Boston Consulting Group argues that persistent sales underperformance is driven less by seller capability and more by weak planning, misaligned territories, and flawed incentives, noting only ~30% of sellers expect to hit quota. The paper positions Sales Performance Management (SPM) as a core strategic capability—not a sales ops task—integrating sales resourcing, deployment, and motivation into one data-driven system. Effective SPM aligns headcount modeling, territory design, quota setting, incentives, and coaching using integrated tools and cross-functional data from sales, finance, marketing, HR, and product. Poor SPM leads to 2–5% revenue leakage, excess commissions, and lost selling time, while mature SPM improves agility, transparency, ROI, and execution. BCG emphasizes leadership ownership, connected tooling, strong data foundations, and specialized expertise to turn SPM into a durable growth engine rather than a reactive planning exercise.

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