SECURING THE RIGHT TRAINING OPPORTUNITIES FOR SALES STAFF
of Primo Solutions, which offers mystery shopping and sales training for senior liv- ing providers. “The number one reason is because we do not build rapport with the prospect. It is impossible to get to the emo- tional level and truly understand the needs of our prospects unless we build rapport with them first,” he said. “We have to gain the prospect’s trust and they have to know we genuinely care before they will ever be- come vulnerable enough to share their true emotions. Gathering valuable, relevant, and actionable data from humans about their experiences is a tough task. Each person comes into a situation with differing expec- tations, past experiences, needs, and wants.” Karon Porter, associate vice president of
sales for The LaSalle Group, a memory care provider, agreed. “I believe there are differ- ent questions you ask when the buyer is not the end user,” she acknowledged. However, “sales is still sales that requires empathy, consistency, and answering the customer’s problem at hand.” The bottom line, said Urbaczewski, is that “facts don’t persuade, feelings do. We train on seven powerful elements of storytelling to gain a better emotional understanding of prospective residents and what’s important to them as they contemplate making a ma- jor life change.”
Homegrown training and development At Mather LifeWays, training is focused on leadership and communication, “not just on how to handle an objection,” said Morgan. The company holds a three-day retreat once a year where topics like demographics and psychographics are discussed. The training is homegrown and home-delivered. Well before the retreat is planned, Morgan asks sales directors to share with her their biggest challenges. The retreat content is built around those issues and delivered by Mather Life- Ways associates in a highly interactive format.
Mather LifeWays sales professionals at their annual sales training. In 2015, Mather developed a program
called Ways to Lead Well that trains strong department managers to ensure the com- pany has more bench strength for senior management positions. Two years later, the company added the Ways to Manage Well program, focused on improving day to day management skills. Again, the training and development programs were created by the company and are delivered by the company. Morgan said she often looks outside the se- nior living business for content and ideas. “We are big benchmarkers,” she said. “We look to other industries.” Senior Lifestyle has also developed an in- house program. The company revised and relaunched its sales and marketing training
this year under the leadership of Cindy Ames, corporate director of sales and mar- keting. Ames built an interactive program that has resonated with new hires, said Ja- nine White, national director of sales. “We always had sales and marketing training, but we wanted to come forward with something our new hires had not seen or experienced before, and that has been accomplished.” The in-person training is hosted every
month. “We learned longevity is impor- tant,” White added. “We want our learn- ers to be fully supported while they take the concepts from training and turn them into habit. That’s where the success is.” The results have been significant. Com- munities have experienced a more than 60
“We talk less about body language and more on how you craft an email response,” said Gale Morgan, senior vice president of sales at Mather LifeWays. “We used to talk about eye contact and mirroring. Now it’s about speed and electronic conversations. We’ve had customers say, ‘Just contact me via text,’ and that’s for a $1 million move-in.”
16 SENIOR LIVING EXECUTIVE MARCH/APRIL 2018
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