Selling Dataset. Maximising data team influence through internal promotion.

Author

Tristan Burns
July 26, 2024

Data people suck at selling.

Huh? What on Earth does data have to do with selling? We don’t speak to customers… that’s the Sales Team’s job.

True - direct external selling is not really our job. But internal selling, you better believe, is our job!

Data teams are notoriously under-resourced, under-represented and generally lack influence and gravitas within their organisations.

They are more often than not seen as a service/help desk and largely considered to be purely a technical function with no place in a business or strategic setting.

In short, we have an image problem and the impacts of this are detrimental both to our careers and to the businesses we work for.

While the reasons for this are myriad, I can assure you one of the main contributing factors of this is our typical inability (or unwillingness) to publicly share and celebrate our tremendous contributions and wins with our stakeholders.

Basically - we need to do more selling.

What are the problems caused by not selling?

So what if we don’t sell? What’s the worst that can happen. Let’s take a look:

🏆 Others will take credit for your work.

We are particularly exposed to this one in D&A due to the nature of our role in supporting and partnering with business domains.

💰Companies won’t know where to invest resources

If we don’t speak up about our contribution to the overall business than you can hardly expect the leadership team to provide us with additional resources like budget and extra headcount. We will forever be seen as a cost centre and therefore a liability.

🔻Career growth stalls and then plummets

Failing to sell your wins will not only affect you personally as a data leader, but it will also directly impact the career prospects of the people working for you. Not being comfortable selling for your own benefit is one thing, not selling on behalf of the people you manage is extreme managerial negligence. 

🎯 You’ll be first in line for the firing line. 

As an extension of failing to demonstrate value and being perpetually seen as a cost centre, you and your team will be first on the chopping block when times are tough. After all - what value do you generate?

The benefits of selling your wins

We’ve seen the pain points of not selling, but what does the upside look like?

🌟 Gain the recognition you deserve for you and your team

We work hard in data and support the business in many ways. We deserve recognition for that. It helps us build better relationships, build a reputation and stands us in good stead at promotion time.

📊 Help the organisation succeed

I hear you asking, how does D&A selling it’s wins help the organisation succeed? When we shout out about our wins, we shine a spot light on certain aspects of the business that might otherwise have gone unnoticed. This improves resource allocation which may include right sizing the D&A team!

🚀 Improve your standing among your peers and superiors

When we discuss our wins we demonstrate our abilities. This will no doubt prove to our peers and superiors that we mean business. The respect will follow.

👩🏼‍💼 Gain confidence as a leader

Selling requires confidence. The more you do it the more you acquire.

💷 Make more money - faster

You sell more, you get recognition, you raise your profile, you get promotions, you get more money in your pay packet. Selling literally helps you to build a personal brand. And a personal brand can be valuable in a monetary sense.

Tactics you can deploy

So far I’ve told the pros and cons of selling your data wins. Now I’m going to tell you some of the ways I’ve done it or seen it done effectively. This will not be an exhaustive list. Just enough to get the creative juices flowing.

💿 Record your wins

Long before you start selling, make sure you and your team are maintaining a ledger of your wins. Update them weekly and review them at weekly team meetings. This will be invaluable for both you and them at quarterly and annual review periods as well.

📰 Create a weekly/monthly data team newsletter

Not every win is worth shouting from the rooftops, but many will be. A newsletter or publication could work as a great way to get many eyeballs on this without being too annoying or intrusive. It’s a great place to start and can be a team effort.

📣 Liaise with your internal affairs team 

If your organisation is big enough to have an internal PR team, use them. This is exactly why they exist. When you really wanna generate some attention and recognition then these teams can be instrumental in finding the right way to do it. They are masters at internal content creation and will truly make you shine.

🥗 Set up lunch and learns  

“No one knows what we do”…. ok so tell them! L&Ls are a great way to bring people together to talk and ask questions about data. You’ll be surprised at how much interest these kinds of forums can generate for a team like data.

🎁 Give praise to get praise

Recognition is not a one way street. While this isn’t strictly “selling” it will help you indirectly get the message out. When you reflect on the positive contributions of another team or individual you can expect it to come back to you at some point. Works every time.

Sell, sell, sell

No one is going to do it for you. Data teams expect their work to do all the talking. It doesn’t, and for that reason we are looked over far too much.

If we want to be an effective data leader, selling is a crucial skill to master!

💡Get a handle on your data leadership career.

I work with people all over the world to help them maximise the potential of their careers and to become influential and unstoppable data leaders.

I assist them with a ranges of challenges (like the one above), including:

🔸 Hiring and firing

🔸 Selling their wins internally

🔸 Battling the service desk dynamic

🔸 Designing and roadmapping their careers

🔸 Fighting for data to have a greater influence

🔸 Building their personal brand so to future proof their careers

If this is something you think you could benefit from, them lets talk.

BUT you’ll want to act fast, my prices are increasing very soon!

Grab some time with me for a free 1:1 intro call here: https://calendly.com/tristanburns/30min

⚡️Whenever you are ready, there are a few way I can support you: