WIM's
Lesson TranscriptRead along · cleaned and formatted for clarity
The Problem with Group-Only Sales Meetings
Hey, it's Jody from Sandler Keystone. In today's video, we're going to talk about the Weekly Individual Meeting — the WIM. Historically, sales teams have had group meetings. A sales manager will cover topics in a group meeting that are appropriate to the group — maybe new product introductions, pricing, market conditions, that sort of thing. Those were good meetings for covering topics that apply to everybody, but there wasn't a format built into the sales management structure where you could have a one-on-one with a salesperson on a regular basis to cover things appropriate just to that individual.
Without that one-on-one meeting format, coaching and accountability didn't happen at the individual level the way it needed to. If you're in a group meeting with the sales team and one person is having an issue with closing, another isn't prospecting, and another is dealing with call reluctance, it's really hard to coach individuals in that group setting. Individuals don't get the attention or the coaching they need. And if we're going to be effective at managing our teams, we have to grow our people.
Why the WIM Was Designed
One of the reasons I designed the WIM as a structure for sales management is that I found the accountability around early-indicating sales behaviors — cookbook management, number of attempts, number of contacts — was not being tracked and discussed. People weren't being held accountable because there was no individual one-on-one meeting. So the structure of the WIM originally started with the primary focus being accountability to cookbooks.
This is the place we're going to talk about the last week. What did you do? What goals did you hit? What goals did you not hit? Let's regroup and go another week. After we cover the accountability piece, we may talk about a pipeline issue or a specific account, but the primary focus of the WIM is accountability to cookbook behaviors.
I was talking to a business leader recently who has veteran salespeople and veteran sales managers, and there is still a gap around that regular cadence of: timeout — what behaviors did you do last week that are going to lead to results in six months, nine months, a year? Those early cookbook indicator measurements — the WIM is the place we talk about them, track them, discuss them, and fine-tune them.
Making Time for the WIM
Some managers will share with me that they're really busy and finding time for individual meetings with all their sellers is a challenge. I get it — it's not like most managers have an open calendar. But think about it: what's more important as a sales manager than having a regular one-on-one meeting where you can talk about the back-to-basics behaviors, actions, and activities, and then do individual coaching based on what you find? When people tell me they don't have time for that meeting, I challenge them and say, "What's more important in your week than having a one-on-one with your seller to help them grow?"
One of the challenges managers face after they start doing WIMs is that over time the meetings can morph into something the WIM wasn't designed to be. It starts with accountability for a few weeks, maybe a couple of months, and then it gradually turns into more of a "tell me how your week was" — a rambling discussion about everything except the behaviors and actions, which is really why we're having the conversation. Many times a salesperson will try to hijack the meeting. They'll come in and say, "I know we're going to talk about cookbook today, but I had this one deal I want to run by you." Then that 30- or 45-minute WIM turns into a discussion on that one account, and we never get to the part the meeting was actually designed for — which is: timeout, where are your behaviors for the week, are you on track or off track, what are you going to do differently, how are you going to course correct?
So one of the things you have to watch for is this: are you starting with accountability for the first portion of the meeting? If you get through it in 15 minutes and have time for pipeline, that's fine — but don't start with pipeline. Don't start with deal coaching. Don't start with a specific account issue. In the WIM, we start with behavior tracking and looking at cookbook.
Structuring the WIM with Upfront Contracts
A common structure for a WIM is 30 to 45 minutes. Classic Sandler would say start with an upfront contract — and we do. Each week we start by saying something like, "We have 30 minutes. Let's not forget the reason we're here is to go through cookbooks, see how your week was, talk about any changes to the cookbook, and agree on what we're going to do going forward. That's our primary focus. If we have time, we can also talk about pipeline review, but primarily today we're talking about cookbooks." A brief upfront contract like that is what I'd recommend as a way to start the meeting.
Then we run the meeting. And in classic Sandler fashion, we end the WIM with an upfront contract as well — the bookend. We close by agreeing: we talked about this, are we on the same page as to expectations? Is there any confusion about what's expected in the next week, or are we aligned? When you view the upfront contract as bookends — starting and ending the meeting with one — that's a really solid way to structure the WIM.
Of course, I'm referencing cookbook a lot in this video because it's a key component of the WIM. If you need a refresher on cookbooks, you can watch the full video I did on the concept, how to structure one, and what its purpose is. As a reminder though, a cookbook is those key actions and behaviors that a salesperson does on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis that lead to success. The cookbook represents the leading indicators that ultimately lead to the lagging indicator — the sale and the revenue. An example of a leading indicator would be dials, cold calls, attempts, LinkedIn outreach, sending a Vidyard video, or sending an email — some kind of proactive, prospecting-oriented attempt.
Another benefit of the WIM is that having one-on-one time scheduled in your calendar with a salesperson sends them a message: this is important. This is your time. This is our one-on-one time outside of the chaos of the typical week, and it signals to them that this is not an appointment we pull off the calendar. This may be your most important meeting with me in the entire week. What also happens is that salespeople come prepared when WIMs are part of the culture. It's not an on-the-fly conversation, not a random catch-up in a hallway or a car. The WIM is meant to be a focused meeting where we very specifically look at the behaviors and actions you committed to in the last week, see where you're at, make adjustments, and do whatever coaching I can provide to you as your manager.