A small conundrum?

“The forecast is below budget.”

Yes ,but it’s 95% accurate. And that matters more than you might think.

So…accuracy or size?

In my view, forecast accuracy matters more than forecast size (within reason).

Not quite a “Chicken or Egg” conundrum situation, which is easily answered… Egg (eggs were around before chickens with the things they evolved from…so egg).

Don’t get me wrong, the budget (if realistic) is king. But if you’re working off a number designed to please rather than deliver, you’re already on shaky ground.

I once bet my COO £1 that our forecast accuracy would be +/-5%. We averaged 98.6% over two years. (Still waiting on that pound… and no, we didn’t sandbag,... cynics.)

That level of accuracy was built on trust.

It came from really knowing the team:

• Their strengths
• The areas we were developing
• Their risk appetite
• Their personalities and skills

And, of course, running it all through the built-in sales leadership “BS algorithm.”

Your team need to know that, even if the news is bad, it must come out so it can be fixed.

You can’t fix what you can’t see. And you can’t see clearly if your forecast is fiction.

Knowing your people well enough to trust them and being someone they in turn trust to tell the truth and get it back, is critical.

Too often, salespeople pour emotional energy into convincing their manager everything is fine, hoping it buys them time to fix it next month.

Pressure builds. Mindset slips. Issues get hidden.

It usually ends the same way:

• The number doesn’t land
• A bad forecast goes up the chain
• Targets are missed

The salesperson exits after repeating the cycle under mounting pressure

It’s not a good place to be, wasting time and mental bandwidth masking problems instead of solving them.

For the business, that means:

• Lost revenue
• Disruption and staff turnover costs
• A culture of uncertainty
• Momentum eroded...

In my teams, one golden rule has always been: Trust first, even if the news isn’t good.

Trust is two-way. It’s not a ploy to flush out bad news. It’s earned by your team knowing how you’ll react when they bring you the truth.

At least then, you know what you’re dealing with, and you can get to work fixing it. (Note: I don’t just smile and nod at poor numbers.

Scathing sarcasm is a perfectly valid management tool. Tact is mainly for those too sensitive to handle it, though, fortunately, they’re rare. It’s a sales team, after all.

Accurate forecasting, even under budget, gives certainty. And with certainty, you can act.

You can pull the right levers: skillset, activity, conversion, coverage, qualification, control etc, and start to move the needle with intent, to get to budget+ going forward. Scale follows. But only if you can rely on the foundation.

Forecast Accuracy first!

I’m always happy to discuss sales and sales leadership challenges, and I’ll always reply to a direct message Stuart@btg.guru