Field Note

If three people failed in the same patch

If three people have failed in the same patch, you probably don't have three bad reps.

The first question most new managers ask is what's wrong with these reps. The better one is what exactly did I inherit. The order you ask in is the order you think in, and it decides what you do for the next six months.

Start with the patch. Territory, account quality, installed base, the quota, the comp plan, who had it before. If a good rep couldn't make the number there, nothing you do to the person matters. Fix the patch, fix the number, or fix the plan.

Then the person, in this order. Do customers choose to spend time with them? Is there pipeline that exists only because they're here? When they're in front of a customer, can they actually sell? Are they still trying to win? The third question is the one most managers skip, and it's the one that separates can't from isn't. One you coach. The other you manage.

Watch out for the rep you'd write off first. The one who skips internal meetings but has customers calling back may be worth more than the polished one with perfect CRM hygiene and no pull.

Before you decide anything

Sit with them and go through five real opportunities. Listen to how they describe the customer. You'll learn more in ninety minutes than in a month of dashboards.

Try it

Rep Check asks the patch first and the person second, and tells you which problem you have.

Try it

More field notes

Mark Flournoy

Hi, I'm Mark.

I've spent a lot of years helping customers buy complicated technology. For six of them I led partner sales teams at AWS. Before that F5, Red Hat, and a couple of storage companies you've probably forgotten. Before all of that, 20 years as a Marine.

Along the way I've been the seller defending the deal, the partner trying to help, the manager asking annoying questions, and the guy one level up explaining why the forecast moved again.

QuotaBird is where I put the things I've found useful. Most of the tools are free. Most take a few minutes. None of them require you to adopt a new sales religion. Use whatever helps.

A few things I see a lot

Rarely just one of them. Usually a couple at the same time, quietly making each other worse.

The forecast call has become the job. Your manager wants a status on everything by noon, the CRM wants a next step on every line, and the customer is the last person you talk to each day.

The pipeline looks better than it really is. Plenty of opportunities in the CRM, but once you ask about budget, timing and who actually wants the thing, the number gets smaller fast.

The partner likes you, but nothing is happening. Plenty of meetings, maybe a joint deck. Nobody can point to the accounts where the two companies are actually trying to win something together.

The team is busy, but there isn't much rhythm. The forecast call happens. The one-on-ones happen. Nobody is sure what the team should do differently this week to make next quarter better.

The number from above doesn't match what you see below. Leadership has a growth number. Your team has a pipeline. You're the one who has to explain why they disagree without sounding like you've already given up.

A team can be behind plan for a lot of reasons. One seller needs help getting in front of customers. Another is doing fine and wants you to stay out of the way. Someone else thinks the year is already gone. Sometimes the rep is fine and the territory, the comp plan or the pipeline they inherited isn't. The useful part is figuring out which one you're dealing with before you fix the wrong one. That's what the tools here do, one deal, one rep, one territory at a time. It's also most of what I do.

Need another set of eyes?

Sometimes a calculator isn't enough. If you're stuck on a deal, an account, a partner, a territory, a QBR or a federal problem, I'm happy to look at it with you. Here's exactly how it works:

  1. Pick a time. Name, email and one line about what's going on. No deck required.
  2. I read your line before we talk, so we start in the middle instead of at the beginning.
  3. Twenty minutes, free. Then you decide whether there's anything more. No pitch, and no sales follow-ups.

If I don't think I can help, I'll tell you.

Chat with Mark DM on LinkedIn

If it's something that takes more than a conversation, we can figure that out too. I also build fedhoo, a federal market research tool.