In my new book, How to Create an Unstoppable Marketing and Sales Machine (available at http://bit.ly/4zTeAs), I devoted four chapters to the subject of how to find, motivate and manage marketing and sales personnel.  I gave this subjet valuable book space because it is not just the budget, programs, and technology that generate the results, but also (and more important) the people who build the strategy and execute the marketing and sales initiatives.  

The end-to-end B2B marketing and sales process has a lot of moving parts.  To be effective, you need to have the right people in place to pull the right levers at the right time.  So what do I mean by the right people and how do you recognize a productive team?  Leo Tolstoy wrote in Anna Karenina, “Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” This is equally true for marketing departments. Part of the successful team is due to chemistry, some to careful selection, and some to good old-fashioned luck and timing, but in my experience, great teams do share five common characteristics:

1. They are results-driven and dedicated to success. They want to know how they are measured and feel pride when they meet their objectives and disappointment when they do not. They take winning and losing seriously and they know how the mission of the marketing department relates to and supports the entire organization.  
2. They are totally responsible for their unique objectives. Just as the team has it goals, so too do the individual members of the team. The person who writes copy is dependent on the media buyer, and if the ad or promotion isn’t run in the right media, the results will be poor. The lead qualification team depends on the outbound lead generation specialist to provide a sources of inquires to be qualified. There are dozens of such interdependencies in the average marketing department and if any member of the team is weak, it impacts the entire team.  
3. They have fun. Let’s face it—there are people out there who are so sour they might have as well have been weaned on dill pickles. They are not the type of people I want to spend time with, on or off duty. Although good teammates take the mission seriously and watch the scorecard, they don’t take themselves too seriously. After all, we are not finding the cure for cancer, or saving anyone’s life; we are simply practicing the art of marketing and sales. Just as in sports, a loose marketing and sales team usually performs better than an uptight team. A little laughter can be a powerful boost to the hardworking marketing team, in good times and tough times.
4. They like and respect each other. It is a painful experience to work around people who don’t like each other. Chemistry will take you far when times are rough. The team doesn’t have to go drinking together every night but it helps if they have a genuine fondness for each other. Equally important is the fact that each member of the team has respect for the professional capabilities of the other members. 
5. They are dedicated to learning. It is hard to improve if you are not learning. Marketing is a profession that changes constantly and it is important to keep up with the newest techniques, media, technology, etc.

Evaluate your team against these characteristics and if you find it lacking, do what you need to do to manage the team correctly or find the right people to ensure your success in B2B marketing and sales.