Spring training has just ended, and the baseball season is on the horizon. But just like managing a baseball team, managing a sales team is no simple task. Managers must consider the performance of individuals, and their team, to continuously work with them to train them towards success.
However, with the influx of technology in recent years, managers now have the access to tools they need to gain greater visibility into the day-to-day activities of their reps, access the metrics that matter, and better train their teams using 100% accurate, reliable data.
As a former Pittsburg Pirates player and Fordham Baseball captain, Greg Smith, Gryphon’s Director of Sales, has experience leading teams both on the field and in the office. He’s here with us today on MLB Opening Day to talk about his experience managing sales teams and using the metrics that matter to coach his team towards success.
Moneyball Your Sales Team – An Interview with Gryphon Director of Sales Greg Smith
“I’m able to offer them (Sales Reps) data points so that they can structure their week and as a result set more meetings.” – Greg Smith, Director of Sales, Gryphon Networks
Gryphon: How do you ensure you have accurate visibility into the day-to-day activities of your sales team?
Greg Smith: First, I think you need to create a culture of accountability and then you need a system, process, and tool to manage to that. Baseball, in general, would look at stats that everyone knew like batting average, home runs, wins and losses and just assume that they are what would define success. Moneyball, saber mathematicians, sabermetrics and the data analytics teams that are now employed on every major league baseball team and other sports that would disagree and talk about stats like on-base percentage, WAR (Wins Above Replacement), launch angle or barrel percentage.
Gryphon: How does the data provided by Gryphon Sales Intelligence better enable you to manage your team? How do you use this data to manage your team?
Greg Smith: Greg Smith: When we are in our weekly 1:1’s or just team huddles and I’m able to offer them data points so that they can structure their week and in the result set more meetings. The company is winning as we are having more qualified conversations with prospects and the SDR is winning because they are setting more meetings than they would be if they didn’t have a system like Gryphon.
Gryphon: There are a lot of people out there using CRMs so what can a sales manager do to look at the CRM and try to make an accurate forecast using these metrics?
Greg Smith: I’ve often found that especially in my management roles that reps will skew their forecasts or updates in a positive favor and when information is not accurate or captured in the CRM there is a huge visibility gap. What I mean by visibility gap is, what really happened on that call? Was it recorded? What was the true result of the call? If the sales rep is updating the record in Salesforce or in any CRM 20-30 minutes or 3 days later after the meeting is what they marked really what happened on that call? For me to be able to forecast accurately from CRM you need accurate information.
Greg Smith has been serving as the Director of Sales at Gryphon Networks since the start of 2017. He has experience managing multiple sales teams of different sizes, with past roles at Box, Smartling, and Oracle. Listen to the Gryphon Knows Podcast for the full interview.
Greg Smith