Like many people who work as sales representatives, I moved upwards in my career and into a sales managerial role. Once I had got my break in a management position, I found it easier to gain higher profile jobs in different industries in similar sales capacities. A good sales manager knows what to measure when it comes to assesing the performance of their team members. Depending on which industry you are working in, the aspects of the job which should be measured do vary.

Many people tend to measure a team members performance in two main categories. These categories are essentially divided into primary and secondary ones. To begin with the secondary markers are the more wider areas and measure the activities that a member of the team carries out. For example these activities are likely to include things such as the amount of phone calls made or the amount of visits made. Then the primary measures would be the outcome of the activities, such as the amount of sales made and even the amount of money that was made because of them.

Many people in managerial roles tend to follow the old approach of believing that if anything is measured it can be approved. This to many extents is true and there is good justification for it being the case. If you make it clear that you will be measuring an aspect of a sales person's work, they will believe that it is an important factor of the role. In addition to this, it will also provide an area of feedback which can help the person improve in future. These measurements can help an individual compete or aim to improve upon the performances of their fellow team members.

The difference between a good sales manager and one that is not so good tends to be how they can keep their team members focused on what is important when measuring how they are doing. In any sales role, the primary target is to make sales and this should not alter, regardless of where you work. However if secondary targets are pushed too heavily, it can result in a decline in sales as the team members are likely to resort to spending far too much time with people that are unlikely to make purchases. Sales figures will drop in this case and it will be your fault!