What's the best thing to do with a top-producing salesperson who refuses to follow process?

Your sub text says “If, despite high production, your top-producer poisons the rest of the team with his bad attitude and even worse approach to sales, what's the best move?” adds context to the question “What's the best thing to do with a top-producing salesperson who refuses to follow process?”

With the words “Poisons the team with bad attitude” and “Even worse approach to sales” there are a few things to do, first to address the bad attitude:
I would first want to understand what “Bad attitude” really means i.e. are they gruff in meetings, argumentative with leadership, or complaining on the sales floor etc. in any case you first need to identify what specifically you want to address. Once you have a specific behavior describe the behavior to the rep and how you think it could be negatively impacting the team, then ask “But how do you see it?”.
Look for things that might be contributing to the issue that can be addressed, seek first to understand, then ask questions to get their ideas on new specific behaviors going forward that are more appropriate.
You now have the basis for an accountability plan and you come up with an evaluation time frame they commit to. i.e. "For the next two weeks you will ____ instead of _____." It is observable and has a timeframe. If they follow it things improve, if they don’t there are natural consequences. You will not be addressing the issue again; you will be addressing their choice to disregard a commitment they made.

If they are unwilling to follow through on commitments that they came up with you know what you need to do. The reality is you are looking to manage up, not out, but some people will self-select themselves out during this process.

This approach also works once you identify which specific approaches define “Even worse approach to sales”.

Some sales people are very direct, and while individually a manager may say “I would never talk to a customer that way” we need to remember, “You aren’t”. In talking to their customers you may find they appreciate the no nonsense way your rep sells. On the other hand you may find that customers aren’t happy with the way they were treated but they bought anyway, but would not want to deal with that rep again. Reaching out to their customers with a non biased set of questions to ascertain this is an easy way to see what’s really going on.

In any case once you are clear on the “Behavior” you want to address use the process above to manage “Up” ideally (Increased satisfaction, better skills, better teams etc.) or manage “Out" when necessary.

For more on this type of approach I recommend reading Crucial Confrontations. –Kevin Maginnis

If your purpose is to assemble a great bunch of top producers, then look the other way; in fact, ask where you can get more.

On the other hand, if you're trying to build a team, an organization that looks out past the second quarter, then honestly--FIRE THIS PERSON. And publicize why you did it.

The number one reason "corporate values" is considered an oxymoron by the general consuming public is because companies are hypocritical about this very example: they espouse values like "team player" and then excuse high-quota-selling players.

If you are serious about running a values-based organization--and very few companies really are--then you must fire a values-violator. Otherwise you're a hypocrite. It really is that simple.

Some questions to help determine the impact of this behavior and create a plan of action:

How far off the process are they?

Are they the only top producer not following the process?

What process are the other top producers using?

How is this behavior impacting the rest of the sales team?

Is the process more important than the results?

This problem is not atypical and the answer is contextual. Perhaps duplicating their successful process may produce better results; isn't that the goal?

First, have a personal interview to learn the "person". It's likely there are personal issues that are spilling over into the work place. If so, get them help and retain that "Top Producer".

If not, cut them lose...

Develop an environment of mutual trust for candid and genuine sharing between both sides. Figure out what's broken and where there is a disconnect.

Seek to understand the reasons for the salesperson's success, and their resistance to process. Ask how the company could empower the salesperson to do even better, and to inspire the rest of the team to do the same.

Collaborate towards a mutually beneficial outcome. Maybe the process is broken, and they are succeeding despite it. Maybe they are just a bad apple and succeeding due to unscrupulous tactics. Lay conjecture aside, and truly seek to understand what's really going on, and work towards a positive outcome, which could be somewhere along the continuum between a big promotion and letting the person go.

There is almost always an inflection point in a company's growth trajectory where you shift your sales candidate profile and lower your OTE objective (or maybe the OTE stays the same or rises, but the quota is increased and/or rate lowered). Using a sports analogy, here's the paradox: "Do you make the uniform or does the uniform make you?"

Clearly in the early, and hopefully, explosive growth phase, there is a natural reliance on individual contribution (read: they make the uniform). These trailblazers are often very highly compensated and OTE objectives are blown away.

If your organization is so process-centric that the "uniform" trumps individual contribution, then you need to part amicably to preserve peace and order. This is not an indictment of process as it has its place in a marketplace where there is an increasing emphasis on governance and compliance.

How about a completely different approach? If this top seller really is that good, why not make them the star of the show? You could easily use them as a study and research subject to find out how and why they are such a top producer.

If their approach is ethical and legal then I would have to question the entire sales process that is being "imposed" on him/her. If my livelihood depended on my performance and I were a top producer, and you imposed a "process" on me that negatively impacted my production I would be pretty resentful as well.

IF, and again that is a big if, the sales person's approach is ethical and legal then this sounds like a battle of egos. The person demanding adherence to the process and the sales person who is producing.

While I can appreciate the idea of removing the frustration I personally would prefer to understand what the beef is. And, in the classic spirit of sales, understand this person's objections and see if the objections can be overcome.

Once again, if they are acting ethically and legally, and since the caveat that they are a top producer was added, it is important to understand where there is a disconnect.

Many have advocated throwing out a top-producer because they don't like some process being imposed on them. Maybe the process is plain wrong? If the sales person is unethical or acting illegally then by all means, dump them!

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And let me assure you as a small business owner I have no problem making the hard decision to remove someone. But if they are doing well and I want to impose my own personal preference on them and they are a high producer I run the risk of not being in business very long.

Sadly, the one sticking point to change seems to be "management attitude": often best illustrated by how poorly we treat some of the most important people in our organization: those who serve customers/ clients via the telephone and web in our customer management, or call centers.
Process must not become "assembly line mentality" rotely following someone's - usually, again sadly, someone who has not ever actually done the job - idea of what really goes on: the human must not be demeaned, minimized, and ultimately denied by the process.
"Management", especially in the days when so many are looking for work, doesn't seem to get that:
Call centers, in other words, are the management hub for customers: the

I think you have to ask yourself how their inability to follow process is hurting the organization. If it isn't then it's a process set up for most people but not all. As long as they are producing and not negatively impacting the company, you leave it alone.

On the other hand, if it is hurting the organization - more work for other people, slower response times, delayed delivery of product or service, confusion, etc, - then you are compelled to have a conversation with them and help them understand the negative impact they are having on the company AND the clients. Being a top performer would suggest that this person is committed to the success of the organization. Explain how their actions are getting in the way of that success and together find a solution that works for everyone.

If it's a sales process he or she is not following, it's time to ask why the top producer is outperforming the rest of the organization. Adopt what they are doing.

If it's a people process, or a mandated process that if not followed violates the law, hurts the team or undermines the company, explain the impact of his/her decisions, show them why it's important to the company and the organization.

If they still won't get on board show them the door.

Without more details, I have to agree with Joanne. I'm a big proponent of sales process, however, organizations need to strike a balance between implementing best practices and stamping out entrepreneurship.

Roger Martin's book, The Knowledge Funnel, outlines how knowledge moves from Mystery to Heuristics to Algorithm (i.e., process). Algorithms give administrators a sense of safety, however, in a fast-changing world, this safety is an illusion. Enforcing process typically comes from fear-based thinking (i.e, we are trying to prevent bad things from happening by stamping out variability). Process enables us to increase profitability and predictability. However, intuitive, exploratory thinkers enable us to navigate mystery and heuristics where complexity and ambiguity must be dealt with.

You might want to think about having lower level sales focus on executing algorithms, while your more advanced speakers focus on more complex opportunities where inductive thinking is required.

Your second question "If, despite high production, your top-producer poisons the rest of the team with his bad attitude and even worse approach to sales, what's the best move?" The obvious answer is "fire them" - if they are poisoning the team as you say then it's hard to build from that foundation. Someone who generates numbers at the high cost of others in the sales organization is not a top performer anyway.

Your first question, however, “What's the best thing to do with a top-producing salesperson who refuses to follow process?” makes me think of this cartoon (http://FunnySalesCartoons.com/photo/funny-sales-cartoon-sales-process).

My motivation behind making this cartoon was when my sales VP tried to stop me from closing an $800,000 software deal because 4 steps in our sales process had not been performed. I closed the deal without his permission, got a tongue lashing in his office, and going forward process adherence meant nothing to me - my non-compliance did not negatively impact team performance or resource scheduling - in fact the team had no visibility on what process boxes I checked along the way - in that circumstance process adherence was more important to the sales VP than results.

If you have a top performer that is not following process, you should answer some questions:
- Are we trying to force-fit a prospect into our "selling process" or do we allow the flexibility to map our selling process to the way our customers like to buy?
- Is the process a sequentially mandated set of steps or is it a guideline intended to accelerate qualification and successful closure?
- Once established, are things "set in stone" or do we continuously re-evaluate the process, learn from every deal, capture best practices and systemically improve the process?

Often there is an opportunity to improve things in cases like this.

I strongly agree that the top producer is that for a reason. I'm sure he/she has no problem closing and doesn’t have to make numerous phone calls to get to this outcome. Most of the time management thinks that the only way to get to this level is by following every metric exactly. I agree that you do have to overcome and exceed the metrics when you are starting your book of business, but when you get to this level it’s not as likely. Most of the time management wants to make decisions as to how the sales are going to increase without even having firsthand experience in the industry. With this being said, the top producer is probably the most knowledgeable of how to get the business to grow. Management might want to check and see what his ideas are to grow the business and structure the new procedures around his ideas, or at least listen to them. He should have an opinion if management really wants top producers in the company. Most of the time the top sales person is a go getter and can sale anything to anyone, but is not the best at policies and procedures. If you have an employee that books 4 times his quota for the month, wouldn’t it be best to let him do what he does best. The small stuff shouldn’t matter, since he is doing his job and excelling at it. I would think a good manager would see how he operates to produce at the maximum level and try to manage toward the individual. If for some reason these new procedures are paperwork and spreadsheets he is not following, then why can’t support take these things off his plate and let him sale. It makes no difference to anyone if he can’t do the paper side fast enough, that is only going to slow him down. Whatever makes him produce at a higher level is ultimately better for the company in my opinion.

Every sales organization faces this problem. Some of your most productive, profitable reps set bad examples for the rest of the team. They work their own plan, don’t consistently follow your CRM best practices, and (worse) oftentimes tell other reps that what you’re asking them to do isn’t the right approach.

Left unchecked, your best reps can have a measurable and sustained negative impact on the morale, retention and performance of your entire sales floor. And yet, they’re your best reps. They consistently exceed quota. What to do?

Below are a few best practices sales organizations nationwide employ to not only improve adherence from their best but “rogue” sales reps, but also improve morale, team-building and overall productivity across the entire sales team in the process.

Find out why
Let’s assume your best reps aren’t intentionally trying to be difficult. Sit down with them and find out why, specifically, they’ve chosen to do things differently. Make it a constructive conversation, do it outside of a formal office setting if possible (a coffee shop or over lunch, perhaps) to make it less threatening. Your best reps, right or wrong, are choosing a path they believe is the shortest, fastest, easiest path to higher commissions for themselves. Figure out their thought process, and take cues and next steps from there.

Demonstrate a clear path from rules to success & higher commission checks
As you learn the motivations and thought process behind your best reps’ behavior decisions, you have an opportunity to help them more crisply understand the path from your intended rules & procedures through to success, higher commissions, more efficient use of time, etc. It’s possible they think your guidelines are dumb, and they haven’t thought through or don’t understand why they’re in place. If they understand them better, and can see the path it clears to better performance and income for themselves, you might find greater compliance comes quickly.

Reinforce & empower their leadership role
Not all top performers are motivated by leadership opportunities (either with a possible promotion to manage or simply as a more formal mentor to junior reps). But many are, and you may not know exactly which reps care about that leadership role until you ask. You can simultaneously stroke their ego, encourage their own direct-against-quota performance, and get them driving greater performance from their peers all at once.

Re-evaluate the rules
Look again at why your top reps aren’t following the rules. It may be because they’ve found or perceived a more direct path to greater commissions. It may also be that your rules aren’t working, do create too much work for the reps that get in the way of productive outbound work, and/or are focused on creating visibility and record-keeping for the company at the expense of rep success. Simply put, make sure your rules aren’t actually getting in the way of helping your reps sell.

Learn from them
Your top reps may very well be innovating on your existing sales process. They might be doing that on their own, not necessarily telling you what they’re doing or why they’re doing it. So before you get upset or discipline them for not following your rules, make sure they aren’t actually making your rules and process better. And if they are, figure out how to get the rest of your sales team doing the same thing.

Get rid of them
A top performer who’s poisoning the rest of the sales team is a net-negative to your organization. They may be exceeding their own quota, but their lack of respect for your rules, and for their peers, is dragging the rest of the organization down. Have the courage, when necessary, to let your top reps go. You may find that the short-term loss in sales is more than made up by morale and productivity across the rest of the floor.

Do what pro sports teams do: trade or waivers.

Don't risk the poison bringing the whole team down - let them go.

It seems apparent to me that we have common ground with regards to gleaning what's going on in the mind of the "Top Producer" before a solution can be developed. Agreed?

Bill I agree.

The problem could occur though, when you have a very large organisation with several sales teams. In this situation, there will be in place a process that feeds back to the head office. In these situations managers and, of course, the process itself ought to know who is going to make the sales and why, if this is not the case, why? The system ought to be in place so that you can predict the logistics needed for delivery / income /staffing. If this is working, then you will not get the situation at all where a one salesperson is performing well but not using the system, as the system / manager would pick this up early and work with adjustments to get the salesperson involved with the system. After years of work as an accountant manager at Xerox I know this works.

Great question; but I don't know that I would have leaped directly to "poison" even though I think I understand how we might get there.

But at the outset, did we stand back and define where we want to go : what is our "desired end-state"?
Weren't there a few first questions we needed to take a look at: How and why did we create "the Process"?
"Steps-to-the sale" was an approach to train and motivate against and can serve as a framework to "the process".
What are we saying about our product(s) and service(s)?
Is there a quantum level of difference between the top producer and the mean? How much and Why?
Can we see real differences of substance in behavior and outcome with our "top performer"? What does that reveal?
And, again: why did we not use her (our top producer) to map out best practices?
I think the real answer, as always, is: "it depends"
Ultimately though, and admitting that I know clients that do not agree with this, I believe that: A great performer ultimately will be broken by a bad process

Nick, you make some excellent points here. Of course, there is a flip side to your last statement "a great performer will ultimately be broken by a bad process." The flip is "a great process will lift the performance of all performers, great and otherwise."

As has already been said, both the process and the performer have to be evaluated to figure out what's really going on. An excellent practice to follow here is to use the skills of root-cause analysis. Regardless of individual performance, what do the metrics tell us about actual performance? What's the so-called 'voice of the process' saying? If there are process peaks, again regardless of who produced them, are there tweaks you can make to the process to sustain those peaks and turn them into your new normal?

If there are valleys, drop-offs to performance, at what point in the process did the drop-off occur? Was the drop-off introduced as a result of sales skills and behavior, internal obstacles or mis-alignments, or something in the external market?

Track and analyze the performance indicators, paying special attention to leading indicators. That's where you'll find where great or terrible performance emerges.

Clearly, much depends upon "the process" in question and the overall value the top producer brings to the table. If "refusal to follow the process" does not constitute a legal or ethical violation, it is makes sense to inquire as to why the individual is refusing to comply.

If you learn, for example, it's because company policy requires lengthy, time-consuming reports to be prepared which in large measure duplicate considerable info the company already possesses--or if the data may be obtained through administrative support instead of the sales function, it may be worthwhile considering changing the rules instead of insisting on compliance.

If completing reports are having a negative impact by cutting into time which the top producer would be spending on prospecting or visiting prospects/clients, you may have discovered in part why this individual is a top producer--and why those who comply to the letter of the law are less productive.

This is a great question. You have some choices. One: Make his process everyone's process. If it works, don't fix it. Two: Isolate him. Reward him financially but don't let him influence the other sales people. Discuss his lack of compliance. Agree to live with it if it doesn't affect anyone else and move forward. The Fosbury Flop didn't follow the standard high jump "process". However, it did set many world records. The third choice is to fire him. Everyone can't be out of step except "Johnny".

Great responses all.

Would recommend finding out what the rep cares about. There may be a better fit inside the organization in a different sales role. Compare the rep to what other sales teams care about in the aggregate and see where they can better help the business.

Or, keep the rep on the same team and incent them differently. They may not measure success the same way as the rest of the team so perhaps they could be compensated differently.

Let him go for it and stay out of his way. Maybe his sales process is better than the one you have!

Top performers are human - there is a science to the human beast. First understand the Psychology of the human animal then, put motivations in place that focus on your top performers. See the full explanation here. http://corporatestrategiesgroup.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article...

You have 4 choices.
1. Change the rules
2. Enforce the rules
3. Ignore the behavior and others will follow
4. Discipline the rule breaker, up to and including termination.

You have two options here: Keep the person or kick him off the team. You can always avoid the latter by resolving matters with the person involved. There is always a reason why that person is behaving in such manner. Perhaps, he doesn't feel that his 'innovative' efforts are appreciated and would want to disprove the norm or what used to work before. If that were the case, the question now is how open are you to suggestions for improvement? If you don't want any bias, you can invite a third person who will facilitate the review process, much like what scrum masters do in an agile process meeting. If the employee has crossed the boundaries between what's legally and ethically wrong, there's no need to go all that trouble, I guess. Here's where you make your gut instincts work with your judgment. Good Luck!

When I first had this problem 21 years ago.

I bought a book called "Talk it Out" by Daniel Dana.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Talk-Out-Managing-Problems-Organization/dp/0874251222

A 'used' copy costs a dollar,
it may be the best buck you ever spend.

In the many, many, many times that
I have had to manage "people problems" it has never failed, even when the "people problem" was me!

I have no link to the Book or Amazon.....

I resemble this statement ..... I wrote this http://www.marcogiunta.com/about/ see if it helps you understand us

I did look at the "Sales Godfather": it reminds me of one prevalent attitude in the '80's. It seems from this vantage to smack of "hubris": I prefer the attitude that Larry Wilson taught around the same time period: approach clients and internal co-workers with an attitude defined by TASTE:
i.e., Trust-Accountability- Support - Truthfulness - Effort. To be reciprocated a full 100% from all involved parties. It works wonders for the sales leader, the account manager, and the the teams that support Icarus and hope s/he flies but just not too high