30 60 90 DAY PLAN EVEN BETTER
The
fundamental premise behind the 30 60 90 Day Plan does not
change no matter what role you’re in or hoping to be in. The purpose of the 30
60 90 Day Plan is widely misunderstood. It has nothing to do with helping you
“get up to speed” or “hit the ground running” and everything to do with aligning
your boss and management team to a definition and framework for success.
The 30 60 90
Day Plan is designed so your hiring will be declared an unequivocal success
after 3 months by the people who matter most to your career. It’s designed to
guarantee the success of the major projects you take on. It’s not about making
sure you focus on learning or training or any of the other misinformation out
there. No one cares about that. The purpose of the 30 60 90 Day Plan is to set
the foundation for your career advancement.
If you
haven't read my original article on 30 60 90 day plans, you can check it out here. This one is about taking you plan to
the next level, especially if you're in sales or management.
While the
basic goal of all 30 60 90 Day Plans is the same, you can and should customize
your approach based on the situation you’re in and the role you hold or would
like to hold. I’ve given some advice below on how to customize your plan for
Sales positions and Management roles. If either of these sounds like you, keep
reading.
The 30 60 90 Day Plan for Sales
The 30 60 90
Day Plan is critical for sales. In the interview process it can help you land
the job. And once you have the job it can help you build a reputation as a
smart and savvy sales executive. It’s about demonstrating that you understand
how to build and execute a sales plan for a territory.
Define the Target
If you want
to differentiate yourself from other candidates applying for a sales job, or
just to impress your boss with your approach to planning a sales territory, you
must start by defining your target with precision. Most reps and sales managers
don’t take this seriously enough and aren’t scientific in their approach to identifying
the “perfect customer”. My recommendation is to spend the first phase of your
sales 30 60 90 Day Plan on defining your highest value target customers.
Show the Model
The
difference between average sales professionals and exceptional ones is often
the model they use to attack a territory or quota. Many people take a “best
effort” approach. They rely on salesmanship and intuition to hit a number. While that may work some of the time, it’s
not a strategy that is going to set you apart from others. My recommendation is
to spend the second phase of your 30 60 90 Day Plan on dissecting your quota
and building a model that shows exactly how you’re going to hit it.
Demonstrate your Approach
This is where
you need to combine the art and science of sales. Now that you’ve show you can
quantify your target and model your business, you need to demonstrate you the
art form of sales. My recommendation is to spend the last phase of your 30 60
90 Day Plan showing the tactics you’re going to use to build pipeline and
develop customers. If you do this effectively, your boss or future boss will
know you have everything it takes to be an effective sales professional.
The 30 60 90 Day Plan for Managers and Executives
It’s very
difficult to be successful as a manager if you haven’t mastered the 30 60 90 Day Plan. In the interview process it will differentiate you from other
candidates. And once you have the job it can help you build a reputation as a
seasoned, thoughtful executive. When done correctly it will demonstrate that
you can think logically about how to build a team and attack a management
problem.
The Situational Assessment
All great
managers’ start by performing a situational audit or assessment. The 30 60 90 Day Plan is no different. Without this context, you run
the risk of being perceived as an activity based, immature manager. My
recommendation in the first phase of the plan is to focus on demonstrating how
you’ll gain a solid understanding of the business situation and competencies of
your team.
The Strategic Initiatives Plan
Now that
you’ve completed a situational assessment, you need showcase your ability to build a focused plan that addresses
top tier initiatives. One thing that distinguishes average managers and great
managers is the ability to focus on the most important issues only. My
recommendation is to spend the second part of your plan describing how you’ll
build a plan that addresses the most prominent
opportunities and gaps.
The Management Dashboard
The last
thing you must focus on in your 30 60 90 Day Plan as a manager or executive is
the management and measurement framework. There is no point in describing a strategic initiatives plan if you
aren’t able to measure it. My recommendation is to focus the final phase of your
30 60 90 Day Plan on providing a KPI dashboard or performance scorecard to
measure the success of your strategic initiatives.
My
ready-to-use 30 60 90 Day Plan Template designed for managers and executives has all of this built already with
tons of extra content from my generic plan template. You can download it here.
I hope my templates are helpful for you. And if you don’t feel like
grabbing one, I hope these tips will make it a bit easier next time you need to
build a 30 60 90 Day Plan.
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