Your best reps are often "unconsciously competent" and can't explain their own success. Before an SKO, leaders must help these individuals deconstruct their process and build a prescriptive presentation, translating their individual "art" into a replicable science for the entire sales team.

Companies often hire trainers for symptoms (e.g., low pipeline) without knowing the true cause (e.g., poor management). This approach wastes resources by solving the wrong problem, and without reinforcement, reps revert to old habits within 90 days, rendering the training useless.

Underperforming sales reps are not failures; they often lack proper coaching or strategic frameworks. Investing in their development can transform these reps from liabilities into consistent performers, saving the high costs associated with turnover and re-hiring.

Go beyond ad-hoc coaching and build a scalable system. Create a dashboard for each salesperson tracking key leading indicators (e.g., pipeline generation). Reviewing this data weekly allows leaders to spot specific gaps and deliver precise, data-driven coaching across a large organization.

Leaders misallocate time on low performers who won't improve or top performers who don't need coaching. The greatest return on coaching time comes from investing 80% of it in the solid B-players (the "six pluses") who have the raw ability to become elite A-players.

Instead of telling a rep to "book more meetings," analyze their process and identify the specific micro-step where they are failing, such as getting past the first 15 seconds of a cold call. Focus all coaching efforts exclusively on improving that single, specific action to fix the larger outcome.

Instead of only tracking final sales, use a detailed system to code every interaction (e.g., opportunity found, pitch made, closed/not closed). This data reveals the precise bottleneck in a salesperson's process—be it prospecting, pitching, or closing—allowing for targeted, effective coaching.

Effective coaching follows a three-step process: Identify a metric-based performance gap, validate the specific rep behaviors causing it, and then co-create a coaching plan focused on improving those behaviors, not just the lagging metric.

Many sales organizations mistake "coaching the deal" for actual coaching. This is merely reactive performance management. True coaching focuses on developing a rep’s core capabilities—like discovery or closing—which prepares them for any future deal, not just the current one.