Thursday's Thoughts - How the heck is it that high?

Thank you for stopping by for this Thursday's Thoughts post. Whether it's your first time stopping by or your 3rd, we appreciate you taking the time to read this post, and welcome your feedback!

Seriously, I know the feeling!

Today's Thursday Thought comes from one of my sales friends' favorite topics - Sales Goals. I mean let's be honest - How many of us who have done SDR, AM, AE, TAM, NAM, GAM, or any other AM role have gotten a sales target and thought "How the heck did they even find that number?" If we're really being honest, a lot of sales people get a number that they can only assume came from throwing a dart at a board with a bunch of numbers. I have ab-so-lutely thought that from some of the goals I've seen both for myself and for others on my teams from the past. I've seen some people only gain 5% of their previous quota, and I've seen others with a goal that triples. So what's happening here?

Now, the fun thing about Thursday's Thoughts posts is that I don't typically make a hard-pointed argument on the topic at hand. It's more of a series to bring topics from regular, every day conversations to light, and to offer a few ideas that can improve the tone of that topic, because here's the reality: Every job has good parts and bad parts, and everyone's definition is different. The topics I bring up in this blog series won't ever go away, and even if it does for some, it won't for others, so the goal here isn't to make statistical arguments. It's to present new ideas and small tweaks to how you approach these topics so that you can stay positive, level-headed, and keep your motivation high. Changing your mentality and focusing on the positives can do amazing things for your career, and in my experience, it opens doors you never thought imaginable.

One confused pupper

So I'm sure at least one person is wondering "Sure, but how the heck can you look on the positive side when you just learned your goal tripled overnight?" In response, I'm going to offer 1 thing to try that might be different for a lot of people, and then I'll also give some points as to how you can stay positive even if you think your sales/meetings/conversations goals are unattainable.

First thing's first - I come from a sales background, and I've done Sales, BDR, CSM and Enterprise roles in the past. I can absolutely say in the conversations I've had that sometimes, people do play favorites in the office. I can also absolutely say that some people get unattainable goals as a way of leadership telling them they may want to find another job, because they're going to use their failure as a reason to let them go. I also know some leaders who come up with the sales targets for their teams using stats that don't even match up, and I also know sales leaders who get their goals handed to them by a CEO or CFO, and their hands are tied. These things absolutely happen, and you can expect these things to happen because...wait for it....people are PEOPLE. "To err is human", so as long as we're humans working for and with humans, mistakes are going to be made, and sometimes there will be things behind the scenes that happen.

With all that out of the way, my first point is this - Don't let that affect your mentality. The second you start thinking that there's a target on your back, or that your manager hates you, or that they have no clue what they're doing, you immediately start coming up with reasons why you're not about to try as hard as you can to reach your goals. As difficult as it is, don't start by making those your excuses to phase out and stop caring!! That's a losing battle with no winners!! Based on the numerous conversations I've had with people on this topic, I would say about 75% do the same thing - They have a meeting with their manager/director, they get their sales target, it's insane sounding, they leave the meeting, they text/message their friends and complain about the goal. What the heck are they thinking? Why do they hate me? Do they just want me to quit?

Anyone notice what was missed? 75% of people I talk to forget to try 1 crucially important thing - They don't ASK QUESTIONS! When you're there in the meeting and receiving your new number, that's the exact moment you should be asking for elaboration, even if your goal seems to be appropriate. There are good questions and bad questions to ask, and phrasing is obviously key.

• Good - To make sure I'm on the same page, how did we arrive at this number?

• Good - I'm very numbers-driven and like to keep track of what my growth is going to look like. Can you break these down so I can have a better guess moving forward for how my goals will fluctuate?

• Bad - What the heck is this crud? Why are you asking me to reach this number?

• Bad - What are you, stupid? This isn't right!

I haven't heard someone ask those bad questions, but I also wouldn't be 100% surprised, and if you're being honest with yourself, you might even know someone who's got a chance at asking a question like that. Regardless, there are good ways to phrase questions that can give you more insight into how your new target was decided on, and if you phrase it in the right way, you can not only get more clarification, but also a way to track what your future growth numbers might look like as well.

Talkin' Numbers

Here's another thing most people aren't doing, and it's my #1 idea to try if you haven't already - BYON. That's right, Bring Your Own Numbers. If you know your fiscal year ends June 30, and you're going to get your new numbers in July, create your own numbers. Know your numbers, and own them! This shows a unique level of initiative, but it can also help answer some of those questions. What most people don't know is that a healthy company with good leadership wants to see you succeed, because your success = their success. This means that some companies with good, healthy leadership will adjust numbers based on market trends, demand, and any of the other hundred factors that come into play when a business decides on their fiscal plan for the year. If you have your meeting, and your manager says your goal is going from $1m to $1.5m, and your projections based on your numbers suggest that you should be around the $1.2m mark, show them the math!

Now, a couple caveats here. 1) Will this work? It can, because it's worked for me and a few others that I know who have done the same thing. 2) Will it be guaranteed to work? Of course not! All leaders are different, and like I said earlier, some sales managers/directors are handed the numbers in a non-negotiable way. 3) Make sure that if you're going to come up with your numbers, that you're not creating biased numbers or fudging numbers to create an easy target for you. I can likely guarantee that will not work. Also, if you're trying to find a number where you don't have to work for it, you're not doing yourself, your team, or your company any favors.

To this point, I'll offer some extra perspective. Most sales people haven't yet dabbled in the sales leadership market where they're responsible for a team's numbers overall, so this added perspective is to shed some light on where your sales targets likely come from on the other side of the fence. Insight Squared has a cool article about creating sales goals, and they do a great job naming the key factors in what goes into a sales target from the leadership perspective. From the leadership side, they're being told their team's goal is $10m (for example), and with 10 sales people, they're trying to find the best way to divvy that up among the 10 where everyone has as fair a number as possible. After all, if someone has the best region or vertical, and their number is the same as everyone else's, that wouldn't hardly be fair for those with a smaller market or vertical, would it? Check out the article to see the factors they suggest, and use them to generate what you think your next targets should be!

This doesn't just go for the sales people either. Sales leaders need to be always re-evaluating the way that they create the target sales goals for their teams. I'll be honest - I've spoken to some managers and directors who honestly don't have a solid plan for how they get their team's new goals. Some just have everyone accountable for 20% of what they did last year. If that's the case, it may be time to see what other professionals are doing, and this article is good for you as well! One of the biggest factors that can improve your leadership, appeal, and comradery for your team is if you're asking for their feedback. You don't have to change everyone's goal who says their new target seems out of reach, because you're accountable for your target as well, but an open conversation can work wonders in making sure your team stays motivated, positive, and feeling like you've got their back. It's amazing how quickly some people will mentally "check out" when they feel their direct report doesn't have their back.

In short, sales targets are one of the most feared topics and conversations for a lot of people still. Nobody wants to go into a meeting and see a number that makes them feel dejected and defeated before the year even truly starts. Here are a few summary items from the article to remember:

• Leaders - Know your numbers! Know your team, know how many leads each person is getting, know their industries, know the trends...know as much as possible. More information is always better than less

• Leaders - Make sure you keep the conversation open so you can hear feedback from your team. This will help you boost teamwork, communication, and team motivation. Be honest and up front with them, but in a way that helps energize them and remind them you're there for them

• Sales people - Don't immediately think people are out to get you! Don't let a big number scare you. You can do anything you set your mind to.

• Sales people - BYON. Bring your own numbers to the conversation, and make sure that you're also open-minded enough to hear your manager's point of view

• Everyone - Don't let sales targets frustrate or scare you. Celebrate successes, set small goals to tackle the big ones, and share success stories across the team! Make sure you're all lifting each other up, because that's how you're going to see team success and create a healthy team environment

That's all for this one. I hope you enjoyed the read, and I definitely hope you were able to get something out of this blog post. If you did, I always encourage you to comment on that, or to comment with additional thoughts to keep the conversation going. The goal is to take every day topics and add a positive mindset into them so that people can stay motivated, and not let the negatives affect them. Andrew Naber guessed that the average American works 90,000 hours in their lifetime. That's brutal if you're only able to see the tough spots of the job, so we're hoping we can help bring out the positives more, and hopefully that 90,000 becomes less daunting. We're all in this together!

If you want more information, check out more of our blog posts, or visit our website (www.sweethartentertainment.com) to see how we're able to help make work less daunting through our entertainment!