Derby Management's "Competitive Edge" Blog

CONGRATULATIONS!!!

At the beginning of the Q on April Fool's Day, it's important to first congratulate yourself for the quarter no matter what the results!!!  Overall, a solid quarter for most everyone as we slowly crawl out of the pandemic. Clearly questions on the horizon with the impact of Putin's War, but still a relatively positive outlook for the balance of the year in which we've discovered workarounds for labor and supply shortages.  At the end of the day, we still need to successfully sell things that create value, no matter what the outside environment is. 

Tags: sales coaching, sales effectiveness, sales tools, how to close sales, sales boot camps, how to write a sales plan, 2022businessplansuccess

Including today, at the most, there's about 18 selling days left in the year...and that's assuming that your prospect is not leaving for the week after Christmas, which is, of course, classic family vacation time. 

With those precious 18 days on the calendar and with B2B sales cycles currently being what they are, whatever is going to happen between now and the end of the year, is going to occur after your "Discovery" step in whatever sales process funnel and CRM you're currently using.  Other than maximizing every hour you can in your calendar and consistently using your exacting value propositions, there's very little that you can do to collapse time given the need to now build your business cases with multiple stakeholders...except in the critical last step of closing the deal.  

Tags: sales coach, sales management coach, sales enablement, marketing effectiveness, how to close sales, sales boot camps, improving sales productivity, how to write a sales plan, writing sales plans

I enjoy receiving the HBR's "Management Tips of the Day" around 7:00 AM every morning.  First, I've been an avid reader of everything HBR ever since my first job as a purchasing expeditor at Honeywell, and second, it's one of those instant pop-ups that takes 10 seconds to read and often stimulates an idea or two.  My initial reaction was the headline that I then wrote for this blog since most probably none of us have ever worked in a 9-to-5 environment... certainly not as salespeople,  certainly not as entrepreneurs, and most probably just never in any position at any company we've worked in.

Tags: sales coach, sales effectiveness, marketing effectiveness, how to close sales, sales boot camps, sales success, marketing planning, Derby Entrepreneurship Center@Tufts

It all comes down to today:  e nd of the month, t he quarter, and the first half of the year.  Hopefully, your high on the charts...and you always have the next 10 hours or so.  An adage in the profession of sales has always been "never give up!".  Put it to good use today...I know that I will be!

Somewhere among the results of the first half of the year are lots of reasons to celebrate, and this weekend is the perfect time of year to do just that.  As we power through the last hours of this month making sure that every drop of quota juice gets squeezed through this quarter's wringer, once that's done, and you've cleaned up paperwork tonight or tomorrow morning, just stop!  Get out of town, go to the beach, hang out in the backyard, and just celebrate!

Yes, I know that this does not sound like the normal workaholic seven-days-a-week, Jack, and no, I did not get mellowed out by the heat, but I'm also a student of the science of when it's time to hang it up and step away for a few days. Plus, I love both the simplicity and the complex history of the 4th.  Later tonight I will be jumping in the fast red car to get to Vermont, where the 4th of July takes on a whole new meaning in this quirky state of my ancestors.  I'll get to watch the West Wardsboro parade twice since there's only one main road in town, and what goes one way, needs to come back.  Simple Vermont practicality.  Then another fast trip back to the NH beach to watch the outlandish fireworks and huge bonfires that are part of the tradition here ever since my parents brought me to this beach at the age of 5.  

Tags: sales management coach, sales enablement, sales planning, sales tools, how to close sales, sales boot camps, strategic planning, how to write a sales plan

This morning, with tonight's Nor'easter looming just a few hours from now, and the end of the entire sales year only eight days away, it's interesting to compare two timely forecasting scenarios:
-On one hand, we have local Boston weather forecasters guessing about snowfall.
-On the other, we have professional salespeople forecasting real revenue.

Tags: sales coach, sales enablement, closing sales, how to close sales, sales boot camps, improving sales productivity, sales success, how to write a sales plan, sales readiness, forgetsalesstrategyfocusontactics

Rarely, as in never, do I get into a discussion in this blog about politics, and to a large degree this post is not about politics, it's just about the science, the data and the sources of the truth behind the pandemic and its impact.

What each of us should be doing at this time is to identify our own "single sources of truth" regarding the disease, the impact that it's making on our physical and mental health, and the devastating effect on our businesses and our jobs.

The only way we can fight back is with discipline in what we do, how we act, and how we sell and market our products
. 

Six months into this, we clearly know the facts...

Tags: Sales Management Best Practices, sales enablement, sales management boot camp, sales boot camps, how to write a sales plan, 2020 sales plans, Selling Successfully in a Covid World

The official summa' kicks off this Saturday, -which by the way, looks like a perfect weatha' day- and we welcome in this season of beaches, barbecues and barefootin'. 

Most importantly, it's time to kick back a bit, take a breath, and simplify from what we've been through over the past 100 days.  We need to take a break, or at least a partial break, from the pressures of the reality of the virus and from the stress of the unrest. 

Given what's been going on around us and the financial realities of where we are, I expect that the word "vacation" may have a very different meaning during the Summa' of 2020.  Having said that, we still need to take a break and shut things off for a day or five or a couple of weekends since it's going to be a long road ahead to get to "recovery" whatever the word means.  We also need some time to get out of the day-to-day survival mode where we've been hunkered down for the last 100 days and think a bit more strategically about where we're going to be at the end of the next 100 days.

Tags: Sales Management Best Practices, sales boot camps, sales management boot camps, Making Tough Choices, how to write a sales plan, 2020 sales plans

Super Bowl Sunday & Sales 

For months, everything in the NFL has been on the line, and it all comes down to this Sunday when the two best teams in the country define the 2020 Champion!  

Not all that different than viewing our own Sales scoreboards at the end of the sales year on January 1, and of course. starting today for January and then in any of the following months and quarters.  Metrics count everywhere in business and in our own personal lives, and achieving metrics always result from executing activities from planning strategies and tactics.

Tags: sales enablement, sales boot camps, sales readiness, superbowl of sales

 

"A clean forest is a happy forest !"

In the tiny town of Bondville (Federal government's name) and/or Winhall (the State's name), population 647, I was out in my Vermont woodlot this past weekend. Always a work process of love for the land that is good for my head, the soul and especially for the woods!  
My family has lived in this valley for over 250 years, and I have enough great grandfather and grandfather stories of real entrepreneurship to fill a book. I think that it's not by coincidence that I'm now director of the Tufts Entrepreneurship Center, just two miles from my grandfather's first retail store opened in Davis Square in 1908.  Bapa left the not-so-rural town of Poultney, just 20 miles up the road a piece from where I live in Vermont, to settle in Somerville next to the Tufts campus.  

Last Friday, Mike, my trusted co-worker, and I were deep in the Vermont muck with chain saws and ATV's cutting, bushwhacking, and generally cleaning up the final damage of the winta'. 

Tags: improved sales management, sales management training, sales boot camps, improving sales productivity, sales management productivity, sales careers

To the uninitiated, the managers who never actually sold anything, the presidents who did not climb up the rungs from entry-level sales positions to become the #1 salesperson, and to the operations managers who regard salespeople as a necessary evil, the presumption is that money drives success in salespeople.  

Tags: sales coaching, Sales Optimization, Sales Management Best Practices, sales effectiveness, sales producitivity, sales culture, sales boot camps