Want to know the “dirty little secret” of why most sales training rollouts don’t stick or move the needle?
Here’s the truth—from an insider’s perspective . . .
Back when I was just starting my training company, I met with a friend who is the founder of a well-known sales training company for some advice.
I told him about all the research we had done on high performance sales teams…
And how we discovered that the high-leverage point—or how to drive A LOT of performance improvement in a short amount of time…
Is NOT to focus on ICs as the industry has led us to believe, but rather to focus on FLMs.
His response was revealing.
He said, “Brian, everyone knows that. Everyone knows that the stickiness of a training program is in direct proportion to the amount of ongoing coaching and reinforcement from FLMs. That’s the dirty little secret in the training industry.”
I said, “Well, if everyone knows that, then why don’t build your training curriculum around FLMs instead of ICs?”
He said, “Because our business model is predicated on putting cheeks-in-the-seats and there are a hell-of-a-lot more ICs out there than there are FLMs!”
Wow… pretty shocking right?
Here’s the truth:
The traditional training model has never worked—and will never work—because it is fundamentally flawed at its core.
The truth is the traditional training model was never really designed to solve the problem and create lasting behavioral change.
It was designed to be convenient for sales trainers to parachute in for a few days collect their check and leave. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but it’s true!
In a sense, the way we’ve been conditioned to see the problem—IS THE PROBLEM.
TYPICAL QUESTION = TYPCAL RESULTS:
◆ What are all the individual skills/competencies our ICs need to learn to be successful?
BETTER QUESTIONS = BETTER RESULTS
◆ How can we systematize sales excellence?
◆ How can we systematically ensure that that our frontline is consistently executing at a high-level—and continuously learning, growing, and improving?
◆ How can we systematically integrate consistent execution and continuous improvement into our operational rhythm, cadence, workflow, and DNA of the organization?”
