The Current State of Sales Manager Training: 4 Lessons from New Research

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Organizations are rapidly coming to the same conclusion: sales managers are the key lever in driving improvement in sales. Whether a company targets higher market share, better account penetration, or some important outcome, sales managers are the principal mechanism for success. The key question is, “how do we best equip those all-important sales managers to get the job done?” Well, training is an important enabler to better sales management. In a recent research study examining the sales manager training of 213 firms, Vantage Point and the Sales Management Association shed light on the vital connection between better sales management and better sales results.
A Commitment to Sales Manager Training
First, organizations must be committed to training sales managers to drive better outcomes. In our study, 41% of participating companies did not have specific sales manager training initiatives. The companies with such initiatives —59%– outperformed the others, by 16%. That’s a pretty startling difference.