When I was in 3rd grade, I rode a bike that was a hand me down from my grandparents.
It was a very uncool cruiser (PeeWee Herman style). All my friends rode the latest Huffys. Sometimes they would make fun of my bike.
I didn’t care. I loved my bike. It had a rear rack that a passenger could sit on. It had a headlight and a basket up front to hold my stuff. I rode it everywhere.
One day, my sister came home and said she had gotten into a fight with her best friend. I asked why and she said, “She was making fun of you because of your bike.”
Nobody on our street ever made fun of my bike again.
As sales managers, there will be times when we need to take a stand to defend our rep.
Sometimes this will be easy like when a rep misquotes a price or ships the wrong product.
Other times, it’s less easy. Our rep will do something that we don’t like. Most of the time, we know our rep’s intentions were good. In these cases, it’s often best to withhold judgement until we gather more information, talk to our rep and give him time to make things right.
The most important time to defend a rep is when it is hard. In times like this, we might have to challenge our company’s culture, our peers or our boss.
Here’s one that you will likely deal with
In management meetings, there is a tendency to “pile on” a rep who’s made a mistake. Someone (often only partially informed) criticizes a rep and then the rest of the managers join in to pick him apart.
This is the adult version of what often happens in grade school when a bully picks on someone. Nobody really likes it, but few people have the courage to challenge the bully.
Especially true when the bully is your boss. Or worse, your boss’s boss.
There’s a simple and effective way to shut this down – defend your rep with the facts.
If you don’t, your rep may have just been put on the unofficial “problem” employee list which could haunt him for years.
Another Real Life Example From My Past
I had a sales rep who was a decent rep but also an immature jagoff who didn’t know how to behave. We had multiple incidents with him because of things he said to his coworkers.
After each incident, he’d be “counseled” by his manager (who reported to me). Things would go OK for a while. Then he’d blow up again. After one too many of these, I intervened.
I gave the rep his final warning. I explained that the next time there was a problem, I would fire him.
There were no problems until a few weeks later, when he reply-all’d to a snarky email and dropped an F***bomb. HR was on distribution list. My HR Director immediately came to me and said, “We’ve got him. We need to fire him now.”
But I refused.
I didn’t like the rep. I wanted to fire him because I was tired of his bullshit. But sending out an F***bomb in an internal email was common practice with our sales team.
There was no way I would fire a rep for doing that. So I refused. HR, being risk averse and wanting to get rid of a problem employee, escalated above my head.
Still I refused to back down.
HR was upset. My boss disagreed. But I held my ground.
I pulled the rep and his manager into my office. I explained exactly what happened and what I had done to save his job. I told him I was counting on him to step up and that I knew he could.
He did – for the next 5 years.
Side Benefits
In time, I was able to rely on this rep to mentor others who had behavior issues. He also became one of my go to reps when I needed to get a “pulse” on team morale.
My relationship with the HR improved. Although I had no problem firing employees who deserved it, I had made it clear where I stood when it came to being fair with my reps.
And of course, I felt good about doing what I thought was right. That was the greatest benefit.
Do I always recommend taking a stand to defend your rep? Not when he has done something clearly indefensible.
But when he hasn’t and you need to take a stand, you’ll know it.
If you’ve ever taken a stand to defend your rep, please share it in the comments. It will help other Sales Managers out there to hear your stories.