Sales Enablement and Compensation are broken—and reps can feel it in their bank accounts, their morale, and their inboxes.
“You’re not failing because of effort,” says Mark L., a former SaaS AE. “You’re failing because the system is cracked.”
And he’s right.
The First Hard Truth: Compensation Plans Are a Trap
Let’s rip off the bandage. **Most sales comp plans punish top performers.**
According to McKinsey, companies that align compensation with performance see **up to 50% more rep output**. But alignment is rare. Too many plans are bloated with accelerators…that only kick in when it’s already too late.
Even worse? Many reps don’t understand how they’re paid. That’s not just a leak—it’s a flood.
Want to stop shredding rep motivation? Bring clarity back. Give reps a line-of-sight to income.
What You Can Do Right Now
- Audit your comp structure. Is it simple? Fair? Predictable?
- Test it with a new hire. Can they explain it in under 60 seconds?
- Use performance data to create dynamic, not static, comp plans. Sales flights are turbulent—your system should adapt.
The Second Hard Truth: Sales Enablement Has Become Sales ‘Disablement’
If enablement is just a pile of PDFs, reps will ignore it. And they are.
Harvard Business Review found that **tailored content improves win rates by 19%.**
But most enablement teams publish generic decks designed to please everyone—and serve no one.
Here’s your wake-up call: If your reps are screenshotting LinkedIn posts instead of logging into your enablement tool, you don’t have an enablement strategy. You have an escape plan.
The Reps Know the Truth. Do You?
They know which slides make buyers yawn. They know which decks work. Tap into their experience and fix your sales productivity gap by involving reps in content creation.
And What About Tech?
Tech stacks are bloated. Your enablement tools should work with reps, not drown them in dashboards. Audit ruthlessly. Remove what doesn’t serve quick relevance and faster ramp.
The Third Hard Truth: Onboarding Isn’t Working—It’s Breaking Reps
Well-intentioned onboarding can do real harm. According to Sales & Marketing Management, companies that optimize onboarding see **13% higher revenue metrics per rep.**
Most don’t.
Instead, reps drown in product dumps and fake call roleplays.
Quick question: Do your new hires actually sell by Month 2—or are they still watching webinars?
The Fix Is Easier Than You Think
- Compress onboarding. Focus on the top 5% of scenarios that yield 80% of deals.
- Shadow top reps live. No scripts. No slides. Just sales.
- Set up a modern, effective onboarding program that mimics real-world tension—not LMS utopia.
Bonus: You’re Leaking Pipeline—Fast
Sales enablement and compensation don’t live in silos. They directly impact pipeline maturity and movement.
If your reps are underpaid, undertrained, and overwhelmed with irrelevant content—they’re not pushing deals forward. They’re wondering if they should apply to your competitor.
Use this checklist as your war room starter:
- Are reps forced to pitch before they’re ready?
- Is your comp plan creating short-term wins but long-term churn?
- Do sellers rate your onboarding as helpful or hellish?
Still bleeding deals? Follow these 7 steps to fix pipeline leakage fast. Your quota depends on it.
More Human, More Revenue
The best sales systems aren’t robotic—they’re human-centric.
That means building comp plans that reward value (not just volume), enablement that meets reps where they are, and onboarding that mirrors real buyer conflict.
Sales is a people sport. Treat them that way.
What happens next for sales teams? The ones that adapt to this shift in enablement and compensation will dominate. The rest? Buried under unread playbooks and ignored incentive emails.