Negotiation is one of the most difficult, and in my opinion, poorly understood aspects of the sales process. If there's at least one thing I've learned about leading sales reps, epecially less experiences ones, they do not know how to negotiate effectively. Even if they run a flawless sales process, they give up loads of value after having created so much in everything they did prior. While the customer ultimately gets the better end of this deal, it's not effective for building a business over the long term. Heavy discounting erodes margin and eliminates a business's ability to invest back into their own people, which in turn, limits the quality of the total customer experience.
In my last post, I shared some reflections on my personal development as a Sales Manager. If you just read that post, you now know my opinion on where most sales leaders miss the mark -- they confuse "leadership" with "problem solving". As a result, they perpetuate the inability for their teams to solve problems on their own and never become the leader they could be because they are not coaching.. which is what I believe to be the secret to being a highly impactful sales leader.
A year ago, I reflected on my first full year (plus) as a Sales Manager. At the time, it was a helpful exercise, and I hope for those of you who may have read the article found it helpful as well. If you haven't had a chance to read it, and you're a new sales manager or sales manager just looking for a refresh, the article can be found here on HubSpot's Blog: 7 Thing I Wish I Knew Before Becoming a Sales Manager.
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