Why salespeople need practice.
Estimated reading time: 2 minutes.
Years ago, we started wondering why sales training never seemed to stick. The companies we worked for invested hundreds of thousands of dollars in well-respected, well-researched training. But when we went back three months later to measure application, it was immediately apparent that salespeople didn’t implement what they’d learned.
Then one day, we came across an article in Harvard Business Review called: The Making of an Expert by Anders Ericcson. And then Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell and Talent Is Overrated by Daniel Colvin. Later we read The Talent Code by Daniel Coyle and Peak by Anders Ericcson. These researchers have been studying the science of achievement and how humans become the best in their field.
“To become an expert salesperson, you need to practice it so you can deliver flawlessly come performance time. ”
Reading their work, we realized that in every other discipline, people understand that simply having an intellectual understanding of behavior is not enough. So whether they are actors, musicians, chess players, athletes, or whatever, they recognize the gap between understanding something and pulling it off in real life.
It suddenly seemed obvious, to succeed, to become an expert salesperson, you need to practice it so you can deliver flawlessly come performance time. These experts deliberately focus on practicing individual skills to the point where they’re flawless. And in sales, we don’t do any of that. We watch a sales training video or go to a virtual class, and everyone assumes we’re good. We’ll be able to do it in real life, on an actual sales call.
But it’s just not true. Without practice, there is inevitably a gap between what salespeople know they should be doing and what they actually do. And that means that dollars are left on the table, and precious relationships are lost.
So we said, all right. Let’s provide a safe space where salespeople can practice and where they:
Can try out new skills
Can refine and improve existing skills
Are free to get it wrong risk-free
Receive unbiased feedback from a sales professional
Master the application of the skills they need to outperform in key sales moments
And so, we created a safe space for professional salespeople to practice in highly realistic simulated sales conversations with actors. And we called that space Practica Learning.
Talk to us about how you are using practice in your workplace. We’d love to hear about it. Free demonstrations are available now.
