I recently read an excellent article on sales coaching by organizational psychologist, Richard Ruff of the blog Sales Training Connection. The article was called “Sales coaching – who to and not to coach” In it, Richard Ruff discussed something we at Randolph Sterling have been telling clients for quite some time.

In sum, often sales teams can be divided into three groups: low performers, average performers, and high performers, which Ruff reports make up 16%, 68%, and 16% of the average sales force respectively. Many sales training books, guides, programs, etc. focus on how to “how to coach.” However, these resources get the question wrong. Sales coaching is not about “how to coach,” so much as “who to coach.” Frankly, even the best programs can’t save those that belong somewhere else, nor can they make the best even better, thus leaving that middle 68%.

Yet, as we at Randolph Sterling have often found when called in to provide our Sales Management or Growth Audit and Autopsy Services, it is this middle group that gets the least attention. At many of the companies we have worked with, too much time was spent working with and often times replacing the low performers, in addition to keeping the top performers happy, while that 68% got overlooked. This often led to solid. But average, performers leaving for another opportunity where they felt more appreciated for their efforts and results. Yet, when this group receives the attention they need and deserve, they not only have the potential to move into the “top performer” bracket, but are also shown that the company appreciates them enough to invest in their success, making them less likely to look for greener pastures elsewhere.

That said, as for the top performers, my experience with them has been that many of them would like less coaching and more assistance with some of their daily tasks. I often hear that they have “graduated” from new business development and cold calling as they spend much of their day nurturing the relationships they already have. Instead of coaching them, a better investment in them, in our experience, has been cutting back on some of their coaching and reallocating some of those funds to having someone help them research and begin to develop a relationship with new prospects so they can focus their efforts on meetings. This also becomes a great incentive for the 68%, and makes their coaching sessions even more effective as they realize that implementing some of the ideas they had resisted could lead to them having someone handle the “less fun” parts of their jobs too.