Tag: team work

Your own thing

FabrizioLeave a comment

It is no longer enough to be able to do your own thing.

Writing a blog post, setting up a campaign, giving an inspirational presentation, writing sequences that sell, hosting an insightful podcast. 99% of us can no longer thrive off of only mastering one of those things.

The two things we need to add to the picture are:

  1. Doing your own thing at scale – e.g., coordinating the writing and distribution of 100 blog post in one year.
  2. Doing your own thing in a way that serves other people that work with you – e.g., coordinating the writing and distribution of a series of blog posts that present the product uniquely and faithfully, while at the same time increases the win rate of prospects in a customer segment.

Art is for the 1%.

For the rest of us, it’s business.

Say it

FabrizioLeave a comment

Who can you say it to?

Who can you talk to about the pain you are feeling, the challenge you are going through, the anxiety, the lack of focus, the impossibility to achieve anything meaningful in this particular period? Who can you say that to?

There’s always somebody you can talk to about how you are today and why it is not great.

And if there’s nobody, at least say it to those who are affected by it.

It’s fair for them. And it’s fair for you.

A different metric

FabrizioLeave a comment

When you measure leads, all you are going to get is leads.

And there might be some very good reasons why you measure leads. You might know that a given amount of leads will translate into a given amount of deals. You might know that one lead has a monetary value attached to it. You might know that people feel motivated in trying to get more leads. You might have evidence and proof of these and many other things. But when you measure leads, all you are going to get is leads.

So, what happens when the team that sits in the other room, the team that gets leads as an input and needs to transform that into deals, cannot complete that transformation reliably and consistently?

Well, of course they are going to say that the leads are not good, that they are not quality leads.

And that’s exactly how the relationship between marketing, sales development, sales, and sometimes customer success, works in most B2B companies. There’s always somebody, further down the funnel, that complains because the quality of what they get is not good enough.

Because when you measure leads, all you are going to get is leads.

Quality needs a different metric.

More than a higher salary

FabrizioLeave a comment

If your team complains about something, it’s not because they are spoiled, naive, or junior. If they complain often, that’s even more true.

There’s probably some deeper issues behind their behaviour. They might not feel motivated, or they might have the impression they are not free to make their own decisions, or they might just be disoriented by the continuously moving targets.

It’s your responsibility as a team lead to figure that out, because you can’t really start talking about performance, goals, development, until you clear the air and tackle the complaints.

And “tackle” is not about blindly accepting all request, but rather managing them.

“Here is how we are going to do this”.

“Here is why we can’t do that.”

“Here is who is going to be responsible for the other thing.”

And so on.

Being a manager is more than a higher salary.

Forceful

FabrizioLeave a comment

You can’t pretend to know what’s better for others. Not even your dear ones.

And you can’t pretend others will come to you when they need something. Or express that in a way that makes what they need clear.

What you can and should do, instead, is to be aware of and vocal about what is better for you. And be adamant about it.

It might actually be so that it will help others figure out their own stuff. Or at least, if you are the person that will help or not.