6 Steps how to make KPIs really work

©GunnarSchröder2016
by Gunnar Schröder
Accelerate your
Sales Performance
To make
KPIs really work
6 Steps

©GunnarSchröder2016©GunnarSchröder2016
6 Steps
to make KPIs really work
There are probably just a few out there
who do not use KPIs in the one or the
other fashion, but what I found is that
many companies do not use
KPIs to their full potential due to
some fundamental design mistakes.
This presentation will give you
practical tips how to design KPIs
and manage them in a fashion to
really drive your organization
to excellence.
Gunnar Schröder, April 2016
Accelerate Your
Sales Performance

Content
6 steps to make KPIs really work
Step 1 - Stop
the misperception of KPIs
Step 2 - Think
before you measure
Step 3 - Make
your team owning the KPIs
Step 4 - Communicate
it right
Step 5 - Work
on the root causes. No cosmetics !
Step 6 - Bin
KPIs which do not proof any value
Accelerate Your
Sales Performance

Step 1
Stop the misperception of KPIs.

StopthemisperceptionofKPIs.
KPIs in many companies are reduced
to tools to find out that something
does not went as expected after it is
already too late or to compensate
the lack of trust between superiors
and employees.
Both is not really helpful to drive a
company to excellence
©GunnarSchöder2016

©GunnarSchröder2016©GunnarSchöder2016
StopthemisperceptionofKPIs.
You should measure KPIs for no other
reason then to identify potentials
for improvement and to
understand your progress to improve
something.
KPIs do help both the sales
executives as well as account
managers to strive for excellence.
KPIs are much more about quality
than about quantities.

Step 2
Think before you measure.
?

Thinkbeforeyoumeasure.
There are more then 100 KPIs for
monitoring and steering a sales
organization. Exactly here starts the
problem of many well thought KPI
matrixes.
Don’t start with more than 7
and really manage them well in all
aspects. This is by far better than to
have some dozens in a nice chart that
no one is really managing.
?

You should know what you
want to do with the result
before you measure.
Don’t collect just data because you
can. Really think carefully what is
the problem/issue you want to
solve, where in the sales process
it might occur.
It helps if you write down :
o I want to improve …
o I want to increase …
o I want to reduce …
?

Then think about what factors are
influencing your “wants” and which
data would help you to identify
potentials to make them happen.
Tip
Please do not create any sentence
with “I want to know”. Knowledge is
nice but if you don’t have a clear
target what you want to achieve with
it, it is pretty useless and will just
make it difficult for you to make other
people enthusiastic about your KPIs.
?

Focus on quality rather than on
quantities
Number of leads is a nice metrics
but practically as a KPI not very
useful because it does not say much
about PERFORMANCE…
… more useful is the
lead/opportunity conversion
rate which gives you information on
lead quality but also indications about
the efficiency of the lead follow up.
KPIs should indicate potential items for
performance improvements which
really give a benefit to company
and customers.
?

KPIs should be easy to
get/measure
If you are convinced a certain KPI is
really important, but you currently
have no way to get it easily – work
first on making it easy/efficient
to get.
I would not recommend loading a
bunch of administrative task to sales
people in order to get KPI numbers.
This will not only raise the
frustration level at your team and
decrease productivity but also will
make the numbers very unreliable.
?

get/measure
All state of the art CRM systems do
support efficient KPI collection. It
might be some effort to establish
them in the first instance but the
effort you make at the start will pay
back a 100 times later on. ?

understand
Make sure you are not creating very
complex mathematical KPIs which will
raise more questions about its
constitution than leading you to
anywhere.
A simple ratio of 2 measures is
very useful but I would not
recommend to make it much more
complex.
?

benchmark
Also Make sure that you establish
clear rules on which level of the
organization you think bench
marking KPIs makes sense.
On local level usually there are not
many limits for benchmarking.
However if you have a larger
international organization please think
carefully which KPIs you can really
benchmark between countries or even
continents and stay straight to
your established rules.
?

Step 3
Make your team
owning the KPIs.

MakeyourteamowningtheKPIs.
If you are sure about what you want, it
is very helpful to involve your
team in the process to derive factors
of influence, potential KPIs and even
activities which support your goals.
My favorite method is to run
workshops with a limited number
of ambassadors that have the right
standing in your organization.
You are the sponsor of the KPIs but
your team must embrace and own
them.
Please refer to annex 1 for KPI
examples

Step 4
Communicate it right.

©GunnarSchröder2016©GunnarSchöder2016
Communicateitright.
It is fundamental that you launch your
KPIs with the full story to make
everybody aware that what you are
doing is different.
Kill the misperception with a good
communication
Communicate ...
o What you want to achieve
o Why your KPIs will help you to
achieve what you want to achieve
o How you measure /collect them
o How you analyze/bench mark them
o When you expect first results

Rule 5
Work on the root causes.
No cosmetics !

Workontherootcauses.Nocosmetics!
It is common that KPIs are collected
very much at the end of the sales
cycle. But if something went too far off
target it is the most difficult point
to countermeasure.
If you have followed already the above
steps you should be well off not to fall
into this trap and have established
KPIs which really help you to make
changes to the root causes.

Workontherootcauses.Nocosmetics!
However there are always many
possibilities how to improve a
situation. Make sure you that you are
not just looking for easy short term
measures but that you change
something fundamentally to
avoid the same issue in the future and
to really drive your organization
to excellence.
For example: Generating more leads is
always nice to create more
opportunities and more sales. However
rather try to improve the quality
in each step than the quantity.

Step 6
Bin KPIs which do
Not proof any value.

BinKPIswhichdonotproofanyvalue.
Review every year your list of
KPIs. If KPIs have not helped you in
any way to improve something,
eliminate them from your list or
redesign them.
Also do not hesitate to add KPIs. if
you have new ideas what you want to
improve to drive your organization to
excellence.
Start again from step 1

Hope You got
some Inspiration
Need More ?
Information, Consultancy, Seminars.
Please contact me at:
Gunnar Schröder
+41 76 748 34 93
Gunnar.Schroeder@bluewin.ch

Most of the following listed KPIs are just
base parameters. To make them a KPI you
have to relate them to something in order
to make them specific to the goals you
want to achieve.
Contact
o Number of visits
o Number of sales related visits
o Number of new contacts
o Customer facing time
o Response time for lead follow up
o Travelled distance
Opportunity
o Number of opportunities
o Value of opportunities (rated/unrated)
o Average opportunity value
o Conversion rate opportunities to sales
o Conversion rate leads to opportunities
o Number of won opportunities
Demonstration
o Number of demonstrations
o Number of workshops
o Number of demonstrations/success ratio
Quotation
o Number of quotes
o Tender response time
After Sales
o Equipment acceptance time
o Installation time
Customer Satisfaction
o Rating based on structured customer
satisfaction survey
o Net promoter score
Annex 1
KPI Examples

6 Steps how to make KPIs really work

Recommended

Recommended

More Related Content

Recently uploaded

Recently uploaded (6)

Featured

Featured (20)

6 Steps how to make KPIs really work