Why sales transformation takes 18 months—And how to make it stick

A question we regularly hear from managers is: "How long will it take to transform my sales? My usual question is:

Do you want real results or do you "sales training"

If the response is "We want real transformational results" then my answer is "18 months. In 6 months your team can acquire techniques, in 18 you'll get long lasting results"...

Why is that?

It's about systems

Let's take the example of weight loss. We can go on a diet and lose weight, but how many of us maintain our new habits over the long term?

According to the US National Institute of Health, only 20% of people maintain their weight over the long term following a diet. So what problems do people have to solve to keep the weight off?

There are various but these include the attitude (mindset) towards dieting, aspects of metabolism, the practical exercise programme, food choices, food preparation, calorie tracking, lifestyle, genetics, habits that work, support from those around you, goals and commitment to success.

So if people who want to lose weight don't tackle the whole weight-loss 'ecosystem', they'll be among the 80% of people who put the weight back on.

Like weight loss, sales transformation is a journey that requires holistic engagement every day. Unfortunately, many companies don't even commit to the bare minimum. A recent study by the Boston Consulting Group revealed that in 48% of companies, salespeople receive less than 30 hours of training a year, or around 30 minutes a week.

Let's think about this. The majority of salespeople 'fall' into sales rather than having undergone rigorous training on questioning strategies, the importance of a process, etc. And the average cross industry is to compensate this gap by 30 minutes a week.

Even sales leaders feel that their company does not invest enough in learning and development - 39% of these leaders believe that their company's training budget is sufficient.

So, what's the solution?

Sustainable change means sustainable systems

To obtain long lasting, sustainable change, a sales organisation needs to address its learning and development ecosystem and the one aimed at the performance of the sales team. And, as a reminder, sales people face unique dynamics: rejection, hostility, their ego get bruised all the time by rejection from prospects, etc… So the classic learning and development mindset of many organisation simply isn't adequate. It has to be tailored, amongst other things, to what is being sold, the sales management capabilities in place, the team in place, the vision that wants to be achieved.

This means tactical skills, the beliefs that support or sabotage a salesperson's ability to execute the sales process, the team's use of technology, the manager's coaching skills and the sales management beliefs, sales hiring and onboarding practices (too often put in place by HR and not sales leaders), to name but a few.

It takes 18 months to get things moving in all these areas, and it has to be done rigorously and continuously.

But how can a company know where to start, whether the sales people in place can develop or not - as our experience sadly proves that not everyone is willing to change -, sales people who can sell more on value and those who will take too much time to change, the impact of sales management (good or average) and what need to change to improve it if it needs to improve, etc....

We working with sales team facing différentes sales dynamique. Broadly speaking the nascent team, with just a founder or 2 or 3 sales reps, the companies with a first structure that need to accelerate and the large teams well established. So if you have a team who is in an acceleration mode or is what we call "stable", we recommend starting with a sales force analysis.

Why? Because every team make-up is unique. And starting a transformation project without understanding the underlying root cause of inefficiencies is more than likely leading to frustration and not achieving the results intended.

You can also have a simple, 5 minutes self-assessment by filling this questionaire which will provide you with actionable suggestions. But to obtain a roadmap to excellence that is detailed and predictive, doing a sales MRI is an invaluable tool for determining how long it will take a sales organisation to obtain the expected results. It's the sales equivalent of a doctor telling a patient whether to start with surgery, physical therapy, medication or bed rest.

An assessment of all sales systems can identify the root causes of problems, evaluate compliance with the sales process or, lastly, the sales DNA of existing sales staff, and then sort out the most important starting points.