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Business Rule #28:
Don’t Expect the Worst...
or You’ll Get It
May 6, 2005
(PAGE 2 of 3)
With a diverse group of people, what can you do to coax the best performance out of all of them? One way is to set a goal and then celebrate and give out rewards when that goal is achieved.
On one sales team that I trained, there were two genuine stars. They were the top dogs in the office every week on sheer dollar volume. My challenge was to motivate the rest of the team to match that same high level of performance. How did I do it? I structured a contest that offered several small prizes for different types of achievements: one for the most sales calls made, one for the most new customers, one for the highest ratio of sales to calls made, etc. That way, each of the sales people had a chance to be the top sales person in one area or another. To ensure they received recognition, I awarded the prizes at a weekly sales meeting, giving each winner a chance to tell the group how he achieved his success. The result? More members of the team excelled and made bonus.
To her credit, Kendra Todd seemed much more willing to accept and work with her team. Even when she was alone with Tana, candidly discussing their new employees, Kendra didn’t rip into her group the way Tana did. It was Tana who first called Michael Tarshi, Danny Kastner, and Erin Elmore “scatterbrains,” not Kendra. Which is why, in spite of Tana’s greater maturity and business experience, Kendra is in a good position to win it all.
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Kendra called her team from the car on her way to meet them, just to pump them up and tell them how excited she was about working with them. For her effort, her team supported her by pulling together in a pinch. When Kendra was unaware that the Best Buy executives were waiting to meet with her, Danny pitched in, trying to show them a presentation on his laptop. Although his song didn’t go over well, he made a valiant attempt to hold things together. When the Best Buy team got impatient, Erin got up and found Kendra. Part of being a good manager is encouraging your team to speak up when they need help. Since they did, Kendra was able to save the relationship with the Best Buy execs by showing them the space for the event and explaining the set up.
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Part of being a good manager is encouraging your team to speak up when they need help.
