Learning from "Salesman-Free Management": How to Create an Organization Where Experts Directly Interact with Customers
How would you feel if someone introduced you to a company that "doesn't have any salespeople"? Some might feel a sense of relief at not being pressured to buy, while others might worry about insufficient follow-up. Recently, I learned about a company in the housing industry that operates under this "zero-salesperson management" model. It's Granhouse, a first-class architectural design firm based in Gifu. In just a few years since its founding in 2017, it has grown to build 170 houses per year and is aiming for 10 billion yen in sales within 10 years. The company consists only of architects and site supervisors. They maintain a system where the experts who actually build the houses deal directly with the customer from start to finish.
When I heard this story, I nodded in strong agreement, as someone working in branding, a field quite different from the housing industry. The choice to "eliminate sales" is not simply a way to cut labor costs. Rather, I felt it was an extremely rational management decision aimed at maximizing the quality of customer understanding. If I were to define it in my own words, I think that management without sales involves an organizational design that "aligns the person who best understands the customer's challenges with the person who actually makes the decisions." Today, using this case study as a starting point, I would like to talk about the same philosophy that we have been practicing for nearly 20 years, along with specific anecdotes.
Why does "not involving sales" lead to better results?
Many companies employ sales representatives for a clear reason: to respect the working hours of specialists and to efficiently manage projects. There's nothing inherently wrong with this division of labor. However, this division of labor has an often overlooked cost. Customer requests are first received by the sales representative, then relayed to the in-house production and design staff, who then reinterpret them before they take shape. At each stage of this "telephone game," subtle nuances are lost. This is precisely the problem frequently pointed out in the field of branding support for small and medium-sized enterprises. It's not uncommon for sales representatives, production staff, and company representatives to communicate different messages to customers, resulting in a failure to establish a brand image in the customer's mind.
In the world of sales, moving away from "order-taking sales," where salespeople simply take customer requests and pass them on from one hand to the other, has long been a challenge. In order-taking sales, salespeople only listen to what the customer has thought of themselves, and it is difficult for salespeople to develop the ability to identify problems and propose solutions themselves. I believe that Granhouse's "zero salespeople" approach is, at its core, one answer to this same structural problem. Instead of having someone simply pass on customer requests from one hand to the other, experts who actually take action and responsibility are involved from the initial hearing. That is why there is no way for information to deteriorate due to being passed on like a game of telephone.
The secret to a "one-proposal" solution that we discovered 20 years ago
This way of thinking is connected to our formative experiences during the early days of Lionheart. About 20 years ago, shortly after we started the company, I, as the founder, was also working on the front lines as a designer. At that time, it was common practice for most designers to prepare multiple designs, such as Option A and Option B, and let the client choose according to their preference. However, I would propose only one option, and that was almost always the one that was adopted.
"Why is it that I can always get a decision with just one proposal?" Wanting to know the reason, I made it the theme of my graduation thesis at the business school I was attending at the time. What I discovered through analysis was that the quality of the interviews was crucially different, rather than the technical skills of the design itself. If you accurately grasp the objective and the current situation, the problems will naturally emerge, and the solutions will naturally be narrowed down. Conversely, if these remain vague, the proposals will end up being nothing more than "matching preferences," and no matter how many proposals there are, they will lack a decisive factor. This realization later developed into a common framework called the "LH Method" within the company.
It's probably based on a similar logic that Mr. Wakahara, the representative of Granhouse, has his architects handle sales. After all, it's the architects who actually draw the floor plans who have the deepest understanding of the customers' lifestyles and non-negotiable requirements. I imagine that because people with a high level of understanding are communicating with customers from the beginning, unnecessary back-and-forth and revisions are reduced, which in turn leads to a high closing rate.
Techniques for in-depth interviewing, starting with "strong interest and curiosity"
We believe that the starting point of the LH method is a strong interest in the other person. Just as a curious child asks "why?", "what?", "who?", and "how?", everything begins with a desire to deeply understand the other person. In the interview, we always try to make the customer's answers concrete. For example, if they say "I want red," we delve into what kind of red that is. Sometimes we deliberately present several extreme examples and ask them to choose, and then ask "why did you choose that?" By refining vague images one by one in this way, we can sometimes uncover issues that the customer themselves hadn't been able to put into words, or values that they had overlooked.
To be honest, this process is quite laborious. Conversations that could be completed in a few minutes by simply acknowledging superficial requests can sometimes drag on for tens of minutes. However, proposals that skimp on this effort, even if they look beautiful, will end up overlooking the fundamental issues. A common pattern cited for the failure of branding in small and medium-sized enterprises is that production begins without a solid strategy, resulting in output that is "beautiful but doesn't function." I believe that much of this actually stems from the superficiality of these initial interviews.
Asking questions that bring you back to the purpose builds trust.
As a project progresses, it's not uncommon for client requests to change from the initial plan. In such situations, we always ask, "Does this change align with the original objective?" For example, we sometimes receive inquiries about cutting elements that were deemed essential for achieving the objective due to budget constraints. Even then, we don't hesitate to ask them to "stop and reconsider." As a result, we often hear them say, "I'm glad we didn't change it after all."
This might be an action that's difficult to achieve from a purely sales-oriented perspective. If you prioritize securing immediate orders, simply accepting the customer's requests without question will result in less friction. However, because I have a deep understanding of their objectives and current situation from the initial consultation, I can ask them on equal footing, "Is this truly the option that will bring us closer to our goal?" I believe that being able to take this step is what separates a mere order-taker from a professional partner.
A principle that works across industries: Placing "depth of understanding" at the heart of organizational design.
To summarize what we've discussed so far, I believe the essence of what we can learn from Granhouse's "zero-salesman management" is not simply about abolishing sales positions. What's important is the idea of organizational design that places the person best positioned to understand the customer's challenges closest to the decision-making process. It's said that there are risks to making sales dependent on individuals, but I think the problem isn't with individualization itself, but with entrusting the most important process—understanding the customer—to someone who lacks specialized knowledge.
Even when we provide branding and marketing support, we don't have a single point of contact who simply passes projects on from one person to the other. We value a system where the person who actually develops the strategy directly interacts with the client from the project's inception. A project that started with a request to create a recruitment website has, through in-depth interviews, expanded beyond the scope of the request to include a review of the employee evaluation system. This is a result of the person in charge trying to pick up not only the superficial requests but also the underlying structural issues. Not separating sales and operations, or if they are separated, ensuring that both parties have the same level of understanding—isn't this a management decision that will determine the results and trust of any company providing specialized services, regardless of the industry?
If you're currently working with a company, or are considering working with one, and feel a sense of frustration like a game of telephone, take a moment to pause and ask yourself how deeply the person you're working with understands your company's challenges. That level of understanding is what ultimately determines the quality of the final output.
We, too, often begin our initial consultations not with sales pitches, but with the question, "Why do you need this?" It might sound mean, but we believe that's the first step in understanding our customers. If you feel that you haven't yet been able to articulate your company's challenges, we would be happy if you would consider us as a partner for such a dialogue.
WRITTEN BY
Ichikawa Atsushi
Representative Director and Chairman
After starting his own business at the age of 26, he has over 20 years of management experience in the design and branding fields. In 2016, he moved with his family to the Philippines and established a local IT outsourcing company, leading its global expansion. Currently, as a "GLOBAL BRANDING AGENCY," he supports the growth of companies while also actively working on organizational reforms within his own company. Based on the real-world struggles and firsthand information he has faced in organizational development and overseas management, he shares practical branding and organizational theories that are thoroughly aligned with the perspective of business leaders.
