If your best sales representative is not taking recruiter calls or checking the market once a quarter, then you do not have a high performer. You have a comfortable one.
Let me be brutally clear: top-tier salespeople operate with leverage. They produce results that fund your payroll, power your marketing engine, and often cover the misfires of their average colleagues. They are team players who pull others up along their journey. And because of that, they know, and you should know as well, that they are never truly locked in. They are renting their desk by the quarter. Rent is paid in revenue.
The Fallacy of Loyalty in Sales
Founders / CEOS LOVE the idea of loyalty. Build a great culture. Compensate fairly. Offer upward mobility. In theory, this environment creates long-term commitment.
While this environment can create long-term commitment, it can create the wrong kind.
Elite sales talent is not wired like most. They are not interested in tenure trophies or your latest team-building initiative. Their loyalty is to performance, personal growth, autonomy, and upside. If another company offers more of those, they will listen.
This is not disloyalty. This is business.
You would not blame an investor for rebalancing their portfolio. Do not blame a sales assassin for doing the same with their career.
The Cost of Complacency
Complacent sales teams bleed companies dry. You can spot them easily:
-
Quarterly forecasts that slip into fantasy
-
Pipeline reviews that sound like fiction
-
Sales huddles that feel more like group therapy
- Bottom performers are retained when they should be encouraged to seek opportunities elsewhere
When you do not have sales representatives with one foot out the door, you do not have the right pressure. Hunger evaporates. Urgency fades. Mediocrity becomes baked into your culture code.
The Rockefeller Habits demand crystal-clear accountability structures. These include individual KPIs, critical numbers, and weekly performance visibility. If your top representatives are not thinking, “Am I still the top earner here, or should I start taking those recruiter calls more seriously?” then you have failed to build a high-performance environment.
How to Lead Them (Without Losing Them)
So how do you keep these apex performers engaged without chaining them down?
1. Give Them Room to Win
Do not micromanage. Instead, set targets that stretch them and reward creativity in execution. Top salespeople are not process-driven robots. They are resourceful, adaptive, and outcome-focused. Let them play to win.
2. Create a Compensation Structure That Scales
Your best closer should make more than your average executive. If your comp plan does not make room for outsized success, they will go where one does. Commission caps are handcuffs. Remove them.
3. Make Winning a Status Symbol
Public scoreboards. Recognition in all-hands meetings. Access to strategic projects. Top performers should not just earn more. They should be visibly elevated. That creates a culture where performance is not just expected. It is celebrated.
4. Always Be Recruiting, Even Internally
Top talent is always evaluating options. Show them why staying with you is the best move. Regular career conversations. Internal advancement paths. Equity participation. If you are not actively reselling the opportunity, you are passively encouraging them to look elsewhere.
5. Make Living Your Culture Code a Requirement
Winning is essential. Winning the right way is everything...
Your culture code must be one of accountability, integrity, strong performance, AND service to one another. This is where it gets dicey because if you allow mediocrity, the best salespeople will not respect your culture code. In fact. The best salespeople expect to be pushed by their supervisor and one another. The best salespeople seek opportunities to both challenge AND raise one another up. Iron sharpens iron.
Final Thought
Having top salespeople with one foot out the door is not a threat. It is a signal. A signal that your bar is high. A signal that your culture rewards performance AND modeling of a strong culture code. A signal that your company is built for scale.
The moment your top salesperson gets too comfortable, you should get concerned. Hunger, not harmony, drives revenue growth.
If you want comfort, build a family. If you want results, build a team of killers.
And remember, you are not running a charity. You are building an empire. Lead accordingly.
Article Origin Note
I am often asked about the source of the articles I write. Every article represents a lesson learned and / or a powerful concept captured in a moment. This particular article is inspired by my good friend and brother Jess Biller. Jess, his daughter Amanda, my son Macauley and I recently spent some time together sharpening our respective axes and breaking bread together. During a discussion, Jess literally said, "Top Salespeople Always Have One Foot Out the Door".
If you are an executive - particularly in a trade association, you owe it to yourself, your team and those you serve to engage Jess Biller and Amanda Biller of PCG - Successful Hiring. Their team takes a hands-on approach to finding the right people for your team. They recruit top performers for pivotal roles. In addition, we provide onboarding support, training, organizational development, and coaching programs that result in effective, efficient, and engaged teams.
Chris Young is a Trusted Advisor To Founders / CEOs | Certified Scaling Up Coach | Builder of People, Leaders, Teams & Economic Moats | Strategist and proud founder of The Rainmaker Group.
