Careers Hub | Ever wondered what the culture of a winning sales team looks like?

Have you ever looked around at the sales team in your office and thought what do our competitors have that we don’t? We have the same technology and the same processes, so what is it? We suggest maybe taking a look at your corporate culture.

The culture of a sales team is essential; it motivates and drives the team to perform better each and every day. When talking to our Director Daniel Hale about the importance of a successful sales culture he notes that he has found there has recently been a shift for candidates in what they find important. He found that a few years ago if you asked a candidate what the top thing they want from a company would be, it would have been money or job stability. However, now he says that 75% of the time when asked what the most important thing in a company is, the response will be culture.

So if we know culture is what is most valued by candidates and what’s going to drive your team to success, then what culture works best? This might not be as easy to pin down as you might think, so we posed it to Daniel. His response was that in his experience there is a direct correlation between a fantastic culture and high performance. When he thought about his most successful clients he would also have described them as having the best culture.

What do these clients do to get this winning culture? Well, they have their team motivated towards a common goal, especially in a sales environment; if you want a winning culture you can’t just have a competitive culture, there has to be a balance between competitive and collaborative. Daniel also notes that if your employees are engaged and loyal, they will want to work for themselves, their manager and their company resulting in a win-win for all. Employees have to love going to work, to achieve this you have to look at both your monetary rewards but also your intangibles, while they may not directly impact your bottom line, you will have better performance overall.

Here at Pulse Recruitment, we like to use ourselves as an example of the impact of culture. We have designed a business focusing on what most recruitment companies don’t, a vibrant culture. Here at Pulse Recruitment, our consultants are still target driven, which let’s face it is essential in sales, yet the environment is still fun and relaxed. When speaking to Daniel about how we achieve this at Pulse he said that for us it’s important to have expectations and targets without being too caught up on metrics and data. He feels that this enables personal accountability and ownership of results without getting caught up on how you got there, letting individuals achieve success in different ways.

But we don’t just want to use ourselves as an example. So again we went to Daniel and asked about these top-performing clients he was talking about. What specifically does he see every time he walks into their offices? Well, he sees energy, along with an underlying competitiveness that is paired with team spirit. The offices are always light and fun, there are jokes flying left right and centre, and it’s an environment you want to be in.

So you think you have a culture like this? Well, congratulations firstly and secondly we recommend celebrating it. If your employees genuinely love coming to work every day, are smashing your targets, if you have team members that are hitting targets but also taking a leadership or mentoring role, celebrate it! Both monetary and non-monetary rewards are an important part of a company’s culture. Offer progression, offer extra responsibility, keep your employees engaged and recognise what you are doing right!