The COVID-19 pandemic has been the ultimate validation of the importance of leadership abilities for sales managers. In addition to navigating their teams through incredibly challenging business conditions, many sales managers have had to almost overnight re-engineer how their sales teams sell to remote customers.
To emerge stronger from this crisis now’s a great time to focus on how you can become an even better sales leader by developing your personal abilities.
Think of a great leader from history who faced challenging circumstances (e.g., Abraham Lincoln or Martin Luther King), or maybe a great business leader that you have worked with. What are some of their crucial leadership characteristics? Maybe you think of their communication or motivational abilities, or their vision, integrity, or optimism comes to mind.
Some of these qualities are skills, while others are personal abilities. These are the unique characteristics, traits, and personalities, which, together, make up who these people are as leaders. Personal ability is not what you do, but who you are. It’s an overall perception of characteristics, traits, and personality, which, together, make up a positive image of the leader.
While some personal abilities are innate, you can develop and improve your personal abilities. However, because personal abilities are personality and behavioral characteristics, they are hard to measure and difficult to change and develop.
So, how can you change a behavior or personality trait? Change or development is a long-term process. Recognizing how you want to develop your abilities is an essential first step in becoming a better leader. Deciding how you want to develop yourself as a leader requires a strong personal commitment.
Consider a basic sales leadership personal ability, such as being a good role model. If this were one of the areas you wanted to develop, what are some of the actions you could take?
You could start by identifying the behaviors you wanted your team to emulate and then demonstrate them yourself.
For example, assume you want your team to be positive and energized, even when times are tough. You could challenge yourself to demonstrate a positive, action-oriented attitude in your tone, words, and actions. Or, if you wanted your team to work harder and be more task-oriented, you could set the standard by starting work early, avoiding long lunch breaks, and focusing on completing your tasks.
Each of these is a concrete action step you could take if being a better role model was one of your priorities.
It can be hard to envision how you might cultivate a leadership trait like having a “sincere and open personality” or having “pride in doing an effective job.” How can you develop your personal abilities that seem so innate? Let’s look at some tangible steps you can take for developing your personal abilities:
The bottom line is that developing your personal abilities will require a long-term commitment. The payoff is worth it as you become the leader your team will follow because of the trust, confidence, and respect they have in you.