The most important meeting for Sales Leaders to get right
Advice on how to nail your monthly kick-off 1:1 with each team member
I posted a poll on LinkedIn yesterday afternoon, and the results are in.
I agree.
1:1s are the most important meeting for Sales Managers to get right. To be clear, they aren’t as high leverage (especially for a second-level Leader - Director/VP/CRO), but they are the most important meeting to execute effectively.
But here is the problem—when I talk to Sales Managers AND Salespeople, most aren’t thrilled with their 1:1s, particularly in a remote environment.
In bad 1:1s, there is a lot of talking about deals, micro-management around goals, and or pointless discussion about low-lift items.
In my course for Sales Leaders, I teach my Development and Coaching Cadence (DCC) to drive improvement across sales teams.
It starts with a quarterly stack rank, leading to a monthly kick-off 1:1, and then is accelerated through weekly 1:1s.
The monthly kick-off 1:1 is most critical. In it, I teach leaders to leverage the Triple D Framework.
Decide on Goals
Diagnose areas of opportunity (needle movers)
Develop sub-goals and action items
When done right, the salesperson brings their goals and ideas to the monthly kick-off 1:1 and leaves with a clear plan for hitting their number that month/quarter, including weekly goals and action items they can tackle and track.
Too often, Managers don’t orchestrate the monthly kick-off 1:1 correctly. They don’t align with the Salesperson upfront.
This leads to scrambling throughout the month in the weekly 1:1 to diagnose how best to help the Salesperson. Even worse, this can lead to Managers repeating the same goals and advice week after week, like a broken record, delivering little impact.
The best Sales Leaders are proactive and empower their team to develop goals and action plans that are effective and give the Salesperson confidence. This is done through delivering strong 1:1s and following a consistent development process month over month.
If you are looking to accelerate your sales team in Q2— I have limited spots available in the upcoming cohort of my course, Sales Leadership that Delivers Results—kicking off May 4th.