Something Better: Change?

One of the soundtracks to my youth was the self titled track by The Stranglers. Hugh Cornwell snarled the lyrics against backdrop of crashing drums and throbbing bass, demanding things had to be different with an immediacy that this (then) 12 year old couldn’t fail to be impressed with. I’ve often pondered the nuance of it. Did he mean “Something better change or else” or did he mean, “[there is] Something Better, [therefore] change?

Either way, I believe that over 4 decades later, there is the same, aggressive demand for change, in many facets of our life as a culmination of the events of the past 6 months. There is immediacy in the demand for change witnessed by BLM and there is something better, if we change as  working practices are reviewed and some of our beloved senior execs realise that you can work from home effectively, even if you are managing a large organisation.

Imagine though if some exec roles were recruited on a fixed term contract, not too disimliar to sports managers? The whole hiring process is fraught with risk even when you engage the best that talent search has to offer. We all make mistakes, mine have resulted from premature hiring before the 5 step process was complete.

Those concerned performed badly in the areas that were omitted from the recruitment process and their unsuitability would have highlighted had we completed our own defined process. Fortunately I only did it twice in more than 250 hires. Even with a robust recruitment process, mistakes can be made with unsuitable leaders hired with a huge impact on an organisation, lasting months or even years.

“The head of an organization or a team casts a shadow that influences the employees in that group. The shadow may be weak or powerful, yet it always exists. It is a reflection of everything the leader does and says.” Marjorie M. Blanchard, co-founder of Blanchard Training and Development, Inc.

A good leader can galvanise a whole organisation. Typically they recruit well, promote astutely and perhaps most importantly: inspire everyone to perform at the highest possible levels. Similarly, a bad leader than lead to an organisation becoming toxic rather quickly. Results undoubtedly suffer and inevitably, there is an exodus of top talent:

“People don’t quit a job, the saying goes — they quit a boss”  Harvard Business Review. 

We’ve all reported to bad leaders and I suspect many of us have resigned to them. I’ve had a few comically bad Line Managers in the past, but thanks to the “Peter Principle” they have go on to sow their seeds of success longer after either of us has moved on.

Yet, the search process for a senior leader is often  lengthy, complex and costly. It will take  a minimum of 3 months to appoint a Chief Revenue Officer, usually closer to 6 months. It then takes that new CRO between 3 and 9 months to understand the organisation, the culture and where change needs to be made.

A bad hire means that process starts again with the resultant delays in change, an organisation in a constant state of flux and a demotivated cadre of revenue generators functioning at sub optimal performance.

Assuming control of an Sales Organisation whether it’s 10 or over a 100 people challenges the best of us no matter how many times you do it. There is a tacit need to “gain control” immediately. That weekly forecast call (assuming of course it exists and you would be surprised by the places I have been where it didn’t!) waits for nobody. Neither does the need to get up to speed on Key Opportunities, Key Accounts and the ubiquitous myriad of reports from CRM.

There will be a need to understand Go To Market, Customers and the underlying Sales Culture. There will also be a substantial amount of effort exerted gaining an insight into the needs of peers and other stakeholders and ultimately the new CRO’s Manager, usually the COO or CEO. It’s a huge challenge and one that I can relate to having faced this landscape over half a dozen times during my career.

Diagnosing your new Sales Organisation’s gaps to high performance is a challenging one during those first 60-90 days. Prescribing, then implementing the fixes is a daunting one and not easy to achieve.

Workload, pressure of the new situation and simply not wanting to appear to be an a**hole during those first critical few weeks means change is delayed until later. Of course, whilst tinkering can be achieved at the margins, the fundamental, underlying problems that brought about a change in leadership will remain. What can we do differently?

Objective Sales Transformation

Unsurprisingly, there is an alternative. In fact, I would boldly wager that there are at least two. First all, engage a Sales Transformation consultant to undertake the critical short term assessment that fixes the long term problems. They should be able to diagnose/prescribe/fix the underlying issues without the pressures of the day job and do it objectively without worrying too much about who whose noses have been moved from their optimum position during the process. I

t can be achieved in 25 days even for the most challenged Sales Organisation. The output should be structured, focused on the 10 critical areas ranging from Sales Culture and Organisation, Leadership and Team Capability through Opportunity and Account Management, GTM, Forecasting and Cadence to underlying Sales Operations. It is a prerequiste that your Sales Transformation Conultant has done this a few times in alternative environments. There are plenty of theorising practitioners out there, most though haven’t had to do this for real in a live environment.

The Interim

Interim Execs have been commonplace for well over a decade. They tend to be focused on Finance, HR, IT or Project Delivery. Very few CROs are appointed on an interim basis. Considering difficulties with finding the right hire described above, this is somewhat rather surprising.

An interim CRO can focus on the day to day operational sales stuff whilst the search for the long term hire can be undertaken. Operating on a 3-6 month contract, this individual  can effect operational effectiveness, undertake some diagnosis and be a great help to the onboarding of the permanent Leader when She or He arrives. In addition, they could, if interested, be considered for the FTE role. Critically, interim CROs are more readily available and reduce the time pressure to make the right permanent hire.

Covid-19 has magnified the problems many organisations had prior to the pademic. If there were performance concerns before March, you can bet they have really taken hold in the past 6 months. Undoubtedly, there will be changes in Sales Leadership in the coming months. However, these changes can be made in a considered way and with reduced risk.

A Sales Transformation consultant should be able to deliver tangible ROI in less than 3 months and with sustainable benefits. An interim CRO can have immediate impact whilst a broad search is undertaken to find the best and most appropriate leader.  It may even be your interim, try before you buy as it were. As the song says: