Effective Sales Coaching for Remote Sales Teams

Once upon a time, sales managers could catch reps at the office and begin a coaching conversation about an upcoming sales call. Not anymore. As more and more salespeople and their managers move to remote working environments, managers must rethink the way they coach their teams.
 

This isn’t a passing fad; it’s the new reality of working life, driven largely by advances in technology that let us communicate any time, anywhere, 24/7. “Virtual teams are here to stay,” says Yael Zofi, founder and CEO of AIM Strategies and author of A Manager’s Guide to Virtual Teams (AMACOM, 2011). To prepare for writing her book, Zofi completed an in-depth survey of 150 managers, and at least 70 percent of those she surveyed reported seeing a rise in virtual teams. This evolution, she says, “has shifted in a fundamental way how managers coach and develop their people.”
 

Coaching remotely is not a matter of simply picking up the phone to have the same conversation you’d have in the office. Things get a little more complicated when you’re trying to elicit goals and concerns and serious introspection from someone you haven’t seen in several months and who might be 2,000 miles away – or even halfway around the globe. Here are three keys to consider when creating an effective coaching program for your remote salespeople.

Communicate, Communicate, Communicate
 

In an office, managers and reps have myriad little interactions all day that serve to build trust, confidence, and boosts in performance. In a virtual environment, those interactions don’t occur naturally; they must be intentionally created – a tall order for busy managers, but a crucial one. “Sales teams need more interaction, and the main role of managers as coaches is to create and enable that bond, even though they are not there in person, so that out of sight does not become out of mind,” says Zofi.
 

To coach effectively, managers must be in constant communication with their teams. Establish routines as you would in an office, such as checking in every Friday afternoon or every Monday morning or at the end of each day. One sales VP in Zofi’s study said his goal was to be totally accessible and replicate “being there” in a virtual way. As part of that effort, each day he held end-of-day conference calls to connect to sales reps and find out what worked, what didn’t, what their plans were for the next day, and so on. There’s no right calling schedule; the key is simply to establish a schedule that works for you and your reps.

Build a Coaching Village

Let’s face it: you can’t do everything, and that includes providing all the coaching your sales team needs when you are geographically dispersed. To supplement your own development efforts, Zofi recommends a system of coaching buddies.
 

“In a virtual environment, a buddy system – whether it’s a surrogate coach who can be there in person or over the phone or a top-performing rep who can mentor and develop a newer rep – can be very effective,” says Zofi. “It could be a virtual team member or a local person or even someone from a different department.”
 

Zofi once worked with a retail organization with sales teams in the United States, Europe, and Asia. The United States-based manager struggled to coach an Asia-based rep who rarely spoke during calls, did not respond to questions, and was unclear in her answers when she did. The manager assigned the rep an on-site coaching buddy in Japan, who was able to meet with the rep in person, review calls, talk about challenges, discuss goals, and offer support – all in the rep’s native language. It worked. After a few months, the rep began initiating more conversations with her American manager. She offered more frequent updates to other team members and her manager, and her sales results improved.

Become an “Agent of Connection”
 

Not too many years ago, the sales manager was an agent of change, solely responsible for getting his or her team to rise to the challenge of meeting quarterly sales targets. The manager was a problem solver. In short, the manager managed. Today, virtual leaders “can no longer successfully manage through command-and-control techniques,” Zofi says. Instead, “a different kind of leadership is emerging, which focuses on connection and collaboration and encourages people to rise above their differences and connect at a human level.”
 

In doing so, coaching is woven into every interaction, as managers are constantly asking questions, listening, reflecting, giving balanced feedback, and drawing out lessons learned. The most successful leaders don’t try to understand what needs to be changed and manage that change; rather, their success relates directly to how well they connect with others and their willingness to trust their own team to solve issues. Today’s manager must be an agent of connection who is constantly coaching.

Fixing a Common Problem: The Problem of Being Attentive

Not long ago, Keith Rosen, CEO of Profit Builders and author of Coaching Salespeople into Sales Champions (Wiley, 2008), assured a group of managers that coaching can be done just as effectively over the phone as in person. One manager responded to this revelation with enthusiasm. “Oh, good!” said the manager. “Now I can get some other things done while I’m coaching.”
 

His response highlights a common problem with coaching remotely: the temptation to multitask. After all, the people on the other end of the line can’t see you, so what’s the harm in answering a few emails or shooting off a text while they’re talking? There’s plenty of harm, as it turns out.
 

“If you are looking to erode trust, multitask during a coaching session,” says Rosen. “People sense when you are not present with them.”
 

Contrary to what many managers would like to believe, remote coaching demands that you listen with 100 percent focus to the rep on the other end of the line. Don’t sign those expense reports you’ve been meaning to get to. Don’t respond to your spouse’s text about picking up the children from soccer practice. Don’t even reply to an email from a customer with questions about his or her order. If you do, the coaching session – and even the entire coach/“coachee” relationship – can be damaged.
 

“On the phone, all you have is the message,” says Rosen. “It forces managers to fine-tune their active listening skills so [that those skills] are more acute than in a face-to-face situation.”
 

To prepare for a phone-based coaching session with a remote rep, Rosen recommends that managers take the following steps to boost their focus and reduce their temptation to multitask:

• Schedule each coaching session on the calendar so your time shows as blocked out, lessening the chance of interruption.
• Go somewhere where you won’t be physically interrupted, and close the door.
• Face the wall or window, where you won’t see messages or emails pop up on your screen. (Or better yet, close your laptop.)
• Move off your desk paperwork you might be tempted to read or sign, or flip it over.
• Have notes and/or prepared questions in front of you to help guide the conversation and keep you focused.

“Whether on the phone or face-to-face, managers need to improve their ability to listen,” Rosen says. Better listening will yield better coaching sessions and, ultimately, better results from reps.

Coach’s Toolbox: How to Build Trust from a Distance

Trust is the cornerstone of a solid coach/“coachee” relationship. Without trust, reps won’t open up and offer the kind of introspection that’s necessary for real growth to occur. But how do you build trust from a distance? It’s not easy.
 

“When a team is geographically dispersed, building and maintaining trust adds another dimension to an already demanding process,” says Zofi. “Once you add the cross-cultural layer, trust can be your biggest challenge.” 
 

To build trust with remote reps, managers must focus on something Zofi calls trust synchronization. There are four principles. Honor these four elements, and you will build a foundation for lasting trust.
 

Honesty: Can I trust you to tell me the truth and say what’s on your mind? Honesty-Trust, as Zofi calls it, is essentially just truth telling. It’s about telling reps what is really happening and sharing all information, raising concerns as they arise and not sugarcoating anything, asking for advice from others, and delivering on what you say you will do. It’s also about operating with integrity.
 

“In the virtual environment, [honesty] becomes especially critical because I cannot see you but need to depend on your word,” says Zofi. “Being honest and thinking that others are honest is the strongest predictor of trust.”
 

Competence: Can I trust that you are capable? Do you possess the skills, knowledge, and behaviors to do your job well? If reps perceive you as being hardworking and contributing relevant, interesting ideas and pulling improved performance and higher sales from them, you will gain credibility, and they’ll be more apt to trust you. Competence-Trust behaviors include managing your time and priorities well, making good decisions, actively seeking out information, and demonstrating motivation.
 

Commitment: Can I trust that you will do what you say you will do? If you say you are going to do something, do you do it? If you promise information or an answer to a rep, do you provide it thoroughly and on time?
 

“In the virtual environment, the most significant way to demonstrate that you are committed is to produce results,” Zofi says. Remote reps can’t see that you worked through the weekend to prepare a great training session; they see only the results; therefore, those results really matter.
 

Representation: Can I trust that you will consider my interests, even though I’m not physically present? Just as we trust our accountant or lawyer to represent our best interests, reps must trust that their manager is going to represent their best interests, even when they aren’t in the same physical location. Do you stand up for your reps and always consider what is best for them? Do you work on presenting yourself well in order to reflect well on your reps? These are key tenets of Representation-Trust.

Additional Resources

For more information about coaching and developing remote sales teams, check out these resources.
 

A Manager’s Guide to Virtual Teams (AMACOM, 2011) by Yael Zofi
 

Coaching Salespeople into Sales Champions (Wiley, 2008) by Keith Rosen
 

The Distance Manager: A Hands-On Guide to Managing Off-Site Employees and Virtual Teams (McGraw-Hill, 2000) by Kimball Fisher and Mareen Fisher
 

Sales Coaching: Making the Great Leap from Sales Manager to Sales Coach (McGraw-Hill, 2008) by Linda Richardson
 

Virtual Coach, Virtual Mentor (Information Age Publishing, 2010) edited by David Clutterbuck and Zulfi Hussain
 

“Coaching a Remote Sales Team” by Jim Hughes, Senior Partner, Sales Leadership Consulting (May 12, 2010, blog post at http://salesleadershipconsulting.com/blog)
 

“Three Keys to Managing Remote Salespeople and Teams” by Mark Lindwall, The Decisive Edge (May 3, 2011, blog post at www.thedecisiveedge.com/blog)