44 GERMINATION.CA JULY 2018 SALES COACHING WHY IT’S THE END OF DEMOCRACY AS WE KNOW IT Rod Osthus President, RC Thomas @RodOsthus • rod@rcthomas.com • rcthomas.com FOR DECADES, the democratic system of selling to farm- ers was fairly successful. That is, sales reps set their own sales goals and decided how and when they were going to achieve them. Many sellers were independent dealers who had the freedom to set their own prices and manage their sales territories the way they wanted. Sometimes they hit their sales goals, sometimes they didn’t. But that democratic system of selling to farmers, though still in place in most ag companies, is not work- ing. As the cost of doing business continues to go up, achieving sales and profit goals is no longer an option. Companies need their sales reps to take total responsibil- ity for hitting their sales targets every year in order to stay in business. Ag companies need to stop being so demo- cratic and insert a system of accountability if they expect to survive the next 10 years. A couple of years ago, I was hired by an ag company to conduct a two-day training session for 110 of their sales reps. Only 82 reps showed up for the class. Prior to starting the session, I told the VP of sales that I didn’t realize his salespeople worked on commission and had the power to decide which company events they wanted to attend. He looked at me in disgust and said, “They aren’t commissioned, they’re salaried.” I said, “Then why do they have the option not to attend this training ses- sion? He said, “You just nailed our biggest problem and a big reason why past training hasn’t been working very well. That’s going to stop.” Some salespeople can operate within a democracy, but most can’t. The cost of doing business today is too high, and achieving sales goals needs to be a more autocratic process, operating under the mentality that hitting goals is no longer optional, but essential to company survival. When you are asked to reach goals that you believe are beyond your ability or resources, your only option is to rethink and innovate. The majority of ag sellers don’t achieve their sales goals because they refuse to innovate and, instead, make excuses. Innovating to achieve goals means taking total respon- sibility for doing what your company asks you to do. And that, my fellow street fighter, is not a democracy — it’s your job. P.S. I just released my brand-new guide, 5 Steps to a Winning Seed Dealership: rcthomas.com/dealership-opt-in PROCESSING EQUIPMENT AVOID USING LOUSY EMPLOYEE TRAINING MATERIALS Jason MacNevin, Owner, Can-Seed Equipment jmacnevin@canseedequip.com • canseedequip.com ONE THING SUCCESSFUL businesses need is investment. Not only investment in equipment, but investment in employ- ees. Human capital is the most valuable capital you have. Material things can be replaced. Talented people cannot be. I encourage clients to invest in their people in a number of different ways. A big one is through training sessions for their employees. Training is key to enabling professional development to happen. There are a number of things you can do to ensure employees get the most out of training sessions. 1. Focus on a range of material. Don’t simply focus these sessions on how to operate equipment (although that is a hugely important aspect). Focus on other matters too, like how to help others and be a good collaborator. Giving employees input into the content of the sessions can be a great idea. Find out what they’d like to learn. As long as it’s relevant to the topic at hand, it will make the sessions more enjoyable and useful. 2. Develop engaging in-house training materials. There’s nothing worse than handing out boring material at a training session. Material developed by someone else outside your company is particularly unhelpful. Create your own with the help of your equipment supplier. With modern technology you can do so quickly and economi- cally. You know your employees better than anyone, so you’ll no doubt have some insight into the kind of train- ing material they would find most helpful. 3. Don’t forget the action plan. One problem I encoun- ter with training sessions is failure to follow up afterward. Employees need the opportunity to turn knowledge into action. Close the training session by setting aside some time to put together an action plan for each employee that can be followed once the session is over. Investing in employees should go beyond just ensuring you have good equipment. Quality training is essential to success.