Leadership in a Geographically Dispersed Sales Workplace

by Dave Brookmire
October 2008

How does one practice great sales leadership skills in a workplace that is increasingly geographically fragmented, where our primary means of communication is electronic, and face time is a commodity? Today’s “flat” workplace offers great opportunities for innovative sales leaders; it also presents unique challenges.

A geographically fragmented sales organization can still be a culturally cohesive and unified organization; in fact, it must be. Every day we read about national and multi-national corporate success stories: HP, Microsoft, WalMart, Cisco, to name a few. Each of these companies has worked to maintain and nurture its corporate culture through excellent sales leadership. Even during their most strenuous growth periods, culture and mission were never left to chance.

Technology allows leaders to capitalize on the time- value of their sales leadership performance. When a company is growing, whether organically or through mergers and acquisitions, the sales leader of the expanding organization is simultaneously challenged to grow the value of his or her leadership performance. By expanding the scope and quality of the leadership along with the scope and quality of the organization, the sales leader has the opportunity to achieve even better returns on leadership performance in the future.

The sales leadership skills that serve people well in a wired and widespread workplace are not so different from those of traditional leaders. The sales leader who can communicate powerfully and prolifically, build relationships, inspire and motivate others, and foster collaboration in a geographically dispersed organization is what Zenger & Folkman discovered distinguished good leaders from extraordinary leaders.

More and more of today’s leaders are finding themselves in charge of an expanding and dispersed workplace. Here are some the lessons we have learned from them over the years.

• Practice equitable information sharing. Geographic distance is no excuse for equipping some of your sales reps with better or timelier information than others. “If you want the people in Germany to feel left out, deny them access to the information that you provided to others in Canada.

1.    Identify your information delivery systems (Intranets, blogs, social networks, email blasts, etc).

2.    Find out who is tapping into these systems and how.

3.    If there are groups who are not accessing a particular tool, find out why.

4.    Determine whether some of your conduits for information sharing are inherently more or less effective than others. Bring the inadequate ones up to par.

• Get together. We are creatures of habit. Make meetings a habit in your organization. Standing meetings are the impetus for information sharing. The Home Depot has made a practice of Monday morning meetings during which the top executives from various regions talk about business priorities. Without a regular, mandatory meeting, these dispersed leaders would never gather as a team. Create a communication framework that includes weekly or biweekly calls with senior management from all of your markets.
• Leaders should be seen and heard. Leaders must spend quality face-time in their markets. Leadership is enabled and strengthened – but rarely established – through technology. A videoconference is never as impactful as meeting face-to-face. That said, remote meetings are a necessity in dispersed organizations. Virtual sales leadership is exponentially more effective when it is supported by periodic, in-person meetings. AirTran Airways ex - CEO Joseph Leonard refered to his employees as “crew members,” even those who don't work on the planes. Leonard makes a habit getting plenty of face-time with his employees – a practice that authenticates his leadership and reinforces his message.
• Make your message relevant and viral. Successful sales leaders of dispersed sales organizations are tireless advocates of a compelling vision. They make their vision relevant to everyone in the organization by continually showing employees how their individual performance contributes to the realization of that vision. Every individual should have a clear line-of- sight from his vantage point to the realization of your vision. Unleash the Creative Potential of E-Collaboration