[johngalt]

I was very pro-comissions until I worked commissioned sales. Completely agree with the author.

I had extremely high numbers, but I hated the work environment. Suddenly every other salesperson wants a piece of you. Trying to stick their names in for a percentage of the sale. Screwing my long term clients for a very small short term sale. Even breaking into my desk to copy my book of business. Adding commissions = scorched earth among co-workers. Not even talking about how this affects training/new hires.

Without incentive my performance would have been equal or better. Commission sales specifically attracts sociopaths.

edit: Despite the above; I think hackers should try a real sales job at some point. It's empowering once you learn how easy it is.

[notahacker]

I worked in a commission sales environment and had a completely different experience. Probably your company management sucked. As it is I had my reservations about my management too, but the payment of commission has the neat effect on focusing attention on boosting their bottom line and diverting oneself away from most of the other dubious metrics they liked to distract me with.

I raised an eyebrow when Joe referred to system-gaming by "making fake phone calls to hit call numbers". If you're incentivising staff with ensuring they adhere to largely meaningless metrics like that you're doing it wrong (it's more or less exactly analogous to judging programmers by their lines of code). Beating them with a stick for not meeting those sort of targets is "coercion", not to mention requiring data-collection time sink; offering a carrot for things sold, which presumably requires tracking anyway, isn't.

Commission sales specifically attracts people who consider themselves to be better than average salespeople. Yes, sometimes they have sociopathic tendencies (although they tend to be the ones who only think they're good). Yes, without going to the ridiculous lengths of some recruiters, good salespeople do tend to have a more mercenary attitude towards work than programmers (they don't have weekend cold calling projects either!), just as programmers on average have somewhat different motivating factors at work from investment bankers, academics and actual rock stars. Even if greed isn't always good, sales roles with an absence of commission and commensurately higher salary incentivises those who suck at selling (or who despite impressive credentials suck at selling your product specifically) to stick around longer. If you're a startup, you're probably not able to offer your staff as attractive a package as Fog Creek or select your salespeople so successfully in the first place.

I agree with the original poster that sales jobs are a good idea for hackers considering starting a startup

[krschultz]

I didn't have that at all. I did did commissioned sales for several years, and then I worked at a company as an engineer that had commissioned sales guys. Yes, you had to hand out the new customer leads equitably or people would freak out. But none of the stuff you mentioned happened. That sounds like a toxic work environment.

edit: I worked at a place where the salary was enough to cover me and the commission was a bonus of 50-150% on top of the salary. I always knew I was at least starting at a living wage. If I was starting at 0, it might be different. Also, we would do 1-2 sales per day, so the volume was high enough that a lead here or there didn't matter. But in businesses where a sales guy makes 3 or 5 sales a month, I can see why each individual sale can be fought over.

[contravert]

Can you elaborate on what you mean by "how easy it is"?

[johngalt]

Maybe it was colored by my expectations going in. With no prior experience, I'd assumed that sales was an arcane art. A combination of charisma and manipulation. Working in a sales role, I felt out of my element for months. Until I learned that sales is a building process just like anything else.

Create a system where you maximize the number of people weighted by their need of what you sell. Presented at a timely moment. The client should see you as a domain expert, and someone who makes the process frictionless. Pricing is a surprisingly small part of it. If you can build a good process, you'll sell 10x what the car salesman types will.

Unconventional approaches to sales are the most successful, so a hacker mindset pays off. Once I got over my initial fears, it was quite easy to get the high score :)

[AnonSales]

I don't want to speak for John, but this is my answer to the same question: "Sales isn't rocket science, it just takes someone who is comfortable talking to people...and when you're selling something you believe in, that's really easy to do."

[wtvanhest]

It depends on the type of sales. Selling two sided markets is much, much harder. Through in required analysis and it takes a lot.

Examples: Real estate Brokerage &

Investment banking

Etc.

I am intrigued by the idea of no commissions in some if not all sales jobs. If the person isn't selling you can fire them. If they do well in the managers judgment you can bonus them. While it is subjective, almost all business decisions are. A good manager is good at making good subjective decisions.

[gamble]

It's a good philosophy to start from, but you can't have a career in sales without eventually being forced to push products that no reasonable person would believe in.

Perhaps I've been soured by the particular salespeople I've worked with, but I don't think it's a job that ethical or sane people thrive in long-term because there are eventually going to be situations where management expects results that can't be achieved without deceptive behaviour. Most of the successful salespeople I've known have been greedy, delusional, unethical, or borderline sociopaths. The really good salespeople are the ones that can hide it until a critical moment.

[dcpdx]

As a sales professional myself, I find it disheartening that so many view salespeople in the manner described. One of the cardinal rules of being a truly great salesperson is to believe in what you're selling (Zig Ziglar talks about this often). If you don't, customers and prospects will not only be able to smell it from a mile away, but your passion and desire to succeed will be nonexistent and you'll have to fight for every closed deal because you won't have anything convincing to say when the person on the other end decides to call you on your bullshit. Being a truly great salesperson means fundamentally understanding the needs of the customer and working together to discover ways that your product or service can deliver them benefit and a positive ROI. Sales is about asking questions and listening intently, and I believe the truly great people find a way to effectively sit on the same side of the table as the customer while at the same time delivering the objectives that their company requires. Honesty and integrity play a huge role in selling and business relationships, and any company that understands the value of maintaining long-term business relationships will work this into their sales incentive structure.

[gamble]

I used to work for a highly sales-focused software company (6-7 figure licenses, year-long sales cycles) with some very good salesmen. It was an eye-opening experience. The really good salesmen were no more ethical than a used-car salesman, but they were very good at portraying themselves the way you describe and extremely judicious in their use of deception. Perception of honesty and integrity is very important in sales, but I have my doubts that genuinely honest people rise to the top in sales. I had the typical distrust of shady salespeople before working there, but now I'm deeply suspicious of anyone in sales, regardless of how honest they seem.

[yuhong]

That is why I mentioned that sales cooperating with engineering would be a better idea instead of incentives.