You can’t manage time.
Tim Connor
Interesting concept when you consider there are thousands
of salespeople every day trying to improve their time management.
I challenge you to manage
the next minute! Can’t do it. Time passes.
When you are doing what you like or are with people you enjoy time seems
to speed by. When you are doing thinks
you hate or are with people you don’t like time seems to creep by very
slowly. The rate of time does not
change. Your perception of passing time does.
Time management is a misnomer. If
you are having trouble managing time I’ll be you are having trouble managing:
-people
-resources
-decisions
-procrastination
-success
-failure
-emotions
-feelings
-problems
-attitudes
and so on.
The inability to
successfully manage any of the above will result in a “time management”
problem. To improve time effectiveness
you must improve one or all of the above.
My
research shows the typical salesperson spends 10-20 percent of their time
selling and 70-80 percent doing everything else. Isn’t it amazing that you can earn an income
in sales spending less than 30 percent of your time selling? Imagine what you could do to your results and
income if you could increase that number only 10 percent?
Time Management and effective time use is a function of many skill and attitude; prejudices, attitudes, habits and personal philosophies. No one can manage time. If a person has a “time management” issue or problem it is most likely due to a weakness or lack of ability in some other area of their life. In order to improve ultimate time use a person must identify these tendencies, attitudes or weaknesses and then develop skills and abilities to address and overcome them. You can’t improve time use, it is a nebulous concept.
The keys to
improving time use and territory management – are to:
-know
yourself
-know
your tendencies
-know
your strengths
-know
your weaknesses
-know
your goals-
-identify
your common time wasters
-have
a prospecting strategy
-establish
regular planning times
-be
ruthless with your self-discipline
Territory
management is the ability to maximize your results, reach your goals and
effectively build your business in your territory while satisfying the demands
and expectations of your management team and customers.
-Know
your prime time. What is prime
time? It is that time of the day, week
or month when you are at your best. Are
you a morning person? Late night
person? Other? Does your energy fade during a certain time
of the day or week?
How
about your Prime Time PLUS- This is that combination of time when you are at
your best and your customers/prospects can see you. For example if you are a morning person and a
client/prospect wants a conference call in the morning- this is your Prime Time Plus. However if you are an afternoon person (your
energy, creativity, imagination) peaks in the mid afternoon and you are not at
your best in the early morning and a prospect wants a meeting in the morning
this is not your Prime Time OR your Prime Time Plus. The key is to schedule critical sales
activities during Prime Time Plus and non sales activities during you non Prime
Time Plus.
Each
of us has numerous demands on our time, energy and resources. One of the keys to sales success is the
ability to balance multiple:
-demands
-expectations
of customers
-requirements
of our position
-personal
needs and desires
-tasks
-routine
activities
-family
roles
-personal
needs and desires
-expectations
of our supervisors
-personal
growth possibilities
-and
much more.
It
is no wonder that many salespeople burn out early in their career due to the
inability to successfully handle all of these issues, challenges and
requirements. If success is one of your
agendas you will ultimately have to:
-eliminate
something from your plate
-better
manage all of these issues and roles
-get
better organized
-or
live with the continued stress of poor organization
I
am sure you know the feeling of being overwhelmed - the need to satisfy
everyone and everything in your life as well as the desire to create a sense of
peace in your life knowing that you - while working on other people’s issues,
expectations and demands - have not abandoned your own requirements for
success, achievement and success as you have chosen to define it at any given point
in your life.
You
have also most likely known how you have felt when you have finished a day,
week or month with a great deal of unfinished business. Everyone who hopes to do more, have more,
become more, learn more and contribute more will, sooner or later, have to
confront their own needs and style of what personal organization means to
them. No one can tell you how to
organize your life and career. What
learning can do is help you identify where growth, change or a new philosophy
is needed so you can regain some sense of harmony while climbing the ladder of
personal success, whatever that means to you.
Let’s take a brief look at a few of the issues that will require your
attention as you attempt to better organize your time, territory, career and
life.
One of the key characteristics in effective territory
management is to do a better job of qualifying prospects prior to giving them
your time, energy or corporate resources. Let’s look at a few ways to better
manage your resource of time and territory management.
1. Ask more effective questions earlier in the sales
process.
2. Pay attention to their answers to determine whether
this is a good time to try and sell
this prospect.
3. Develop a customer profile to use as a template for
your prospecting.
4. Audit your sales call activity by dividing the number
of calls you make in a week by
the number of
miles you drive in that week. This
number will give you your call
route effectiveness.
5. Spend more prospecting time getting referrals.
6. Develop strategic alliances to help you improve your
prospecting activity.
7. Plan you call activities early in the week, month or
day.
8. Don’t give poor prospects more time than they
deserve.
9. Develop a daily checklist of what you will need to do
to be effective.
10. Try to get more of your prospects to visit your
location, plant or office.
11. Don’t spend time giving presentations to
non-decision makers.
What
are some common time/territory management attitudes?
1.
There is always tomorrow.
2.
There are too many demands made on my time.
3.
There is too much paperwork.
4.
My geographic territory is too large.
5.
I have too many prospects/customers.
6.
I don’t have anyone to delegate to.
Always work from a list. Working from lists is one sure way to ensure that you:
-don’t
forget to do something important
-work
on the important stuff first
-can
feel good about your day
-end
the day/week/month without neglecting an important task, activity or role
-can
enjoy the time you have
-get
more satisfaction from your life’s responsibilities
-get
more done
-can
sell more
Work
from lists of things TO DO. Here’s how.
1.
Male a list.
2.
Prioritize the items on the list according to your goals, needs, desires,
activities,
demands etc.
3.
Start with the important ones (must do’s) first.
4.
Finish these before you move to the less important ones (should do’s)
5.
Finish these before you move to the unimportant ones (will do’s if I get time)
Work
from lists and you will get more done in less time.
-planning
-contemplation
-reflection
-relaxation
-fun
-thinking
Develop
the habit of spending a certain amount of time each day/week/month and year in
solitude or mini breaks for recharging your battery. It doesn’t matter if it is walk in the park,
slow relaxed meal, meditation time or just sitting doing nothing.
Paperwork
is not going away, not in this lifetime anyway.
It doesn’t matter how technically oriented your organization becomes,
there will always be paper reports; information to share, something to write,
forms to complete, reports to evaluate or analyze and some piece of paper that
finds its way to your desk or mailbox. The key is to honestly and effectively
determine whether you want or need to spend time on this stuff or whether you
can discard it without negative consequences.
Let’s take a brief look at a few of the paperwork demands on your time.
1.
Expense reports
2.
Call reports
3.
Territory reports
4.
Customer reports
5.
Customer history reports
6.
Forecasting reports
7.
Goal or quota reports
8.
Competitor evaluations
Here
are a few ideas to consider while managing paper.
1. It
is a myth to believe that you can handle each piece of paper once.
2.
Technology will never replace someone’s need or desire to have a
‘hard copy’ of something.
3.
Let’s face it – depending on who wants the information – a customer,
your boss, a fellow employee or another
department will determine
your attention span and response time.
4.
Most people are not good communicators on paper. They either go on and on and on
with endless dribble OR they give us far
too little information to help us make a
decision.
5.
Sooner or later someone/everyone wants to be copied on everything/something.
6. You
need a priority system for handling your administrative tasks.
7.
File any notes you take during telephone conversations or appointments.
8.
Establish a reading file.
9.
Use expandable file pockets instead of hanging folders.
10.
Keep your briefcase organized.
11.
Have an effective follow-up system.
12.
Have an effective suspense action system.
13.
Do difficult tasks first thing in the day.
14.
Use a pencil for scheduling appointments.
15.
Confirm all appointments.
16.
Send yourself e-mails as reminders.
So, how can you streamline your paperwork?
1.
Allocate a specific amount of non-selling time to administrative requirements.
2.
Don’t let paperwork/reports get in the way of you prime time selling
activities.
3.
Make a daily/weekly appointment with yourself for reports/paperwork.
4.
Categorize your administrative tasks into:
-A- Must do’s now/today.
-B- Should do’s now/today if you have time.
-C- You will do when you finish you’re A’s
and B’s
5.
Form the habit of keeping daily records so at the end of the week it isn’t as
big a chore
to complete a report or administrative
task/function.
6.
Organize you routine tasks reports/roles in such a way that they can be
completed
easily.
7.
Delegate what you can to a subordinate, staff person or another department.
8.
Have your mail screened by a support person.
9.
Create files for your paperwork: routine, urgent, archive, action today, action
this
week, action this month, suspense, action
this year, pending, to review, to read,
when I get time, from my boss, customer
requests. Get creative here – the more
you
have the easier it is to keep track of
everything.
10.
Subscribe to a book review program.
11.
Spend a half-day a week or month in the library catching up on industry
information/trends.
12.
Write responses on memos/faxes/e-mails rather than create a new document.
13.
Keep things brief, short and to the point.
Avoid editorializing.
14.
Keep your memos, reports, correspondence accurate not perfect.
15. Develop a standard format or template for al
of your routine reports.
16.
Have a self-rating system for how well you think you are doing managing your
paperwork.
17.
Develop the habit of asking yourself: do I need to do this? Do I need to do it now?
Can someone else do this?
Territory management, like time management, is a
function of many attitudes, habits, values, skills and beliefs. It is also a function of:
-the
geographic size of the territory
-the
number of clients/prospects in the territory
-the
method of travel through the territory i.e. air, car etc.
-the
non-sales responsibilities within the territory.
-the
degree of administrative sales support
Here
are a few territory management ideas to consider that can improve your results.
In
order to effectively manage a sales territory it is critical that a salesperson
have a “prospecting strategy’ – a rational for how much time, energy and
resources to give to each type of prospects/customers. Many salespeople travel hundreds of unnecessary
miles each week or month and still do not effectively ‘cover’ his/her
territory. Without this prospecting
strategy it is impossible to get better use of one’s time and have effective
territory coverage.
1.
Get a flash pass to speed up routine travel.
2.
Bring reading material on the road (entertainment, self-help, business related)
3.
Leave important contact telephone numbers with people who may need to reach
you.
4.
Use meals to meet with clients, associates suppliers.
5.
Have someone review your incoming e-mails while on the road.
6.
Use a contact management system that permits access to all necessary
client/prospect
information while traveling.
7.
Read or write while on the plane.
8.
Use a map software in the car or have current maps with you.
9.
Get directions to your destination before you leave.
10.
Confirm all reservations before you leave:
cars, hotels, limo’s, airline reservations.
11.
Have a duplicate schedule with you while on the road and leave one with a
spouse,
associate, subordinate or friend.
12.
Travel during non-rush hour periods.
13.
Get Cell phone caller ID.
14.
Develop an office travel file which can contain: documents, itineraries,
articles to
read, information to review etc. Keeps everything in one place.
15.
Use a journal while on the road to keep track of objectives, actions, messages
etc.
16.
Stick with your typical routines while home such as: eating habits, exercise
routines,
reading etc.
You
have heard it thousands of times – in sakes time is money. How about –time is life!
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