Inside Sales by Design

leadership characteristics

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Focus your time: Become the Mistress/Master of your Calendar

In this short clip, we talk about time. There is a massive body of work out in the world talking about time, time management, maximizing your time, getting the most out of your time, etc….you name it, there’s an article, book, expert, example. Here’s the reality, we all get 168 hours a week and time is the most important resource we have; once it’s gone, it’s gone.

Perhaps approach how you spend your time by using the Pauli exclusion principle that says no two things can occupy the same space.*  Folks, if you have an hour, you only have an hour. That’s a total of 60 minutes and we can only use them once.

So what does all of that mean? That means we employ massive, epic, and egregious prioritization and compartmentalization of our time, tasks, talents, and treasures to become the Mistress and Master of our Calendar. Here are some tips you can use:

  1. Brendon Burchard’s 1 Page Productivity Planner
  2. The Power of the Three-Item-To-Do-List
  3. Search the power of to do lists and you’ll get about 587 million returns.

Action tip for the day: employ a to-do list, make it manageable, keep your eye on your strategic goals, while executing tactically daily

*I am not, nor will pretend to be a physicist. I am, however, citing the Pauli exclusion principle in its most simple form. 

Dionne is a 20 year sales veteran having built and scaled Inside Sales team from the ground up. She started her own firm, Inside Sales by Design, to work with companies wanting to build their Inside Sales Teams right the first time and transform their current Inside Sales Team into something greater. Dionne believes in and uses common sense, practical approaches to inspire leaders and teams to greatness.

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Are You A Thermostat or a Thermometer?

The latest Video Blog from Dionne Mischler: Are You a Thermostat or a Thermometer?

Welcome to the latest prep speech from Dionne Mischler. Today’s topic: the difference in being a thermostat and a thermometer – and why it’s better to be the former versus the latter.

Watch Dionne’s blog and get the full synopsis below. You can also click here to request a meeting with Dionne.

Are You A Thermostat or Thermometer?

If you have been following my blog, you have heard me discuss the concept of being a leader by title or deed (or both).

Today, I’d like to discuss the concept of being a thermostat or a thermometer – the former is someone who has a ton of energy and can change the temperature of a room just by entering it, the latter is someone who is an expert at reading the room and taking its temperature.

I think this is a very interesting dynamic to bring to the table. Leaders need to have a heightened sense of self-awareness and understand at which points they need to be a thermostat and at which points they need to be a thermometer.

The key pieces for leaders are: know thyself and know the situation. Think about this as you’re coming up with your 2019 strategy and be mindful of the situations you are entering and what they call for on your behalf.

Get in Touch With Dionne

Looking to optimize your sales organization in 2019? Contact Dionne to help you coach and train your sales team to become all they can be. Schedule time with Dionne here.

Enjoy the rest of your holidays!

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Who’s at Your Table?


Do you know who is at your table? As we’ve said, Leadership isn’t about us or even about titles. Leadership is about getting stuff done and getting it done well.

If you’re given a new project and/or assignment today, who would you go to? Probably the person who comes to your mind first as someone who is capable of helping, leading, guiding, etc.

Here’s why this matters: As leaders, we’re responsible for knowing who’s at our table and harnessing resources the right way to get the job done.

Action Tips of the Day:

  1. What’s your sign? – How would you describe your communication sign? Would others agree? Get to know yourself.
  2. What’s their sign? – Get to know the communication style of those on your team, your peers, your co-workers; you get the idea.

Resources:

  1. MRG Research – this was mentioned in the video, very powerful information
  2. Five Voices – very impactful book that allows us to communicate effectively

 

Dionne is a 20 year sales veteran having built and scaled Inside Sales team from the ground up. She started her own firm, Inside Sales by Design, to work with companies wanting to build their Inside Sales Teams right the first time and transform their current Inside Sales Team into something greater. Dionne and her team believe in and uses common sense, practical approaches to inspire leaders and teams to greatness.

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The #1 Luxury a Leader Gives Up

Reaction

As leaders, we do not have the luxury of reacting. We MUST chose an appropriate response in any situation.
Ergo, we must continually build our skill set and experience set to know how to appropriately handle situations with our teams, peers, bosses, etc.

A reaction from us is because something is happening to us. Remember the example I used in the video with my son.

When we respond, we are making a conscious choice in our return. Not a gut-level reaction.

Let’s go back to physics, Newton’s third law to be specific: For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. This means there are multiple forces exerted on something (typically us) at any given moment.

The beauty of this is, as humans, we have a choice in how we respond to being yelled at, cut off in traffic, a team member quitting, a team member doing really well, someone gossiping about us, someone giving us praise….

Resources:

  1. How to Win Friends and Influence People (book)
  2. One Minute Manager (book)
  3. Have your own advisory council that can unequivocally tell you the truth (we’ll talk more about this one later)

Action tip of the day: what do you do in situations that may push you to a reaction? How do you stay calm, think, and choose an appropriate response?

Come up with those responses, document them, write them on a 3×5 card memorize them, commit the actions to memory, exercise your responses like a muscle so that as situations come up, you’re prepared.

Here are two of my personal favorites:

  1. That’s interesting….tell me more. Why: This phrase allows you to acknowledge the other person and gives your brain time to process what the other person is telling you.
  2. Wow, what are you going to do about that? Why: This allows you to stall a “complainer” and transition the conversation from spewing to action. Specifically, what the other person is going to do about the problem (real or perceived) in their life at this moment.

Please share your favorite response phrases so we’re all equipped as leaders to respond appropriately in the situations that come up in our lives.

Dionne is a 20 year sales veteran having built and scaled Inside Sales team from the ground up. She started her own firm, Inside Sales by Design, to work with companies wanting to build their Inside Sales Teams right the first time and transform their current Inside Sales Team into something greater. Dionne believes in and uses common sense, practical approaches to inspire leaders and teams to greatness.

 

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Get Stuff Done

If you live by the words “this is how we’ve always done it” and really, really like a well defined rut, this is probably not what you’re looking for. If however, you are interested in making changes within yourself and your team, you’ve come to the right place.

If you’re someone who likes to get up and get stuff done, then you’re in the right place. If dangling items on your to-do list make you nauseous and procrastination make you cranky, you’re in good company.

As a leader, we are on the hook for numbers, relationships, process, initial onboarding, ongoing training, the list goes on and on. Can I get an Amen? Sometimes, tackling these big initiatives is so overwhelming, we don’t know where to start.

And even worse, we do nothing.

Well, let’s talk about eating the elephant one bit at a time, just like in the video. At the AA-ISP Leadership Summit in 2017, I was fortunate enough to lead a pre-event workshop titled Transforming your Inside Sales Team. During this workshop, we walked through an Inside Sales Infrastructure scorecard and everybody rated themselves.

The purpose of this exercise was (and is) to stop, think, and do.

The leaders in this workshop scored themselves and then rated what particular area of focus would give their team the most lift. Based upon those scores, they were then able to plot actions on an annual calendar for tackling.

Again, keeping in mind that things happen – both good and bad – and we should allow enough time so we’re not short-circuiting our efforts before they begin.

ISbD Annual Plan
ISbD Annual Plan to get stuff done

 

Resources for you:

  1. AA-ISP
  2. Transforming your Inside Sales Team worksheets (this is where you’ll find the scorecard)

Action tip of the day: (1) complete your scorecard, (2) figure out which area of your Inside Sales Infrastructure you could improve that would matter most to your team and deliver the biggest impact, (3) determine next steps and right them down, and (4) compartmentalize what you need, next best steps, and execute!

 

 

 

Dionne is a 20 year sales veteran having built and scaled Inside Sales team from the ground up. She started her own firm, Inside Sales by Design, to work with companies wanting to build their Inside Sales Teams right the first time and transform their current Inside Sales Team into something greater. Dionne believes in and uses common sense, practical approaches to inspire leaders and teams to greatness.

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The 3 Most Important Aspects of an Inside Sales Team

Via a polling question, we recently asked Inside Sales Leaders to select the three most important aspects of an Inside Sales team. Here they are, ranked by most number of votes:

  1. Sales Processes
  2. Clarity of Strategy or Goal
  3. People on the Team

Let’s unpack these answers.

  1. Sales Processes – Having a well-defined Sales Process allows your teams to execute against their daily/monthly/yearly goals. Think of your Sales Process(es) as the lines on the road that your reps follow, allowing them to reach their destination in a predictable and repeatable fashion. What would your drive to work look like without lines on the road?  How about your kids’ activities?  A trip to the store? Probably chaotic at best.

Having well defined Sales Processes in place is critical. They eliminate confusion and provide clarity, with the intent of driving predictable results via a tried and true path.

  1. Clarity of Strategy or Goal – We all have friends that say, “let’s get together soon.” Awesome, would love to. What date/time works best? Hard to get together without a date/time. Same concept here. What is the revenue goal? New customer acquisition goal? Customer Retention goal? Average Contract Value goal? Sales is about revenue goals, acquiring new customers, and executing against your Success Plan in order to achieve goals.

You cannot know if you’ve ‘arrived’ if the ultimate destination wasn’t set from the beginning. Set very clear daily/monthly/yearly goals and watch your team overachieve.

  1. People on the Team – Have you ever been a part of an amazing team? You were all clicking together, gelled, and were aligned to your goals? There is a ton of research out there that dives into how the right team can achieve anything.

It’s imperative to have the right people on your team and in your organization. Having the right Job Descriptions, Hiring Process, a vetted Onboarding & Training Program all come together to hedge your success bets.

The most successful companies and leaders have these three key aspects at the forefront of their minds, and it shows in the results. Learn more and join the PM Inside Sales movement at www.PMInsideSales.com.