Jbeans profile picture
Jbeans profile picture

Jbeans

Director of Sales

Opinionated
Praised Answer
Contributor
+2

Missing Deadlines

How do you deal with saucy reps that miss deadlines but have a good funnel and had strong good Q1? Continues to miss agreed upon deadlines, rage is surface deep and is a self described “spicy” meatball. All deadlines are discussed and agreed upon, yet rarely met. My frustration is growing.

🧢 Sales Management
7

18 comments

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poweredbycaffeine
WR Lieutenant
4
☕️
I'd pour some proverbial bleach on this so-called spicy meatball before it becomes a full-on ghost chili pepper that ends up affecting the whole sales team. They are clearly not aware of the consequences of their actions, and sometimes you gotta hold a rep's hand to the fire so they can feel it.
Coffeesforclosers
Notable Contributor
1
Director Sales and Market Development
Manager- Fire hot, dont touch. Rep- Im gonna touch it, Manager and now youre burnt, lets not touch the fire anymore ok.  Rep- im gonna find a colder fire, lol. 
poweredbycaffeine
WR Lieutenant
2
☕️
Or, better yet, I'm going to find a fire-proof glove (BDR/SDR/AM) to touch the fire for me.
Coffeesforclosers
Notable Contributor
0
Director Sales and Market Development
lolololol, right. Where my intern at?!?!?!?!
Jbeans
Opinionated
0
Director of Sales
Yah. That’s on me to grow as a leader and be more comfortable being uncomfortable addressing these things. Radical Candor is something I need to work on. 
poweredbycaffeine
WR Lieutenant
2
☕️
The person who gave me the Radical Candor book did not read it...but preached it hard. I am so glad that I DID read it--it's changed the way I handle not only direct report conversations, but peer and executive conversations as well.
SADNES5
Politicker
0
down voters are marketing spies
I agree with this. Radical candor means both ways, good and bad.

You always hear those people that are "brutally honest"... With negatives, but nothing positive leaves their lips.


MMMGood
Celebrated Contributor
1
Senior Account Executive
What's the historical performance over several quarters/years? One good quarter isn't enough to "overlook" poor accountability...if at all.
Jbeans
Opinionated
0
Director of Sales
Great point. 
Captain_Q
Arsonist
1
Sr. Account Executive
It took me a handful of years to understand the importance of being a team player.  I have always been a top performer on any team I've been on and used to act like the little things didn't apply to me.  However, after time that attitude will haunt you as a rep and will affect team morale.   



Now, as long as you don't micro-manage me and make me attend pointless meetings, I don't give push back on things like deadlines.  Especially if they are visible to the entire team.   

That being said, my manager also knows that during the summer I take a lot of half days to take the boat out or play golf or just fuck off.   BUT, he only looks the other way because I lead by example for the rest of the team when it comes to deadlines or other such tasks that are visible to the whole team.

Hope this helps!
Coffeesforclosers
Notable Contributor
0
Director Sales and Market Development
Continual missing deadlines should be addressed, but what about the ones that hit all the deadlines and dont have the performance. Hard to reward bad behavior but are they the only one on the team doing this? if so, it should be addressed or it spreads
Jbeans
Opinionated
1
Director of Sales
Oh it spreads. The team is notorious for missing deadlines as we don’t have consequence culture - which I would prefer not to have for “little” things. However I’m also not their mum, and I’m not going to call their parents down to the office to discipline them. My goal is to get them to have more accountability and shine a light on the impact of missing deadlines. But also don’t want to kill anyone’s spirit that’s finally hitting their stride with numbers. It’s a delicate balance I find. My boss wants to hit them in the pocket book and remove them from the lead pool for a set amount of time. Or until said assignment is completed. I’m very close to this point, but doesn’t feel great. 
Coffeesforclosers
Notable Contributor
0
Director Sales and Market Development
You are right in balance vs lighting it on fire in their pockets. Make it a point, punish lightly when point is dulled. Then 2nd time drop that proverbial hammer on em and hit em where it hurts
MMMGood
Celebrated Contributor
0
Senior Account Executive
Adding to my earlier comment...if the team in general is not good at this, then there either needs to be some recourse for the entire team or not at all. 

Sidenote: the other members on the team who miss deadlines AND aren't performing should start looking for new work...if they aren't already. 
Coffeesforclosers
Notable Contributor
0
Director Sales and Market Development
agreed 100
ARRisLife
Politicker
0
Account Executive
@Jbeans can you elaborate? What deadlines are you speaking about specifically? Do you mean forecasts for deals? ie they're slipping into other quarters and they don't seem to care or are you talking about something else entirely? (couldn't decipher from the other comments in the thread)
Jbeans
Opinionated
0
Director of Sales
Hi! Yeah it’s various things - for example -  training certifications we need to take to stay licensed to sell specialty items!! (That’s something that can directly impact our revenue) I also still sell and carry a big quota - so I have to adhere to the deadlines myself. So, I know they are achievable- I’m flexible -but just talk to me. Don’t call me 30 minutes after dinner starts to tell me you’ll be late for dinner, you know what I mean? Lol 
Ace
Arsonist
0
CEO
Do you meet often with them? Maybe they're going through something and don't know who to talk to about it. Just communicate. If this is being done, then just give 2 warnings before firing.

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