Managing people is never easy, but it is particularly demanding in sales. Salespeople tend to be independent, self-motivated, self-assured and restless by nature. If you manage a sales team, nobody needs to tell you how hard it is to influence the way people like that work.

So let’s look at some principles that genuinely help you manage and improve your team’s performance. This isn’t about becoming the alpha wolf everyone respects out of fear — that creates a toxic environment and burns people out. It is about building a working environment that motivates and invites collaboration.

Be present

Salespeople don’t have it easy. They spend their days hearing “no” and living under pressure. Even after hitting target, they start again from zero every month, like Sisyphus pushing the boulder up the hill.

Even the best reps feel that pressure, and they lose motivation when they sense there is no support behind them day to day. That is why people say 99% of a sales manager’s job is simply being there.

Being present lets you offer moral support — but it does more than that. Attention and availability are what allow you to spot individual difficulties, pass on best practice effectively, act as a mentor and stay close to what is happening in the market.

So organise your calendar around supporting the team, and avoid disappearing for long stretches.

Build trust before you make demands

Before you ask the world of your team, build a relationship. Get to know your people, how they work, what motivates them and what they are aiming for. That is what lets you adapt how you communicate and keep them engaged.

Be transparent about plans and goals

Many companies don’t think it is worth sharing the organisation’s plans and overall objectives with their employees. The result is that people never quite understand their own role, and start to feel like pawns on a board.

Which is why it is good practice for a sales manager to share plans, goals and tactics with the team. It gives people direction and helps them understand the why behind the recommendations, practices or changes you are trying to introduce. The conversation also gives you a chance to hear their views and bring them into the process.

Focus on behaviours, not only results

We have already covered why being present motivates a team. There is a second, even more valuable effect: the ability to correct counterproductive habits as they happen.

If you wait until month end to look at what your reps did, all you can record is that the target was missed. That tells you nothing about why — and without the why, there is nothing to manage. Use your time with the team to review activity while there is still time to step in and change course.

Looking at behaviour rather than results alone gives you another insight. A rep who does the right things, even without hitting target every month, is someone with potential. A rep who hits target but behaves badly can destabilise the whole team — and that damage usually costs more than the number they bring in.

Give feedback regularly

Feedback deserves special emphasis. Once you have earned the team’s trust, made yourself available, set clear expectations and observed how people work, it is time to help each person improve.

Feedback only works with positive reinforcement, though. Think about correcting in order to develop someone, not about exposing or diminishing them. And remember that only regular feedback produces real, lasting change in a team’s habits.

Use incentives deliberately

All of the above motivates people and supports their development, but there is one lever sales managers can use specifically to drive results: incentives, monetary or otherwise.

Incentives serve two purposes: they drive concrete results, and they reinforce the behaviours you want to see.

Rewarding behaviour is especially useful when you introduce a new stage in the sales process. It matters just as much as rewarding outcomes, such as:

• the rep who generates the most revenue;
• the rep who closes the most deals;
• the first rep to hit target;
• every rep who passes a minimum revenue threshold.

Avoid the classic mistake of setting numbers nobody can reach — that demotivates instead of driving performance. Work with targets that are achievable and aligned with what the business actually needs.

Incentives can be tangible or intangible:

Tangible: prizes, trips, dinners, team events.

Intangible: public recognition, awards, plaques, trophies.

The next step is taking these ideas back to your own operation and putting them to work.

Grow with Digital Selling

Digital Selling works with Growth Intelligence: strategy, managed execution, training and technology in a single partner, with AI built into the operation. We act as an extension of your team — with shared accountability for targets, an explicit SLA and a real-time dashboard — and with local teams in every market where we operate.

Predictable growth isn’t bought, it’s built. Talk to our team and see how managed execution fits your numbers.

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