Recently, I was chatting with a fellow sales manager who mentioned his reps were having trouble generating enough pipeline (sound familiar?).
“What’s the issue?” I asked. “Do your reps not have enough leads?”
“No,” he said, “they have lots of accounts to call on, but they’re just not calling on enough key stakeholders.”
“Why?” I asked again. “Do they not know how to get customers on the phone?”
“No,” he continued, “I think it’s just that a lot of my reps are new to the team and they’re not confident calling high-level customer executives and talking to them about their business.”
“And why’s that?” I asked. (I’m a fan of the 5 Why’s methodology.)
“Because they feel they don’t have the stories and insights yet. They feel they lack credibility and won’t be able to add value to the conversation. They’re afraid.”
And there lies the root of the problem.
