Latest / I Used To Be Crap At Sales / Why the Best Salespeople Struggle Most When They Become Managers | EP27 | John Mason

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Why the Best Salespeople Struggle Most When They Become Managers | EP27 | John Mason · I Used To Be Crap At Sales

0:00
Mark Ackers: I see this trap all the time. First time managers
0:02
were previous top performers. They now don't know how to
0:06
manage top performers. They want more. So businesses promote them
0:10
to the manager role that is a completely different role to the
0:14
one that they've been doing. So what they do is they lean on
0:17
well, do what I did, because that's what made me successful,
0:20
and that's their approach to management.
0:22
John Mason: I'd say those two things are definitely far apart.
0:25
Everything you think the job is, is that and more,
0:27
Mark Ackers: they still keep their quota, but now have more
0:29
responsibility. It's
0:30
John Mason: spooky. It's scary.
0:31
Mark Ackers: Today's guest is someone who spent more than a
0:33
decade in sales and commercial leadership roles, progressing
0:37
from SDR through to leading business development teams. He
0:41
blends leadership, coaching, sales, psychology and real world
0:45
go to market experience. John Mason, did you used to be crap
0:49
at sales? Yes. What part of your career flashed through your mind
0:53
John Mason: the start of every chapter of my career in sales,
0:56
we expect people to wear many hats, a team that cannot turn
1:00
six people that are responsible for inbound, outbound, SDR
1:04
functions, closing the business and upsell supporting they will
1:08
just fail at all six rather than be good at one. Internal
1:10
coaching is brilliant, but external coaching is the thing
1:14
that teams need when
1:15
Mark Ackers: you first become a manager. What kind of training
1:18
and coaching did you get? The
1:19
John Mason: company did invest some time, effort and money into
1:23
leadership training, for those of us that were new managers,
1:25
and this is a point about the industry as a whole, in sales
1:28
training that, to me, felt like a HR tick in the box exercise.
1:32
It's just a case of being able to say we did some training, we
1:35
can just hire someone to come in for a half day or one day
1:39
workshop that's going to eradicate all of our problems.
1:41
Why do people still turn to that? We think it's a silver
1:44
bullet. This is the reason why my team is not successful. This
1:46
is going to solve all my problems. Do you think HR people
1:49
should be arranging sales training sessions? I'd say
2:00
Mark Ackers: sales leaders, coaching. We all know how
2:02
important it is, but we also know finding the time to coach
2:06
as often as needed is a challenge. You often have random
2:10
pockets of time, and you feel like, how do I coach effectively
2:14
to the time that I have in my calendar? We've created a guide
2:16
for you, whether you've got 10 minutes, 20 minutes, 45 minutes
2:20
or an hour in there. You go to the chapter that you need with
2:23
the time that you have, and it'll teach you how to coach
2:25
effectively. Link in the comments to download So John,
2:28
welcome to the show. Good to see you. How you feeling good?
2:31
John Mason: Thanks, Mark, Yeah, glad to be here. Thanks.
2:32
Mark Ackers: And I can't help with notes immediately. Your
2:35
background that looks like, I think, are they called Funko
2:38
Pops?
2:39
John Mason: They are indeed.
2:39
Mark Ackers: Is that the turtles behind you or not? It's
2:41
blurring. I can't see what are they?
2:43
John Mason: Oh, no. It's Yoda at the top. So it's Yoda at the
2:45
top. They're out of focus for the camera. So it's Yoda at the
2:47
top. There's some Marvel characters in the middle, and
2:49
some rather jazzy colours and hidden just here is one that my
2:52
team bought me, which says the king of SME sales says, when I
2:57
left my previous role, they got me my own custom phone call.
3:00
Mark Ackers: Wow, which
3:01
John Mason: is nicely a book crest there.
3:02
Mark Ackers: Yeah, very good. And I can see a little bit of a
3:04
Star Wars AT walker. I believe they're cool, but yeah, no
3:07
great. Great to have you on the show, John. It's always
3:09
interesting to see people's backgrounds and what they share.
3:11
But no big welcome to the podcast. We always kick off with
3:14
a yes, no question. John Mason, did you used to be crap at
3:18
sales? Yes. And when you heard me ask you that question, and
3:23
you answered yes, what part of your career flashed through your
3:27
mind?
3:27
John Mason: I'd say the start of every chapter of my career. So
3:32
whether it's my first role in sales as an SDR, my first
3:35
promotion, my first change of job, my first change of
3:37
vertical, my first time in management, I think every time
3:40
you start something new, that imposter syndrome creeps back
3:43
in, and you're like, I am crap at sales. And
3:44
Mark Ackers: I suppose that's an interesting differentiation,
3:47
though there's the imposter syndrome, whereas that self
3:50
limiting belief and the reality. What do you think's going on
3:54
when you say that? Is it the imposter syndrome and it's like
3:58
your own self limiting belief? Or do you think there's a
4:00
reality to that as well.
4:01
John Mason: I think the reality is there for a lot shorter time
4:04
than the imposter syndrome makes you feel like it's there. So
4:07
there are going to be times in your career when you're gonna be
4:09
a look back and think there's one time I remember this
4:12
particular call, this particular demo, where I really messed up.
4:14
And they are the points in which you are crap at sales. But you
4:18
may have that longer lingering thought and feeling that you are
4:20
Mark Ackers: every sales person I speak to has got their own
4:24
story where something has gone horrendously wrong. If I asked
4:29
you to think back to perhaps your worst moment, where you've
4:33
just made a mistake that now you can look back on and laugh, but
4:35
others could maybe learn from what is probably the biggest
4:38
Howler you've had in your career. Today,
4:40
John Mason: I recall in my previous role, when I was at
4:43
down at planner, sort of I was fairly fresh in the role,
4:46
probably my first three to six months on the phone, and there
4:50
was a big uptake in the number of inquiries we were dealing
4:53
with as a big sort of push. And I was doing a lot of
4:56
demonstrations, a lot of conversations on an autopilot,
4:59
quite a. Lot, and I fell into this sort of bad rhythm of just
5:03
taking everyone through the same motions. And I remember being on
5:07
a demonstration with a client, trying to convince them to
5:10
upgrade to the latest thing. And at every turn I'd say this
5:14
wonderful new thing, that wonderful new thing, selling the
5:16
features, the thing we shouldn't be doing. And they're just sort
5:19
of very uninterested, but they're still going to buy it.
5:21
And I couldn't understand what I was doing wrong. And it was that
5:24
I was selling the features, but I kind of got to the end of the
5:27
call with that particular client and said, I think I've just sat
5:31
here and talked at you for half an hour trying to sell you this
5:34
latest thing, when, in fact, you just want to continue and have
5:38
whatever we're offering. And I on the phone sort of coined an
5:41
analogy or a story, that if you walk into a car dealership
5:44
because you just want the latest hatchback, you just buy the
5:46
hatchback, and then you upgrade to the next hatchback, and then
5:48
you upgrade to the next hatchback, because you're just a
5:50
creature of habit, and you don't really care what features there
5:53
are. I've just sat there and told this person all these
5:55
wonderful new things and latest car, and he's like, I just want
5:58
a car, mate, just give me that car. Thank you. So that Howler.
6:01
I'd say it. Wouldn't say it haunts me, but I definitely look
6:03
back on it and think that was a point in which I realised you
6:08
can't just cookie cutter your demonstrations or conversations.
6:10
You need to adapt and listen to what the client wants.
6:12
Mark Ackers: And that's interesting. Like, I think a lot
6:14
of salespeople will know that feeling of I'm on a call with
6:17
someone, it's not gone well, and I just needed to end now and
6:22
forget about it and go on my next call. But what you've done
6:24
differently there is you've kind of called it out. You've said,
6:27
Look, on reflection, it feels like I've just spoke to you for
6:30
half an hour. That wasn't the right thing to do. I can imagine
6:32
that disarms the prospect, because they're not expecting
6:36
you to say that. How. How did they respond to your brutal
6:39
honesty there? I think
6:40
John Mason: they responded, Well, I think you're right, that
6:42
the fact I was able to think on the fly and turn it around and
6:46
have that self awareness probably comes from a time
6:49
previously in my career where I've made a similar mistake, but
6:52
wanted the ground to swallow me up and wanted to get off the
6:54
call as quickly as possible. So the fact that this happened
6:57
pretty much six years into my career, halfway, halfway into my
7:00
career, could work out how old I was then, meant I would have
7:03
learned a lesson previously and applied it then. But yeah,
7:05
definitely has been times where I've come off a call as quickly
7:08
as possible, wanting the ground to swallow me up. I
7:09
Mark Ackers: think what's interesting there is you're
7:11
talking about something that's happened six years into your
7:14
career, and I know you'll take this the right way. Many people
7:17
on paper would read that story and think surely in the first
7:21
six years, you've learned that lesson. Not just a feature dump,
7:25
but I think one of the things that I see all the time is
7:27
people confuse years in role for growth and development, and it's
7:32
not the same thing. So many sales people have the same year
7:36
over and over again, and they're not learning, they're not
7:39
developing, they're not moving on. And it feels like perhaps
7:43
you got to a point where you realised, okay, something needs
7:47
to change. I need to grow and develop. And maybe that was the
7:50
point where you realised that, is that, is that a fair
7:52
John Mason: statement? I'd say it was a fair statement. It was
7:55
the third vertical, the third area that I was selling into. So
7:58
financial services was not something I'd done for six
8:00
years. I had some selling for six years, but for six years,
8:03
but financial services was new. Some days I was doing three or
8:06
four, three or four days in a row. So the thing that I slipped
8:08
back into was that cookie cutter demonstration. Just go through
8:12
the motions, get it done. And that's when I lay, sort of fell
8:16
foul of going back to the default, which I had spent years
8:21
unlearning, and let's talk about that early period then, like the
8:24
years that you'd spent learning and trying to undo that. How did
8:28
you actually end up in sales in the first place? I think I ended
8:30
up in sales, like everyone else ends up in sales. I fell into it
8:34
by accident. I woke up one day, decided I needed a nine till
8:37
five that paid me a salary I couldn't necessarily just keep
8:39
working zero hour contracts and the gig economy as such. And
8:43
basically applied for the, you know, took the first role that
8:45
would accept me, which, yeah, back in 2012 was my local BT
8:49
business office,
8:50
Mark Ackers: and what was an early John like in a sales role,
8:54
John Mason: a deer in headlights, Bambi on ice. I had
8:57
plenty of soft skills that I took into the role where I had
8:59
worked in bars and done cross sell, up sell. I had done some
9:02
door knocking. I had done some telephone sales, appointment
9:05
setting for like, you know, Windows and things like that in
9:08
my teens and early 20s. But this was B to B sales, selling
9:11
telecoms. It was like a step up, and there was a steep learning
9:15
curve. So, yeah, deer in headlights or Bambi on ice is
9:18
definitely a good way of describing how I would have been
9:21
in those first 369, months,
9:23
Mark Ackers: and in that time, who helped you? That's
9:25
John Mason: a really good question. I was quite lucky. So
9:28
BT is a large organisation, but the local office is franchised,
9:31
and so it's small. At the time, we probably had 30 or 40 staff.
9:34
I know the Southwest office now has probably tripled in size
9:37
since I left in 2014 you learn off your peers. So it's who's
9:40
already there, setting the appointments that are doing
9:42
well, sort of copy. Sort of copy them. But I did have a really
9:45
good team leader, manager that was fantastic at protecting his
9:50
team. You know, if there was some negativity coming down from
9:54
the top table, you know, make more calls, but more
9:56
appointments. You know, why are you guys not hitting target?
9:58
He'd do very well at the. Absorbing that and then playing
10:01
it back to us in a constructive way for us to be able to achieve
10:04
those targets. So having a really good team leader allowed
10:09
me the space to grow in those two years. I get the idea of
10:13
absorbing the pressure from above and relying that in a
10:17
message that is softer, more motivating than it is
10:21
criticising. I tell you that, what other traits did this team
10:26
leader have that perhaps has left an impression on you? They
10:30
were always fair. So there's a few, a few mouths to feed,
10:32
whether it was like, you know, in down leads and things like
10:34
that. So there was always fair in making sure that everyone got
10:37
a fair shot. He didn't share show favouritism, and I probably
10:40
couldn't quantify what it is that he did, but I can quantify
10:44
what feeling I had when I was at work. And it's a case of, I was
10:49
ready to go back for him. I was ready to go to war. If he said,
10:51
We need to book two more appointments today, I was ready
10:53
to go. So the things that he would have done that would have
10:57
instilled that in me. And so obviously, you know, this is
10:59
going back 12 years, so I can't necessarily think of what they
11:03
were, but I do vividly remember that feeling of way too bad for
11:07
him already to go to war. And I think that's important. If, if
11:10
your leader can make you feel like that, then that's a really
11:14
important thing. What
11:15
Mark Ackers: was this leader's name?
11:16
John Mason: It was Matt charleck. So, yeah, he was at
11:19
BEC for quite a long time. I think he's now at OT or Virgin.
11:22
I know those merged. So he's doing something over on that
11:25
side of the the telecoms fence, just so to speak.
11:29
Mark Ackers: And let's say I said to you, oh, I know Matt.
11:31
I'm going to give him a call if I was to call him up and say,
11:34
Tell me about John Mason in those early years. How do you
11:37
think he would describe you?
11:38
John Mason: I was inconsistent. You know, back then I was I'd
11:43
have good days of booking two or three appointments, and then go
11:46
two or three days without booking one. I just couldn't
11:48
seem to find the strive that. I couldn't seem to find the thing
11:54
that made it click. I remember watching Wolf of Wall Street
11:56
thinking, This must be the secret sauce to how you'd be a
11:59
good appointment setter. So from a performance perspective,
12:03
that's what you definitely say. But I'm I know that I shared it
12:06
showed a lot of of those skills. That says, If I teach this
12:10
person how to achieve those things, there are other things
12:13
that they can do naturally that will help them in their career
12:15
move forward.
12:16
Mark Ackers: And what do you think the difference was then,
12:17
on days where you might set two or three appointments, and then
12:20
days where you where you wouldn't was it a tactical
12:23
difference in those days or a mental difference in those two
12:26
days?
12:27
John Mason: Tactical? I think back then, it was just sheer
12:29
luck. This is 2012 2013 14, the days of just do 100 dials a day.
12:34
There's no full enrich LEM list. There's no sequences. It is just
12:37
pick up. There's no parallel dialers or anything like that.
12:39
It's just pick up the phone manually, type in a number, and
12:43
do that 100 times in a day with as little research as possible.
12:46
I think that was a very shotgun scatter coach, scattergun
12:49
approach to appointment setting and to sales development roles.
12:53
And I think it was brilliant to have learned how not to do
12:57
things and to have that experience to cut my teeth, but
13:00
people coming into the industry now, they've got a lot more
13:03
support behind them to not get to that target by chance, but to
13:08
actually get there tactically,
13:09
Mark Ackers: I'm going to change that slightly, and I'm going to
13:11
do that in a way which I think is going to be a really good
13:13
conversation. John, and this comes from a place of working
13:17
with and managing SDRs for a long time now, the tactical side
13:22
of things, I get it, if you do something different one day to
13:25
the other, that can impact results. I suppose what you were
13:29
talking about there, though, it wasn't different tactics. It was
13:32
pick up the phone. Have 100 dials a day. I get you might say
13:36
and do things differently, but your point about in today's day
13:40
and age, there's like, full and rich cognism All these sort of
13:44
you know, we've never had more technology at our fingertips,
13:47
but that technology wasn't different for you day to day. So
13:50
I wonder, was it that you might just take your foot off the gas
13:54
a little bit because you've had two or three appointments a day
13:56
before, you don't feel like you need to achieve that the next
13:59
day, and perhaps you are just a little bit more relaxed. You're
14:02
not desperately trying hard. Do you think, like, mentally?
14:06
Because I think tactically, when people looking to improve the
14:10
form to sales team, they focus on those tactics. But I feel
14:13
like most of it's actually the mental side of sounds like,
14:15
obviously you need to know how to do things. You need to know
14:18
how to say, what to say, the cool structure, etc. But I think
14:23
your answer there would tell me it was more mental than
14:26
tactical, because you were doing the same thing each day. Talk to
14:29
me about that.
14:30
John Mason: Yeah, I think I probably didn't actually
14:32
describe it as well. I didn't know what I was doing. So it was
14:37
sheer luck if I was booking appointments, because there was
14:40
not necessarily a huge amount of science behind it, other than
14:43
pick up the phone and make those dials. So now we would better
14:47
define an ICP. We would create sequences. We would be more
14:51
targeted, methodical in our approach, so that we can take
14:53
what works and repeat that. I didn't necessarily know what was
14:56
working, so I didn't necessarily know how to repeat it, and I.
15:00
100% agree with why you think the side of it would be mental,
15:05
and I've seen that as well in the near decade that I've worked
15:08
with, SDRs and AES, training, coaching, managing, working
15:11
alongside. But I do know, from a perspective, when I was working
15:15
at BT, you couldn't take your foot off the gas. You weren't
15:18
allowed to, I definitely felt like there was a degree of
15:22
ruling by like an iron fist and fear. You know, there, there was
15:26
no coasting. You know, you did need to hit two appointments,
15:29
three appointments a day. And if you didn't, you know, you're in
15:32
for a bit of a rollicking. So I think the mental side of it
15:35
would be around the that imposter syndrome creeping in.
15:39
You know, it's not going well. I'm at lunchtime, I haven't
15:41
booked an appointment, and then you start the self doubt, and
15:44
that will probably carry through into your course, so that
15:46
mentally, I think, would be where your subconscious is
15:50
probably actually affecting your dials in the afternoon, for
15:53
example.
15:53
Mark Ackers: So that's, yeah, that's interesting, because that
15:56
that to me, if you get to lunchtime and you've not had any
15:59
success, you start to count down the hours that you've got left,
16:03
and you start to become more attached to the phone calls
16:06
you're making and the outcome. But again, you know, that's that
16:10
look. Could you argue that's tactical, maybe. But again,
16:13
that, to me, screams mindset and being able to rise above what
16:18
situation you find yourself in. I've enjoyed that part of the
16:21
conversation. John, when I know BEC was was in conversation with
16:27
you about organising this this episode, you shared some really
16:31
interesting thoughts, and we agreed that we'd feature, sorry,
16:36
we agreed that we'd focus this episode on that first time
16:39
manager role that this is one of the biggest challenges that the
16:44
sales industry has, right? You get top performers, they want
16:48
more. So businesses promote them to the manager role, and that is
16:54
a completely different role to the one that they've been doing.
16:57
And there's so much we could talk about here, and this is
16:59
kind of what I want to get into, but I see this trap all the
17:02
time. First time managers were previous top performers. They
17:06
now don't know how to manage. So what they do is they lean on
17:11
well, do what I did, because that's what made me successful,
17:14
and that's their approach to management, and the company
17:18
doesn't support them in that transition from quota carrier to
17:23
manager, and actually, far too often, they still keep their
17:27
quota, but now have more responsibility, and they've got
17:30
to navigate so much, not not just learning how to interview,
17:35
recruit and onboard, how to have one to ones, how to use the tech
17:39
stack in a reporting sense, how to forecast, how to have
17:43
difficult conversations. They've also got to go from being a
17:46
friend to being a boss, and it's a huge step up. And like, like
17:52
you said in your notes when we were swapping some emails, most
17:55
sales people don't become managers by accident. We all
17:59
accept that they do choose it because they feel like it's the
18:02
next step, more money, more status, career progression. And
18:07
companies say yes, because you're a top performer, we don't
18:11
want you to leave. We'd rather promote you than bring in
18:14
someone external. It looks like we're a great employer. We are
18:18
developing people, but yeah, the issue that nobody talks about is
18:22
the reality of the job. Talk to me about your experience when
18:25
you first started thinking about leadership, what did you think
18:29
the job actually was going to be and what was the reality?
18:33
John Mason: Yeah, I'd say those two things are definitely far
18:35
apart. A lot of professionals not just sales, but sales very
18:39
much so your top ICS tend to become your your managers,
18:43
because of the status thing, everything you think the job is,
18:46
is that and more. And you probably hard. You probably hold
18:50
things that you think are important in the role, that
18:52
aren't you think they're more important than they actually
18:55
are. Yeah, you touched on quite a few really good points there.
18:58
So you're going from you know, you're now managing your peers
19:01
and your friends. How do you do that? How do you still build
19:03
that relationship where they will, you know, go to bat for
19:05
you. How do you make them better without trying to make them four
19:09
or five clones of yourself? What support do you get from the from
19:12
the business? I remember vividly when I took over my first
19:15
leadership role, it was a very much a firefighting moment. I
19:18
was trying to fix the things that hadn't been done because
19:20
there was, you know, no one at the helm for a small period of
19:23
time. I was trying to fix the things that needed to be done on
19:25
the day to day basis as they were coming in. And, you know, I
19:29
was a few weeks or months away from planning for next year. So
19:31
I try to fix the future. I thought some of those things
19:35
were really important, and little did I know that many more
19:39
would come, you know around to need urgent attention, because
19:44
you step into leadership and you're managing your team, but
19:47
now you have this level of exposure to the rest of the
19:49
business. So there are other people in the business that now
19:53
need things from you and need to do things that you weren't
19:55
necessarily expecting. So I remember when I was promoted to.
20:00
Become the team leader, the head of business development. We were
20:03
going through our ISO 27,001 certification. So the head of it
20:06
adopts needed some things that had been sort of left in the
20:09
inbox tray. And I said, When do you need these? And he went two
20:12
weeks ago. So I've just been stepped into a role. I've got
20:15
all these new things that I think are super important to
20:17
deal with, and I've just been given a deadline of something
20:20
that I didn't even know was on the radar. So it is a it's
20:23
spooky. It's scary. When
20:25
Mark Ackers: you first become a manager, what kind of training
20:28
and coaching did you get on how to be a great frontline manager?
20:32
John Mason: I had a really mixed bag in my previous employer done
20:36
that planner. When I was made head of I was really blessed
20:38
that the previous person who was my manager, allowed me exposure
20:42
to her job and to do things on her behalf, to kind of, I guess,
20:47
Tee me up ready to take over in the event that she was to leave.
20:52
I was then promoted, not because I was the best individual
20:55
contributor. I was, you know, jostling for first and second
20:58
continuously with another, but I was the one that could also lead
21:02
people, but I did carry an individual contributor target
21:05
and the team target and the responsibility of basically
21:08
heading up the department with the CRO and the planning and
21:12
everything else that comes between that the company did
21:15
invest some, some time, effort and money into leadership
21:19
training for those of us that were new managers, getting sort
21:22
of consultants to come in and do workshops and things like that,
21:25
to me, and this isn't a point specifically about my previous
21:30
employer. This is a point about the industry as a whole, in
21:32
sales training that, to me, felt like a HR tick in the box
21:36
exercise, as opposed to a structured need for training
21:40
something you'd be awful too familiar with my sales coach.
21:43
Plenty of you know, people will come to you looking to training
21:46
for their sales team, and it's just for their tick box
21:48
exercise, rather than actually trying to develop that manager
21:52
to an end goal as part of their career, as part of their
21:55
development, etc. It's just a case of being able to say we did
21:58
some training. And I think that may have been the case, and I
22:01
know that is the case for a lot of other businesses.
22:04
Mark Ackers: I think, sadly, the vast majority. Let's go back to
22:07
then, to that strategy of teeing you up. I'm a big fan of that. I
22:13
remember when I was in SDR, I wanted to become an AE, and I
22:17
got some exposure in the sense of, I got to run some events
22:21
where I sold tickets. Then run events. I got to learn to speak
22:24
to people. And as I say, I was selling those tickets to an
22:27
event in London, and that was my first taste. Then I got to if I
22:33
overachieved on my quota of booking meetings, I got to spend
22:38
a day a week trying to be an AE and take those first meetings,
22:42
and then as a, as a, an AE, I made it my, my purpose in every
22:47
one to my boss to say, can I take that off your plate? Can I
22:51
take that off your plate? And I used to get all the crap jobs
22:55
that they didn't want to do, but you do them well, and then you
22:58
get more responsible, and you get more exposure and and I
23:01
really believe in that strategy, not just promoting someone into
23:04
a new role. And it's like day one, this is all you do. I think
23:08
you have to give that soft exposure and those those
23:11
opportunities which seem to work really well. That sounds like
23:14
that will happen to you as well, which is great when you say
23:17
about getting some tick box training and workshops? Yeah, I
23:22
sort of in the back of my head, just thought, Well, we both know
23:27
as as does anybody listen to his podcast? Right? No, nobody
23:30
listens his podcast. Will be of the opinion, well, that sounds
23:33
great. Just do a workshop and training, because we're all
23:38
smarter than that. We know better than that. But why? Do
23:40
you think that people still in 2026 believe that we can just
23:46
hire someone to come in for a half day or one day workshop,
23:50
and that's going to that's going to eradicate all of our
23:53
problems? Why do people still turn to that?
23:55
John Mason: I think it's the path of least resistance. I
23:57
think it's the easiest thing to do to satisfy an, you know, a
24:02
question with the answer that we've done training, but the
24:05
question doesn't probe deeper. So I think in companies in
24:09
general that make this mistake, and frequently make the mistake
24:13
and don't necessarily learn from it, I think they are the ones
24:15
that don't probe deeper at the SLT, C suite level, when asking
24:21
those questions, you know, why are we delivering training? What
24:24
are we trying to do? What's the positive outcomes we're trying
24:26
to enact? Also goes to commission plans as well. You
24:29
know, we put this commission plan together, what behaviours
24:31
are we trying to get the sales reps to do? I think if we don't
24:36
challenge the why, the what, the when, the where, the WHO, and we
24:39
just accept the first answer rather binary and linearly, we
24:43
will continue to make those same mistakes and sales, sales
24:48
professionals, AES, SDRs, leaders will continue to, I
24:52
guess, be held back by their inability to evolve and to take
24:57
that step forward. The
24:58
Mark Ackers: other thing that you said that just made. Maybe
25:00
wins was HR booked the training effectively. Do you think HR
25:06
people as great as I'm sure they are at their jobs should be
25:10
arranging and booking sales training sessions?
25:13
John Mason: No, they are great at their job, and they're great
25:14
is people in human resources, just like I don't think finance
25:18
and operations should be anywhere near commission plans.
25:21
But in plenty of companies, that is the case. I think sales
25:25
leaders, you know, team leaders, head of business development,
25:28
sales director, CRO Chief Sales Officer, Chief Commercial
25:31
Officer, whatever they may be, they are the people that own
25:35
their domain. And I think they are the ones that should be
25:38
involved in the training for their their teams and the
25:42
responsibility and power should divulge down from the CRO all
25:46
the way down to the team leader of an SDR,
25:50
Mark Ackers: you've signed your team up to another E Learning
25:52
course. You've hired a trainer to come in and run a workshop.
25:55
But guess what? Six months later, pipeline and performance
25:58
is still lumpy. My sales coach turns learning into doing. We
26:02
evaluate everyone on your team, we identify with real data the
26:06
critical gaps that are holding them back, and then we remedy
26:10
it. We match each person to their dream coach and provide
26:14
consistent one to one coaching to help them fulfil their
26:18
potential and hit the number less one size fits all,
26:20
training, more personalised support, which results in the
26:23
growth of your team. That's predictable sales execution.
26:27
That's my sales coach. I think that's one of the big shifts
26:34
that I've seen in the last sort of 20 years. Though, I think if
26:37
I go back to the first 10 years of my career, lots of companies,
26:41
particularly like the FTSE 100 you can, you can see who the
26:44
CEOs are. It was a lot of sales people with sales backgrounds.
26:48
And then the 10 years that followed, it seemed to change,
26:50
to be more CFOs and financial people. And I think you do just
26:55
run the company completely differently and have a different
26:58
outset to it. Let's, let's put something out there for anyone
27:02
that's listening to this podcast that thinks the next role for
27:06
them is to be a sales manager. They perhaps feel like that's in
27:10
their grasp. First of all, what do you think they believe the
27:14
job to be? So just imagine being that IE, I've got a sales
27:19
manager role in my grass. What do you think they believe that
27:23
role to be like on a day to day basis?
27:25
John Mason: Oh, gosh, it could be so many things. Some people
27:30
probably just think it's a title and some power, and they are
27:34
people that shouldn't be promoted to that position.
27:37
Others may just think that they're now responsible for a
27:40
bigger target, because they're looking after 345, AES,
27:44
hopefully plenty of them realise it's now my responsibility to
27:47
make these people better at their job so that they can
27:51
progress in their careers. And I am commercially incentivized.
27:54
The better they do, the better I earn. The latter one's one, I
27:57
hope is the one, but it's probably the middle
28:00
Mark Ackers: one.
28:00
And let's talk about the realities. Let's imagine again,
28:03
you're gonna create the perfect advert that is a true
28:07
representative of what it's like to be a sales leader. What do
28:10
you think those people that have that job in their grasp need to
28:13
know about the reality of the role?
28:15
John Mason: Yeah. So what is the true purpose of a sales leader?
28:19
You go from being all about yourself to being about others.
28:24
I guess anyone watching this podcast that has children, when
28:26
you're single, you don't have children, you're responsible for
28:29
yourself. When you have children, you're now responsible
28:31
for other human beings, and you then put them first over
28:34
yourself. I think sales leadership is very similar. I
28:37
think you need to realise that it's no longer about you, it's
28:42
about the collective team and those individuals. So anyone
28:46
looking to go into leadership needs to very quickly be able to
28:50
shift from that mindset about being me and it's it's then
28:54
about them. I think
28:56
Mark Ackers: that's a really good analogy, and as a father of
28:59
two and a sales leader, that probably explains why I'm
29:02
exhausted all the time you talk about being responsible for
29:06
making the team better, let's have a really open conversation,
29:10
because I think this is one of the things that sales leaders
29:13
need to accept when you think of all the things a salesperson
29:17
needs to be good at in 2026 and by the way, that list has
29:21
changed dramatically in the last two years. Is it actually fair
29:25
to think that a sales manager has all the domain expertise and
29:30
knowledge to make their team strong across all areas and
29:34
disciplines?
29:35
John Mason: I will say yes in theory, but no in practice. One
29:38
of the things I think we struggle with in sales as well
29:42
is we expect people to wear many hats, so in lots of companies,
29:48
even ones that have grown, you know, your A's may be doing
29:51
outbound, they may need to have SDR skills. They may be doing
29:55
upsell as well, so they need CSM skills. So to expect, without.
30:00
Are like specifically defining, you know, the manager and their
30:04
role. I think they can fall foul of that target of making them
30:10
better in an organisation or structure where it's a case of
30:13
you are in charge of the outbound team make them better.
30:16
I think providing there is the additional support, training,
30:20
coaching, mentoring, for that new manager, then we do have the
30:24
technology in place, the understanding of the human brain
30:27
and psychology to be able to make those people better.
30:31
Everyone has a limit, though, I'd say it's the same with
30:33
football. You know, the level of game that's played today in
30:36
football is very different to level of game that was played 20
30:39
years ago, 30 years ago. But not everyone has the ability to
30:42
become a Christian art or an owner or a messy but everyone
30:45
has the ability to become, you know, 110 120% better than that.
30:49
Well they were, and a lot of people say, just make yourself
30:52
better, 1% a day at a time, and that compounds over time. So I
30:55
think there's a bigger ceiling that we can reach for but there
30:58
needs to be that, that structure in place, and that understanding
31:01
that you cannot a team that cannot turn six people that are
31:06
responsible for inbound, outbound, SDR functions, closing
31:10
the business and upsell supporting they will just fail
31:13
at all six rather than be good at
31:15
Mark Ackers: one. Yeah, I think the important caveat that you
31:17
mentioned was if they have the right training and coaching and
31:20
structure around them, which, of course, we know, unfortunately,
31:23
isn't true. It just I had a conversation the other day. I
31:26
speak with a sales leader. They love the idea of my sales coach.
31:30
They have told me my team is not going to hit the number that
31:34
we've been set this year. They are new to the role. They're
31:37
like, kind of green. There's a lot they need to learn and do.
31:40
And they shared with me many examples across the sales
31:43
process where they're struggling, like qualification,
31:48
discovery, getting the right, decision making, criteria,
31:52
understanding how they're going to buy, budget, all of this
31:55
stuff. And it'd been four weeks since we last spoke, which is
31:59
always obviously a warning sign in general. But got on the call
32:03
and they said, I've still not asked my boss if we could buy my
32:08
sales coach. And I asked why, and they said, I feel like the
32:12
answer is going to be it's your job to fix this, and I
32:15
understand that it is your job to fix this, but doesn't mean
32:18
you have all the answers. So I said to the sales leader, I
32:21
said, Look, when you think of all the things that you ask your
32:24
sales team to do, what part are you weakest at? And by the way,
32:28
everyone's got a part of the way it's at. And he said,
32:31
negotiation. I said, Okay, so how are you going to get the
32:34
team better at negotiation if that's your weakest part and you
32:38
struggle with that? And then we spoke about how that's one of
32:41
the problems. They're leaving money on the table. They're
32:43
negotiating too early. They're discounting against themselves.
32:46
I was like, that's what you need to be saying to your CEO. I
32:49
don't have all the answers. I want to learn and develop. How
32:52
can I do that? It's about working with someone that is
32:56
stronger in that in that area, and that's obviously where a
32:58
sales manager should be able to help. In a lot of cases, they
33:02
they should be stronger, because they've been a top performer,
33:04
and they've been promoted all of that stuff. But the reality is,
33:07
the way in which the landscape is moving and the pace that it's
33:10
moving at, I think expecting a salesy to have all the answers
33:13
really difficult, particularly when they've not done the role
33:18
before. And this is obviously kind of what you specialise in,
33:20
right? It's about helping people that are now managers know what
33:25
to do. And let's talk about that, right? You make the play
33:29
in your LinkedIn. It's about knowing what to do on a Monday.
33:33
What does that mean in real life, not on LinkedIn. Help me
33:37
understand you've got a first time manager in front of you.
33:40
What does that really mean to them?
33:42
John Mason: It could be incredibly daunting to be a
33:44
first time manager, and if you're in a very reactive
33:49
environment, you're firefighting, essentially making
33:51
it up as you go along. You don't know what you're going to do on
33:54
Monday, you don't know what you're going to do on Tuesday.
33:57
You're just dealing with whatever shouts the loudest, and
33:59
it's about being able to structure what you need to deal
34:03
with, fixing the problems that the team have, you know from the
34:06
past and the day to day, planning for the future,
34:09
developing the team and developing yourself. You spoke a
34:13
moment ago about that example of a prospective client for my
34:18
sales coach, that happens way too often. Hence, you guys have
34:22
a business. I do also think that sometimes promoting a team, new
34:25
person into a manager position, if the business thinks they're
34:28
going to solve the problems. And you know, if a sales leader came
34:32
to me and said, I'm not going to hit my number this year, I'd
34:34
sort of put it back and go, like, is your first start? Is
34:36
your number actually physically attainable? Like, if I got you
34:40
the best SDRs and AES in the world with the current resources
34:45
that you have, the tech, the structure, everything else could
34:48
they hit that number. Because that's also a thing that I don't
34:51
think sales leaders challenge enough, is that sometimes
34:54
numbers can be pulled out of thin air, and they aren't
34:56
unattainable. Don't get me wrong. I am not scared of a big
34:58
target. I went from. Being an individual contributor at BT,
35:03
dealing in pocket change to being given a million pound
35:06
target for myself to achieve in a year. The king of the caveat,
35:10
if we don't get over 500,000 pounds, it's a red mark against
35:13
us keeping our franchise X number of red marks, and we
35:16
lose. So, you know, although my target was a million, I had to
35:19
get over by 500 grand by hook or by crook, it was inevitable. Can
35:23
the best of the best do that? And if the best of us can't do
35:26
it, the business needs to have an honest conversation. But
35:29
then, how do you get the most out of those reps? In that
35:31
example that you were speaking about, he was talking about them
35:34
not being able to do X, Y and Z, internal coaching is brilliant,
35:38
but external coaching is the thing that teams need. They need
35:42
both because they're not experts. I'm not a cold calling
35:46
experts. Why I'm not an SDR coach. I could do cold calling
35:50
Absolutely I am, probably better than some, but I would always
35:55
play to my strengths. And I think when you're a new leader,
35:59
you need to very quickly identify those strengths,
36:01
identify those weaknesses, and then ask for support on those
36:05
weaknesses, exactly as you said, going back to your your boss and
36:09
saying, I don't want my sales coach to do the heavy lifting of
36:12
the training you expect me to do and the coaching I want my sales
36:15
coach to fix the problem the team have with negotiations,
36:18
even I could learn something about negotiations so I can then
36:21
better train the next generation of leaders. But for now, I need
36:25
help. It's an area I'm very passionate about. Obviously, I
36:27
feel like I was a bit of an accident manager myself. And in
36:30
addition to that, I know plenty of other sales professionals
36:33
that have gone on to have fantastic careers that were
36:35
accident managers. You mentioned you wanted to be an AE, you were
36:38
proactive in it. I know an SDR that wants to be an AE, that
36:42
became an SDR manager because the company said, Oh no, no, no,
36:44
no, you. We're not going to promote you to AE. We're going
36:48
to make you the leader of the SDRs. We need you to be in Team
36:51
Leader of the SDRs like I don't want to manage people. And it
36:55
happens far too often for reasons we've discussed so far.
36:58
One of the biggest reasons is businesses can't afford the
37:02
double hit. You can't afford to take your top forming SDR and
37:06
their performance out of plan. So you try and keep them in that
37:09
world or your AE, you can't afford to take their number out
37:14
of plan, but they want to be a manager, so you keep the quota
37:18
and ask them to manage. But it's just, it's just unfair. I think
37:23
one of the interesting things you spoke about was about how
37:26
sales leaders have to also think about the future. That's
37:30
Mark Ackers: really hard when every quarter you start at zero,
37:33
and you're always measured by your number, and you live month
37:36
to month. I kind of compare it to, you know, you use the
37:39
football analogy earlier. I think most football managers get
37:43
less than a season, or maybe a season a half. Whatever the stat
37:46
might be, we all know as football fans, is a short amount
37:49
of time. How are they meant to focus on the Academy and the
37:53
youth team and developing, which is, you know, if you look at
37:55
longevity in the role that's what if you take, you know,
37:59
arguably the very best ever. So next, Ferguson, it's because he
38:03
was at helm for 27 years, and he used to work on four year
38:07
cycles, always refreshing the team every four years, and a big
38:11
part of that was the Youth Academy and the pipeline in the
38:14
future. As a sales leader, you can't be looking at if you've
38:19
had three bad quarters in a row, you can't say yep, it'd be fine
38:24
in two years, because we're doing this development and
38:27
coaching, and I'm spending time with the team, and I'm listening
38:30
to calls, and we're doing live training and workshops. You
38:34
can't do that, and I think that's the sad reality. So sales
38:38
leaders get beaten up by the system, and they focus on the
38:41
classics, like they obsess over pipeline and micro management,
38:45
and they become hero managers that join calls and try to save
38:49
deals or win them single handedly, and, you know, or and
38:54
they avoid, like, those hard conversations that they need to
38:57
have internally. I think the other thing that you said was
38:59
interesting is about the disconnect from where the number
39:02
comes from. I know you said it sort of flippantly, but it like
39:06
your words were. It can feel like the numbers come out of
39:08
thin air. The reality is, it's not come out of thin air. It's
39:12
just not been shared properly with the sales leader. You know,
39:16
when you set I don't like the word target in sales because it
39:20
that's something you aim for. I do think the word quota is the
39:23
right word to use. I know that when I set my team's quota for
39:29
the year that has been reverse engineered against the plan that
39:33
we've created, and everything centres around that plan, from
39:37
hiring, spend, tech stack, budgets, recruitment, all of it.
39:43
So when a manager gets given a number, they feel like that's
39:46
unachievable, or that's been pulled out of thin air. That's
39:49
because the plan hasn't been properly shared, and there isn't
39:53
that belief that they can get there, but it would be carefully
39:57
worked out like people will spend. Weeks and weeks, maybe
40:01
months and months, putting together the plan and the quotas
40:04
that go alongside it. But yeah, it feels like what we're
40:08
starting to talk about here is some of the emotional burden
40:11
that you can feel as a sales leader. Let's talk about that,
40:15
right? You know, the pressure that you can be, the imposter
40:18
syndrome, the, no doubt, the burnout that people feel, and
40:23
what's the emotional bit of leadership that nobody warned
40:27
you about before you take the job?
40:28
John Mason: I guess the emotional bit of leadership is
40:31
you're you're now invested in your team's real motivations. So
40:36
if anyone says they're motivated by money, the chance are you can
40:39
actually pinpoint down further, why they're motivated by money.
40:41
What it is about money that motivates them. They could be a
40:44
family man. They want to make sure that their wife can not
40:47
have to go back to work after their second child. They want to
40:49
get a bigger house. They're motivated by family, not by
40:53
money. They just need money, which is why they're in sales.
40:56
You are now responsible for other people's personal and
41:00
professional aspirations. I always used to think to myself,
41:04
I want to make sure the people that I lead are better
41:06
professionally and personally. For every year that I manage
41:09
them, they have to move forward. That is a burden that if you're
41:13
unable to leave your work at the door when you go home, be it
41:17
virtually or in person, that can be can be quite a burden that
41:21
could keep you up at night. That's one of the things that
41:23
you're not necessarily prepared for in leadership, is that
41:26
you're now responsible, in a way, for those people and
41:31
helping them achieve their goals. I
41:33
Mark Ackers: think there's a couple of interesting things to
41:35
talk about there, so I'm just going to say it as I see it, and
41:38
I'd love you to tell me I'm wrong, because if I'm right,
41:40
it's a sad reality. I think most sales leaders don't truly
41:44
understand each individual's motivation. They might
41:48
understand it at a headline level, or they want to earn more
41:51
money, or they want to buy a house, or, well, they're going
41:54
to go travelling, but I think that's the best that it normally
41:58
is the headline level of the motivation. I don't think, and
42:02
it's harder in a remote world, which, you know, lots of people
42:05
operating or hybrid, but yeah, I'm gonna say, as it is. I think
42:09
most sales leaders would say, Yes, I know what my team are
42:13
motivated by. If you really pushed on it beyond the
42:16
headline, I think they'd struggle. Do you think that's
42:18
fair, or have I got that wrong?
42:20
John Mason: I think I think that is fair, and I think it actually
42:23
goes to a bigger and wider issue. The same surface level
42:29
answer without probing could be so for pipeline, yeah, you know,
42:32
sales leaders think they know what's going on in their
42:34
pipeline, but they don't. They haven't probed deep enough if a
42:37
company doesn't pass down the target structure correctly, the
42:41
quota structure correctly. It's because when you know the top
42:46
levels pass it down to the second level, the second level
42:48
hasn't asked an important why question. So when it gets down
42:51
to the fourth level, they've got no idea. I think especially in
42:55
sales, we need to be more inquisitive and ask why, and
42:58
probe further and not take everything at face value,
43:02
because there is a underlying cause. I'm motivated by success.
43:05
Money is a byproduct of success. I know that I'm motivated by
43:09
success because if I was in a role where we were not hitting
43:13
quota, and I was feeling miserable for missing quote all
43:16
the time, and someone offered a pay rise to keep me because I
43:20
could leave, you know, and get 20 something else. Well, I
43:22
wouldn't stay to fail. I'd rather leave earn less money and
43:25
be successful. So if you don't know what your own individual
43:29
motivator is and the level of depth that you can give to that
43:32
answer, how would you expect to be able to question your team?
43:35
You'll just take the top level answer, which is not just about
43:39
their motivations. It's the sad reality of of discovery, right?
43:43
You know, being able to go further, we should all learn to
43:47
be detectives that have to solve murders. I think that would
43:52
help.
43:52
Mark Ackers: I am. I love that analogy. I've said many times I
43:56
love watching, particularly the BBC and ITV have done great
44:01
detective shows, and I love the interrogation scenes because I
44:06
feel like they just ask great open ended questions to get to
44:10
the truth and to solve the crime. And one of my analogies
44:14
in the recent book that I wrote my colleague, rich Smith,
44:17
deconstructing discovery, we have this golden minute. And
44:21
again, I took that from a crime scene that Trevor McDonald was
44:25
exploring, and they speak about the golden hour, how you have to
44:28
solve the case, or get as much as you can the first hour,
44:31
because what you solve there really links the outcome. So
44:34
yeah, you tell you, right, we have got to be detective. You've
44:36
got to have that natural ability to keep asking questions, even
44:40
when you feel like you've asked enough. And I remember there's
44:45
been times in my career where I feel like I know everybody in
44:49
the team's personal challenges and frustrations outside of
44:52
work. And whilst that can be a heavy burden to have, you have
44:56
to learn the school to disconnect from it and leave
44:58
leave work when you do etc. But yeah, your job is to help them
45:02
as human beings, not just sales people. But I think one of the
45:06
other mistakes that you see sales leaders make, and I was, I
45:11
was really guilty of this earlier on in my management
45:14
career, was, let's remember why sales managers are in that role.
45:18
Most of the time. It's because they were top performers and
45:21
they've been promoted. Top performers are typically
45:23
ambitious. They're they crave success and all that stuff,
45:27
right? They want it. You can be guilty of assuming everyone is
45:32
as motivated as you are. They have the same drive, the same
45:35
moment, same motivation. It was only when I took and we offer
45:40
these at my sales coach, but I took our I took our sales DNA
45:44
assessment, and it's, it's incredibly in depth. It's like
45:47
45 page report on who you are as either an individual contributor
45:52
or a manager or a manager of managers. And there was this
45:55
page on how I motivate the team, and it basically, in black and
46:00
white said, You do not understand how your team are
46:03
motivated. You assume everyone's motivated like you, and they're
46:07
not. And that was a bit. That was a big shit moment, and I
46:12
made it my mission, therefore, to go and really understand
46:15
motivations and drivers. And you know how they like to spend
46:19
their time outside of work, and I think, but again, it's hard to
46:23
do that when you manage big teams and you're under pressure
46:25
and you're remote, and you're new to the role, and you've got
46:28
a quota. There's so much
46:30
John Mason: going on there. Here's what I'd love to hear
46:32
from you, though, right? What as a sales leader can you do to
46:36
really get through all of that crap? Like, how do you get
46:40
through all of that on a day to day basis. What are the ways in
46:43
which you can identify the team, understand their motivations,
46:47
put the plans in place, build for the future, not, not not
46:52
carry a quote like there's so much there. Help me understand
46:56
what is your playbook? You've got a first time manager in
46:59
front of you. They don't know what to do on a Monday. How do
47:02
they bring it to life? How do you bring to life? Even caffeine
47:04
and sarcasm would be the two things. No, it's a great
47:10
question, because there's a lot to do. I think prioritisation is
47:13
key. So if you are just stepping into a new manager, work out the
47:16
input, yeah, the important things that needs to be done.
47:19
Now, get a real grip on your diary. Put in dedicated time
47:26
that's you know, it can be rescheduled in the same week for
47:29
conflicts, but it is dedicated to your team, whether it's a
47:32
Monday morning catch up or Friday afternoon before you go
47:34
off for the weekend, time together, one to one separate
47:39
your pipeline reviews from time with the team. So instead of
47:43
doing an hour on pipeline, do 30 minutes on pipeline and 30
47:46
minutes on them. Have they got anything they want to bring to
47:49
the conversation? Ensure that you're getting the most out of
47:52
your one to ones with your your manager, because they are the
47:56
person that's supposed to help you move forward. These are all
47:58
things that I'm trying to put down into into a playbook and a
48:02
framework that isn't just in my head, because you know, you'll
48:05
know this as well from from forming your business. It can be
48:09
very much a case of, I just, I just do it right, and that will
48:14
be the thing that I'm looking forward to most, to finishing,
48:17
is that blueprint of what's the first man, first time manager,
48:21
need to do in their first, second, third, fourth month. So
48:24
if they were to receive coaching from me or from anyone else,
48:26
whether they did it for 123456, months, they know what they're
48:30
able to achieve at the end of that period. And the chances are
48:33
the things they think they have to do are things they have to do
48:37
later, not immediately, there'll be more pressing and burning
48:40
issues to deal with. Straight off the bat. Can
48:42
Mark Ackers: you give me some examples of things that they
48:44
often prioritise that can wait
48:46
John Mason: they want to put their stamp on something. So
48:49
they're going to change the sales terminology that they use
48:52
or process, you know? We're going to start using medic, you
48:54
know, or we're going to get this new bit of tech in. I think a
48:56
lot of people, when they come in new try to put their stamp on
48:59
things. I think that they feel the need to impress, especially
49:03
if they've been promoted. You know, did we deserve and earn
49:06
that promotion, or did we kind of wing it? And then you start
49:09
to try and do things that we think can impress? The most
49:12
important thing I think you need to do is understand your current
49:17
state. So what are the team doing now? What are your
49:19
metrics, the average order, value, conversion, ratio,
49:22
velocity, etc, and get hold of that plan that you spoke about
49:26
there, where your target must be based on some sorry, your quota
49:28
must be based on some assumptions. You know, we're
49:31
going to get this many leads and convert them for this much
49:33
value. Reverse engineer your target. Are your current metrics
49:36
going to going to get you there? Do you need to improve the
49:39
metrics? What metrics do you need to improve? Where can you
49:41
get help improving
49:42
Mark Ackers: them? Let's talk about metrics. Because one of
49:44
the things I've enjoyed is you've spoken in the past about
49:48
leaders chasing the wrong metrics, and when they chase the
49:51
wrong metrics, it encourages the wrong behaviour. And you give
49:54
the example of the hospital being measured on waiting times.
49:59
Tell us. All about that analogy and how that links to the wrong
50:03
metrics and the wrong behaviours as a result.
50:05
John Mason: Yeah, it's nothing that I've come up with. I've
50:08
definitely heard it from someone else, probably Rory Sutherland,
50:11
who's a brilliant marketing genius. So if you said to an A
50:15
and E department, you need to reduce a and e waiting times, if
50:18
they focus on the number as opposed to the patient outcome,
50:22
they will do things which ticks that operational number box that
50:26
doesn't actually solve the problem. And what actually does
50:29
happen in a live example is you have patients in corridors. You
50:33
have patients still in ambulances that have not been
50:35
admitted to any yet, because if we admit them, the clock starts,
50:38
so let's keep them outside in the ambulance, then our clock
50:41
doesn't start. None of those things actually solve the issue.
50:45
They just deal with the symptoms rather than the root cause. So
50:48
if you chase the number, I've got to hit 100 dials a day, what
50:52
you're going to do then is consider success being hit 100
50:56
dials, whereas if you turn around and say, I want to have
50:58
20 meaningful conversations, completely different thing, you
51:01
know, again, it's a bit metricy. You could have 20 meaningful
51:03
conversations in 20 dials, or you could have 20 meaningful
51:06
conversations in 100 dials. You try to do something that isn't
51:09
just that tick box exercise of Look what we did, because 100
51:14
dials a day doesn't get you to quota. It might do by fluke, but
51:17
ultimately, you want to book two appointments, three
51:20
appointments, make a sale. So look at the root causes of the
51:24
things you're trying to achieve, the outcomes, not just the
51:27
symptoms and the metrics,
51:28
Mark Ackers: sales leaders. I guarantee this, the forecast
51:31
you're looking at isn't accurate. Why? Because your reps
51:34
have deals that become stuck in the pipeline, things like
51:38
champion leaving, not being taken to power competitor enters
51:42
the deal at the last minute. They're ghosting. You imagine if
51:46
your reps had access on demand to support where they could get
51:50
one to one deal coaching with one of our expert coaches.
51:53
That's what we provide. Your reps can use it proactively.
51:57
Perhaps they've got a meeting coming up and they want to
51:59
ensure they're putting their best foot forward. They can book
52:02
time with a coach and prepare for that upcoming meeting, or
52:05
perhaps it's reactively. There's a snag, there's a last minute
52:08
problem. They need help moving an opportunity forward. They can
52:11
book same day coaching with one of our expert sales coaches and
52:16
get help deal. Coaching gives your reps every opportunity to
52:20
secure the best outcome and keep your forecast as accurate as
52:23
possible. One of the things that I'd love to get your take on is,
52:31
how does a sales leader draw judgement on the team that
52:36
perhaps have inherited and their true capabilities, their
52:40
weaknesses, the opportunities to improve. How does a sales leader
52:43
go about getting that insight without having their biasness
52:48
affect what they believe to be true? What do you see sales
52:52
leaders do to get a real grip on where the team are today and
52:55
where they need to get them to I think
52:57
John Mason: it's really important, because you might
52:58
have biases positive and negative. You might think
53:00
someone is taking their foot off the gas, or that they are
53:03
really, really good at their job, and they're not that. I
53:05
think the way that you would try to understand the real scenario
53:09
of what's happening, not just your biases, is to get into the
53:12
data. The data will tell you what their average order value
53:15
is, the average order value of the team of the other members.
53:17
Where do they stack in comparison? Where is the
53:20
comparison average for the industry, you know, how well are
53:23
you guys as an individuals or team, doing we can be over
53:27
inundated with data in sales. You know, we've never had more
53:30
data at our fingertips, but have we had the right data at our
53:34
fingertips? You know, I believe, I believe this. Since I first
53:37
saw an OMG sales assessment, I've done one myself as well. It
53:40
is brutally honest, like you said, honest, like you said, can
53:43
really open up your eyes. And I remember seeing Ben from OMG and
53:48
Tim Ergo from toggle consulting present at a CRO event that I
53:52
was at, and I just sort of looked at it and I went, this is
53:56
the data that you need to understand. You know, the 21
54:01
different outputs that you can factor into, whether it's a
54:05
sales DNA, their ability to accept rejection, the
54:08
negotiating skills, etc, see whether or not you've got the
54:10
right people in the right jobs. This was a presentation on, you
54:13
know, the cost of hiring, the strain of resource and getting
54:16
it wrong. You know, you could have SDRs that become AES
54:19
because they think that is their career path, but they could be
54:22
the best SDR since sliced bread, and make a terrible AE, they
54:26
could actually be the best CSM person ever, unless you actually
54:30
look for the right data to understand your your team or
54:34
your future hires, I think you will just get cluttered by the
54:38
bias and potentially This noise unnecessary data.
54:41
Mark Ackers: Yeah, so the assessments you speak about,
54:43
yeah, like, just for those listening, that's exactly the
54:45
same assessment that I spoke about when I when it highlighted
54:48
to me that my motivation, I believe everyone's motivated
54:52
like I am, and it was a big learning point for me that
54:56
having that data is paramount, because it gives you that
54:59
crystal. Clear insight into the team and the individuals. And
55:03
here's what you notice, everyone's different. Everyone
55:05
has different strengths, be that tactically, but more
55:09
importantly, that mindset piece that we spoke about. And if you
55:12
can't fix the mindset and the behaviours, it doesn't really
55:17
matter what you help them with tactically, because they've got
55:20
what I would call like hand brakes on that affect their
55:23
mental the mental side of sales that you know they're let's give
55:28
some examples, right? So they might have a poor operating
55:32
system so they need to be liked and loved by their prospects.
55:36
They are uncomfortable talking about money. They let people buy
55:39
from them, how they buy themselves? Let's talk about
55:43
their natural drive. They might have a high desire to be
55:47
successful, but a low commitment to actually doing it. You know,
55:51
they don't actually want to do things that are uncomfortable,
55:54
even though they'd love to be successful. Perhaps they don't
55:58
take responsibility for the number that that's been set, and
56:01
they'll always blame marketing or leads or events or the
56:06
economy rather than how effective they were. And I think
56:09
this links really nicely, because you know, if you have
56:11
that data, I mean doing these assessments, I think it could
56:16
take you years to get that level of insight, which you can get
56:19
within an hour of someone completing an assessment, but
56:22
you've spoken about frameworks and hard data, and you mentioned
56:27
it earlier on, like one of the things that people should leave
56:30
until later is a framework, right that you gave the example
56:33
of, I think it's a med pick. Why? Why do you feel like people
56:38
prefer the comfort of frameworks versus the discomfort of data. I
56:43
John Mason: think it comes down to the we think it's a silver
56:45
bullet. We think it's the thing that's going to solve our
56:48
problems. You know, make $100 a day, have a tech system that's
56:51
got a million different data points use AI, implement a new
56:55
framework, a new sales methodology. This is the reason
56:59
why my team is not successful. This is going to solve all my
57:02
problems. I think that's what we fall foul of. You should deploy
57:05
medic when you want to understand how you can go from a
57:11
30% conversion ratio to a 40% conversion ratio, which areas of
57:15
the process are maybe lacking. So, you know, is it
57:18
understanding the economic buyer. Is it understanding the
57:23
competition? Is it understanding decision criteria, etc? Who does
57:27
what at what stages, and who does it well and things like
57:30
that. That's what should be done. But what actually happens
57:34
more often than not, is people go, Yeah, let's put medic or med
57:37
pick in, and you just feel your CRM nonsense. You don't actually
57:41
take the learnings. I know, obviously, you know, seeing a
57:44
few reports that yourselves, my sales coach and other training
57:49
providers, or SaaS providers in the tech space, in the sales
57:52
space, have put out there that more often than not, things are
57:55
more successful when a good discovery is done. You know,
57:58
things are more successful when the more people you know, fill
58:01
out medic correctly, not just as tick box exercise, but as an
58:05
outcome exercise. If I do these things correctly, I'm going to
58:08
be successful. The correctly bit is important. If I do these
58:11
things, I'll be successful. It doesn't work all of the time. It
58:14
only works some of the time. So I think that's why people jump
58:18
to that silver bullet, the thing is going to make their team
58:20
better. What is missing? You know, it's volume. Let's get a
58:23
parallel dialer, 200 dials. It's tech. Let's get to get LEM list,
58:26
and let's get fully rich. It's AI. Let's send out 1000 emails
58:31
that they're all personalised. Or it's a new sales methodology
58:35
and framework. If I just deploy this, it will be fantastic.
58:38
Mark Ackers: I think it's just something to hide behind. You
58:40
can point to look, I've done this, I've deployed this
58:44
technology, I've deployed this framework. It's not me. It's not
58:48
my fault. It's gone wrong. I think when most companies want
58:53
to there's here's here's the things that sales leaders really
58:58
care about, right? It's headlines, of course, but
59:01
improving revenue, improving pipeline, upsell, cross, sell,
59:06
and when you think about those things, they're like, they're
59:09
headline problems, right? We want more revenue. We want
59:13
revenue from different places. We know we need more pipeline to
59:16
do that, and where most revenue is lost is in the quality of
59:21
your sales team, sales conversations, right? Like what
59:24
they do and what they don't do in those sales conversations,
59:27
that's where your company leaks revenue. But to go in and fix
59:32
that requires a manager, one, to spend the time, two, to put
59:37
themselves out there and say, This is where I think you've
59:40
gone wrong, and it's their opinion, it's their belief, it's
59:44
their coaching and and I think that that sometimes is hard for
59:48
a manager to do. There's that imposter syndrome, there's that
59:50
self doubt, there's that I don't want to give this feedback to
59:53
this individual. I don't want to carve out time. You know,
59:57
listening to calls is time consuming. I. I know, and again,
1:00:01
I get slightly worried that people feel like they can hide
1:00:04
behind Oh, we'll just automate that now. We can build a
1:00:07
scorecard in conversation intelligence, and that will
1:00:10
surface it. But the art of the sales conversation is where most
1:00:15
companies leak revenue. And it might not be in that call, but
1:00:18
it would be what didn't happen that call is the reason your
1:00:21
deal much further down the line doesn't come in, or it slips, or
1:00:25
they ghost you. And I think, I think if you can hide behind,
1:00:29
well, the medic scorecards filled out, or, you know, we've
1:00:33
done some training on this, or I've done a DISC profile on the
1:00:39
team. It's stuff you can hide behind,
1:00:41
John Mason: just tick box exercise, isn't it? It's
1:00:43
Mark Ackers: just tick
1:00:44
box. But what you have to do as a sales leader is immerse
1:00:47
yourself in what is the quality of the conversations my sales
1:00:51
team are having. And to do that, you have to really put yourself
1:00:54
out there. And there's no way to hide. I've listened to this
1:00:57
call. This is what I think we need to be doing differently,
1:00:59
and then putting that into practice. But just because you
1:01:02
do it once doesn't mean it changes. It's a constant
1:01:05
listening to calls and reinforcement. But I don't know.
1:01:08
I feel like a lot of leaders are reluctant to do that because of
1:01:12
time, because of will and skill. It is a skill to be able to
1:01:16
listen to and coach sales conversations effectively that
1:01:19
drive positive change as well, where it's not a skill to
1:01:24
implement a framework, it's you get it done, and you maybe bring
1:01:28
someone in, or a consultant or and whatnot. So that's my
1:01:32
thinking. But what would you say to that? I'd
1:01:34
John Mason: agree. I definitely think it's something to hide
1:01:36
behind. And like you said, then, you know, just use a scorecard
1:01:39
and get AI to read all our read all of our transcripts from our
1:01:43
calls and tell us what was good or bad. But if you actually
1:01:46
listen to the calls, you might pick up on some nuances that are
1:01:50
just completely subjective to that call, that interaction
1:01:53
between that client and that AE or that SDR that you wouldn't
1:01:57
pick up just from the scorecard. And if that thing that has come
1:02:00
up is actually a much deeper root cause or underlying
1:02:04
problem. It's something to fix. You'll find it quicker. I think
1:02:07
you can leverage AI to identify which calls to listen to, so
1:02:13
that, because, yeah, you can't listen to all of them rather
1:02:15
than randomly checking them. Can we be a bit more selective? Same
1:02:18
way we would do it for ICP, is there a way which I can filter
1:02:22
this data down so that I've got the greater chance of listening
1:02:26
to a call that I can actually gain a teachable moment from
1:02:29
it's also a difficult conversation. You've got to tell
1:02:32
someone that they're, you know, not doing it right. Is that
1:02:35
opinion, you know? Is it fact? Is it subjective? How do they
1:02:39
take criticism? How do you deliver criticism? You know, do
1:02:42
you do the sandwich method or various other words? Do you, as
1:02:47
a leader, take time to go? I'm not being coached on how to do
1:02:51
this. Let me go and research how to do it. You spoke earlier in
1:02:55
this, in this interview where you said you're constantly
1:02:58
saying as an SDR to your AE, can I take this off your plate? Not
1:03:02
everyone thinks of that instant what I can do next. Some people
1:03:06
are waiting to be told. As a sales leader, you need to very
1:03:09
quickly realise you need to work out what you need and where you
1:03:14
can get it, what your team needs and where they can get
1:03:17
Mark Ackers: it. And I think that's a lovely way to bring the
1:03:20
conversation to a close. I really enjoyed getting to get
1:03:24
into speech here today, John, you know, we've spoke about how
1:03:29
people fall into leadership roles. They might chase it
1:03:33
because they're a top performer, and it feels like the next step.
1:03:36
How companies back it, because they feel like they're a company
1:03:40
that's showing progression, and they don't want to lose their
1:03:42
top performer, we spoke about the challenges that can bring
1:03:45
where they don't want to lose the revenue so they give them
1:03:48
the quota as well. And when I spoke about how leadership is
1:03:52
just a completely different job, like different skills, different
1:03:55
pressures, different emotional load, and you need people to
1:04:01
help you make that shift. You need support from the
1:04:04
organisation. We need support from internal and external
1:04:09
coaching. And we need to not just focus on the month and the
1:04:13
quarter, but look ahead and really put our team forward,
1:04:18
team first, I should say. And I love the parent analogy, and I
1:04:22
think to anyone that's got kids myself included, I think that
1:04:26
really does bring it to life. But yeah, John, I just want to
1:04:29
say, yeah, thank you for sharing your knowledge and expertise
1:04:32
today. I think this is a great episode for anybody that is
1:04:36
thinking about making the step into a leadership role, or
1:04:39
they've just got their first leadership role, and they're
1:04:42
thinking shit, what do I do on a Monday? Thank you, John, you're
1:04:45
John Mason: welcome. Thank you.
1:04:50
Mark Ackers: You.