If you are like most sales managers, you are spending time trying to figure out why some of your producers produce and why others do not. There are sophisticated assessment tools that will help you do that; we use them to help us pinpoint the focus of our development programs for our clients. We also use this very simple approach:
There are three categories that you can put your people into that help identify their personal commitment to success: WIT, Coast- to-Coast and my favorite WITALAIITU.
WIT = What ever it takes. Now, when I say that and discuss it with our clients, I ALWAYS mean within legal, ethical and moral standards. Now that I've made that clear, whatever it takes also means doing everything possible. You know this group because they overcome obstacles that others use as excuses, they get results and often they are the over performers.
Coast-to-Coast = This is the group that has retired and hasn't told anyone. They coast from the beginning of the workday (week, month, quarter, year) to the end of the day (week, month, quarter, year). They don't necessarily act as a cancer, but neither do they add anything. They often manage a revenue book that you would rather not lose, and if you followed them around, you would see that they live quite comfortably on their income and have very little desire to improve their station in life or contribute to the betterment of others.
WITALAIITU = Whatever it takes as long as it isn't too uncomfortable. This is the group that looks, acts and sounds excited. They nod their head vigorously with each new idea and initiative and tell you what a great job they think you are doing. They occupy the lower 3rd of the results list. You can identify them because they look like your WIT group, but perform like the Coast-to-Coast group.
What to do? Thank the first group for there desire, commitment and results. Announce to the other two groups that starting immediately two (2) things are going to happen:
1) They will begin to report daily or weekly their sales activity results
2) That beginning at the next sales meeting you will stack rank the entire sales force looking at sales activity and sales results. Based on those stack rankings you will begin in 6 months replacing the bottom 10% of the sales group.
Go ahead. Be brave. Be a WIT!