I couldn't help but think of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups.
In a conversation I had, a senior sales executive expressed frustration about her organization’s ability to cut into a significant sales deficit, six months into the year. The organization was launching more and more initiatives and sales promotions to drive sales growth. At the same time they were training more reps than ever, but all to no avail. Their net sales growth was marginal, at best.
In a separate conversation with another sales leader (of a different firm), she was recalling a dark time in her organization’s past. The morale and energy in the organization had taken a major dip – the environment seemed to shift, the intention and drive in each person’s step was a bit slower, a bit less meaningful – and nobody could seem to put their finger on what was happening. A byproduct of this was a decline in sales from existing accounts, and also net new accounts. Promotions, new advertisements, training – none of it made a substantial or sustainable improvement.
We have two different sets of circumstances, and similar outcomes. So what’s the connection?
Whether the chocolate gets put in the peanut butter, or the peanut butter gets put in the chocolate, there is a critical intersection between culture and successfully executed strategy. After some reflection and light organizational analysis, the points of failure for each organization became fairly clear:
• At best, there was a weak link back to the organization’s vision. Each firm expressed that their teams were not connected to the company’s vision – in their actions, mindset, conversations with their customers, and prospective customers. The lack of connection between an individual’s passion (their ‘why’, as Simon Sinek would say), and the organization’s was tangible.
• The values and behaviors for each organization were not coming to life in everyday work and in the environment. Why is that a big deal? When an organization declares that integrity is a key value, and then the individuals in the firm intentionally place individual goals and priorities above that of the team; that kills teamwork, focus, and a healthy culture.
• The culture was eroding, and upon reflection, it was also tangible. Every company has a culture, and subcultures, but the question is: are those the cultures that the organization wants? Culture, loosely defined, is ‘how things happen around here.’ Regardless of what is written on websites or employee handbooks, the way things actually happen is what defines the real culture of the organization. Without consistent and deliberate attention to this the culture will take shape based on the mindset and actions of the individuals in the organization. In the second case that I mentioned above, as the sales leader looked back at that period in the company, she attributed the challenges the organization had. She did not attribute them to bad markets, untrained sales reps, or poor promotion or pricing. Instead she looked to the fact that the company strayed from what was a vibrant culture with a core focus on the vision and values of the firm.
What’s the point? Two actually:
• Whether your organization is crushing goals or missing the critical milestones, look beyond traditional metrics to understand what is happening. Often, there are factors beneath the ‘surface’ that are directly linked to the results.
• Culture and strategy, much like chocolate and peanut butter, are close partners, and it is tough to succeed without a good blend of both. When it comes to sales, the entire organization needs to have clarity of the vision and values of the firm, how to fully express the brand in everything the firm does: advertisements, promotions, website, blogs, every touch point with prospects, how sales reps are trained. Without this, often what occurs is what I described in the first case above, an endlessly spinning cycle of: promotions, training, marketing spending, multiple initiatives with low impact, overworked team members, unhealthy conflict, and blame……
Stick to the basic recipe – regardless of how big and how much success your organization has – and you will have a foundation for long term, sustainable success.
Andrew Freedman, Principal at entreQuest, specializes in helping eQ’s clients grow by creating well aligned company cultures and strategies that result in remarkable client and employee experiences.
