Company: The Brooks Group, Greensboro, NC
Company Description: Founded in 1977, The Brooks Group is an award-winning B2B sales training company focused on providing clients with practical, straightforward solutions to improve and maintain overall sales effectiveness. Our training systems provide street-smart, actionable strategies that help salespeople sell more effectively and sales managers coach and lead more successfully.
Nomination Category: New Product & Service Awards Categories
Nomination Sub Category: Customer Service or Sales Book of the Year
 Nomination Title: The Brooks Group - Sales Book of the Year
- Which will you submit for your nomination in this category, a video of up to five (5) minutes, explaining the features, functions, benefits, and results to date of the nominated product or service, OR written answers to the questions? (Choose one):
Written answers to the questions
- If you are submitting a video of up to five (5) minutes in length, provide the URL of the video here, OR attach it to your entry via the "Add Attachments, Videos, or Links to This Entry" link above, through which you may also upload a copy of your video. If you are submitting written answers to the questions for this category, provide them in the spaces below.
- Describe the features, functions, and benefits of the nominated product or service (up to 350 words):
Total 343 words used.
Agile & Resilient is the product of two years of research by the authors, Michelle Richardson and Russ Sharer of The Brooks Group. The book highlights key change drivers that have transformed how buyers and sellers interact, including 1) increased buyer sophistication, 2) digitization, 3) the need for transparency in the buyer/seller relationship, and 4) buyer avoidance of sellers. These change drivers took root in the late twenty-teens, as both the makeup of typical B2B sales forces and the technologies they used in daily selling began changing – and then accelerated during the COVID pandemic. How sales leaders and their organizations respond and adapt to these change drivers have important implications for their future success.
Certainly, there are core selling fundamentals that are critical to success and remain constant over time – skills such as consistent and intelligent prospecting, quality call preparation, asking good questions to uncover buyer motivations, and connecting the dots between what buyers need and want and the value of a supplier’s offering. However, the authors of Agile & Resilient maintain that the best sales organizations have expanded their selling fundamentals to include intentional sales cultures, team alignment, understanding of buyer journeys, the ability to convey value amid aggressive cost competition, and useful KPIs/metrics to stay ahead of the competition.
These changes have given rise to what the authors call the Hybrid Seller; the salesperson who recognizes the importance of joining buyers on their decision timeframes and journey and understands how to use a combination of virtual and in-person selling tools to get results for their customers and for themselves. In addition, these changes impact how sales leaders build agile, resilient sales teams, and how they measure, compensate, and coach performance in a post-pandemic sales landscape.
The book is a compilation of research conducted by The Brooks Group’s Sales Performance Research Center, third-party data, and the authors’ experience working with business-to-business organizations across a variety of industries. Each chapter includes a link to free downloadable tools to assist the reader in implementing the principles and tactics covered in the book.
- Reference any attachments of supporting materials throughout this nomination and how they provide evidence of the claims you have made in this nomination (up to 250 words):
Total 168 words used.
We have provided a link to the electronic version of the book, and to the online toolkit with free downloadable tools. Please see below for a link to a webinar supporting the book’s release.
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- 2022 or 2020 Part Two: What Agile and Resilient Organizations Are Doing Today (webinar supporting the book): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYYNQHSzgZI
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- If you are nominating a brand-new product or service, state the date on which it was released. If you are nominating a new version of an existing product or service, state the date on which the update was released:
The Brooks Group released Agile & Resilient: Sales Leadership for the New Normal on Februrary 22, 2022. Backed by two years of research, the book offers perspective on 6 trends accelerated by the pandemic and shaping the future of sales organizations, with implications for sales leaders and their teams.
- Outline the market performance, critical reception, and customer satisfaction with the product or service to date. State monetary or unit sales figures to date, if possible, and how they compare to expectations or past performance. Provide links to laudatory product or service reviews. Include some customer testimonials, if applicable (up to 350 words):
Total 224 words used.
Reader reception to the book has been very positive, and customer feedback has indicated that the content is both timely and relevant to a current sales environment, characterized by sluggish supply chains, inflationary price increases, global conflict, and a tight labor market.
One CEO noted, “As a current CEO and former career sales leader, I would strongly recommend this book be made a compulsory read for everyone in the commercial organization.” (Steve Snedegar, GMT Corporation). Additional reader testimonials may be found on our website: https://brooksgroup.com/agile-resilient-sales-leadership/
In addition, articles based on the book were picked up by several outlets, including Modern Professional, MarTech, and Modern Marketing Today. Topics included “How to Sell When the Supply Chain is Broken,” “5 Tips for Talking to Customers About Price Increases,” and “Meet the CXO: How to Sell to the New Make-or-Break Buyer.” Links to these publications may be found below. The book has been incorporated into The Brooks Group’s Sales Leadership Accelerator, a training program for business-to-business sales managers and leaders, and a workshop series based on the book was also developed.
[REDACTED FOR PUBLICATION] The book has been purchased by readers globally, in North America, South America, and Europe.
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