Colleen’s Blog

After a week of touring ancient cities on the Rhine including visiting a good selection of castles, fortresses and churches, I discovered that I most enjoy them! They offer a complete glimpse into the way entire towns lived, the ways families came together and went about their daily lives, and how they protected their lives. One thing that came as a surprise was this: All castles have a single weak spot. There was only one penetrable opening in the castle that put the inhabitants at risk of enemy takeover. And, it’s the one spot with direct and open access to the ground below. Any guesses where it is? The toilet! Because the toilet was a simple hole in the floor with direct access to the outside, usually on the second floor and located over a hill, it created a vulnerable spot for the fortress. For this reason, the toilet only locked on the outside so you could escape quickly and lock the enemy out, and, was located in a highly trafficked room such as a dining hall so that if the enemy came up, there were lots of knights waiting to attack them! As I was learning about all the attempted attacks on the Marksburg Castle (the most well-restored castle on the Rhine), I got to thinking about sales teams. It struck me that all sales teams have a weak spot too. And while all teams might not have the exact same weak spot, identifying yours is the key to accelerating performance. In my experience, a sales team weak spot falls into 1 of 5 categories:

You have a few top performers on your sales team. That means they don't need to be coached, right? Wrong. Your top producing salespeople need to be coached just as much as your mid or bottom performing reps. In fact, it may be a wise decision to start coaching them even more! Why? Because by coaching your best reps, developing them further and encouraging them to raise their own bar, you better your chances of moving your sales results forward.