Can HR Leaders Drive Sales Team Easily? Traditionally, It has been observed that the HR department and sales department never work on the same platform.
Human resources deal with recruitment and employee issues. Whereas the sales department focuses on driving sales for the company.
However, today in many workplaces, these two departments are integrated. Where the HR department is now tasked to drive the company’s sales team. Again the question is raised Can HR Leaders Drive Sales Team Easily?
A leader with a combination of HR & Sales skills is found very rare. Today’s top and successful leaders in giant corporates have passed thru’ this ladder. Corporations have to nourish these leaders.
90% of the sales team issues related to HR are solved on the spot during discussions same vice versa.
My answer to the question Can HR Leaders Drive Sales Team Easily? is big YES human resources can handle the sales team. Tips on how HR can drive sales teams more effectively.
Can Human Resource leaders drive the Sales Teams?
1. Know-How of Company Products
The HR leaders must understand the company products and the sales strategies used in marketing them.
This will allow them to understand what talent is needed and in what places to find the candidates. HR and sales teammates should have discussions.
Only meeting in the conference room will not help the leaders to understand the business ground realities. Leaders will have to be with the sales team on the field every day. Meeting with customers and feedback on the product is very critical.
2. Mapping Performance of the Sales Team
The mapping performance of a sales team up to date gives HR leaders a clear understanding of what’s working and what’s failing. It gives recruiters a key reference point to leverage when hiring candidates.
By mapping the performance on a daily/weekly/fourth nightly basis. HR leaders can identify the right talent for the job position.
Many salespeople who get hired did not flourish because they were put in the wrong positions. HR leaders can map such talents and accordingly put them in the correct position.
3. Perfect onboarding
For HR leaders to create a top-notch onboarding program, they need a clear strategy for Sales that aligns with revenue goals.
There are three primary components of an onboarding strategy that HR leaders know. A clear understanding of onboarding, pre-hiring documents, and sales material.
By sharing clear benchmarks and objectives, HR leaders have a bird’s-eye view of the goals of the onboarding program.
Sales-specific reading materials provided by HR with tools, to educate recruits on their first day. And once a new hire arrives, a detailed sales playbook serves as a textbook during the onboarding process.
4. Understand the Hiring
In normal conditions, HR just hires people for the sales team according to the recruitment requests. Can Human Resource leaders drive the Sales Team?
Instead, in these conditions the sales team will work on common leadership. HR leaders know exactly about the responsibility metrics for the job descriptions based on ground realities.
Leaders need not wait for the manpower requisitions for the new hiring process. Instead, hire a salesperson with the experience and skills required.
5. Clarity at the time of the Hiring Process
Clarity at the time of hiring processes and estimated timelines create a mutually beneficial framework for the recruitment process.
Leaders should advocate for a rigorous three-tiered interview process that eliminates average and below-average salespeople.
This approach leaves only those candidates who demonstrate the skills, experience, and sales DNA.
The first interview qualifies the candidate. The second interview measures skill level and experience. The third interview analyzes behavior, attitude, and a psychometric assessment.
6. Regular Training for Middle Sales Team
Sales managers cannot give their attention to all the employees. They tend to put a lot of focus on the top and bottom performers.
However, the middle-level team where most results are produced often gets neglected. Therefore, HR leaders should incentivize the middle section.
Organizing on-field training programs for them to participate under the supervision of their seniors. This will help them to achieve next-level targets. They can also conduct trainings to educate all employees of the sales team on how to use various resources.
In this Digital era, HR leaders can make small on or off-field documentary films to train their all sales personnel. Stepwise sales videos can be prepared to complete sales.
Providing access to training videos can help employees and boost retention rates. These short product-oriented films can reduce costs. These training videos can be prepared in collaboration with sales & hr experiences.
7. Administrative issues
Many times I have observed while on tour as an HR professional. While Interaction with the teams I used to find a few pending issues used to unaddressed for a long time. HR leaders can address all the pending issues & on the spot, and they can be helped to get resolve them.
8. Develop a weekly Incentive System
Leaders should work with the sales department to develop a weekly compensation system that meets the company’s goals. The sales manager should discuss with the leaders the incentives they offer for the sales team.
They could incorporate them into the compensation plan. The compensation plan can motivate the sales team to keep in good performance and meet the company goals.
They should also take into account the recession when creating compensation packages. In this way, the company can reduce the risk of losing profitable sales workers that are hard to replace.
9. Create a Strong Sales Culture
Without a strong sales culture, HR personnel can’t attract and retain top sales personnel. The best talent wants to work and grow in a sales team. That is engaging, competitive, and respected within the larger organization.
HR leaders need to diligently work to ensure effective recruitment & retention of their manpower. Leaders have to need to acknowledge the champions of their teams in the wider organization.
10. Create a Diverse SalesForce
HR plays an important role in creating a diverse sales force. The diverse sales force is especially important when the customers are made of different gender, race, and ethnicities.
If the company did not maintain a diverse sales force, they can be accused of discrimination. The diverse team introduces fresh ideas and different perspectives. People from different backgrounds boost the company’s brand.
It can help to foster a positive image of an employee brand that can attract top sales performers to work for your company.
11. Identify Skills, Experience, and DNA
These three characteristics — skills, experience, and DNA — help recruiters to narrow a group of potential salespeople. Those who are most likely to excel in their organization’s unique selling environment.
Many employee turnover results due to bad hires. Leaders have to be very specific about the exact characteristics of an ideal hire. The lower the chances of a hiring mistake.
Primary Skills:
Leaders have to work on the skill sets of an outstanding salesperson.
- Ability to connect prospects to meet those needs.
- Ability to collaborate with prospects to achieve positive results.
- Good capacity to negotiate and conclude agreements effectively.
- Good understanding of the product and demand.
- Outstanding ability to reduce the risky behavior of a prospect.
- Ability to sell against profit/loss statements.
- Ability to think out of the box and resolve issues.
- Willingness to market to several stakeholders.
For you
These two departments under one umbrella or you can say the partnership between HR & Sales is the backbone of any organization. Sales will be in safer hands.
This collaboration will help the organization in many aspects. Hr leaders can create a strong pipeline of sales teams that will consistently drive profitable revenue and achieve sales targets.
Really well drafted, very informative indeed.