Turn '10 Minutes of Fame' into Process

I’m often asked what other sales teams do to enliven sales meetings.  Most follow a tried and trusted pattern; figures, roasting/champagne, admin, touch of training, marketing/production/operations update, specialist speaker.

I visited a product-labelling business last week where it was one of the occasions I wondered how on earth the fella got there.  He’d no ideas, no passion, no openness to new things.  We tossed around the subject of sharing best-practice.  He delighted in telling me they had a great process in place.

At sales meetings, everyone got “their ten minutes of fame”.  Sales people got to tell the rest about any new tactics or market knowledge they’d used or become aware of.  He reckoned it was super-successful.  I naturally enquired how much better still things would be if you could do this, rather than simply ten minutes a month, every single day.  And he clammed up.  The point is, this approach has nothing to do with best-practice or key message share.  It’s placed in totally the wrong context.  It’s seen as purely a recognition tool delivered as entertainment.  To be truly successful, such goals need to become part of the fabric of the team as an on-going frequently repeated procedure where results of intel shared are monitored, not a one-off talking-head backslap.