Any tips for transitioning from SE/BDM to management?

Recently made the jump from being in an outside sales engineering role to director of new business at a new company with an established team, and I'm wondering if anyone had any tips for avoiding some of the pitfalls all of the managers we've ever hated seem to fall into. I had one amazing sales manager, who I plan to emulate, but I'd hate to become the "if it's not in salesforce, it doesn't exist" guy.

Basically, what would you like to see less of from your management, what could a new manager do to gain your respect/trust, how would you suggest they get up to speed on the company's capabilities/offering, and how do you think they could help you more effectively?

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salesnerd

WR Officer

Head of Growth

First off: congrats!

Secondly, the biggest piece of advice I could give to a new manager is to know that you don't know everything. It's totally fine to say "I don't know" as long as you follow it up with "but I'll find out for you" or even better "but let's find out together!"

Finally, people know the answers to their own questions most of the time. If you're the manager who just answers every single question for your reps, they won't learn and grow. Instead I always take a Socratic method to managing.

A rep comes to me and asks "how should I respond to this email?". The easy thing to do would be to write the email for them. The better thing would be to say "what do you think you should say?" and help guide them to the right answer.

Give a salesperson an email and they will hit their quota once. Teach them to write an email and they will hit their quota for the rest of their career.

Plnths

Good Citizen

VP of Sales

Thanks @salesnerd ! You're 100% correct about the being comfortable not knowing piece. My best manager/mentor was this way, and I've used this tactic from the get in my sales career. Making the process of finding answers/arriving at solutions a collaborative effort will be key, too. I really appreciate the input.

FYI, totally stealing that last line, hope you're cool with that

salesnerd

WR Officer

Head of Growth

Haha of course, steal away.

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Plnths

Any tips for transitioning from SE/BDM to management?

3 comments

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