Introduction

Think back over your sales career and count the number of really good managers you’ve had. You know, the ones who brought out the best in you. The ones who made your sales job exciting, challenging, and rewarding. The ones you could trust. Have you gotten past five fingers yet? Probably not. The Big Irony of sales is this: The ones who are most likely to become sales managers—salespeople—are usually the ones least prepared for the job. Couple that phenomenon with a lack of management training, and you have sales-fails waiting to happen. Ill prepared and under pressure to deliver results, many managers seek shortcuts, giving in to management fads and cookie-cutter approaches to sales management. Many fall prey to metrics addiction, ...

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