One Size Doesn't Fit All... How to avoid alienating agents that can be top producers by embracing diversity

Have you ever wondered how diversity on your sales team can drive revenue? Would you be interested in learning how to take advantage of different perspectives, different skill sets and a variety of experiences?

Embracing diversity the right thing to do. Anyone that is a good fit for our sales teams because of their values, work ethic, career path and attitudes should be given a fair chance to thrive in our universe... no matter who they are, where they come from or their superpowers/disabilities.

And... here is why it's profitable for you as a team leader.

Why do some team leaders try to build a team of clones?

The biggest mistake some team leaders make is to try to build a team of clones. These teams have the highest level of turnover and the least growth potential.

Most teams are started by producing sales agents that want to take their careers to the next level by starting a team. They have become successful using their innate talents and building on their essential skill sets to drive in business. Fair enough.

BUT, there is a big difference between being a transactional sales agent and running a business that cash flows via team sales.

If your only goal is to build a small team of killer sales people, please understand that you still just have a job and not an actual business. Most of these agents you bring on board care only for one thing… sales income. This doesn’t allow you to replace yourself so you can step into an executive level role in the business. You will be forever locked in the middle management zone, often still doing field work.

AND when you do have an ambitious person that wants to level up by starting their own team. A small killer team of agents isn’t a model that allows them to grow WITH you so they quit and end up competing for your clients.

If you want to start a team, think about the bigger picture. How do you build an organization that your top people can be rewarded by helping you grow your business?

Did you know that every agent you will ever hire has their own superpowers?

Everyone has their own superpowers. Some will be introverted like me. Some will be gregarious extroverts. Some will love technology, others will thrive belly to belly with customers.

When Agents & Team Leaders book time with me to talk about our Field to Executive Free Course and One on One Executive Mentorship, I hear it all the time. I need help because my team leader is a superstar, but I can’t do what she does. I have a different style and they keep pushing me to follow their success story and business blueprint and it’s not working for me.

What is the ONE thing that agents need to do to make sales? Talk to enough people about their product or service. Use the law of averages to convert enough business to be successful. Even terrible salespeople can earn a living if they talk to enough people… not that we want terrible salespeople on our teams hahaha.

If your agent is representing your brand well, serving customers with integrity and broadcasts a great attitude… do you care what superpower they use to get their butts in front of enough people to serve?

Let’s put it another way. If someone absolutely hates technology and social media but is outstanding at networking what method do you think you should encourage them to use?

The method they hate using will result in poor performance, a lack of consistency and low morale. If you encourage them to step into their superpower, the opposite will happen.

YOU as a salesperson will have your preferences on how you attack your sales goals. Personally, I hate cold calling and door knocking. I am an introvert so its really uncomfortable for me. That’s why I focus my time on building warm audiences online and offline that know like and trust me before I talk to them.

Conversions are easier and a lot more fun that way… for me.

I ran a company that specialized in customer acquisitions for fortune 500 companies. We were B2B specialists that required direct sales… aka door to door. I was good at it, but hated every single moment. The only thing I could think of was getting my ass out of the field and into a team leader position.

Most agents won’t be that ambitious and focused.

Forcing your agents through a cookie cutter training process instead of mentoring them to use their superpowers will will trigger the mindset trap of thinking that this business isn’t for them. That they don’t have what it takes… and you will face huge turnover. Completely avoidable.

How does diversity affect the bottom line on your sales team?

Take a look at your agents. They all have different strengths and weaknesses. Trying to train them the same way or expecting them to think and behave like you do as a leader is a common mistake and ends up alienating your people causing them to leave… and frustrating the crap out of you.

Your customers are all different too. You are not serving a community of clones. You have different walks of life, languages, histories, preferences and they like to hang out in different places.

I lost a huge sale once. The commission was going to be around 40k… and the reason why I lost the sale was because the client spoke English as a second language and had a different set of cultural values. We simply didn’t see the same things the same way.

That kinda pissed me off. I really didn’t want to lose that sale because I was 1000% confident that I could have done an outstanding job.

So I thought about how I could avoid that in the future. I have a saying… “you either Pay for your education or you pay for your education”. This time, I paid with lost business.

BUT it inspired me to create a system in my team that ended up making 100’s of thousand in commissions for me and my entire team.

We counted the number of languages we spoke collectively on my last big team. We had 24 different languages and cultures represented… and once we knew that, our agents were able to work together to help each other out when they needed assistance with a culture, perspective or language resulting in a lot more sales. 

Do you know the fastest method we have found to help agents unlock 100k plus sales incomes? 

Teaching them how to niche down into a high paying target market that reflects who they are as an agent. We dedicate ¼ of our "Launch 100k Earning Agents Bootcamp" to that concept alone because it is so important and profitable.

You don’t need to have all the sales, you just need enough to hit your goals.

By helping your agents focus their energy on a tribe of people that can easily know, like and trust them. You are helping them stack their own decks with easier conversions which makes you AND your agents a lot more money.

This also increases job satisfaction, gets your agents paid faster and gives your people the confidence they need that they can survive and thrive in this business and on your team.

What is one of the most valuable lessons we can learn from having a diverse sales team?

Do you know how much you can learn about people and yourself as a leader when you embrace diversity on your team? Not to mention the food at company pot locks is insanely good.

How people express their talents and bring value to your team is always going to be different. Embracing this allows you and your top people to learn one of the most profitable lessons in team building… how to develop people from different walks of life, different perspectives and who have different goals.

I have a saying. Every single agent and team we coach are like snowflakes. Unique and special in their own way. They are the only ones working with their innate abilities, their personal values, their goals, their product, their location, their niche market.

If we try to force people into a box. We end up losing the potential to serve our customers with an army of well rounded specialists.

As leaders, we know that our team teaches us as much as we guide them right?

We need to take every chance we can get to broaden our perspectives and grow skillsets in leadership and motivation.

I remember one young saleswoman on my team. She was around 26 years old and was crushing sales. She was exactly the kind of agent we wanted to replicate on our team. Smart, driven, caring, details… so we started giving her people to train on her own team.

She loved the idea, and the extra income from team overrides, until one day when she came into my office to complain about an agent we gave her to train. He was a 60+ year old middle eastern gentleman that was an engineering specialist back in his home country. Very successful, multiple houses and catered to executives in the oil industry.

Talk about a difference in cultures and attitudes.

She wanted to not only get him off her team. She wanted me to fire this man because she simply didn’t see the value he brought to the table. Admittedly he had some old school perspectives and a culture that didn’t resonate well with this young team leader.

I told her to stick it out. I was not hiring a bunch of clones and while she was amazing, she wasn’t the only one with specialties that could serve customers. I asked her to open her mind and find all the ways he could benefit from her knowledge while looking for opportunities to use his skills, culture and perspectives to create sales for himself.

They didn’t become besties, but they did learn from each other. They both kept an open mind and learned skills and perspectives they never would have if they didn’t work together. She became a superstar team leader that ran an incredibly diverse team… and he turned into a rockstar agent serving his community.

Diversity is profitable in so many ways.
We may be smart and talented individually… but collectively we are genius.

#BEMEGA My Friend

Dustin Pritchard
Executive Mentor

PS. If you are looking for guidance and mentorship while you build your team. You should register for our free course "From the Field to Executive". It shares with you the methods I use when personally Mentoring team leaders in our One-On-One Executive Mentorship program.