This document discusses using a Toyota Kata approach and PDCA cycles to continuously improve the sales process. It advocates focusing on understanding the customer's desired outcome or "job to be done" rather than prematurely pushing solutions. Marketing funnels and value stream mapping are criticized for being too linear and risking the wrong solution. Instead, knowledge building and learning from customers in small increments is recommended. Regular review and adjustment of the sales and marketing process is important to incorporate both long-term thinking and responsiveness to feedback in becoming customer-centric.

1. Sales Kata

2. In recent years, there has been a rise of popularity in Toyota Kata as demonstrated in the slide by Mike Rother.
Using the Improvement and the Coaching Kata gives us a form for continuous improvement to overcome the re-
sistance to change and to develop deliberate practice in the discipline of Lean and maybe even Sales.
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mrother/Homepage.html

3. Many visualize the marketing cycle through the use of funnel thinking. How it narrows down to the actual purchase of
the product. A linear approach to predict, plan, and proceed is a precarious way to advance. This approach prema-
turely foresees a solution for the customer without ever understanding their needs. As we work our way down the
funnel, it is just as likely evidence will mount that the proposed solution is wrong. However, we have so much invest-
ed we attempt to sway the course of action in our favor. Linear planning actually increases the risk for a customer to
engage in an inappropriate course of action.

4. People are busy looking at Marketing Funnels and Value Stream Mapping thinking it will make them more effective. It
has been said over and over again in the B2B world 57% of the selling cycle is over by the time we get invited. The
majority of our growth and revenue is coming after the sale, not before. But our marketing dollars and direction of
our sales efforts are at the top of the funnel. We talk about being adaptable or agile, but few of us know what that
means. We may talk about being customer-centric or customer focused. But for both of those to take place, we must
develop a sales and marketing planning system that incorporates a structure that values long-term type thinking
with a short term process of regular review and assessment that can be adjusted or changed.
We must recognize that sales is not about a transactional exchange of value at a moment of time, but part of an on-
going investment in customers as appreciating assets. Is there a reliable system that incorporates both long-term
type thinking with a short term process of regular review?

5. It is no longer about mapping and scripting. It is about knowledge building and learning. Instead of looking at creat-
ing marketing content in reaction to each of these stages I like to think of it as a way of creating and gaining
knowledge for the customer and myself.
Set the Target condition based on the Customer’s Job To Be Done. What the customer is trying to achieve. Most pur-
chase processes consist of 3 phases: defining a problem, identifying a solution and selecting a supplier. Anymore
there are numerous, I have heard over 5 people on average, are involved in most purchase decisions. Though they
may have agreed on problem, how they perceive the problem and solution is most likely different and with that said
deciding on a supplier may be even more unclear. Most of us focus on the wrong problem, which is choosing us, the
supplier, rather than aiming for the target condition or the job the customer needs done. We need to stop looking at
“solutions to customer problems or delighting customer experiences. They are important but the longer term, maybe
even a target condition we need to see customers as valued investments in who the customer wants to become…their
target condition.
Co-authors Liker and Meir of The Toyota Way Fieldbook created
the pyramid of the Supplier Partnering Hierarchy of Toyota that
consisted of these 7 steps.

6. The creation of knowledge is a fundamental agile concept and an integral part of the process. In Agile, you build in
incremental steps, delivering to the customer frequently and gaining customer insights along the way. This way you
can keep the good things and discard the unwanted. Small incremental batches of information often will facilitate in
getting quicker feedback from the customer and help us determine what is of value to them. As these areas are un-
covered and considered, our credibility also increases and often a stronger loyalty develops.
I encourage you to download the Improvement Kata Handbook from the Toyota Kata Website. You can start using
those tools right NOW. I warn you though, Lean, Kata is not a magic potion. They are not a prescription. They set the
ideal, however, you must understand your organization, the culture that exists and the culture that your customers
expect and are willing to derive value from. You have to make the process your own. I believe successful companies
that start down a Lean path are not Lean anymore, only the unsuccessful ones are. If you are successful at imple-
menting Lean, it is simply not Lean. It becomes yours.
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mrother/Homepage.html

7. Sales people return from an external world that has afforded them the opportunity to explore, converse, share ide-
as, and ask questions. They are often met upon their return to a restrictive internal world. Don’t go down this path.
It has failure written all over it. It is a prescription for cost savings not for growth. Making connections to what is
known and what needs to be learned is today’s sales funnel. It is just as important for sales and marketing to get
the message in as it is to get the message out.
We use PDCA to provide a flexible structure and create a team with shared responsibility and authority for a suc-
cessful outcome. The plan is in creating an effective way for teams to work, create, share and capture knowledge
during the sales cycle. It has been said that less than 20% of the knowledge within a company is captured. When
you consider that number and now consider that you are primarily dealing outside the company that percentage has
to be significantly lower. PDCA is an effective methodology that can be utilized to counter act this. It is first and
foremost a learning tool that emphasizes the creation, sharing and capturing of knowledge. It is also a people pro-
cess that emphasizes learning by doing and as a result focuses on making things happen.

8. If you can build a culture of PDCA, a culture of learning, growth becomes part of everyone’s job. It is
this aspect I believe that separates good companies from great companies.
Use Lean as your growth engine. Do something BIG!