My company (New) will be doing a JV with a Chinese manufacturing company and we have decided we will be incharge for setting up sales teams around the world.

Our product is new to the market and our budget is limited. Each sales team/company will be incharge of running themselves in their respective country.

Could you advise on a structure and qualities we should be adopting to achieve sales growth. How should we motivate them etc?

My understanding is that the more sales people we have the better chance we have to mass produce our product.

I suppose my main heading should read “HELP I need to set up a successful sales team worldwide”.

We have two areas for the same product a) LImited Edition Glassware & b) Mass produced glassware.

I hope you can point me in the correct direction.

Kind regards

Stephen Rayment

Thanks very much for the feedback – it was very kind of you.

Oh, and Michael, your quote is so true – “The hardest people to work with are those who’ve been reasonably successful doing unsustainable things.”

The very worst though are those who have been successful despite of themselves!

Jonathan

“The Sales Leader’s role is one of catalyst – constantly helping their team to keep up with events, to change in the light of events and to succeed because it is always configured for success.”

I couldn’t agree more, and I agree with Derrick as he goes further:

“If you not only hold your sales manager but your organization accountable to this statement, you will allow your sales manager to react proactively to the revenue goals of the company.

The thing is, I see so little realization of this as I survey the sales scene. The sales departments are often the last to adopt Internet skills, strategies and resources – and now they are slow to adopt some of the savvier social networking approaches. And, when they do adopt them, they do it clumsily, forgetting everything they’ve learned about selling in person – and the online result is often just broadcasting to their network, “You should buy my stuff.”

I’m going to post Jonathan’s and Derrick’s quotes above my desk, along with the one from Steve Lishansky that says:

“The hardest people to work with are those who’ve been reasonably successful doing unsustainable things.”

Got to strongly disagree!

The very best salespeople are not motivated by money at all, but they are motivated by achievement.

They understand that achievement brings with it appropriate rewards.

We also know that top performers are very competitive.

Best

JF

Sure, it sounds a bit crude, but at least they have a shared vision. Things start go off the track when team members lose that focus and start spending too much time looking internally. Things like job titles, bonus plans, SPIFs, etc. can lead to distraction which can disrupt team harmony.

I believe that, all your points being valid, the movie Jerry Maguire go it right: “Show me the money!”

- Dr. Jim Anderson
The Accidental Negotiator Blog
“Learn The Secrets of Side-By-Side Negotiating To Get The Most Value Out Of Every Negotiation”