Attraction and retention of talent is one of, if not the biggest, single issue facing organisations today.
This is not a new issue, but it has been made worse by the shifts in the workplace since Covid, which has seen many talented people review what is important to them and either drop off the workplace altogether or change careers. The net impact is that we have less talent. Experience is walking out of the door mainly because the work environments presented to them are no longer seen as valuable.
Considering that according to McKinsey and Company, the cost to replace a Seller is at least 5x the quota of the Seller that left, we are looking at a serious and significant problem.
Just think about what that really means. If someone leaves with a $200k target, it will cost you $1m to replace. Ouch.
With some investment and focus, however, we can change this. We can make our Seller's environments attractive again - but this can't be just done by money anymore.
Gone are the days when throwing money at Sellers would get them to overlook poor, toxic, and damaging working practices. We can see this not just from the impact of the pandemic, where Sellers are choosing to give up well paid roles for a career that isn’t so toxic, but also because the next generation is not motivated by the money anymore. They are motivated by their values.
And these values are very different than the current generation, with common values that include a desire for:
Did you notice that money was missing from this list? Let’s look at the research against each of these values:
The next generation wants a different workplace, and so, if we fail to adapt, not only are we going to (and have) lose talent, but we are also going to struggle to recruit new talent as the brightest stars will migrate to workplaces that are more in line with their values.
I truly believe that dealing with Mental Fitness in Sales, along with flexible working, will become a competitive differentiator. Organisations that embrace it and put in programs specifically to help improve Seller mental fitness will not only attract and retain better talent, but the evidence also shows (as you will see later in the chapter) that they outperform other organisations in every metric.
So how do you know how mentally fit you are?
Well, there are plenty of tools that you can use to find this out, but here is a simple litmus test. If you have experienced or are experiencing any of the following, there is a chance there is work to do on your mental fitness.
My guess is that we have all experienced at least one of these. And that’s good news as it means we are all in the same boat. No stigma. We ALL have issues with our Mental Health from time to time and there is no shame in admitting it.
When we realise others are in the same boat, we can start to use our empathy to change the workplace and to create high trust which in turn, creates high performance.