Are you gathering rep feedback on sales compensation plans? If not, please start. Our Sr. Director of RevOps Ryan Milligan shared a few tips on what to ask and what to do with their feedback.
RevOps remains a relatively new field, with many organizations writing the job description for their first RevOps hire as we write this.
At QuotaPath, we’re slightly ahead in our RevOps practice, as we recently celebrated the one-year hiring anniversary of Sr. Director Ryan Milligan. We’ve learned a lot from him over the past 12 months, such as how to run a data-first sales practice that’s both more efficient and effective than before.
We watched him stand up a data warehouse, create a scoring system for customer health, geek out over SQL, and more.
But that’s not where he got his start at QuotaPath.
Instead of jumping head first into SQL, Ryan dedicated his first few weeks gathering feedback from every person on the sales team.
To this day, he continues to meet with reps one-on-one regularly.
“Sometimes RevOps leaders make the mistake of not asking the sales team what they need, what they see in the market, and how they think they should be measured,” Ryan said.
By gathering feedback from each person, Ryan said he learns where he should prioritize his attention and what motivates each person.
The latter is especially important as leaders begin planning out their 2023 sales compensation strategies.
Ryan typically floats the following questions when seeking feedback:
- Do you feel this comp plan is fair? Why or why not.
- Are you incentivized? Why or why not.
- Do you understand how you’re paid?
It’s imperative that you ask these questions with reps who aren’t driving the outcomes you aimed to achieve with your comp plan.
“You can figure out pretty quickly if it’s because of the plan that they’re not having success or something else,” Ryan said.
For instance, if the plan pays out higher percentage rates for multi-year deals but reps aren’t selling 2- to 3-year deals, this may indicate there isn’t a big enough difference between your base rate and your multi-year rate.
“Then you can think about, ‘How can I make this more lucrative to motivate you to drive that outcome,’” Ryan said.
What to do with the feedback
One thing to note, is that if you’re going to ask your reps for feedback, you should have a plan in place for what happens to it.
“If you’re not planning to make any changes to the comp plan, and you know the decisions have already been made, don’t ask for feedback,” said Rosalyn Santa Elena, Founder and Chief Revenue Operations Officer at The RevOps Collective.
Similarly, if you collect feedback on sales compensation plans, you need to communicate with your reps what changes went into effect and why. Dedicate a meeting that guides them through the changes and how it impacts them. Show your math and how the company will support them in achieving their numbers.
Reversely, when feedback doesn’t lead to changes, you should update them accordingly and explain why.
“Sales reps tend to giver their RevOps counterparts more honest feedback than they do with their sales managers,” said Jessica Zangre, Head of RevOps with Syncari. “That loop is really important to keep that trust.”
Have a tool in place that makes compensation clear
To continue to build on that trust from your feedback sessions, give your reps full transparency into their real-time and forecasted commissions. Learn more about QuotaPath’s commission tracking and compensation management software by booking a time with our team today.
