I have recently been asked by my manager for a report of my daily activities in an email format from my Blackberry. This is how it begun…my territory has been doing poorly (I am also in a very economically challenged area, in a territory that has not been worked) and my manager wanted to help me succeed.
Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate the help, however, as a rep, reporting daily emails to your boss doesn’t really make you feel all that great. One of the greatest things about sales is that you can run your own business under the umbrella of a company. If my boss were to give me great feedback about my daily activities to help me turn things around then it would almost be a worthwhile exercise. I have received 2 replies to my emails in the last 20 or so emails. The comments written for each one of my activities were one liners that weren’t helpful at all. Am I overreacting? How can a manager really know if you are doing the necessary work to produce sales when you are an outside sales rep and there aren’t enough sales coming in? Maybe it’s something for her to protect my job to her bosses. I know I am doing the work and it’s going to take me some time to develop the necessary relationships and get the business from the clients I work with and maybe this is her way of knowing I am doing the work as well.
I am torn on this one. Should I be annoyed (daily) as I am?
Tags: micro manage, reports, sales
September 8, 2008 at 1:46 pm |
You should be annoyed if there are not consistent dialogues around the information you are sending.
Have you and your manager considered a 5 minute daily huddle to review the information?
September 8, 2008 at 3:15 pm |
There are two main things I look at when managing my sales team.
1. Are they seeing enough /prospects?
2. Are they seeing opportunities and are they handling them correctly?
In essence I manage to activity and skill level. If they are seeing enough customers and still no sales it is probably a training issue. I and obviously your sales manager should ride along with you to observe how you are handling calls. Be open to feedback. Daily activity sheets may seem excessive but as long as it is temporary it may help them to give you better direction. The best way to not be micro managed long term is to crush your numbers. As to a bad territory I am reminded of the story of two salesmen sent to the desert. Salesmen 1: territory dead. Stuck in dessert, primitive people don’t wear shoes.
Salesmen 2: Wow! huge opportunity. Market wide open no one has our product and we have no competition.
Which one do you most closely resemble.