The Organizational Network Fieldbook: Best Practices, Techniques, and Exercises to Drive Organizational Innovation and Performance

Chapter 8. BUILDING HEALTHY TEAMS

Kate Ehrlich, Ivan J. Blum, and Inga Carboni^[]

Sales teams face numerous obstacles to the internal sharing and coordination of information. They are often organized around customer accounts rather than functional groups and, as a result, are composed of people from multiple divisions, product groups, service lines, and specializations. Members have different reporting structures, which can fracture their loyalties and commitments. Also, people may be on two or more account teams, which further fragments their time and attention. And because they spend a lot of their time traveling, salespeople have few opportunities for the face-to-face meetings and direct phone calls that help keep them current with changes ...