The one lie that should concern you the most as a business owner, is when your salespeople lie to management in order to protect customers from your service inadequacies. That’s right, the worst reason salespeople lie is when your company’s after-sales service and support is so poorly structured, so poorly managed, and so out of touch with the needs of your market, that your salespeople have no alternative but to make secret deals with customers in order to retain business.
The Reasons for Secret Service Deals
The intention isn’t to imply that your salespeople are doing anything illegal. However, what it does mean is that they’ll use your company's special offers, free samples, promotional products, invoice discounts, price reductions, and or favorable stocking arrangements, in order to make up for your company’s lack of customer service capabilities.
Now, most managers and business owners scoff at the mere notion that their salespeople would make special deals and secret agreements in order to retain a customer’s business. However, there are multiple reasons why salespeople would make deals without telling you, and most of them have nothing to do with their relationship with you as their manager or business owner.
The purpose isn’t to deceive you; the purpose is to work around your company’s inability to properly service its customer base, and to retain that business that is most important to your enterprise. In essence, your sales team is doing what your management team hasn't allowed them, or empowered them, to do. They are trying to save business for your company - without much support from their direct reports.
The above video is from the post: Manage Your Customer’s Expectations and the Rest Should Follow
Understand Why This is Happening
You must focus your efforts on the underlying reasons your salespeople are forced to lie to management in order to retain business – not necessarily why they lie to you as a manager or a business owner. Remember, it’s not personal. It’s an act that is borne out of necessity, one where your salespeople are assuming control in order to save their customer relationships. Here are just some of the reasons why a salesperson might decide to take matters into their own hands.
Lack of “Official” Power: One of the biggest reasons a salesperson might decide to take matters into their own hands is because management hasn't given them the "official" power to do so on their own. For instance, they may face a competitor that empowers its salespeople to make immediate decisions. Or, they may decide to do something on their own simply to save face with their customers, ones who expect to be serviced by proactive salespeople. Ultimately, your sales team lacks the power to decide on their own, and it’s this power that is seen as essential by your customers. It’s either coming from your competition, or it is something that is seen as vital within your market. Either way, you are forcing your salespeople to make these decisions on their own and lie to you in the process.
Fractured Operations: Are your company’s operations and customer service processes redundant and time-consuming? Do your operations make it next to impossible to properly service and manage your customers, thereby forcing your salespeople to take matters into their own hands? If you’re unsure of the answer to these two questions, then it’s more than likely that your company’s operations are fractured. Because of this, your salespeople have no choice but to assume control of their customer relationships. This is the perfect example of how your salespeople may lie to management in order to save their customers from your company’s bad service.
Management Resistance to Change: Your customers’ needs and priorities are constantly changing and either your company change with them, or you'll lose business and market share. Ultimately, your salespeople may decide to take charge simply because your company is resistant, or worse, unable to change in a constantly changing marketplace. If your customer service simply isn’t able to keep up, then you’ve given your salespeople no other choice but to assume control.
Management Can't Define Priorities: Internal management squabbles do have a cost and they can often be measured by lower revenue and decreased market share. When your company is fraught with internal issues, then it’s a guarantee that your management won’t be able to define your customer service priorities. A management team that can’t come to an agreement is one that forces its salespeople to assume control until management finally gets its act together. The longer that takes, the more the salesperson has to lie to management in order to win business.
An Example of Fractured Operations: I once worked for a company that asked its customers to place new purchase orders in order to return defective product. Our policy was to hold back on a Return Merchandise Authorization (RMA) number until the customer generated another purchase order that matched the number of defective finished goods they wanted to return.
Regardless of why this practice was being adopted, it was obvious that we were forcing our customers to work around our operational deficiencies. We were putting our own operational needs ahead of the needs of our customers. It was wrong, caused friction with customers, and it was not at all conducive to winning business. Worse yet, it was the first of many such decisions, ones all focused on simplifying how we worked within our company and not simplifying, nor improving, how we serviced our customers.
As customers become more and more upset, we as salespeople found that management was unwilling to accommodate and change to this new reality. Our competitors were servicing their customers better than we were and we were losing market share as a result. No matter what we said, or how we tried to define the severity of the situation, it always fell on deaf ears and lead to more internal bickering amongst management.
As a business owner, it’s up to you to understand exactly why your salespeople are forced to lie to management in order to save customers from your company’s bad service. Ultimately, your salespeople are assuming control because the market demands it, your customers expect it and your managers are unwilling to listen or adapt to the changes within your market. What’s the best strategy you can employ to find out if this is an issue in your enterprise? Well, one only needs to look at “undercover boss,” a show where business owners and executives go undercover within their companies in order to see exactly how their employees work. You could adopt the exact same strategy. Or, you could be more direct in your approach by sitting down with one of your salespeople and having them outline some of your customers’ biggest concerns. Start by asking them what your company is unable to deliver in terms of its after-sales service and support. This should be more than enough to get the conversation going.
To read about how to make your customer service strategy clear and easily understood, please read: Your Customer Service Strategy Must Start with Marketing & Sales
Comments