Winning The Big Deal: Selling Strategic Enterprise Solutions - 27 Lessons for Sales Professionals

By Amnon Zohar

This book is a collection of 27 lessons learned from a half-century in business ownership, executive management, sales management, and enterprise (B2B) sales. Over this period, almost everything has dramatically changed: the technology that is being sold; the technology used to facilitate and manage B2B sales; the technology used to communicate with customers, partners, and co-workers; the technology and tools used in targeting, analyzing, and marketing; the culture, the language and the (younger) age of executives and sales professionals emerging from the start-up world. But one thing did not change and is central to sales and management effectiveness: human nature. The methods, strategies and practices are integral to what, in essence, is a people business. As such, they remain timeless.

Business owners, founders and executives, sales managers and sales professionals may all find something here that may contribute to their success in sales, management, and leadership however they define success to be.

It offers practical, proven and readily deployable solutions, methodologies and tools focused on growing the top line of small, medium, and even start-up companies.

It offers business executives insights and self-reflection on their and their peers leadership styles to facilitate communications and collaborations between contrasting leadership personas.

It shares classic situations in scaling up and turning around ailing businesses through real-world case studies.

It offers business leaders shared experiences in creating and nurturing a healthy corporate culture and the effective planning and management of the strategic intent of the enterprise's mission.

In small and medium enterprises, and certainly in early and growing stages of start-ups, it empowers business leaders or owners to effectively manage their sales function, whether, or not, they themselves have had professional sales experience. It allows them to create and deploy a sales process, direct, manage and support sales professionals and create a culture of transparency and accountability in the sales organization and increase sales and revenue forecasting accuracy that is so crucial to the health of the business.

But most importantly it offers both experienced and new B2B sales professionals creative, innovative, and strategic practices to advance and win successful sales campaigns — or, as we refer to it, "winning the big deal." It equips them with the tools to plan and execute sales campaigns, measure progress, sequence sales activities and draw on the knowledge and resources of the entire sales (account) team. It equips them with tools for communicating and reporting to management on the need for resources, representations, and engagement by company executives at critical junctures during sales campaigns.

If efficiency means doing things right, our focus is effectiveness, which means doing the right things at the right time. We invite you to pick and choose the parts that are most relevant to you, the business leaders, and sales professionals, that will accelerate your success in selling and the growth of your enterprise and the prosperity of your stakeholders.

This book is a companion reference to a series of on-site and online workshops: Leadership in Disruptive Times, for business owners, founders, or C-level executives; Sales Effectiveness in Competitive Times, for sales managers; and Winning the Big Deal, for B2B sales professionals. Each is a half-day workshop that includes tutorial, discussion, and real-world case studies.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Jul 5, 2021
• ISBN: 9781098381554

Book preview

INTRODUCTION

This book is a collection of 27 lessons learned from a half-century in business ownership, executive management, sales management, and enterprise (B2B) sales. Over this period, almost everything has dramatically changed: the technology that is being sold; the technology used to facilitate and manage B2B sales; the technology used to communicate with customers, partners, and co-workers; the technology and tools used in targeting, analyzing, and marketing; the culture, the language and the (younger) age of executives and sales professionals emerging from the start-up world. But one thing did not change and is central to sales and management effectiveness: human nature. The methods, strategies and practices are integral to what, in essence, is a people business. As such, they remain timeless.

Business owners, founders and executives, sales managers and sales professionals may all find something here that may contribute to their success in sales, management, and leadership however they define success to be.

It offers practical, proven and readily deployable solutions, methodologies and tools focused on growing the top line of small, medium, and even start-up companies.

It offers business executives insights and self-reflection on their and their peers leadership styles to facilitate communications and collaborations between contrasting leadership personas.

It shares classic situations in scaling up and turning around ailing businesses through real-world case studies.

It offers business leaders shared experiences in creating and nurturing a healthy corporate culture and the effective planning and management of the strategic intent of the enterprise’s mission.

In small and medium enterprises, and certainly in early and growing stages of start-ups, it empowers business leaders or owners to effectively manage their sales function, whether, or not, they themselves have had professional sales experience. It allows them to create and deploy a sales process, direct, manage and support sales professionals and create a culture of transparency and accountability in the sales organization and increase sales and revenue forecasting accuracy that is so crucial to the health of the business.

But most importantly it offers both experienced and new B2B sales professionals creative, innovative, and strategic practices to advance and win successful sales campaigns — or, as we refer to it, winning the big deal. It equips them with the tools to plan and execute sales campaigns, measure progress, sequence sales activities and draw on the knowledge and resources of the entire sales (account) team. It equips them with tools for communicating and reporting to management on the need for resources, representations, and engagement by company executives at critical junctures during sales campaigns.

If efficiency means doing things right, our focus is effectiveness, which means doing the right things at the right time. We invite you to pick and choose the parts that are most relevant to you, the business leaders, and sales professionals, that will accelerate your success in selling and the growth of your enterprise and the prosperity of your stakeholders.

This book is a companion reference to a series of on-site and online workshops: Leadership in Disruptive Times, for business owners, founders, or C-level executives; Sales Effectiveness in Competitive Times, for sales managers; and Winning the Big Deal, for B2B sales professionals. Each is a half-day workshop that includes tutorial, discussion, and real-world case studies.

CHAPTER 1 - Management & Leadership

1.1 Leadership Styles

What sort of leader are you?

Leadership qualities are developed early in the human life cycle: captain of the soccer team, president of the student body, etc. My premise is that leadership is not only a skill, it is an expression of one’s personality and value system, something that begins evolving from childhood and, for the most part, remains unchanged throughout one’s career, no matter how high up the food chain they may ascend.

Personality and one’s core values are the engines that drive leaders to become who they are.

Lesson learned #1: Know who you are!

Being able to recognize and understand your own leadership style and how you are perceived by your constituents is key to effective leadership and therefore business success. It is especially important in your interaction with peers, competitors, clients, and shareholders.

We have identified six types of leaders: Motivator, Operator, Dominator, Exploiter, Pleaser, Follower. Read on to find out what type of leader are you.

The inspiration for understanding how to deal with and effectively communicate with other leaders or for that matter subordinates came to me after I read Pete Blaber’s book The Mission, the Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander.

As part of that elite special operation unit of the U.S. Army, Blaber, his bio says, has taken part in some of the most dangerous, controversial and significant military and political events of our time. In his book, he takes what he learned in combat zones and applies it to civilian life.

Here is how the playwright and author David Mamet described the impact of Blaber’s book: His thesis is that there aren’t that many different situations in life, and there aren’t that many different ways of dealing with them — have a few, simple principles, and when in doubt, refer to them.

Blaber's principles can be applied to business leadership, particularly in the way leaders prioritize the three elements of Mission, Men and Me.

Let us first define those key terms in the context of business:

Mission: The set of goals to be accomplished for any task, project or company, and the strategies to achieve them. For a CEO, the mission may include increasing profitability, achieving growth, improving customer satisfaction, enhancing shareholder value, etc. Success or failure is a direct function of attaining the mission at hand.

Men (and Women): Deploying the company’s human resources as effectively as possible in the process of executing the mission. For a CEO, that includes business partners, employees, associates, agents, etc.

Me: The personal involvement, interests, and ambitions of the leader in achieving success by attaining the mission and being recognized and rewarded for its success.

There are six combinations of these key elements. See if you can recognize your leadership style, or those of your peers.

Mission-Men-Me

In simple terms this set defines a leader who creates, or is given, a Mission where his or her energies, priorities are focused on the accomplishment of the Mission. This leader understands that to accomplish the Mission he or she must rely on the Men needed to be deployed on this Mission. As the focus is on the success of the mission, this leader recognizes that the Men must understand, believe, and be motivated to contribute their part to the best of their ability with the same or similar degree of commitment as the leader. This leader also understands that by motivating his or her team to accomplish the Mission, he or she will be recognized, rewarded, and appreciated by all his or her constituents. We would classify this leader as a Motivator.

Most leaders aspire to be Motivators, would like their constituents to perceive them as Motivators and most would like to believe that they are in fact Motivators. However, their style, actions, decision making, and communications may not in fact be consistent with our definition of Motivator, something they can do little about but to adjust their own distinct style to achieve success which some may be able to do, and others fail miserably by pretending to be who they are not.

Mission-Me-Men

This set defines a leader who will accept, commit to, and be focused on the success of the Mission so long as he or she is being assured that their specific personal interests will be satisfied by accomplishing the Mission. This may be financial reward, a promotion or protection from lack of success or failure in accomplishing the Mission such as a golden parachute or golden handcuffs. With this as their prime motivation, they will be more directive and demanding of the Men without necessarily requiring that they concur