MNI Blog  /  4 minute read

How to Be an Effective Team Leader

With nearly ten years of management experience, eight in my current organization, I have learned a lot. Regardless of my experience, I’m always open to learning new ways to communicate

 

Don't Get Left Without a Leadership Legacy

With nearly ten years of management experience, eight in my current organization, I have learned a lot. Regardless of my experience, I’m always open to learning new ways to communicate and motivate. It’s important to me to share what I’ve learned with members of my team, who are embarking on the initial chapters of their own sales management/leadership careers. There has been a lot of testing, learning, and struggling—and even some failures along the way.

Most importantly, there were also a lot of opportunities to learn and grow. Here’s some of what I’ve learned and what I’m passing on to my team as they advance their careers.

 

What are effective leadership qualities?

• Understanding roles of every team member

• Focusing on key strengths of individual employees

• Embracing failure

• Understanding comfort levels

• Sharing knowledge

• Promoting healthy competition in the workplace

• Taking Ownership & Individual Accountability

 

1. Teamwork begins by Understanding Roles of Every Team Member:

The success of a sales team starts—and ends—with each individual. A good leader invests in each individual’s success. Work side-by-side with your team as their partner. This way, each individual feels supported and confident that you care about him or her, that you’re in this journey together, and that their individual contribution is valued. Working side-by-side can mean rolling up your sleeves and living alongside them in their day-to-day, so you can understand their highs and lows, wins and losses, and barriers to business. It also means working with each team member differently: we all have unique needs, strengths, and areas of growth. Most of us are at our best when leaders understand this and offer an individualized approach.

 

2. Focus on Key Strengths of an Employee:

Everyone has natural skills and talents, advantages that they lean on in their jobs, day in and day out.This natural comfort zone is always a great place to start when helping your team members grow their business and their overall skill sets. What are they doing that’s working and driving their success? Help each team member discover their strengths, and show them when, where, and how they can use that to their advantage.

 

3. Embrace Failure:

Someone once said that every failure is an opportunity. This is completely true—and it’s the best way to view a loss: as an opportunity to learn. There are no failures on my team, but there are obstacles and challenges that allow us to improve, grow, and win the next time.

 

4. Get Comfortable Being Uncomfortable:

Growing through adversity or challenges is not a new concept, and it definitely applies to sales leadership. All those natural strengths form the foundation of our comfort zones. They make us feel safe, but as they say, real growth lives outside the comfort zone. These outside-the-zone skills aren’t weaknesses; they are skills that are ready to be honed, then shifted inside the comfort zone.

Recognizing and understanding those emerging skills for each individual team member is important for a leader. How can you inspire each member of the team to push his or her boundaries and grow? If presentation skills are outside that zone, how can you partner with a team member to develop those skills, working on them frequently enough to get comfortable? Most managers know which skills can be strengthened. Creating a dialogue and action steps around those developing skills can start the change and build an even stronger, more well-rounded team.

 

5. Encourage Sharing Knowledge in the Workplace :

Any good leader invested in the success of their team will want to have answers to every question and every situation. Discovering that’s not possible, new leaders may be convinced they’re failing at their job—especially as others on their team find out they don’t know everything. In any business, depending on the role or position, no one can be working the floor while simultaneously contributing to the 10,000-foot view. It’s just impossible to do both at the same time.

 

6. Healthy Competition in the Workplace:

Every team needs a rallying cry and a means of building success together. Focusing on each individual is important, but the team as a whole needs value from a leader to unite toward the common goal of success for the clients and the company. If one individual is successful, the natural mathematics increase the odds of success for everyone else on the team. Healthy competition forms bonds, unites the team, and leads to greater progress and growth for the organization. Too much competition can impede teamwork, sharing, and learning. Finding the balance between healthy and unhealthy competition and working around it is key.

 

7. Taking Ownership & Individual Accountability:

The measurement of success of any sales team is generally all in the numbers. I work with several highly successful sales reps who reach and exceed their numbers on a regular basis. The common choice they make is to own their successes and their losses. They own their accomplishments and all the hard work and perseverance it took to achieve them; they also own their defeats—and they choose to learn from both scenarios. You can’t always coach or encourage an individual to emulate certain character traits, but you can offer the choice of choice. Your team members should choose to own and be accountable for their work, and so should you.

 

8. Trust Your Employees:

Of course, one of the most important aspects of the relationship between a sales leader and their team is trust. My team knows I don’t have all the answers, but what we don’t know, we’ll learn together for the benefit of the organization. My team also knows that I trust them, and as a result, I give them the space to do their own learning, growing, and selling. I have confidence in their skills, talents, and their belief that we’re working together to build something great. Hopefully, they’ll take that trust and confidence with them as they progress in their careers. I’d like that to be my legacy.

Have questions or want to talk more about leadership in the workplace? Don’t hesitate to contact us using the form below.