Too many sales teams waste valuable time and opportunity on undisciplined, poorly planned sales meetings. That is the unfortunate conclusion we have formed over a 15-year period of coaching sales teams. Can we resolve to make 2010 the year we finally end bad sales meetings?

It isn’t that managers and salespeople don’t need to meet – but without a detailed plan, meetings tend to disintegrate into a series of either ad hoc affairs (getting together around a crisis) or tactical “base-touching” issues (which generate side conversations but fail to build skills) that should instead take place in “off-line” conversations or emails.

The best sales organizations, just like the best sports teams, do not operate like this. Excellent sales managers prepare their teams to excel in all key sales competencies and excellent sales organizations carry this coaching out through strategically timed, carefully structured meetings across teams.

For each of these meetings there is a defined agenda, duration, checklist of goals, and coaching questions. These elements are developed by drawing on best practices across the sales management team and turning them into regular “practices” with specific “drills.”

With a regular cadence of coaching and review meetings in place, sales teams are able to perform with greater consistency across their key sales competencies – resulting in increased revenue and better pipeline visibility.

In a future post I will talk about fundamentals, variety, transitions and other important elements to help you get the most out of sales meetings. What have you found that works in your meeting schedules?