When people hear the phrase “sales culture,” many picture scripts, quotas, or pressure-driven tactics. Troy Harrison sees it very differently. For Harrison, founder of The Sales Navigator, strong sales cultures are not built on force or fear. They are built on clarity, consistency, and alignment with how a company operates.
Harrison said sales culture is often misunderstood, even by experienced leaders. “I don’t think people know what culture really means, either company or sales,” Harrison said.
At its core, Harrison explained, sales culture is the shared acceptance of the role sales plays in a company and a clear understanding, by salespeople themselves, of what their role is.
Sales belongs at the center
When that culture exists, sales is no longer treated as an outsider. “You don’t have to have debates with other departments about whether or not the sales department is important,” Harrison said. Instead, sales become intrinsic to the company’s mission and direction, with a seat and a voice at the table.
Harrison contrasted that with organizations where sales floats on the fringe. Operations, finance, and service delivery sit at the center, while sales operate in isolation. “Sales culture from a perspective outside the sales department means that sales are intrinsic to the company’s mission. It’s about what we do. It’s about how we do it,” he said.
Culture shows up in daily habits
Inside the sales department, culture takes on a more practical form. Harrison described it as the routine execution of sales responsibilities. He referred to it as “routineization,” a term he admitted may not exist, but one he claimed anyway. In healthy sales cultures, there is no debate over basic expectations. Entering activity into CRM, following up after calls, and maintaining consistent behaviors simply happen.
“We’re not debating with salespeople over whether they enter their stuff into CRM. It’s just what you do,” Harrison said. “When exiting a sales call, grabbing your phone, entering in what happened on that sales call, that’s just a routine.”
Defining expectations removes friction
That same mindset applies to activity levels. Managers should not argue weekly about fundamentals like meeting volume. “We’re not having a debate about the basic responsibilities of a salesperson,” Harrison said. “But having that kind of a salesperson also means that you’ve got to be willing to define down the details and define down the roadmap to success.”
Coaching is another critical component. Harrison said many sales managers struggle with the idea of going into the field to observe sales calls. “Out of a group of 10 sales managers, I had three of them that said, ‘Troy, how am I supposed to say to my salespeople, hey, I’m going to go out with you and coach you?’” Harrison said. “It shouldn’t have been foreign, but it was.”
In strong sales cultures, that presence is expected. Salespeople understand that observation and feedback are part of the job, not a punishment. Harrison said culture changes start with communication. “You begin by announcing it to everybody. Just say, ‘Hey, guys, I realize I haven’t been going out on sales calls. I’m going to start now.’ And then you just start doing it.”
Structure without scripting
Importantly, Harrison stressed that culture is not about scripting personalities out of sales. “That doesn’t mean you’re scripting your salespeople,” he said. “It’s about allowing people room to channel sales techniques through their best personalities.”
Leadership, however, must manage behavior beyond the sales department. Harrison warned against allowing salespeople to bully others internally. “Salespeople aren’t bullies,” he said. “They earn their spot as part of the team.”
Culture reflects leadership
Ultimately, Harrison said sales culture reflects leadership. “Every company has a sales culture,” he said. “The only question is, is it intentional, is it accidental, is it positive, or is it negative?”
For Harrison, the answer starts at the top. “Great cultures don’t happen by accident,” he said. “Culture is top down. Leadership is there to set the culture, foster the culture, sometimes enforce the culture, and to change out personnel if those personnel are not willing to support it.”
How leaders treat their salespeople, Harrison added, will be mirrored in how salespeople treat customers. “Ultimately it’s all going to flow down to your customers,” he said. “And that is probably one of the biggest yardsticks for sales culture.”
