There are sales teams, and then there are world-class sales teams. What sets the highest achievers apart from the average Joe?
We looked at research around the web and, of the many factors that help a sales team run like a well-oiled machine, we were most interested in one particular finding: high-performing sales, sales operations, and sales enablement teams are better at collaborating.
To create a world-class sales team, your organization must capitalize on collaboration within your team (from individual to individual), as well as between teams (from sales to marketing, IT, support, etc.).
We're sharing stats we found online that show why your team needs to focus on collaboration if you want to keep things moving "up and to the right."
World-Class Sales Organizations Collaborate Within Their Team
A yearly study conducted by the Miller Heiman Research Institute reports the best practices of identified high-performing sales organizations versus average sales organizations. We compared results from their 2015 study to the results from their 2013 study to see how the trends in sales collaboration are changing.
Sales organizations were asked to rate the performance of their teams based upon the following statements:
On collaboration between management and team members:
"Our management team is highly effective in helping our sales team advance sales opportunities."
World-class teams are continuing to focus on collaboration between managers and team members, as other teams pick up on the trend.
On collaboration between top performers and their colleagues:
“We know why our top performers are successful.”
"We leverage the best practices of our top performers to improve everyone else."
(only reported in 2013) 
World-Class Sales Organizations Collaborate with Other Departments
Stats on cross-department collaboration including the sales organization from the same studies done by the Miller Heiman Research Institute:
On collaboration between sales and other departments via shared tools:
"Our CRM system is highly effective for enabling our organization to collaborate across departments."
(only reported in 2015) 
On collaboration between sales and marketing:
"Sales and Marketing are aligned in what our customers want and need."
And it's not only the Miller Heiman Research Institute reporting findings that cross-department collaboration helps sales teams perform better. Together, Salesforce and The TAS Group reported numbers on the benefits of aligning your sales and marketing teams:
Where sales and marketing are aligned on their initiatives and goals: — Sales win rates increase 15%
— Company revenue can increase as much as 25%
— Salespeople are 57% more likely to be high-performers
And if your sales and marketing teams work together to take your leads from day 1 to the end of a sale: — Email marketing has 2X higher ROI than other channels (Direct Marketing Association, via Smart Data Collective) — Nurtured leads make 47% larger purchases than non-nurtured leads (The Annuitas Group)
Is Your Sales Organization Collaborative?
The trends are clear: collaborative sales teams perform better. So how would you classify your sales organization? Are you highly-collaborative, or do you still have room to improve?
Share your team and cross-department collaboration wins in the comments, and help other sales, sales operations, and sales enablement teams learn more about what really works. Thanks for sharing your wisdom!
If you're ready to improve team and cross-departmental collaboration for better business results, see how Wrike can help with a free Wrike trial.
