Building A Sales Culture At Every Level

In the fall of 2008, COO of FirstBank Wib Evans entered into discussions with Coach Micheal Burt about taking on one of the largest retail initiatives in FirstBank history, the opening of 10,000 new checking accounts across the 40 plus city bank. With 2.2 billion in assets, FirstBank has quickly risen to one of the top banking institutions in Tennessee. With big bank capabilities and a small bank atmosphere, FirstBank is the largest independently owned bank in Tennessee. Chairman Jim Ayers is rated as one of the most influential people in Tennessee and has devoted his life to becoming an Entrepreneur who is serious about business and serious about giving back through the Jim Ayers Foundation.

With the vision of Wib Evans, he believed FirstBank needed a coach to help drive the process, implant systems to win, motivate and inspire the associates, and instill a laser-like focus to achieve 10,000 new accounts.

The person they turned to was Championship Coach and Leadership Expert Micheal Burt. In October of 2008, Coach Burt began sowing the seed for what was to come in 2009 with a 40 plus city tour through the branches and trainings of the leadership teams from across the state. Coach Burt worked with top leaders to install his Rock N' Roll Management concept where he encourages associates to become RockStars in their industry by becoming the best at what they do. With new incentive systems and rewards for performance, through statewide motivational trainings coupled with a scoreboard that measures weekly performance of every branch, FirstBank associates officially hit the seemingly achievable number of 10,000 new accounts for 2009.

Coach Burt sat down and discussed this feat during an Annual Winter Retreat, reflecting on the overall journey with FirstBank and the partnership they continue to have.

Q: How did you get introduced and started with FirstBank?

A: I was asked in the spring of 2008 to speak to all FirstBank associates at a company wide meeting in Tennessee for 20 minutes about building a culture that wins. After that meeting came a number a number of engagements where I spoke to top leaders of FirstBank, including COO Wib Evans. We then discussed how to drive a mission of opening 10,000 checking accounts in 2009.

Q: Initially, what type of reception did you receive from upper-management?

A: There was an overall enthusiasm. People were excited about driving such an increase but anytime you bring someone in from the outside it's a question of what this person can do for change and obviously in any corporate setting people resist change. I had to alleviate that by showing direct correlation of the affect on them and the overall company.

Q: What were the main concerns FirstBank expressed to you?

A: The main concern was how we drive 500 people in 45 cities around the same initiative. The logistics of the systems, intensity, and accountability is a challenge. We took a culture that wasn't accustomed to selling and turned it into a sales culture and the dominant daily focus increased intensity and pressure to produce and change behavior. The new results were a result of new behaviors. I was asking for something that had never been done before at FirstBank.

Q: Tell us about the methodology you used to drive this initiative.

A: The methodology we used to achieve this is right out of the playbook of my fourth book, The Anatomy of Winning focusing on the dream, a dominant focus, and aspirations; harnessed by leaders at top local and bank levels through the concept of Rock N' Roll Management and creating a scoreboard. We created daily high value activities and built them around a blueprint that automated the systems. We experienced some adversity in July with our lowest numbers and in my book I talk about thunderbolts, a burst of energy through unexpected methodologies to wake people up and keep them focused. Remembering 'what got us here won't get us there'. We had to recreate and reinvent where we go from there. Humans are the only species that can do this, and leverage our past to bigger futures.

Q: What was the biggest concept you had to sell the employees on?

A: Driving a belief into them that we could hit 10,000 accounts although it's never been done was first, with disciplined, concentrated focus and effort. They had to come in and grind it out every week in retail sales. Everyday they had to ask what are we doing to get and keep customers.

Q: Describe the system you put into place and where the scoreboard concept fits into the equation.

A: My philosophy is people play harder when there's a scoreboard. We created a dominant theme of taking people and try to turn an everyday worker into a rockstar. This is a person at the pinnacle of their performance. To find out who is or isn't, we had to create a management system that set ideal numbers for performance indicators for every branch as a whole based on past market variables, future polls, and on percentage of community. We had them compete against their own numbers. We want everyone to know where everyone is at all times. This is done through transparency and a competitive environment tracking whether you are winning or losing and holding people accountable.

Anytime there's a measurement on daily activity, there's going to be apprehension with management but it's an accountability factor. The way you overcome that is by celebrating success when people who are winning and vise versa. Once we started celebrating the success and it went from being a threat to a challenge. It activated an internal competitive piece of people who wanted to win and be number one every week. We found out who the rockstars were and who produced like rockstars and then treated them like rockstars every month, quarter, and annually.

Q: Once you started working with the employees what issues did you face?

A: Getting everybody to understand we're going to a new level is the biggest challenge and the pushing is part of breaking through this ceiling to achieve something that's never been achieved before. Once everyone buys into it, then it becomes the fabric of the culture where people come in and get better every day. A page out of the athletic book.

Q: Talk about this "dream" number everyone thought was unattainable at first.

A: It represented a 43 percent increase in sales, an optimistic 'dream' number considering last year a little over 7,000 accounts were opened. Also, the retention of accounts increased drastically from 2009 with over half of them being retained, a number created by Wib Evans. Every person and banker I talked to said we could not hit that number and it was too drastic. It was a leap of faith but something I believed we could hit. It took a whole sell buy in from every person at FirstBank to drive this initiative.

Q: Once the results kept coming and you were ahead of pace what type of buzz was created?

A: There was general excitement. When standing in the corridor of your dream, which means it's close enough to see and attain, at that point you are within manifesting a dominant aspiration which is powerful. This gives meaning to your vision and purpose and dream, something we talked about daily and building into a winning culture and was the dominant focus.

Q: What type of relationship was built with COO Wib Evans throughout this whole journey?

A: I have an enormous amount of respect for Wib. He was a pioneer in hiring a coach to drive an initiative. This was his concept and he found me, took the leap of faith, and it paid off. He believed and affirmed my worth in the company which only helped drive us there.

Q: What is the next step in your partnership with FirstBank and beyond?

A: It's important to step back and reflect on how we can take this model and take it into other disciplines and organizations. This system works. It worked in building a culture that won a basketball championship, it worked in business in driving sales, and the capacity of employees. Now we need to reflect where we want to go in 2010 and take time to celebrate. Celebration in this world is very important. What's the point in attaining an aspiration if you're not going to enjoy it?

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