In a BLR webinar entitled "Sales Compensation Strategies: How to Motivate and Re-Energize Your Sales Staff in a Challenging Economy," Dan Kleinman, principal of California-based Dan Kleinman Consulting, explained the importance of defining your sales staff.

Regardless of whether it's relationship or transactional selling, real sales people influence the customer's decision and cause the close.

Ticket takers are not sales people. Easy renewals, cashiering, standing aside and letting the product or price point sell are all critical, sometimes cost-effective and worthy of compensation -- just not sales compensation.

Sales staff are:

• Prudent risk takers
• Believe in their skills, abilities and attributes
• Understand and identify with the company and its mission
• Organized -- optimize their time
• Steeled against rejection

If someone spends less than a third of their time selling, they are typically not sales staff. Bottom line: If you don't have sales staff you don't need a sales plan.

If you do need a sales plan, you need alignment in:

• Vision
• Objectives
• Operating style
• Sales force profile
• Performance metrics
• Compensation

Look back before moving ahead.

• Take inventory of your situation.
• Address misalignments.
• Ensure trust exists.

Dan Kleinman is the principal of Dan Kleinman Consulting (www. dankleinmanconsulting.com), a California-based compensation and human resource consulting firm. For the past 18 years, he has served as an independent consultant for a broad spectrum of regional, national, and international companies, providing compensation, performance, organizational planning, and reward-system design services. His last assignment was serving as vice president and manager of compensation, benefits, human resources information systems, and payroll for Charles Schwab.

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