{"id":847,"date":"2014-03-11T08:37:42","date_gmt":"2014-03-11T16:37:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/?p=847"},"modified":"2014-03-17T14:04:41","modified_gmt":"2014-03-17T22:04:41","slug":"measuring-sales-operations-selfie","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/archives\/847","title":{"rendered":"Measuring Sales Operations \u2013 A Selfie"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-850\" style=\"width: 288px;\" alt=\"Oscar Selfie\" src=\"http:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/03\/Oscar-Selfie-300x275.jpg\" width=\"300\" height=\"269\" \/>Sales Operations teams typically\u00a0produce and\u00a0analyze dozens of metrics and KPIs related to the productivity of the sales team or qualitative measures regarding other aspects of Sales.\u00a0 Rarely\u00a0is qualitative and quantitative\u00a0analysis focused on measuring Sales Operations.\u00a0 We never take a selfie and it&#8217;s about time we did!<\/p>\n<p>A few days ago I was asked by a VP of Sales, how should he measure his Sales Operations organization?\u00a0 Is his Sales Ops investment optimized?\u00a0 Is Sales Ops effective at adding value?<\/p>\n<p>Since Sales Ops organizations are responsible for vastly different tasks across different companies (<a title=\"What\u2019s The Difference Between Sales and Sales Operations?\" href=\"http:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/2013\/04\/25\/difference-between-sales-and-sales-operations\/\" target=\"_blank\">read my theory as to why here<\/a>) there can be no standard set of questions or metrics that\u00a0apply to all Sales Ops\u00a0teams.\u00a0\u00a0 Below I have compiled a starter list from which you can choose but I\u2019m also looking for your\u00a0input.\u00a0 How have you measured Sales Operations in your past?<\/p>\n<p>These questions\u00a0have been categorized by major area of Sales Ops responsibility.\u00a0 Some of these items are not easily translated into numeric output but I believe them to be critical questions that should help position your Sales Ops organization for a greater impact on the success of the company.<\/p>\n<p><b>Sales Enablement (beyond training)<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Balanced burden of policy requirements<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Validate Legal\/Finance policies are essential and not merely created to shift work to sales.<\/li>\n<li>Validate that the risk mitigation created by Legal &amp; Finance policies is appropriately balanced.<\/li>\n<li>Does Sales compliance with these policies materially impact bookings?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Balance of process complexity\n<ul>\n<li>How much time does Sales spend on low-value activities?<\/li>\n<li>Has the process been simplified as much as possible given the environment?<\/li>\n<li>How much has automation simplified\/accelerated Sales\u2019 role?<\/li>\n<li>Is each segment of each process or approval coupled with a valid business requirement?<\/li>\n<li>Are your processes more or less burdensome than your competitors?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><b>Analytics<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Relevance, accuracy and timeliness of pipeline and forecast reporting<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Is the data an accurate reflection of Sales\u2019 input?<\/li>\n<li>Is the report data focused for the audience?<\/li>\n<li>Are the Sales metrics actionable by the audience?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Accuracy and timeliness of sales activities reporting\n<ul>\n<li>Is the data source accurate?<\/li>\n<li>Are the reports produced in time to be relevant?<\/li>\n<li>Are the metrics actionable?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><b>Operations<\/b><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Quality, accuracy and timeliness of lead assignments after handoff from Marketing\n<ul>\n<li>Are the leads of the agreed quality?<\/li>\n<li>Are the leads fresh?<\/li>\n<li>Are the leads delivered to the right person?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Account firmographics data quality\n<ul>\n<li>Is the data complete and accurate?<\/li>\n<li>Does the data support how the account is assigned?<\/li>\n<li>Is the account hierarchy documented and match the coverage model?<\/li>\n<li>Can the data be refreshed from an external source?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Relevance, accuracy and currency of contact record quality\n<ul>\n<li>Is the contact data current and associated with the correct account?<\/li>\n<li>Is the contact role relevant to the sale?<\/li>\n<li>Can the data be refreshed from an external source?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><b>Sales Compensation Design \u2013 Some responsibility shared with Sales Management<\/b><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The Terms and Conditions address nearly all questions that arise about the plan\n<ul>\n<li>How many issues need to be clarified or escalated to management for resolution?<\/li>\n<li>Document is distributed on a timely basis<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Quota Letters (Exhibit As)\n<ul>\n<li>Are quota letters are accurate and distributed on a timely basis?<\/li>\n<li>Are quota letter delivered to new plan participants on a timely basis?<\/li>\n<li>How many quota letters had to be revised?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Accuracy and transparency of sales territories and account assignments\n<ul>\n<li>How many account or territory assignments require correction?<\/li>\n<li>How many assignments have to be escalated to management?<\/li>\n<li>How many complaints are there about imbalanced territories?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Clarity of account assignment rules (rules of engagement)\n<ul>\n<li>Are documented rules approved by management and published to Sales?<\/li>\n<li>Are the rules followed by Sales Ops?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Comp plan alignment with corporate goals\n<ul>\n<li>Chart $ vs. time for commission and the corporate goal (lines should be parallel)<\/li>\n<li>Above metric can be adjusted to apply to specific sales teams and plan components<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Accurate quota setting\n<ul>\n<li>Distribution should appear as a normal (\u201cbell\u201d) curve.<span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Calibri;\">\u00a0 <\/span>\n<ul>\n<li>Too many outliers or \u201cabnormal\u201d curve reflect inaccuracy.<span style=\"color: #000000; font-family: Calibri;\">\u00a0 <\/span><\/li>\n<li>Averages are a poor measure of this metric.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Were quotas set such that ~60% of participants achieve them (SaaS Industry = 61% per HBR in 2013)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Design changes during the plan period were released to the effected plan participants in the form of a revised quota letter in the first month of the revised period.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><b>Sales Compensation Execution \u2013 Some responsibility may be shared with Finance<\/b><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Credit for comp plan components determined accurately\n<ul>\n<li>How many revisions to the proposed bookings credit were required?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Commissions are calculated accurately\n<ul>\n<li>How many corrections for miscalculated commissions were required?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Credit and commission data clearly communicated to participants\n<ul>\n<li>How many questions are heard from plan participants?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Accuracy and timeliness of sales commission reporting\n<ul>\n<li>Is the commission accrual timely and within agreed accuracy expectations?<\/li>\n<li>Accuracy and timeliness of attainment reporting to Sales management<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Which of these are relevant to your organization and what worthwhile metrics have I not mentioned? \u00a0\u00a0As always I look forward to your insights!<\/p>\n<p>Cheers!<\/p>\n<p>Bob Bacon<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sales Operations teams typically\u00a0produce and\u00a0analyze dozens of metrics and KPIs related to the productivity of the sales team or qualitative measures regarding other aspects of Sales.\u00a0 Rarely\u00a0is qualitative and quantitative\u00a0analysis focused on measuring Sales Operations.\u00a0 We never take a selfie &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/archives\/847\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"no","footnotes":""},"categories":[23,4],"tags":[11,88,13,29,37,35,89,12],"class_list":["post-847","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sales_compensation","category-sales_ops","tag-commissions","tag-icm","tag-incentive-comp","tag-sales-compensation","tag-sales-operations","tag-sales-ops","tag-spm","tag-variable-comp"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/847","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=847"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/847\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":866,"href":"https:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/847\/revisions\/866"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=847"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=847"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bobbacon.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=847"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}