Every manager has, or will, confront this troublesome issue.  It’s arisen in every workshop for sales managers or branch managers I’ve done.

One or more of your sales people has leveled off.  Their performance hasn’t improved much in the last few years.  Where before you were able to count on significant increases each year, now you can not.  You know that these experienced sales people can do better, but they seem unable or unwilling to break out of a certain level of performance.  You are scratching your head, frustrated, and loosing sleep at night wondering how to improve the situation.  What do you do?

Here’s a simple, effective strategy:  First, verify that a problem exists.  Then, place the responsibility for solving the problem where it belongs. 

First, verify that it is a problem.

It may not be a problem at all.  On the surface, there is nothing wrong with a sales person becoming comfortable at a certain level of performance.  Aren’t sales people allowed to become comfortable in their jobs?  Isn't your warehouse manager comfortable and competent?  What about your customer service managers, or your CFO?  Don’t you expect them to perform, year in and year out, in a predictable manner?  Are sales people any different?

For a lot of people, the answer is, “Yes, sales people are different.”  We really do have a different set of expectations for our sales people than we do for other job titles.  Sales people are supposed to sell and sell more each year.

So we need a way to sort this out.  On one hand, it may be perfectly acceptable to have a sales person that has leveled off.  On the other, it may be a problem.  Before you rush to judgment on this particular person, you need to ask, and answer, two important questions about this sales person’s performance.  First, “Is the sales person appropriately profitable?”  Second, “Is the sales person appropriately directable?”  Let’s look at each of these.

Is this sales person appropriately profitable?

Don’t be fooled by looking at net sales or even total gross profit produced by the sales person.  Profitability is a function of the difference between costs and revenues.  In order to answer this question of profitability with any degree of objectivity or accuracy, you need to compare the total direct cost of this sales person with the total absolute dollars of gross margin this sales person has generated. 

We can help you with this calculation...[CLICK HERE TO READ ENTIRE ARTICLE ONLINE]