Distributors are the cornerstone of every direct selling business. They work collaboratively to sell products and services of the direct selling companies to customers. So we can say the performance of the distributors is one of the major factors that affect the revenue and profitability of the organization. Retaining high-performing distributors and empowering low-performing distributors by enriching their knowledge and skills are important for every direct selling business. Performance enablement is one of the effective approaches used by direct selling companies to retain and empower their distributors.
What is performance enablement?
Performance enablement is an emerging approach in the field of human resource management. It is a process of empowering the human resources of the organization by providing them with all tools and materials needed to perform their duties and achieve their goals and objectives.
Performance enablement in direct selling business
As we discussed earlier, distributors are an important human resource of direct selling companies. Performance enablement in direct selling is mainly concentrating on enabling distributors to attain their full potential to improve sales and overall performance. It can help direct selling companies empower and retain their valuable distributors by developing their sales and other skills through a continuous process. When you deliver all relevant resources like learning materials, software, support, and guidance to distributors, it can help them to develop a successful career in their current field.
Performance enablement vs performance management
Performance enablement and performance management are not the same thing. However, we can say performance enablement is an advanced version or replacing version of performance management. Let's understand the major differences between performance enablement and performance management.
Performance management is the process of evaluating and monitoring the performance of employees/distributors of the organization. When it comes to performance enablement the process involves delivering all tools and resources needed to perform duties and achieve objectives of employees/distributors.
- Performance management is focused on measuring past performance but performance enablement focuses on improving future performance.
- Performance management is typically done every year or periodically, but performance enablement is a continuous process.
Enable distributor performance in direct selling
To enable distributors to attain their full potential, direct selling companies need to focus on three vital areas that are learning, communication, and collaboration.
Learning
To perform the various tasks of distributors, they need enough resources. Learning resources stay at the top of the priority list, this includes courses and training material designed to improve sales skills and knowledge of distributors. There are many tools available for direct selling business to upskill their distributors. The Learning management system comes with MLM software that can help distributors fill their knowledge gap with interactive training modules.
Communication
Setting up clear and achievable goals and communicating them with distributors is an important activity for direct selling business. As the distributors work together as a team to improve sales, setting up effective communication channels across organizations can help improve effectiveness.
Collaboration
Collaboration between team members across direct selling organizations helps to enhance performance. Collaboration enables upline and downline distributors to work together by providing guidance and support to improve overall sales performance.
Performance enablement process, overall helps direct selling companies to improve their profitability by empowering their distributors.
