“The Specialist” Sales and Management Training Blog

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Tonight I have a very unusual post. The only reason I am even discussing this subject tonight is because, even though I’ve tried over the years to forget about these situations, I was thrust into the center of such a situation very recently and thought it was an important clue for young and inexperienced managers to know when making important hiring decisions.

At the least it would give the young managers the pieces of the puzzle that would normally go unanswered until they had many years of experience and learned it the hard way. Ladies, you’re probably not going to like this but it IS the truth…

click to read the entire post…

Hello everybody,

I gave everyone a management scenario yesterday and promised to give you my take. Well here we go.

First it was obvious that the manager should not have left the young crew leader without instructions. EVERYONE got that! But what and why if anything should the young crew leader have done with the 2 new faces that were not performing up to company standards? Let’s look at this closely.

Since this young crew leader was gone for 3 days and did not know these 3 people her first obligation should have been to assess the situation. Who are they? Are they new? Possibly from another location? Are they just on loan for the night? Are they permanent new staff? Now, regardless of her conclusion the only thing she should have done is welcome these people with open arms to HER LOCATION, make some new friends and when the Manager returns, tell HIM your concerns. The last thing the young crew leader should do is attempt to enforce company standards! That is a recipe for disaster. You will instantly create animosity.

Remember, assess the situation first, I mean lets face it if they are only on loan for a single night, why even get involved. Let the Manager do it. Always when you find yourself in a new situation around new people, win them over FIRST, then convey your ideas or implement your companies policies. Darn, if this doesn’t sound a lot like sales!

“The Specialist”

Hello everybody,

Okay, here’s the scenario.

Young crew leader comes back to work after 3 days off finds that her manager has brought over 2 girls and one young man to her location. The Manager has to go to the restroom and leaves the 3 new faces with the young crew leader until he returns. He gives no instructions. The 2 new female faces are not performing up to expected company standards. The young crew leader knows what everyone should do and should not do. Now keep in mind there are a lot of variations that could take place IF the Manager had left specific instructions. The fact is He didn’t and we cannot change that.

Now the ultimate question…If you were the young crew leader, how and why, if at all, would you have handled the situation? In other words, “WHAT SAY YOU?”

“The Specialist” will give you His take tomorrow!

Hi everybody,

I have a great true story to share with you this evening.

When I was very young I had the good fortune of owning a resturant/nightclub. My partner was an expert in the food and beverage industry. I was kinda like a front man. Well one night we were closing and we found 4 prime ribs (approx. value $240 each) in our dumpster wrapped in aluminum foil. It was obvious the cook was going to come back in the middle of the night and retrieve them. My partner asked me what I thought we should do with the cook. Without hesitation I stated that we should fire her. I mean It was close to $1000 in theft. He agreed, but said we should sleep on it and we would meet in the morning.

The next morning came and as we talked about it he once again asked me for my opinion. My position had not changed. He said he agreed and proceeded to throw me a white apron. I asked him what the apron was for and he said we needed to go in the kitchen and cook because when we fire the cook there was no one left but us.

I got It. It was then that I realized that maybe it wasn’t necessary to fire the cook so fast. My partner made me realize that maybe we should wait until a time of our choosing, like after we hired someone else then let the other cook go. Like I said I was very young. The lesson here for all you young managers is when you have a situation where you find it necessary to relieve someone of their position make sure you have all of your bases covered. Your time can be put to much better use by managing. NOT COOKING!

I have never forgotten that lesson and it has served me well throughout my career.

“The Specialist”

I thought I had it today. I was all prepared for today’s blog and then on the way home something happened that made me change courses. I am going to try to address both issues tonight. Lets start with what happened on my way home. My loving wife called me and asked me to pick up some milk at this high end grocery store known for outstanding customer service. Not uncommon when I arrived at the store my wife called again and asked me to also bring home this special kind of band-aid for blisters. I went over to the medical counter and there were tons of band-aids. Well with my old man eyes I enlisted the help of these two bag boys that were nearby and asked for help. With my wife on the phone helping to describe the special band-aids the two young men were unbelievably helpful in our quest. We finally found the elusive product and I thanked the two young men very enthusiastically. After I checked out I saw two women that looked like they were possibly management…I stopped, introduced myself and started to mention the two young men and their above average performance. As soon as I started to talk and mention these boys the lady cut me off, introduced herself as the customer service MANAGER and blurted out “were they acting weird to you”? I was taken back by her response and told her in no uncertain terms that it was not the case at all. Quite the contrary, I found them to be unusually helpful and tremendous ambassadors of their store. The manager’s face turned red and she realized the enormity of her mistake.

The reason this story is under the heading of “Management tips for beginners” is because she broke some of “The Specialist’s” basic fundamentals. 1st, she didn’t listen or even give me a chance to finish my sentence! 2nd, instead of thinking positive of these young men and catching them doing something right, she was all too anxious to TRY and catch them doing something wrong! Remember what “The Specialist” says… To be good in sales you HAVE to be a GOOD LISTENER! And by the way if you are in a leadership role you are selling. Not only yourself. but more importantly the goals you want your team to achieve. It is also a lot easier and a lot more effective to catch people doing things right so you can build their self esteem. It is a fact people perform better for you if you make them feel good about themselves. I will elaborate on this and many other management tips in future blogs.

Now, my good friend, Mr. Anonymous. I agree with part of your comment last night. However, you asked for my thoughts so I am going to tell you. Sometimes we forget our roots. No one just woke up one day and was a great professional salesperson. Never happened. We all learned from someone or many others. Yesterday’s blog in regards to budgeting your money in the sales industry was critical. One of the greatest tragedy’s in the sales industry is that literally thousands of people have gotten out of the industry because no one and I mean no one took the time to teach the hotshot new guy or gal how to prepare themselves for the slower times while their knowledge catches up to their work habits. Most people that have blown out of our great industry refer to sales as “Feast or Famine”. It doesn’t have to be that way. All I try to do is share my knowledge and experiences. Thanks for your comments. Keep them coming.

“The Specialist”