Far be it for us to draw a relationship between a clogged sink drain and a stopped up sales pipeline, but humor us for a minute.

As a leader in your firm (a.k.a. “The Plumber”), one of your roles is managing the sales pipeline which is most likely an Excel spreadsheet or a report detailing prospect  meetings, potential business and targeted prospects that you sincerely believe need your firm’s services.  And, because you are a thoughtful leader responsible for the firm’s P&L, you bring all the associates, managers and whoever is responsible for building business together to review the pipeline report on a frequent/infrequent schedule.  The Plumber (you) begins the round robin exercise of going around the room, inquisitively asking each person “So, what did you do this week? Any  meetings? Any closed business?”  If you’re lucky, one or two associates will chime in with the results from a conversation where they uncovered a pain point or two with a prospect.  The remaining group, normally with eyes cast downward on the conference table, will confess they were too busy with billable projects/client crisis/couldn’t get prospect on the phone/dog ate my homework……you get the idea.

 The pipeline is clogged.

So how do you unstop a clogged pipeline?   Take a lesson from a plumber.   

UNSTOPPING CLOGGED SINK DRAINS
• If the drain is sluggish but not completely clogged, turn on the hot water tap for 5 to 10 minutes. This sometimes opens the drain.  Are you setting expectations for managing the pipeline? Do you have an easy to use tool for associates to enter details from their conversations? It doesn’t have to be fancy, just be sure to include next steps, rank the prospect by closure priority and potential revenue. Does your compensation system reward rainmakers who bring in new business or is it a deterrent?

• If running hot water does not open the sluggish drain, try an environmentally safe chemical drain opener.  Some associates need coaching. What barriers are they running into? How do they respond to a prospect who doesn’t want to meet? How are they gaining knowledge about a prospect before they meet? Checking LinkedIn pages? Who else knows the prospect?  Remember, this is about building relationships which takes time.

• After using any chemical cleaner, flush it from the drain pipes by allowing hot water to run for at least 10 minutes. Hold your associates accountable. Peer pressure is a wonderful thing but get to the root cause of why an associate is having trouble. Not everyone is cut out to be a plumber. urxs2n6qv9