Which Type of Sales Manager Are You?

It doesn’t matter what your business card says. In my book, if you’re responsible for bringing revenue in the front door you are some sort of sales manager.

And sales managers divide into two main categories – Activity Managers and Action Managers.

The names reflect the philosophy of the manager, their training and where there’s been no training, the books they’ve read.

Both philosophies are legitimate (in there are lots of people who do it that way) and depending on the markets, can be more, or less appropriate, but in performance terms one stands head and shoulders above the other.

The Activity Manager is the one who sets targets for numbers of calls, numbers of presentations, numbers of quotes.  He believes for every 100 calls there will be x% presentations, y% quotes and z% deals won.

His planning is relatively simple, management is easy and he can easily explain his performance to bosses – they all think this is the way sales works – they must have read the same books.

The Action Manager focuses on the right actions.  His planning is more complex, management is more challenging, and he spends his life explaining detail to his bosses.

Doesn’t sound like there’s much of a choice does it?

Except the Action Manager will always get better performance out of the same resources, he’ll get happier customers,  better margins, more referrals.  His reps will be happier, stay around longer and make more money for themselves and the business.

That sounds like a deal to me!

Why is the Action Manager more effective?

Because he doesn’t treat his resources, customers and opportunities as one of a number.  He sees every combination of customer/requirement/rep/opportunity as unique.

And guess what, that’s the way the customer sees it.

In these days of infinite competition for the customer’s time and money the only sales organization that stands out is the one that recognizes the unique combination of customer circumstances, and manages the sales process accordingly.

The Action Manager will get the most out of every opportunity while the Activity Manager burns customers, deals and reps in his pursuit of numbers.

Activity Managers leave their brains at the door and only bring their brawn to the office.

Action Managers make friends, build relationships, maximize margins, minimize cost of sale.

Of course they work a lot harder too.

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Tagged as: Business, Customer relationship management, Management, Marketing and Advertising, Revenue, Sales, sales management, Salesmanship