Feed Your Eagles

Derek Newton’s book Feed Your Eagles, about how to create a high-performing sales team, had a profound effect on my thinking many years ago.  

Having been trained as a coach and helper, my natural inclination was to “help” people who were struggling. Derek’s advice for businesses, and sales teams in particular, is to prioritize your limited time and money toward making sure your “eagles” (high performers) have what they need to take your business to the next level.

His argument is: instead of spending limited resources trying to turn a “D Player” (below average performer) into a “C Player” (average performer), or even a “C Player” into a “B Player (above average performer), spend those resources on helping an “A Player/Eagle” (top 10% performer) actualize their full potential and make your business much more successful.

For example, one of the best salespeople I ever heard of didn’t even work 40 hours a week. He played a few rounds of golf each week, and he closed many big deals on the golf course.

He outsold everyone else in the sales team by a wide margin while the other salespeople complained that he wasn’t in the office more often. My thinking is that the money invested in a country club membership for this guy had an incredibly high ROI, and that maybe the other members of the team would benefit from golf lessons.

Lastly, if you often find yourself having to choose between feeding your “eagles” and rehabilitating your “turkeys”, you probably need to analyze your hiring practices to make sure you’re adding folks to your team who have “A Player/Eagle” potential to begin with.

Feed your eagles and watch them soar!

Don’t be a stranger. (770) 993-1129. tdockery@TheResolveFirm.com