Motivation – The Sales Manager’s Part

Every sales manager loves team members who are “self-motivated” mainly because it makes their job as manager, well, easier. Just because some people are more “self-motivated” than others doesn’t mean they can’t be even more motivated if the right environment is set in place for them to succeed. A large part of the sales manager’s job is to understand what motivates his team members and help them obtain their goals, together.

One tool sales managers can utilize is giving their team a personality assessment. ASHER recommends the CPQ (Craft Personality Questionnaire). The CPQ gives the sales manager in-depth recommendations of how to motivate each individual based on their personality type and characteristics. For example, how great would it be to know that one team member is motivated by recognition and another team member is not motivated by recognition and hates to be in the spot light? In fact, the later team member is motivated by money and less recognition.  Each motivating factor is determined by the team member’s personality.

Lifestyle is another key indicator of motivation. If a sales manager takes time to get to know each team member, they can find out clues to their lifestyle that may help them with motivation. For example, one person may be very interested in climbing the corporate ladder so sending them to additional management training would be a good motivator. While another team member wants to send their children to private schools and needs to hit a number each month to ensure they can afford that choice. Sales contents, spiffs and bonus opportunities could be great ways to motivate him/her.

Many organizations make the assumptions that everyone is motivated by money. Not true. While most of us do work for money, it’s not everyone’s prime reason. Some people simply want more challenging work, or feeling of purpose or social interactions from their jobs. Everyone has different things they are motivated by and top sales managers pay attention and align customized factors for each team member to create the ultimate win/win.

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