Communicating with other people is really simple. We all have communicated countless thoughts, ideas, moments of happiness and occasional anger since childhood. We each have spoken with and listened to countless individuals. The difficult part of communicating is doing it well.
Effective sales managers learn that communicating with an audience is much important to be left to random pronouncements, poorly reasoned statements or meaningless conversations. The audience may be your sales team, your customers, business partners or a single individual. Leaders are held to a higher standard. They understand the importance of thinking before they speak.
One of the oddities of human nature is we all want to be heard. Unfortunately, many of us don’t want to be the person who gets to listen. In truth, learning to listen can be a difficult skill to master, but the dividends it pays are enormous and immediate. Listening starts when you focus on the other person, make and hold eye contact with them and approach each conversation with a sincere sense of openness.
When you learn to listen you will discover that asking questions comes easily. It’s an extension of listening. Asking questions is critical to effective sales management for a simple reason that you need to learn and understand the internal and external realities that impact your team’s performance. Communication is difficult enough without stumbling over different vocabularies and business terminologies. Learn all the current terms and definitions used within your business and the external marketplace as quickly as possible.
The value of consistency in your communications is important. Your team will observe if you live by what you communicate. Communicate enough empty or contradictory messages and your team begins to view your leadership as hypocrisy or worse. If you promise something, be prepared to deliver on the promise whether it be good, bad or indifferent.
