What Do You Bring?

Ever wonder what you can bring to your team?That’s exactly what I was thinking when I first started in my job as asales manager.

The team that I inherited had survived 6 company “restructures” which had eliminated about 75% of the original field force leaving only the best of the best. Their previous manager had been very experienced and even worse for me, a super nice guy. Even my own girlfriend told me that he was much more likeable than I was.

Always having been somewhat socially awkwardand this being my first experience leading a large team, I knew that I would have to work on the likeable factor amongst many other things.

The cherry on the cake was that this was a team based in Quebec and functioned completely in French. Despite my French name and many, many years of lessons, my ability to speak and write in French is less than perfect. I always feel like my IQ drops about 20 points whenever I switch into that language.

So, with all of this, what could I possibly bring this team of accomplished professionals?

Anyone who has reads my blog regularly knows about my obsession with understanding the customer. A business venture that failed many years ago burned into me the importance of going beyond the obvious and digging into both the conscious and unconscious reasons why customers do what they do. My subsequent years as a marketer had given me the chance to refine the techniques on howto do it.

My experience was unique and I knew that because of this, I could bring a new perspective to my team on how to dig deeper to really understand their customers.

I set up one-on-one sessions every month to discuss their top customers and used my unique experience to help to provide them with the tools needed to better understand those customers.

Over time, the members of my team reported to me that they were having better conversations with their customers and where adapting their presentations to their customer’s specific needs and interests. This paid off for them as they eventually became the top performing team in the company.

My team was already very good, butthe value that I was able to bring to them came from leveraging my unique perspective and experiences.

You have the same opportunity to do the same thing with your own team.

One of the things that I see over and over again as a consultant helping sales and marketing teams optimize their performance,is that the people who bring the most to a team are the ones who leverage and share their unique perspective on the business with their colleagues.

We all have unique experiences and perspectives. Don’t underestimate the value of yours.

It is much like the story of the 5 blind men, each touching a different part of an elephant and describing it to each other. We all experience different parts of the business and by sharing and combining our different perspectives, our teams become much more effective.

If you are wondering what you can bring to your team, think about what is unique about what you know and have experienced.

Share it and I guarantee that you will be adding value.