Congratulations—you’ve identified your next sales manager. They crushed their quota, earned the respect of their peers, and demonstrated natural leadership qualities.
But as you prepare to promote a sales professional from individual contributor to first-time sales manager, you’re facing one of the most critical decisions in sales leadership: How do you ensure their success in a completely different role?
The transition from seller to manager is one of the most challenging career shifts in business. Your star performer will need to develop a new skill set while potentially managing former peers.
As their sales leader, your support during this transition will determine not only their success but the performance of their team. This post explores what you need to know when promoting sellers to management roles.
Managing a Sales Team for the First Time
Before diving into training, it’s essential to understand what your newly promoted manager is experiencing. The skills that made them successful as an individual contributor—closing deals, building relationships, and hitting personal quotas—are necessary but not sufficient for management success.
The mindset shift is profound. They must transition from being responsible for their own results to being accountable for their team’s collective performance. This means their success is now measured not by the deals they close, but by their ability to develop others who close deals.
Be aware of these three common issues:
Identity Crisis: Many new managers struggle with losing their individual contributor identity. They may continue trying to be the top seller while managing—leading to burnout and team resentment.
Set clear expectations that their individual sales activities will decrease. Help them understand that developing one seller who exceeds quota by 50% is more valuable than personally closing a few extra deals.
Peer Challenges: Managing former peers creates unique dynamics. Some team members may test boundaries, while others might expect special treatment. New managers often avoid addressing performance issues or become overly controlling.
Teach them to lead through influence rather than authority. Help them establish new boundaries while maintaining relationships. Provide frameworks for difficult conversations and role-play scenarios.
Skills Gap: Even your best sellers rarely have experience with forecasting, coaching conversations, performance management, or strategic planning.
Diagnose and fill skills gaps using a sales assessment. Provide targeted training to fill gaps and monitor your first-time manager’s progress over time.
Your role as a sales leader is to be their coach, mentor, and champion during this critical career transition. The effort you invest now in developing strong sales managers will multiply across every seller they lead and every deal their teams close.
Essential Training for New Sales Managers
With proper support, training, and realistic expectations, you can develop exceptional leaders who will drive long-term organizational success. Sales training for first-time sales managers should include these five essential skills.
1. Leadership Fundamentals
Sellers need to learn the difference between managing and leading, how to inspire and motivate others, and how to build trust with their team.
How to support them: Pair them with an experienced manager as a mentor. Provide leadership training that covers difficult conversations, giving feedback, and handling conflict. Role-play challenging scenarios they’ll face with their team.
2. Coaching Skills
Sellers need to learn how to conduct effective one-on-ones, ask coaching questions, and provide developmental feedback rather than just giving answers.
How to support them: Teach them structured sales coaching frameworks. Observe their coaching sessions initially and provide feedback. Help them understand that their role is to develop sellers, not to be the best seller on the team.
3. Performance Management
Sellers need to learn how to set clear expectations, track sales performance metrics, document issues, and conduct performance reviews.
How to support them: Provide templates for performance conversations and documentation. Walk them through your company’s progressive discipline process. Help them understand the legal and HR implications of performance management decisions.
4. Data Analysis and Forecasting
Sellers need to learn how to read and interpret sales analytics, create accurate forecasts, and use data to make strategic decisions about pipeline management and resource allocation.
How to support them: Invest in data analysis training. Teach them your forecasting methodology and have them shadow you during forecast calls with senior leadership. Help them understand leading vs. lagging indicators.
5. Strategic Thinking
Sellers need to learn how to think beyond individual deals to sales territory planning, account strategy, and long-term team development. They need to understand how their team’s performance impacts broader organizational goals.
How to support them: Include them in strategic planning meetings. Discuss market trends and the competitive landscape. Help them develop territory and account strategies for their team.
Developing First-Time Sales Management Skills
The transition to management is not a 90-day process—it’s a multi-year journey. Plan for ongoing development through:
Advanced Leadership Training: After the first year, invest in advanced leadership programs focusing on strategic thinking, change management, and executive presence.
Cross-Functional Exposure: Give them opportunities to work with marketing, customer success, and product teams to broaden their business understanding.
Succession Planning: Begin developing them for senior leadership roles by involving them in company-wide strategic initiatives.
Set Your First-Time Sales Managers Up for Success
Promoting your top seller to sales manager is both an opportunity and a risk. Remember that your investment in their development during the transition period will pay dividends for years to come through improved team performance, higher retention, and a stronger leadership pipeline.
The key is recognizing that management success requires a fundamentally different skill set than selling success. By providing structured support, clear expectations, and ongoing development opportunities, you’ll set your new sales managers up for success while protecting the performance of their teams during the transition.
Learn more from The Brooks Group about sales leadership training for your first-time sales managers.
