outside efforts in the search for adding more customers. Where is that numbers mentality as it applies to the inside-the-company efforts? Sorely lacking, that’s where. So how do we get there? We’ll answer that in a moment.
Recognized as the “Inventor of Modern Management”, Peter Drucker’s greatest contribution to business was his mind-set, not methodologies. It always represented intuitive counter-intuitiveness. And it is mind-set that has gotten many businesses in the fix that they are now in. Need I mention GM for example? In his 1954 watershed book The Practice of Management, he stated “There is only one valid definition of business purpose: to create a customer.” He was also of the mind-set that in business there are no such things as “profit centers”, only cost centers. Sprinkling this commentary with these business realities of his, I pose the question: If everything inside the company is a cost center, of which an expected greater-than return on investment is required then to be profitable, how can companies best exploit optimizing sales?
That’s where the 88% team comes in. Now, I’m not dismissing the need to strengthen the 12% of your company that represents the silo of sales, through hiring people with better character along with regular and intensive training to name a few techniques. But what I AM saying is why not focus on the 88% of the company who most likely have the mind-set that they are NOT in sales and therefore disregard it or superficially tolerate it, and work toward converting their mind-set into more of a true sales mentality and focus, thus energy, and get more of that sought after return-on-investment from them as an existing cost center to generate more sales? Put another way, let’s look at simple math.
Realizing that accounting, marketing, HR, operations, etc. do have specific tasks to perform, what if we could extract 10% of their energies in the direction of sales efforts, be they direct or indirect? 10% of 88% is 8.8%, which added to your existing 12% of salespeople serves to nearly double your sales efforts in the aggregate to almost 21% of the company. And which group out of this 88% is a chief area to extract this out of? Clearly it is all executives, apart from the sales executives. They are the most insulated from the market (despite their claims to the contrary while they work their numbers to give the illusion of customer-connectedness).
Drucker would be most complimentary toward Tesco PLC, the UK company who best exemplifies extracting sales momentum, thus revenue, out of all of the employees, including the CEO. By the way, Tesco is the world’s fourth-largest retail chain after Wal-Mart, Home Depot, and France’s Carrefour Group. In the early ’90’s they were a second-rate company annually losing 1-2% market share, with a lousy reputation regarding customer service. And then, the CEO took a different approach and engaged the entire company in a total reorientation and purpose, engaging therefore that 88% that I have been writing about. In their headquarter’s is a plaque that reads CREATE VALUE FOR CUSTOMERS TO EARN THEIR LIFETIME LOYALTY. This company-wide mind-set reinforces their mission to “understand customers better than anyone.” Today, with over 30% of the grocery market, their efforts of company-wide customer-focused incremental changes speak for themselves. The CEO himself regularly works a cash register at various stores by the way - for an entire week!
In a subsequent article I will expand on the Tesco PLC example, furthering my arguments in favor of capitalizing on the 88% Team sales principle. In all of my sales coaching that I have done, none has been more rewarding than working with that “88% Team” to (1) substantially enhance the customer value proposition, (2) enliven the organization, and (3) to go back to my opening statement adding sales effort percentage points to that 12% Team. Let me know how I can address this 88% Team in your company by writing me at info@MikeMuhney.com.
August 19th, 2009 at 5:57 am
Mike very approporiate. A couple of other organisations that work towards the view of all executives must be customer facing are:
a) McDonalds executives must spend at least 1 day every 6 months and the current Australian CEO came from being a casual when she was only a young girl and lives by the example.
b) When Tandy was in Australia all executives and HQ management staff had to spend one day per year in a store and it was amazing to see the change in these people after the experience.
I believe a phrase that you coined of “everybody sells” is one that has stuck with me forever.
It seems and the more you look into an organisation the more organisations need to understand the number of customers who cease to do business with them because of indifference. This often comes from customer attitudes of those who believe they do not sell but provide a service to customers and customers are a distraction to their daily workload. The fact that they exist because of the customer often fails to excite them.