Why you do this session / potential triggers
Coaching your reps on forecasting includes helping them to understand the ultimate value it brings to you running the team and to them since visibility on deals closing is key to their success.
You should be pushing your reps to achieve at least 80% accuracy, acknowledging that pipeline management is dynamic and you can’t always hit 100% (remember, even if their attainment is over what they forecasted, that still means it was an inaccurate forecast).
The root cause of forecasting issues is often one of two things:
- lack of clarity
- avoiding a sense of pressure when they forecast a deal
This is a great time to help a rep get control of their book of business, but don’t fall into the trap of sliding into a pipeline review.
What you need to prepare as a manager
If you’ve scheduled a forecasting coaching session with a rep, you should be reviewing their pipeline in advance so you can refer to their current level of accuracy and pull out some examples you can use to uncover and discuss the root cause.
For example, do you notice a lack of notes or updates or a jump from earlier stage opportunities straight to closed won? Are they struggling to provide you with a $number commit? When they do commit to a number, does their pipeline reflect it?
What the rep needs to prepare
The rep should come to the session prepared with examples they can use to explain where they are struggling for accuracy in their forecasting.
What you’ll cover
Here’s some guidance for each talking point in the notes template:
What triggered the need for this session
If you have details about their level of accuracy, you can note them here.
Recap why it’s important to forecast deals
Here’s where you discuss the impact of forecasting on reps, the team and the company. The rep should know the contribution they have to make.
Review examples
If you have examples of specific opportunities where you see issues, you can note them here for review.
Then, you can look at the total pipeline and be able to quantify a number and show which opportunities get a rep to a number.
Rep input: why they struggle to forecast
This is an opportunity for a rep to advise you on issues they are having around forecasting and visibility if you haven’t already addressed them.
How can the rep develop based on this?
To make the session valuable for the rep, there should be some action for them to take to make an improvement based on what they’ve learned. This section of the notes is a reminder to add those as actions so you can follow up later.
Some examples might be:
“Get clarity on timelines on deal XYZ and move stage”
“Review all pipeline and come up with a commit number by Friday of this week”
“Read book / blog post / article on how to forecast and come back with questions”
What next?
Remember to share the notes and actions once you’re done.
Based on how the session went, you might want to update the rep profile with an update or a change in their skills profile.