Continuous Improvement: Lead to Quote, to Order, to Cash, to Client Success
Having worked with hundreds of companies, their leaders, investors, and thousands of salespeople, operations, and account managers, I’m beginning to see a new pattern of challenges that impacts the entire spectrum of business growth effectiveness. I see it as an evolutionary twist on a common theme business leaders have all always known and have tried to work through: technology and knowledge-based sophistication do not naturally yield operational efficiency and sales growth effectiveness.
That is, while there has been impressive growth and advancement in business technologies and processes and people skills applied to simplify complexities in pre-sales and post-sales activities, business operations, and customer success and renewal, there is still today ample evidence of business dysfunction and a miss on business optimization.
Technology and knowledge-based sophistication do not naturally yield operational efficiency and sales growth effectiveness.
The good news is that is fixable
It’s a People, Process, and Management Thing
People are great. The talent pool of good people is still there for the patient and discerning. And people in today’s marketplace are armed with better and more efficient tools that drive productivity. And, for the most part, people have good intentions. Although I do recall a quote from my favorite high school teacher that “the road to hell is paved with people that try and have good intentions.” 1
And therein actually lies the problem. People with good intentions left to themselves may produce good work; but in business, that specific work and intention needs to be guided, directed, and managed with an attention-to-detail and follow-up that is often lacking in today’s fast-moving work environments.
Sales Effectiveness
I certainly see it on the sales front where all businesses will have some semblance of order and structure associated with their sales organization’s generation of leads and pre-sales process activities including qualification, discovery, solution development, quote/proposal, and closed deal or order generation. There is ample room at all points for clarity of approach and process, as well as improvement of quality in engagement messaging, probing discovery, solution articulation and demo/display, quantitative business value presentation, and deal closing navigation and negotiation.
Easier said than done. But doable nonetheless through the proven business practice of continuous improvement. This has been overdone in the sales world through the tired method of general sales training.
But doable nonetheless through the proven business practice of continuous improvement.
There is a better way.
And by the way, AI is and will be a part of a top-tier sales organization. But it’s not the end all. Certainly not now, but needs to be incorporated in the assessment of a sales team’s effective process and prowess.
Operations Effectiveness
While the notion and practice of continuous improvement is not new to the operations front, the long road of business history is paved with many examples of fits and starts, successes and failures of companies that have implemented or tried to implement lean practices and thinking to drive operational efficiencies. Lean business optimization is a set of practices that help businesses improve their processes to create more value for customers. It’s based on the idea of continuous improvement and eliminating waste. 2
On this front too, it’s a people, process, and management thing.
Within any business, there are invariably a whole host of operationally dysfunctional processes and practices on the post-sales side. That is, from the point of sale, through order processing, product sourcing/development, fulfillment, warehousing, manufacturing, packaging, loading, routing, trucking/delivery, account management, finance, billing and collections, client success/satisfaction, and customer support, there is ample room for brokenness and dysfunction, and continuous improvement.
And it’s not that people are not trying.
…there are invariably a whole host of operationally dysfunctional processes and practices on the post-sales side.
As on the Sales front, the Operations front needs to be clarified, streamlined, directed, coached, and managed with an eye toward excellence and continuous improvement. Mapping a value stream or identifying and tracking all the steps of a product or service’s lifestyle, like good selling, is not rocket science, but is not ABC simple either. It requires knowledgeable and purposeful leadership that can inspire and lead a team to ongoing excellence and achievement for the business and for their customers.
There is a better way.
It Doesn’t Happen Overnight
I’ve learned that good things do not happen overnight. It takes time for assessment, evaluation, planning, prioritization, and mapping a game-plan over time with strategic deployment, milestone goals, objectives, and points of adjustment.
But goodness comes out of a good plan.
The solution therefore is to optimize high-growth business on the sales AND operations side with a diligent, proactive process that is proven, effective and sustainable.
It is a better way.
Are you executing effective sales and business operations leadership and implementation?
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Michael Griego is founder of MXL Partners, a Silicon Valley based consulting firm working with high-growth companies of all sizes. As part of Talus Group Holdings, MXL advises, trains, and optimizes sales organizations and develops effective sales and business operations leadership. Michael is a world-class trainer, speaker, and has authored 42 Rules to Increase Sales Effectiveness and No Excuses! A Better Way to Sell. He has an MBA from Stanford University and a BA from Occidental College.
1 Wikipedia notes several sources for this proverbial quote ranging from Virgil (19 BC) to St. Bernard of Clairvaux (c. 1150) to John Wesley (1741), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_road_to_hell_is_paved_with_good_intentions.
2 Taiichi Ohno (1912-1990), a Japanese industrial engineer and business, is considered to be the father of the Toyota Production System, which became known widely as “Lean Manufacturing” in the U.S.
