The Toughest Role in Sales
Only as a bridge. A selling sales manager makes sense when you’re growing toward a dedicated sales manager and aren’t there yet, because a dedicated manager needs somewhere between four and twelve direct reports. If your team will stay at three or fewer, don’t create the role at all — you, the owner, should manage the team. And don’t outsource the problem to a fractional sales manager. Part-time authority doesn’t produce full-time accountability.
One of the questions I’m constantly asked is, “Troy, what do you think about having a selling Sales Manager?” By that, they mean a Sales Manager who also carries his/her own sales territory and is measured against a quota, not only for team production, but individual production. My answer is simple – I almost always dislike it.
Or, more to the point, I only like it when it’s a bridge to something else. For instance, I’ve always maintained that a dedicated Sales Manager needs somewhere between 4 and 12 direct reports. Less than four, you can’t support a Sales Manager. More than 12, your Sales Manager gets stretched too thin. But what of those situations where the object is to grow the sales force, but you’re not at the level of needing a dedicated Sales Manager yet? Well, that’s where the selling Sales Manager comes into play – but if you’re going to do it, you need to know the pitfalls and the must-dos. Hence, today’s article.
What if my sales team will never be bigger than three?
Then don’t build the role. Manage the team yourself.
I know that’s not the answer most owners want, because managing salespeople is the part of the job that gets pushed to Friday afternoon. But with three reps or fewer, there isn’t enough management work to justify the position, and there isn’t enough selling time left over to justify the territory. What you’ll get instead is a title, a raise, and a person doing two jobs badly.
If that’s your situation permanently, own it. Run the weekly one-on-ones yourself. Inspect the pipeline yourself. Ride along a few times a quarter. It’s a few hours a week, and it’s a great deal cheaper than the alternatives.
What about hiring a fractional sales manager?
I’ve done this work, and I’ll tell you plainly: it seldom works.
The reason is structural, not personal. Managing salespeople is a daily job. It’s the ride-along on Tuesday, the call debrief on Wednesday, and the hard conversation on the day the hard thing happens, not two weeks later when the fractional manager is next on site. Accountability gets tested on ordinary days, and whoever isn’t there on ordinary days can’t enforce it.
Your salespeople also know exactly how permanent that person is. Authority that leaves on Thursday gets treated accordingly.
Then there’s the part nobody mentions in the proposal. Renting a manager doesn’t teach your company how to manage. When the engagement ends, you’re back where you started, minus the fee, and you still don’t have anyone in the building who can run a pipeline review or coach a struggling rep.
Be skeptical of the results numbers you’ll see quoted, too. They’re self-reported by the firms selling the service, usually stated as an average, with nothing said about how many engagements never moved the needle at all. An average tells you nothing about your odds.
What actually fixes this is less glamorous and more permanent. Find out what’s actually broken, which is usually structure, compensation, hiring standards, or process rather than effort. Fix those. Then develop the person who’s going to hold the job, whether that’s a rep you promote, a manager you hire, or you. That way the capability stays in your company when the outside help goes home.
Having a selling Sales Manager (we’ll call it the SSM) has numerous pitfalls, and you need to be aware of these – whether you’re the owner employing the SSM, you’re the SSM, or you’re the salesperson working for the SSM. Here they are:
Competing Priorities: Every management position has competing priorities; however, for a SSM, the conflict is built-in. The SSM has to budget time between hiring, training, and developing his/her staff (the Sales Manager side), and protect a certain amount of time for selling (the salesperson side). This is a difficult balancing act, and all but the most disciplined people will struggle with it.
Personal Production: Production is, of course, important for all salespeople, but for the SSM, personal production can dictate the overall performance of the sales force. Think about it for a minute. If you’re a SSM, and you’re struggling in sales, how can you then coach and counsel performance issues? It’s hard to maintain the moral authority to keep your salespeople accountable for results if you’re not generating results. Hence, the SSM must produce, and ideally should produce at a star level (taking into account the reduced selling hours).
Stockholm Syndrome: A struggle that many SSM’s have is that they end up thinking more like salespeople than managers. Let’s be clear – a Sales Manager must be an agent of the company, thinking in terms of the good of the company overall. Sales reps are more free to think in terms of their own territories – they are solo performers. “Stockholm Syndrome” comes in when the SSM stops thinking like an agent of the company, and starts thinking like a salesperson. There are times when the Sales Manager must do things that the salespeople may not like, but are in the interests of the company. This is tough for many SSM’s.
The Compensation Conundrum: How do you pay and incent an SSM? One of the most common mistakes is to create a compensation plan that rewards personal production far more than team production. Let’s be clear on this – for the SSM, time and effort directed toward building and developing their sales force must be at least as valuable to the SSM, from a compensation perspective, as time spent selling – or the SSM would be a fool not to direct most of his/her time toward selling.
How do I make the role work?
So, how do we make the SSM a successful position? Well, here are a few guidelines:
Hire the right person. I know, this sounds obvious – but it’s not. The right person for the SSM spot might be different from the right person for either a Sales Manager slot or a Salesperson slot. They need excellent management abilities, precise personal discipline, and exceptional sales abilities (more than you’d normally demand from a Sales Manager). It’s a needle-in-a-haystack proposition.
Have a very clear description and expectations. Clarity is even more important here than for a normal Sales Manager. The job description and expectations should clearly delineate how much time and effort should be directed toward selling vs. managing.
Design the right compensation plan. As I mentioned earlier, the time spent (and results generated) through coaching and developing the team should be at least as valuable as time spent selling. You may need to play with sales commission and override plans, or put a team-centered bonus in place, to make this happen – but if you don’t, you’re on the path to failure.
Manage closely. The SSM will need to be managed fairly closely by the immediate supervisor, whoever that is; managing tightly means that you will be constantly looking for that balance between selling and managing to become unbalanced.
And set the expiration date when you create the job. The SSM is a bridge, so decide now what tells you it’s time to cross it: a headcount number, a revenue number, or a date. Otherwise the temporary arrangement becomes the permanent one, and you’ll spend three years wondering why your sales team never quite gets managed.
Most business owners who hire an SSM find that their happiest day comes when they turn the SSM into a dedicated Sales Manager. Use the right processes and techniques, and you can achieve that day.
If you’re trying to decide whether to promote someone, hire a manager, manage the team yourself, or bring in outside help, that’s exactly what the Navigator’s Sales Diagnostic is for: a free 45-minute conversation about how your sales organization is built, and what to fix first. Learn more and schedule yours here.
Questions owners ask about this
How many salespeople justify a dedicated sales manager?
Four to twelve direct reports. Below four, you can’t support the position. Above twelve, the manager is stretched too thin to coach anybody well.
Should I promote my best salesperson into the role?
Only if they have the management ability and the discipline, which are different from selling ability. The SSM job needs both at a high level, and that combination is rare. Promoting your best rep into a job they’re wrong for costs you a manager and a salesperson at the same time.
Isn’t a fractional sales manager cheaper than a full-time one?
Cheaper per hour, yes. But you’re buying presence, and presence is the part that makes management work. Use outside expertise to design the system and coach the person who’ll run it, then put someone in the seat who’s there every day.
How do I pay a selling sales manager?
So that coaching and developing the team is worth at least as much as personal selling. If the plan pays more for personal production, your SSM would be a fool to manage, and they won’t.
How long should the bridge last?
Long enough to grow into four direct reports, and no longer. Decide the trigger when you create the role, and write it down.
