The Challenger Sale

LESSONS FOR ALL SENIOR LEADERS
Tolerate (Limited) Rejection of the Model
One of the questions we get frequently is about high performers who aren’t
Challengers. Should organizations force reps who beat quota—but are more
naturally disposed to a different, non-Challenger selling approach—to

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change how they engage with customers? Our answer is no, you shouldn’t,
but there are some important caveats here.
One of the lessons we’ve learned about any type of change in the sales
organization is that companies shouldn’t shoot for 100 percent adoption.
We’ve found that the best companies shoot for 80 percent adoption of any
change—whether a new skill, tool, process, or system. The final 20 percent
is always hugely painful to attain. Exemplars shoot for 80 percent and let
the rest of the organization come along at their own pace, provided these
reps are beating goal (and not being detrimental to the broader
transformation effort).
The same rule applies for driving the Challenger approach among sales
reps. Some reps will simply buck the journey and point to their performance
as evidence that they don’t need to change. This is fine, but only as long as
they continue to beat goal. The way we think about it is this: When a new
standard for sales excellence has been defined by the organization (in this
case, the Challenger Selling Model), those who refuse to make the journey
are effectively the new Lone Wolves. And as we discussed earlier in this
book, the rule of thumb for managing a Lone Wolf is “live by the sword, die
by the sword.” The minute their performance slips, they need to adopt the
new approach or relinquish their seat in the organization to somebody else
who will.
High performers share a common code—they are always eager to
understand how they can improve their own performance. Therefore, they
are usually the 
first
reps to want to try something new. Think of these reps
as your elite athletes. Athletic high performers are always looking for that
extra edge. If there is a new technology that helps, they adopt it. If there’s a
new training approach they believe in, they incorporate it. If there is a new
skill that’s been shown to yield better results, they want it. High-performing
salespeople are no different. They are the ones who will read up on sales
(many of them have probably beaten you to the punch in reading this book).
They are always on the lookout for messaging, tools, and ways to position
deals that have been tried successfully by their peers.
But like elite athletes, high-performing reps are highly discriminating. If
they don’t see value in a new approach, they will reject it. Therefore, if
companies can identify their high-performer Challengers (as well as high-

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performer managers who exhibit Challenger skills) and turn them into
champions early on, the rest of the organization is likely to follow.
Right now, the Challenger Selling Model is a novel approach, but soon
it will become the standard. Those who refuse to adopt it will find it
increasingly difficult to engage with customers when those very customers
are being engaged by reps from other companies who 
are
employing
Challenger methods. The state of the art moves and evolves. Advantages
accrue to the early adopters, to be sure, but eventually adoption isn’t an
option anymore; it’s a requirement.
For sales leaders struggling with that “final 20 percent” who refuse to
make the journey now, it’s really just a matter of time. If these reps are
beating quota, let them sell their way. But they’ll find that overperformance
harder to attain year after year, will get frustrated as others in the
organization displace them on the President’s Club rankings, and they’ll
give the new methods a shot too.