John Robert Confrey

Practical Sales Management John Robert Confrey

My previous work, Practical Selling -- No Seminars in Foxholes, addressed the issues important to salespeople out in the trenches. Together with Practical Sales Management -- Alone in the Field, these two books are calculated departures in approach from all of the Sales Books descended from Dale Carnegie's 1936 How to Win Friends and Influence People. 68 years is long enough to pretend that large complex sales will be won or lost based on whether the prospect likes the salesperson. Hopefully, we are done with pop, self-help psychologists telling salespeople how to sell. Likewise, the two works deviate significantly from the latest themes of 80's-90's sales books: (1) one-size-fits all selling techniques; (2) interchangeable salespersons; (3) rational, fair and honest selling environments; (4) the presumption of competitive products, unlimited resources, competent management, strong companies. Regarding (4), I am amazed by how many individuals, even with sales in their titles, know very little about selling. There are armies of salespeople working for large American companies who, in the final analysis, simply take orders because their companies and their products are so strong. No one has to sell anything until the customer says "no." Meanwhile, the sales manager must lead the right organization to address multiple territories, product lines, channels and strategies. None of that would especially matter if orders simply came in due to the likeability of the salesperson or the strength of the product or company. Unlike the idealized environment described in books and seminars, he must often deal with limited resources and lack of support from his company; a broad range of sales roles required by his company's situation; flesh-and-blood salespeople with their individual capabilities and deficiencies to train and motivate; and huge amounts of effort put into non-revenue-producing, often meaningless, administrative tasks that drain his time and energy. And this is just the shortlist of challenges. In a sense, the sales force manager's dilemma is this: Unlike notions presented in conventional theory, the experienced sales manager knows that what he can achieve is going to depend on what situation he is in. This includes all the key components: what kind of industry, what kind of resources, what kind of company, what kind of salespeople, what kind of product, and what the market and account situation really is. The situational aspects are key! In short, Practical Sales Management -- Alone in the Field describes what actually happens in the real world of the sales manager.