The leadership qualities that sales leaders possess are rooted in seven powerful beliefs:
- Belief #1: You can improve any area of your life that you choose. Effective salespeople are always more interested in what they don’t yet know than in what they do know. They realize any hope for future sales success can only come from learning and implementing. They search constantly for new knowledge that they can apply in their careers, and applying that new knowledge is what leads to sales success.
- Belief #2: Everything is possible. Truly successful salespeople find ways to abandon biases that may hold them back. They believe great things are possible. They assume things can be done. To make great things possible, they are willing to revise their strategies, their level of intensity and their focus. They understand they must grow and be prepared to do things differently if they wish to sell more.
- Belief #3: Preparation maximizes potential. To accept this belief, sales leaders are willing to invest the time and effort necessary to do a better job of preparing themselves than the competition does. They hone their skills in order to achieve their true potential in terms of creating sales. They recognize that a truly positive outcome depends on the whole package: skills, mindset and preparation.
- Belief #4: Customers come first. Real sales leaders adopt a completely customer-focused mindset. They internalize the same things customers internalize, worry about the same things customers worry about, and experience the same emotions their customers experience. They set goals their customers buy into and make sure the goals are met.
- Belief #5: Hold yourself accountable. The best salespeople assume accountability for their outcomes. They never hide behind the organization, and they never make excuses. They recognize that salespeople are accountable to customers, not the companies they represent. They make promises to themselves first, and then follow through on those promises. It’s their dedication to their own standards that makes it possible for them to follow through when they make commitments to customers.
- Belief #6: Building alliances. Building new relationships and alliances, and strengthening existing ones, is a major part of the sales leader’s job description. This is what sales leaders spend most of their time doing. They use relationships to accomplish their critical goals — and that means building bridges on a regular basis.
- Belief #7: You have everything you need. You have all the tools you need to reach and even exceed your sales goals. Your job is simply to build on the qualities and resources that you already possess. You can begin with what you have and who you are, right here and right now. The sooner you accept this, the faster you will adopt sales leadership traits into your life.
Adapted from the book Lead, Sell or Get Out of the Way by Ron Karr, president of Karr Associates, Inc., a business consulting firm specializing in sales and operational results.
