High-performing sales teams rely on peer coaching, one-on-one mentoring, and more frequent assessment to achieve success, according to data
Allego, the sales learning and coaching platform, announced the results of its survey on how sales leaders assess sales rep competency and popular strategies for effectively hiring and training sales reps. The study’s findings, which are summarized in the e-book “The Ultimate Guide to Assessing Sales Rep Competency” and in an infographic, reveal that ride-alongs (68%), activity tracking (61%), and peer feedback (46%) are the most common means of assessing sales rep competency.
Additionally, the survey found that high-performing* sales teams not only value different skills and training practices than lower-performing teams but that they also asses sales rep competency more frequently than sales organizations that struggle to meet their numbers.
“One of the results that stands out is that sales leaders who achieve the fastest ramp time put more emphasis on manager interaction and peer mentoring to develop reps”
Top-Performing Companies Had a Different View of the Most Important Sales Skills to Asses
“One of the results that stand out is that sales leaders who achieve the fastest ramp time put more emphasis on manager interaction and peer mentoring to develop reps,” said Andrew Hally, CMO of Allego.
Andrew added, “Having an ongoing focus on coaching and mentorship supports our belief that sales training isn’t a one and done activity. To truly achieve success, top performing teams must continuously coach and assess their reps’ skills to ensure that each and every salesperson is as prepared as possible when they pick up the phone or walk into a customer meeting.”
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The survey also looked at eight sales competencies and found the three most commonly assessed by managers were: the ability to close (70 percent), the ability to prospect new opportunities (69 percent), and the ability to retain existing clients (59 percent).
- Top-performing companies had a different view of the most important sales skills to assess, with 80 percent citing sales messaging – the ability to pitch their solution and its value – as the most important skill, versus only 53 percent for other teams.
- The top-performing companies assess more competencies overall, including communication skills, pproblem-solvingskills, and customer feedback, than their lower-performing peers.
- When it comes to how often organizations asses their reps’ skills, the survey found that 85 percent of high-performing teams assess their reps at least monthly, while only 70 percent of the general population does the same.
- When faced with sales rep competency gaps, high-performing teams were three times more likely to increase training rather than use a Performance Improvement Plan, the most popular choice among their lower-performing peers.
The results also suggest that more comprehensive and frequent sales rep assessment will be a growing trend, as more than half of respondents believe that they should expand their capabilities in this area.
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Ramp Time Varies by Industry
Across the industries surveyed, only about half of respondents (54 percent) stated that they fully ramp new hires in less than six months. 82% of life sciences sales teams fully ramp their reps in six months, compared to only 32 percent of high tech companies.
Not surprisingly, the survey found that rep ramp time is tied closely to product complexity – the more complex the product, the longer the ramp time. Additionally, companies with complex products reduce ramp time by 20 percent by hiring reps with previous industry knowledge.
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