Honey, I shrunk the inside sales organzation

I could never imagine myself working in certain jobs- like working as a toll-booth attendant on the Golden Gate Bridge or a Bob Cat driver digging up swimming pools in Beverly Hills or as a social worker in the Bayview dealing with juvenile delinquents.  So when I had dinner last night with two inside sales director buddies of mine and they brought me up to speed on what they’ve had to manage for the past 6 months, I had to add being an Inside Sales Director to my list of undesirable jobs.

Imagine having a vibrant and thriving inside sales organization of  500 people. An organization you’ve grown from zero for the past few years, you hired the right talent, fought the tough battles with the field and the channel, went down in history by generating some of the most prestigious leads and consistently sent your top performers to  President’s Club. Your inside sales organization hummed, it worked and everyone wanted your team to sell their products and manage their accounts.

Then the economy hit and it was time to downsize- you started with the budget freeze and then continued with the 18% cut, then the 32% cut and another 27%.  Now there are rumors and requests to prepare your Plan B as you anticipate another round- but what goes up are quotas and revenue goals through all of this. Your skeleton team’s morale has taken a beating but they are too scared to complain- they just show up and try their best but it’s not good enough because your small team isn’t making their high numbers.

Now you tiny inside sales organization is now under scruntiny as it’s viability and visibility are in question- will it grow or continue to shrink more?  This discussion topic struck a chord in our popular webinar last week on our channel as we discussion the difference between good or bad downsizing and which departments are the first to get kicked off the island. Will it shrink more?  No one really knows if we have hit rock bottom, even the housing market predicts it has further to fall before it bottoms out. Shrinking an inside sales organization isn’t just about reducing headcount and expenses, it’s about shinking consciousness of it’s capabilities.