Automating Sales Workflows: When to Use Automation Over Chat

Automating Sales Workflows: When to Use Automation Over Chat

In sales management, there’s often some confusion about when to use artificial intelligence chat interfaces versus automation workflows. Chat interfaces are ideal for creative problem-solving, learning, and strategic research, while automation excels in repetitive, high-volume, data-driven sales tasks. The trick is to recognize when consistency and scalability are more important than customization.

Automation delivers consistent execution, eliminates human error, and operates 24/7. Sales leaders can rely on it for triggered communications, data synchronization across systems, CRM updates, and compliance tasks that require accuracy and complete audit trails. By moving these routine tasks into automated workflows, sales teams free up valuable time for relationship building, revenue generation, and refining sales strategies.

Real-world examples highlight the impact: a team once spent three hours daily crafting manual follow-up emails. Shifting to automated sequences not only saved time but also improved messaging consistency and pipeline response rates. Similarly, another team utilized automation to synchronize sales data across six systems, thereby eliminating bottlenecks and enabling sellers to focus fully on sales.

Hybrid approaches really take things to the next level! By merging human creativity in chat interactions with the quick and precise power of automation, businesses can craft workflows that beautifully balance personalized service with the ability to grow. This type of teamwork enhances value-driven selling, sharpens business skills, and accelerates revenue management throughout the sales journey.

Avoiding common pitfalls is essential. Overengineering automation, failing to consider team skills, or building systems in isolation can slow progress. The most effective strategies focus on simple, well-integrated workflows that evolve as business needs change.

The future of B2B sales isn’t about choosing between humans and AI. It’s about humans amplified by AI. Let’s build that future together.

If you’d like to explore this topic in more depth, a podcast episode is available that covers all this information and more. You can find the link below and consider subscribing to the podcast AI Tools for Sales Pros on your favorite podcast player.

From 10 to 100 Customers: Scaling Your Sales Process for Growth

From 10 to 100 Customers: Scaling Your Sales Process for Growth

For founders of companies, the journey of a business is a narrative of evolution, growth, and constant adaptation. As salespeople, sales managers, and CEOs, we are all too familiar with the challenges and triumphs that punctuate this journey. In the world of sales, one of the most critical turning points is the transition from acquiring your first ten customers to expanding your customer base to 50 or even 100. This pivotal moment sets the trajectory of a business and is a key focus of our discussion.

When you’re starting, the founding team is focused on acquiring those first ten customers. They’re trying to find their footing in the market, identify their target audience, and refine their product or service offering. You might be customizing your product or service for each customer to ensure it fits their specific needs. However, as you aim for the next level of growth, it’s crucial to start thinking about systemizing your sales process. This will ensure efficiency and prepare you for the next level of growth. 

To scale effectively, company leaders need to standardize their product or service offering. While customization can be beneficial in the early stages, it becomes impractical and inefficient as your customer base grows. The key here is to create a product or service that can be sold repeatedly with minimal adjustments. This streamlines the sales process, making it easier for others to sell the product or service.

In the early stages of a business, the founders might be the ones doing all the selling. But as the company grows, this becomes less feasible. To reach a larger number of customers, you need to bring others on board to sell for you. This is where standardization comes into play. By standardizing your product or service, you make it easier for others to understand and sell it. 

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Sales Management with AI: Chat Interfaces vs. Automation Workflows

Sales Management with AI: Chat Interfaces vs. Automation Workflows

Sales organizations today face a critical decision: should they rely on interactive chat interfaces like ChatGPT, Claude, or Gemini, or should they focus on automation workflows? The answer isn’t either/or. Each approach has unique strengths, and choosing the right one directly impacts sales processes, productivity, and revenue generation.

The problem many sales teams encounter is “random implementation.” They hear about a new AI tool, adopt it quickly, and use it for the wrong purpose. The result? Chat interfaces get bogged down with repetitive work, and automation gets tasked with jobs that require creativity and nuance. Misuse not only reduces efficiency but also frustrates teams and erodes trust in artificial intelligence altogether.

So how do you know when chat is the right fit? The decision comes down to task complexity and uniqueness. Chat excels in situations that require creativity, flexibility, and human judgment. Four categories consistently stand out:

  • Creative and strategic tasks: proposals, executive messaging, strategic planning, and competitive positioning.
  • Complex problem-solving: sales opportunity strategy sessions, unique customer needs, and crisis management.
  • Learning and development: role-playing objection handling, skill coaching, and competitive intelligence training.
  • Research and analysis: prospect research, market analysis, and strategic planning.

Real-world examples show why this matters. Sales teams that use chat interfaces to refine proposals or craft custom strategies consistently achieve better win rates. Reps practicing objections with conversational AI ramp faster and perform better. Strategic analysis guided by chat tools generates insights that canned research often misses.

The key takeaway is straightforward: chat interfaces are most effective when tasks require human oversight, creativity, and iterative improvement. These are the high-value, low-frequency tasks where human expertise combined with AI delivers maximum impact. For repetitive, high-volume processes, automation is the right tool.

The future of B2B sales isn’t about choosing between humans and AI. It’s about humans amplified by AI. Let’s build that future together.

If you’d like to explore this topic in more depth, a podcast episode is available that covers all this information and more. You can find the link below and consider subscribing to the podcast AI Tools for Sales Pros on your favorite podcast player.

Transform Your Sales Team: Strategic Compensation Adjustments for Year-End Momentum

Transform Your Sales Team: Strategic Compensation Adjustments for Year-End Momentum

Autumn is the time of year for sales leaders, managers, and CEOs to begin laying the groundwork for next year’s success. Have you considered how your current sales compensation plans impact your team’s motivation and productivity? Now is the ideal moment to evaluate, adjust, and deliver these plans, preferably by December 1st. Doing so can significantly influence your team’s drive to close deals in December and build momentum heading into the next fiscal year.

Sales compensation should be motivating and rewarding for employees. It directly shapes your sales team’s behaviors and priorities. An effective plan incentivizes the right actions and deters the wrong ones.

Consider a common pitfall: salespeople holding back deals to inflate their numbers for the following year. Does your current compensation structure inadvertently reward this practice? If so, you’re unintentionally harming your year-end results.

To counter this, strategically incorporate compensation escalators and cliffs into your plan. Escalators progressively reward increased sales performance throughout the year. Higher performance equals higher commission rates, driving your sales team to push forward continually. 

Commission cliffs reset commission rates at the beginning of each year, creating a sense of urgency to close deals before the end of December. Communicating these compensation details clearly by early December ensures your team understands what’s at stake.

Don’t hold your team back!

Another critical compensation consideration is eliminating commission caps. While some organizations cap commissions to control expenses, this practice can backfire dramatically. Caps tell your top-performing salespeople that their exceptional efforts are neither valued nor rewarded appropriately. This demotivates your top talent and encourages them to seek opportunities elsewhere that offer uncapped rewards. 

Removing commission caps signals that the organization fully supports and rewards outstanding performance. Have you considered how much growth your company might achieve if artificial constraints didn’t limit your sales team?

When evaluating compensation, look beyond simple cost containment. Consider the true profitability of incentivizing increased sales volume. Once salespeople reach their targets and enter accelerators, each additional dollar earned typically comes at a lower incremental cost to your organization. 

Sales transactions earlier in the year have already covered the salesperson’s base salary once they have met their annual quota. In fact, at 100% of quota, the salesperson should have covered all their costs and their share of the overall company’s revenue needs. Thus, every extra sale at escalated commission rates still contributes positively to your overall profitability. 

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Choosing the Right AI Stack for Your Sales Organization

Choosing the Right AI Stack for Your Sales Organization

A VP of Sales recently confided in me: “We have six different AI tools, but our reps are still doing manual work. What went wrong?”

This is the AI tool proliferation problem. Sales leaders often collect tools without a strategy, mistaking a pile of features for a cohesive system. It’s like buying a hammer, screwdriver, saw, and drill without realizing you’re actually trying to build a house. An effective AI stack means integration. When tools work together, they amplify each other’s value. When they don’t, they add complexity, confusion, and wasted money.

Why Strategy Beats Random Adoption

Random tool adoption is rampant across sales organizations. Teams chase shiny new software, often ending up with overlapping features, siloed data, and productivity lost to tool-switching. Instead of solving problems, the stack itself becomes the problem.

But when built strategically, the benefits are profound. Integrated systems reduce manual data entry, accelerate response times, and deliver actionable insights for reps. Three well-chosen, well-connected tools can outperform six isolated ones. Integrated stacks also improve adoption rates by providing consistent interfaces and reducing training overhead.

The Five-Layer AI Stack Framework

To avoid the chaos of random adoption, I use a five-layer framework for structuring sales AI tools:

  1. Data Foundation – Your CRM and data management system, enriched and maintained for accuracy.
  2. Intelligence & Analytics – AI-driven insights, lead scoring, forecasting, and market intelligence.
  3. Automation & Workflow – Sequences, task automation, and cross-platform orchestration.
  4. Content & Communication – AI writing, proposal generation, and customer-facing tools.
  5. Optimization & Learning – Conversation analysis, performance tracking, and continuous improvement.

These layers aren’t just categories; they’re connected through data flows and integration principles. Each layer enhances the next, creating a system that scales intelligently with your team.

Your foundation layer usually consumes about half of your AI stack budget, but it’s worth it. Clean, structured data is the lifeblood of every other tool. From there, intelligence and automation layers drive the bulk of ROI by improving deal velocity, conversion rates, and rep efficiency.

Content tools and optimization layers build on that foundation, ensuring customer-facing communication remains sharp while performance is continually refined. When done right, this phased approach allows organizations to see value in months, not years.

Too many organizations make predictable mistakes: choosing tools for features rather than integration, underestimating training and adoption costs, or layering new tools on top of dirty data. Others rush implementation without testing, or ignore governance and compliance until it’s too late. The result? Expensive tools with low adoption and little measurable impact.

The lesson is simple: treat your AI stack like architecture. Every decision influences the system’s stability and scalability for years to come.

Real-World Configurations

  • Small teams may thrive with Pipedrive, Make.com, and ChatGPT handling CRM, workflows, and content.
  • Mid-market firms often layer Salesforce, Gong, Outreach, and PandaDoc for stronger intelligence and automation.
  • Enterprises combine Salesforce, advanced data platforms, SalesLoft, Gong, and dedicated optimization teams for scale.

These examples prove the point: success isn’t about tool count, it’s about fit, flow, and integration.

The Competitive Advantage of Integration

Companies with strategic AI stacks create barriers that their competitors can’t easily replicate. Data integration, consistent workflows, and continuous optimization compound value over time. The earlier you get your architecture right, the stronger your long-term advantage becomes.

And remember: the future of sales isn’t about humans versus AI. It’s about humans amplified by AI.

Immediate Action Items

  1. Inventory your current AI tools and map them to the five-layer framework.
  2. Identify missing layers and integration opportunities.
  3. Calculate the ROI of your current stack by measuring time saved, deals accelerated, and revenue uplift.
  4. Create a phased implementation plan using a 12-month roadmap.
  5. Establish data governance processes to protect the foundation of your stack.
  6. Pilot integrations before rolling them out team-wide.

If you want to go deeper into this topic, listen to Episode 7 of AI Tools for Sales Pros: Choosing the Right AI Stack for Your Sales Organization. You’ll find it on your favorite podcast player. Be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss the next episode: The AI Sales Process Map.

Mastering Sales Channels: How to Align Your Strategy for Maximum Impact

Mastering Sales Channels: How to Align Your Strategy for Maximum Impact

Understanding the dynamics of sales channels can transform how businesses approach their markets. Many sales professionals, whether they are salespeople, managers, or CEOs, often miss a critical distinction: the difference between the product they are selling and the value it provides. 

This gap in understanding can lead to suboptimal sales performance, particularly in environments where products are sold through intermediaries, such as distributors, referral partners, or dealer networks. The challenge is not just about knowing your product, but also about understanding how to position it in a way that resonates with every player in the sales chain.

Sales success starts with recognizing who your true customer is. In sales management or channel sales, the end customer is often not the person you interact with directly. Instead, your “customer” might be the intermediary, your distributor, reseller, or even your own sales team. These intermediaries are the ones who ultimately connect your product to its final user. If you don’t understand their challenges, motivations, and context, you risk failing to equip them with the necessary tools to succeed. Are you selling a product’s features, or are you helping them understand how to sell it effectively? This distinction is vital.

When selling through intermediaries, the emphasis should shift from “what the product does” to “how the product can be sold.” Your distributors or referral partners don’t need every technical detail of your product. They need clarity on how it solves problems for their customers, how it fits into their existing offerings, and how they can position it to drive sales. 

The goal is not to overwhelm your partners with information but to provide actionable insights that align with their specific needs. If you’re focusing solely on product features, you’re likely missing the mark.

Salespeople and sales managers must also recognize the game they are playing. Are you selling a commodity, a widely available product, or an exclusive offering? Each scenario demands a different strategy. 

Commodities often compete on price, necessitating bulk sales or value-added services to differentiate themselves. Widely available products often rely on relationships, service quality, or unique add-ons to differentiate themselves. Exclusive products, on the other hand, can often avoid price wars by emphasizing their uniqueness and superior quality. Knowing which game you’re in allows you to tailor your approach and avoid misaligned strategies.

For small businesses and solopreneurs, the challenge lies in effectively managing referral partners. Referral partnerships are a powerful way to generate leads, but they require careful management and oversight. 

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Two Tall Guys Talking Sales – How Sales Leaders Use CRMs to Align Sales Processes, Value Selling, and Revenue Management – Episode 152

Two Tall Guys Talking Sales – How Sales Leaders Use CRMs to Align Sales Processes, Value Selling, and Revenue Management – Episode 152

In this episode of Two Tall Guys Talking Sales, hosts Kevin Lawson and Sean O’Shaughnessey build on last week’s discussion of qualification methodologies and take the conversation further—into how these frameworks should live inside your CRM. From aligning sales processes with the buyer’s journey to enforcing accountability at each stage, this conversation offers practical strategies that every sales leader and salesperson can implement. Expect a deep dive into sales management, revenue generation, sales processes, and how value selling thrives when marketing and sales teams work in sync.

Key Topics Discussed

  • Why your CRM is the right home for qualification methodologies (00:48)
  • Best practices for embedding qualification questions into sales processes (02:01)
  • How sales leaders enforce discipline and consistency across teams (03:18)
  • Eliminating Excel spreadsheets and consolidating data for effective revenue management (05:12)
  • Aligning marketing collateral with sales strategies to support qualification and value selling (06:00)
  • Real-world stories of late-stage deal failures caused by missing buyer-side approvals (10:21)

Key Quotes

  • Kevin Lawson (05:12): “Oh, please, oh, please evacuate Excel spreadsheets from your solution guide… For the purposes of this discussion, we want to strenuously avoid having third-party apps disconnected from your system.”
  • Sean O’Shaughnessey (10:40): “There is nothing worse than missing your quarterly number because you didn’t know how they were going to buy… Knowing the paperwork process is the difference between celebrating the win and missing your commission check.”
  • Kevin Lawson (14:10): “Having a qualification methodology mapped into your CRM, aligned with a buyer’s journey and supported by marketing resources, gives you a fully wrapped system that prevents that dreaded CEO call asking, ‘What’s the status of that deal?’”

Additional Resources

A Significant Actionable Item from this Podcast

Embed your qualification methodology directly into your CRM, tied to each stage of your sales process.

Don’t let critical deal information reside inside spreadsheets or Word docs; configure your CRM so progression requires those qualification questions to be answered. This not only improves sales accuracy but also enhances revenue management, ensures consistency across your team, and creates alignment with marketing resources to drive value selling.

Summary

This episode of Two Tall Guys Talking Sales is a must-listen for anyone serious about building sustainable sales success. Sean and Kevin reveal how sales strategies such as qualification methodologies come to life when fully integrated into CRM-driven sales processes. You’ll learn why sales management must prioritize data consistency, how business acumen prevents late-stage deal disasters, and how aligning messaging between sales and marketing fuels stronger revenue generation. If you want practical insights on improving your sales processes and elevating your organization’s performance, download this episode today and start putting these best practices to work.

From Manual to Automated: A Sales Pro’s Guide to Zapier, Make.com, n8n, and Pipedream

From Manual to Automated: A Sales Pro’s Guide to Zapier, Make.com, n8n, and Pipedream

A sales manager recently told me something that stuck: “We went from twenty hours per week of manual work to two hours. Our lead response time dropped from four hours to four minutes.” That dramatic transformation wasn’t magic—it was automation.

The reality is that sales teams today have more automation tools available than ever before. But with options like Zapier, Make.com, n8n, and Pipedream, the real challenge isn’t whether you should automate—it’s choosing the right platform for your team. Each one comes with strengths, limitations, and unique philosophies. Get that choice wrong, and you’ll waste time, money, and buy-in. Get it right, and you’ll see efficiency gains that completely reshape your sales process.

Why Platform Choice Matters

Many sales teams stumble when they underestimate the cost of a mismatched platform. Some platforms are too simple to scale beyond basic automations. Others are too complex, leaving non-technical teams overwhelmed and projects abandoned. Switching platforms midstream is not only disruptive—it’s expensive and time-consuming. Integration limitations, hidden in the fine print, often surface only after a team has invested weeks in setup.

The right platform, however, unlocks real productivity gains. I’ve seen companies scale from five to fifty automations without hiring additional staff. I’ve seen sales teams reduce errors through automated data transfers, and I’ve seen response times improve from hours to mere minutes. Those results come from aligning platform capabilities with team comfort and long-term strategy.

Breaking Down the Four Platforms

Zapier is often the starting point. It’s user-friendly, highly intuitive, and backed by the largest integration library in the market. For sales teams with little to no technical experience, it’s a great way to achieve quick wins—connecting CRMs, email platforms, and lead management tools in minutes. The trade-off, of course, is cost at scale and limited customization for advanced workflows.

Make.com represents the next step up. It’s a visual workflow builder designed for teams that need more sophisticated automations but still want a no-code interface. It handles complex branching logic, advanced data transformations, and high-volume workflows at a fraction of Zapier’s cost. But it comes with a steeper learning curve and requires more planning.

n8n is the open-source powerhouse. Unlike Zapier or Make.com, there are no artificial limits on workflow complexity or execution. It can be self-hosted, giving technical teams total control over security, customization, and cost. It’s ideal for organizations with developers or strong technical resources. The downside? It requires real expertise, both to implement and to maintain.

Finally, there’s Pipedream, which includes String. It blends accessibility with developer power, offering real-time event processing, API flexibility, and built-in coding support for JavaScript and Python. It’s the platform of choice for teams that want advanced, responsive automations but are comfortable getting hands-on with APIs and code when needed.

Matching Platforms to Your Team

The key to success is not asking which platform is “best,” but which is “best for us.” If your team is non-technical and just needs quick, reliable automations, Zapier is the natural fit. If you want advanced workflows without hiring developers, Make.com is the right middle ground. If you have developers or strong technical resources, n8n gives you unlimited control at a fraction of the long-term cost. And if your workflows demand real-time responsiveness and advanced API integrations, Pipedream is worth serious consideration.

Think carefully about your team’s technical comfort, the complexity of your use cases, your budget for scale, and your integration requirements. These factors should guide your decision far more than flashy features or marketing claims.

Taking the First Step

The best way to move forward is to experiment. Sign up for free accounts on two platforms and run the same simple workflow in each. For example, capture a new lead from your website, push it into your CRM, and trigger an automated welcome email. Watch how each platform handles it. Document the process, note the pain points, and gather feedback from your team.

Once you’ve seen the difference firsthand, you’ll know where to invest. Start small, prove the value quickly, and then scale. Over time, your automation strategy can evolve into a foundational pillar of your sales operations.

You can learn more by listening to my podcast episode for AI Tools for Sales Pros. Check out the episode here:

Join the B2B Sales Lab

If this episode leaves you curious—or perhaps a bit overwhelmed—remember that you don’t have to navigate these decisions alone. Inside the B2B Sales Lab, you’ll find sales professionals who are actively testing these platforms, sharing workflows, and troubleshooting challenges. It’s a private, member-led community where sales pros exchange real-world experience, not theory.

Designed and led by veteran sales leaders, the Lab is where strategy meets execution. Whether you’re evaluating platforms, designing your first automation, or scaling to dozens of workflows, you’ll find actionable insights and peers who’ve been there before.

👉 You can join today with a free 90-day membership at b2b-sales-lab.com.

Turning Around Sales Performance: Strategies for CEOs and Sales Managers to Foster Internal Alignment

Turning Around Sales Performance: Strategies for CEOs and Sales Managers to Foster Internal Alignment

Navigating a sales turnaround isn’t just about fixing numbers; it’s about transforming the business. It’s about realigning expectations, rebuilding internal trust, and creating a structured, sustainable path forward. 

If you’re a CEO, sales manager, or a key salesperson in your organization, the pressure to reverse a sales slump can feel overwhelming. However, the truth is that turnarounds aren’t made in a sprint; they’re built through clarity, consistency, and effective communication.

Too often, sales leaders make the mistake of focusing only on the downward trend. They get caught up in the urgency of the numbers and forget that the real challenge lies in managing upward, setting expectations with executive leadership, and aligning them with reality. 

If your sales team is underperforming, your internal stakeholders are your new audience. Just as with external prospects, you need to manage their expectations with a clear, actionable plan.

The process starts with a shift in mindset. 

Instead of viewing upper management as critics, think of them as clients. What do they need to believe in this turnaround? What information do they need to trust your leadership? Start by building a high-level outline. Avoid over-engineering the details in the early stages. Focus on where you want to go, then reverse-engineer the steps to get there.

Every turnaround starts from a rear position. That means your first job is to stop the downward momentum. Before you can scale revenue, you need to stabilize it. That requires a clear definition of success, agreed upon by everyone involved. 

  • Are you trying to double revenue in 12 months? 
  • Or just return to last year’s baseline? 
  • Is that goal realistic given your market, team, and resources? 

If not, revise it. A stretch goal is fine. A fantasy is not.

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From Reporting to Coaching: Elevate Your One-on-One Sales Meetings to Drive Performance and Trust

From Reporting to Coaching: Elevate Your One-on-One Sales Meetings to Drive Performance and Trust

A one-on-one sales meeting is not a reporting meeting. It’s not about reviewing what already happened. And it’s definitely not about the manager doing most of the talking. The purpose of a one-on-one pipeline review is to develop the salesperson, surface challenges, and accelerate opportunities. If your one-on-ones are anything less, you’re leaving performance on the table.

Sales leaders often default to micromanagement. 

Especially when the rep is new or struggling. But that approach backfires. It creates dependency and stifles problem-solving. The goal is to coach your reps into leading the meeting. That shift changes everything. When reps own the agenda and bring forward deal-level insights, they’re forced to think critically. That’s where growth happens.

If you’re leading a sales team or are a CEO playing the role of sales manager, you need to establish a clear structure. But the rep does the prep. You define the meeting cadence and format. Weekly or bi-weekly, depending on your velocity. You outline the sections: committed deals, stalled deals, and at-risk deals. 

But the rep fills in the content. They come to the meeting ready to walk you through each opportunity, with specific updates and clear asks.

Preparation is non-negotiable. For both sides. 

The salesperson should have updated their CRM before the meeting. The manager should have reviewed that data in advance. If either party shows up unprepared, the meeting becomes reactive. 

A waste of time. And it erodes trust quickly. 

Reps notice when you haven’t read the notes. They know when you’re winging it. And if they feel their effort isn’t valued, they’ll stop putting in the effort.

You want to create a culture where preparation is expected and rewarded. 

The fastest way to management failure is to ask questions that could have been answered by reading the CRM. Instead, use that time: 

  • To probe deeper. 
  • Ask about the deal strategy. 
  • Challenge assumptions. 
  • Help salespeople spot gaps they missed. 

That’s where your experience has real value.

It’s tempting to jump in and solve the problem. Especially when you see the red flags before the rep does. But resist the urge. Let them talk it through. Coach them toward the insight. Your job isn’t to close the deal; it’s to build someone who can. That means teaching them how to identify weak spots, how to pressure test a deal, and how to re-engage a stalled buyer. The real value of one-on-ones is in that development.

Think about how you coach. 

Are you diagnosing for them? Or are you helping them diagnose for themselves? When a rep says “this deal is solid, no issues,” that’s a red flag. Every deal has risk. Your job is to help them uncover it. Ask: “What’s the biggest thing that could derail this?” Or “What’s the last thing the buyer said that gave you pause?” These questions surface the truth. And they teach reps to self-assess more effectively.

There’s a fine line between coaching and grading. You want reps to be honest about their pipeline without fear of judgment. 

If a deal is weak, that’s not a character flaw. It’s a coaching moment. 

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