Do you have total mastery of your incentive compensation plan? If not, you are truly missing out on utilizing one of the best tools to motivate your salespeople to peak performance. In sales, you are incredibly fortunate to have such an enticing carrot to dangle in front of your salespeople as a good comp plan. You need to be the absolute master of it in every way and nuance.

To explain this incredibly important concept, I drew a parallel between Tim Ferriss, an American-born martial arts master and motivational speaker who won the Gold medal at the Chinese Kickboxing National Championships using some incredible techniques. Although Tim had been a martial arts expert in the U.S., he had moved to China to compete in the National Championships. The problem was that he had given himself very little time…and had only four weeks to prepare.

New to this form of kickboxing, (and at a huge disadvantage to his home-based rivals); he needed a distinct edge to match his skill and overcome his relative lack of experience in this form of martial arts. So he did his homework. He pored over the rule book for the matches, looking for loopholes that he could legally exploit, furiously searching for anything to give him an edge.

He finally uncovered a technicality in the fine print of the rule book that he knew he could use to his advantage. The book stated that if one combatant fell from the elevated platform three times in a round, then his opponent would win by TKO. Armed with this knowledge, as well as his raw skill, he set out to the ring.

His results were astounding. Although the judges were not particularly pleased with his performance, he won all of his matches and came home to the U.S. a national champion, accomplishing a feat 99% of those with five to ten years of experience had been unable to do up until that point in time.

Was he a great and skilled fighter? Without question, but with his skill, combined with a mastery of the rules of the game – he became unbeatable.

Using this analogy, I trained all my salespeople on the importance of achieving mastery of the compensation plan; understanding every nuance as to how it can be fully leveraged to their advantage. They needed to know it so well that it was second nature to them.

Post a comment below and tell me about your incentive plan for your salespeople.