I love developing leadership skills and sales organizations whose culture authentically connects with the motivating values of the customer.
Deep customer loyalty begets the best kind of brand positioning more often than the inverse. Loyalty is a very personal expression of aligned values and is cemented or eroded through person-to-person relationships.
Companies spend a great deal of money and energy developing their brands to be associated with a feeling or emotion, while often failing to apply the branding iron to their sales organization.
The Sales VP must recognize that although they have nothing to do with R&D, they are in a product development role.
The relationship that their sales rep fosters with their customer can account for perhaps half of the perceived value of the product being purchased by the customer.

Leadership skills and Relationships
For the past 15 years, I have worked in key account sales management and business development with companies whose products and services are sold to either health or legal professionals.
I have met dozens of customers whose choice of product was predicated more on their degree of satisfaction with the personal connection they had with their sales rep than on the scientifically validated efficacy or technology of the product they were purchasing.
Many times I have heard a doctor say “I loved Company X’s products. They’re effective, but the rep was such an arrogant ass I just started using Company Y so I wouldn’t have to deal with him”.
All that R&D, marketing effort, copywriting, and branding strategy is wasted because the human relationship piece was neglected.
Becoming a Trusted Resource
For 7 years, I was the president of a sales organization that provided manufacturer’s rep services in the NYC and Long Island region. When I took the contract and launched the company, that manufacturer’s sales in the region had been completely flat for 4 years prior.
I began by meeting with all of the top accounts to introduce myself and establish rapport. These were not customers who needed product detailing. They knew the products well.
But why were they underutilizing the line?
They needed someone they trusted to help them think through and develop protocols for tough cases. They needed someone to find a bottle of immune support on a Sunday morning when their daughter had the flu. They needed someone to convince them to hire a virtual assistant to do their billing and scheduling so that they could spend their own time being the doctor and helping people get well.
“So what?” you might say. “Consultative solution-selling is old news, and all that other stuff is time wasted when you could be closing or visiting more accounts.”

Authentic Relationship Strategy
What my team and I developed over the course of those seven years was an authentic relationship strategy. To truly become trusted colleagues with shared values and a well-articulated shared mission. And because our mission was genuine, it gave us complete access to our customers.
By our second year, my small sales organization had the highest year-over-year percentage growth in the country and again in the 3rd year.
Within four years, we had built an $850k/year region into a $3.3 million/year region.
Values-Oriented Mission
In hiring your sales team, it is important to ask questions that will draw out one’s ability to adopt a values-oriented mission and their capacity to listen and express compassion.
When checking references, spend time speaking with the potential candidate’s previous customers as much as with previous employers.
Look for examples of their relationship skills as much as their problem-solving skills.
When playing out problem-solving scenarios with potential candidates, look for them to make an emotional connection to the problem before offering solutions.
For example, when a doctor was struggling with a difficult case involving an ailing patient whose care was not yielding optimal results, my first action was to acknowledge and validate the doctor’s frustration and disappointment, or even anger. I knew that their motivation was to make the patient well and relieve their suffering.
It was this genuine expression of compassion, and recognition of our common humanity, that established trust in me, my care for their patient, and my product guidance.
The Humanity Element
Your sales organization delivers the human element to your customer’s experience and must wear its values and mission on its sleeve.
Your sales reps are the eyes that your customer looks into for a heartfelt understanding of their needs and goals well before they are wowed with technical knowledge or your slick widget.
What Makes Good Sales Management?
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Excellent article from an experienced leader and salesperson. Max has obviously recognized that until rapport and trust is built nothing of significance will be built… thanks Max for offering your insights and experience.
I love these articles that explain the basic rules for the leadership team work in addition to being important in family relationships