Consult Carson 7/4: “I’m being pressured to write up and fire my team. What do I do?”

From today’s mailbag: “I’m getting pressure from senior leadership to write up and fire people on my team with whom I still believe in, want to work with and disagree that it’s the right course of action. How should I handle this?”

Carson: Like the mantra of city officials, you are paid to serve and protect your team.  When it all comes down to it, you should know what’s best for them – what course of action will result in their success, what they need to modify in their process to be more successful and ultimately if you have given them one chance too many.

Sometimes, that last one is a little tricky; sometimes, we give people too many chances.  However, we are working with people’s livelihoods.  I’ve heard it said that it’s business and not personal, but when you have control over someone’s quality of life, their ability to put food in their families’ mouths and their careers, there’s nothing more personal.

From time to time, senior leadership can lose touch with the front lines.  It is very important that you are at the pulse of your team.  It’s my philosophy that if someone earns the right to be in any position in an organization, they have the right to make many of their own choices in how they will carry out the necessary processes to fulfill their assigned tasks.  By this, I mean that until or unless you or your team is not getting the job done, there should be a degree of latitude they are allowed to do their job.  If they are failing, it is up to you to make a plan with them and ensure it is executed.  If they continue to choose to make the wrong decisions regarding those plans you have come up with, by all means, it is time to let them loose to be free to find their real destiny because this clearly isn’t it.

That said, because sometimes senior leadership can be out of touch, they can make blanket rules and regulations and guidelines to govern all.  While this may be necessary to help folks who need the guidance – the equivalent of the bumper lanes in bowling – some people do not.  You cannot make all rules to govern all.  It just doesn’t work.

And some people in senior leadership roles in organizations never did the jobs they govern or they have forgotten when they did.  We’ve got to have massive respect for those on the front lines, because they do the selling, the administrative work, the backbone of our business.  It’s why we must make decisions with their input in mind and we have to take into consideration how anything we do will impact them and our business.

If you are getting pressure to write up your team or fire your team members and you feel they are undeserving, you go to bat for them.  You ask clarifying questions about the process.  You make sure your team knows that you have their backs and that you are supporting them.

However, at the end of the day, the company also pays you to carry out their mission statement, their way of business and their process.  It’s important you don’t forget that.

You can certainly respectfully ask for clarification around the thought process of writing up your team or firing them; you can make a case for why someone should not warrant that type of treatment.  However, when you are instructed to do something, you are being paid to carry out those orders.  Don’t forget that.

We are all varying degrees of important cogs in the wheel of business; while we can certainly have a high level of impact, we must also choose our battles.  Everyone – people above and below us on the sales food chain – makes choices.  Your defense of your team may be aesthetically appreciated and it may boost morale.  But you cannot make a difference in the grand scheme if you don’t play the game and you are always butting heads with those ahead of you on the corporate ladder.

Receive the message, ask for clarification of process, make any kind of case you plan to make (the problem you see with the course of action followed by a solution that will provide necessary results along with your commitment to get the team member where they need to be on an agreed-upon timeline) and accept the judgment of your superior at that point.  You won’t win every battle, but you’ll gain the respect of your team for standing up for them and by being gracious and working with your manager and not against them, you will also likely gain their respect and trust when you successfully carry out your plan.

Sometimes, these gambles you make for your team will fail, and sometimes they will succeed.  It will be just as much of a learning experience in this experiment of human behavior in the laboratory of your business.

Win, lose or draw, you did what you felt was right by your team, you supported them, you followed the direction from your manager, and you did your job.  Stand proud.

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Carson V. Heady posts for “Consult Carson” serving as the “Dear Abby” of sales and sales leadership.  You may post any question that puzzles you regarding sales and sales leadership careers: interviewing, the sales process, advancing and achieving.  You will also be directly contributing to his third book, “A Salesman Forever.”

Question submissions can be made via LinkedIn to Carson V. Heady, this Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Carson-V-Heady/125078150858064?ref=hl , Twitter via @cvheady007 or e-mail at cvheady007@yahoo.com or you may post an anonymous comment as a reply to my WordPress blog at the bottom of this page: https://carsonvheady.wordpress.com/the-home-of-birth-of-a-salesman-2010-published-by-world-audience-inc-and-the-salesman-against-the-world-2014/

Carson V. Heady has written a book entitled “Birth of a Salesman” that has a unique spin that shows you proven sales principles designed to birth in you the top producer you were born to be.

If you would like to strengthen your sales skills, go to http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00ICRVMI2/ref=cm_sw_r_tw_dp_yGXKtb0G28TWF