Big mistakes are being made by sales managers every day when it comes to reviewing quotas and managing pipelines. Numbers alone will not get results. To win, dig into the “why” behind every opportunity. Surface-level reviews might look clean on a spreadsheet, but they poison performance long-term.
Let’s stop being spreadsheet jockeys. Let’s demand quality, not just quantity.
Don’t Be a Spreadsheet Jockey
Too many sales managers believe their job is done if the numbers look right in the CRM. Staring at columns, checking totals, and declaring all is well, or all is wrong, misses the point entirely.
Sales is driven by reasons, not digits. No number belongs in the pipeline without a reason. Every opportunity needs to be justified and examined for quality.
The Dangers of Pipeline Stuffing
Pipeline stuffing has become an epidemic. Too many managers push their teams for 3x, 4x, even 6x pipeline coverage, so salespeople “inflate” their pipelines to keep up. The result? Numbers that look good but mean nothing.
“Pipeline stuffing and putting things in a pipeline that are not warranted is really a result of your behavior.”
Why do so many deals miraculously close at quarter-end? Discounts, panic, and last-minute scrambling—all symptoms of quantity-first thinking.
Endemic pipeline stuffing never leads to sustainable results. What matters is real opportunity movement, not just a full-looking pipeline.
Movement Matters: Is the Pipeline Flowing?
Ask yourself: Are your opportunities progressing? Or have they stalled after weeks or months at the same stage?
A stagnant pipeline is a sewer pipe, not a flowing water tap. If opportunities aren’t moving through the stages, they don’t belong there. Deals stuck in elementary stages aren’t really deals, they’re just clogging the system.
Accepting vague updates compounds the problem. If the salesperson cannot share, in the customer’s actual words, exactly what the need and urgency are, they’re making it up.
“If the salesperson cannot articulate the urgency and why it is urgent, then you got to really take a step back and say, this deal doesn’t exist.”
Don’t accept assumptions. Challenge every update.
The Trap of Assumptions
Assumptions get sales teams into trouble. Whenever a salesperson claims to have a solid opportunity, ask: What specific questions did you ask? What did you hear? Who are the contacts? Are these people decision-makers or just interested bystanders?
If a salesperson says they only have two contacts on a big opportunity, that’s a red flag. Real deals, especially large complex ones, require multiple contacts—often ten or more!
Unchallenged assumptions lead to disappointment. If salespeople aren’t challenged to provide concrete evidence, everyone ends up believing a pipe dream.
Coaching Beats Reporting
Reviewing numbers alone accomplishes little. The goal is to review the “why” behind each number.
Coaching should replace reporting. Spend the time to do a deep dive on one account in every review session. Drill down through every scenario, challenge each assumption, and role play possible situations.
One focused, thorough review is more valuable than a dozen surface-level reports.
When managers coach this way, salespeople learn to critique themselves. That’s priceless. They also develop a better sales process, one that’s rooted in evidence, not wishful thinking.
Aim Above 100%
Never manage to exactly 100% of quota. Not every team member will deliver, and not every deal will close. Demand 110%, even 120%, to give your team, and yourself, the margin of safety needed to hit the target.
It isn’t just about hitting the number; it’s about thinking bigger, stretching beyond the obvious, and covering for unpredictability.
Set the Standard. Lead with Integrity
The best managers set high standards and lead with integrity. They coach for understanding, challenge for evidence, and drive for continuous improvement.
Get rid of pipeline pollution. Focus on why. Demand urgency and quality. Challenge every assumption. Coach, don’t just report. Aim higher than the target.
That’s how high-performance sales teams make their numbers and do it with integrity.
Mark Hunter :
There are some big, giant mistakes that sales managers make when reviewing sales quotas and looking at pipelines, and you can’t afford to be making those mistakes. Hey, why am I talking? Let’s get the show going. Right now you’re listening to the Sales Hunter podcast with Mark Hunter, where the focus is to help you as a salesman, sell with confidence and integrity. And now, here’s your host. Sales managers, listen up. You cannot be a spreadsheet jockey. You cannot think that you can manage the numbers by merely looking at the CRM system, looking at the quota and saying all is well or all is wrong. That’s wrong.
Mark Hunter :
Hey, that’s looking at the numbers. You got to look at why behind the numbers, if you really want to find out, the biggest mistakes really is because you’re focusing on the numbers and not on the quality of the numbers. No number goes into a pipeline without a reason. And that’s what you got to figure out. That’s what you got to find out. Because you got to be asking your salespeople what makes this an opportunity with each individual number for a customer. What makes it. If they can’t be clear about what that is, then why is it in there? Because let me tell you something.
Mark Hunter :
You got to ask yourself and you got to ask them, they, does the number even warrant a spot in the pipeline? Too many times. They don’t. They don’t warrant. And what’s happened is that there’s a history of pipeline stuffing. Oh, don’t think that’s not happening. Because you know what? You are the one that’s contributing to it. Because you’re the one that’s saying, hey, you need to have 3x4x, 5x6x7x the number of deals that you’re going to close in your pipeline. So what happens? Salespeople beginning stuffing the pipeline.
Mark Hunter :
And the way you can really understand this is when are the deals going to close? When are they going to close? Are they suddenly going to close at quarter end? What. What leads you to believe that suddenly quarter end, all these customers are going to want to say yes. Oh, you know why they’ll say yes? Because the salesperson thinks it’s going to be a big fat discount that you’re going to authorize to allow them to close the number so you can make your number. You see, pipeline stuffing and putting things in a pipeline that are not warranted is really a result of your behavior. Yeah, I’m calling out sales managers now. Chances are this probably came from one step even above you. Yeah, see, this is A culture, it’s endemic in the sales community and we have to stop it. You see, the challenge we have here is that we have to stop and ask ourselves, and is the opportunity in the pipeline moving? In other words, you may have your pipeline set up with five, six, seven stages, four stages.
Mark Hunter :
I don’t know how many stages you have, but if it’s not moving, and I kind of use the number three every three weeks, and again, it can vary depending on the industry you’re in. I get it, I get it. The purchase frequency, the sales cycle and so forth. But if it’s not moving, why is it in there? If it’s not moving and it’s in there, at anything beyond an elementary stage, what you’re doing is you’re creating a sewer pipe. You’re creating a sewer pipe. And, and, and, and a sewer pipe is not going to make your quota. What you want is you want a water tap. In other words, you may have deals that are, so to speak, stuck because they’re down at the prospecting phase.
Mark Hunter :
Then you got to question yourself, should they even be in the CRM system? I mean, can I even validate a number against it? Because I don’t have it qualified. Which takes me to the next problem, accepting vague updates. Oh, this is, this is, this is so damaging. You see, we ask salespeople, so what’s the need? How do you know that? And if they can’t give you the exact words that the customer shared with you that the customer shared with them, they’re making it up. They’re making it up. They are guilty of assumption. I’m going to talk about more, I’m going to talk more about that in a bit. But what they’re doing is they’re simply saying things based on what they assume is going to happen and really goes to this one, what’s the urgency? What is the urgency? And again, if the salesperson cannot articulate the urgency and why it is urgent, then you got to really take a step back and say, this deal doesn’t exist.
Mark Hunter :
Hey, if you may be a salesperson, and I hope you’re listening to this because you know what, what I’m telling sales managers applies to you. It applies to you. You have to be, you see, you really got to stop and then ask yourself, who are your contacts? Sales managers be asking your salesperson, who are their contacts with the, you know, email in the customer, who’s the buyer? And what credibility do these people have? Because in other words, is the salesperson kind of blowing smoke at you or Is the salesperson serious and is the salesperson giving you names that are credible names? You see, it is so easy for salespeople to get caught up with buyers. They think they’re buyers, but they’re people who just have interest, they don’t have intent. That’s what you’re really trying to figure out here. You’re really trying to figure out what’s the need, what’s the urgency. Salespeople listening to this, Are you paying attention? Yeah, because these are the questions you’ve got to be asking yourself. And it takes me to the, to my next point is not challenging assumptions.
Mark Hunter :
Assumptions get salespeople into trouble. Ask the salesperson specifically what are the questions you’ve asked, what are the specific questions you’ve asked and what were the follow up questions? In other words, it isn’t just the question you asked, but then what did the customer say and what was the follow up question? You have to go in and do a, a full analysis, full review of sales calls. Now here’s what I’m going to challenge you as a sales manager. While you’re doing this, as you’re doing this, you know what’s going to happen. You are teaching the salesperson to do it themselves. When you do this right, you are teaching the salesperson how to do it themselves. Because the other question comes along is, is who else are they talking to? And so you got to stop and ask, are there even enough relationships? This again helps me get beyond just interest. 2 and 10.
Mark Hunter :
You may be closing large deals. Large deals, large complex deals. And the salesperson says, they’ve got two contacts. That’s not going to be enough. That’s not going to be enough. You see, you begin to compare that with others customers in your ICP that you’ve closed. And maybe you’ve got a history of customers in this ICP where it’s 10, 12, 14 contacts. And this salesperson says, oh, they’ve got two contacts, but they’re really good.
Mark Hunter :
They’re really good contacts. No, it’s not going to close. It’s not going to go anywhere. You see, you have to challenge every assumption that the salesperson is making because otherwise what happens is it gets you into trouble. I can remember time and time again when I fell victim to this as a sales manager because I was being too gullible in accepting the numbers. Because the numbers look good. The numbers look like, okay, we’re going to make our number and I’m going to suit. Because this is what’s interesting.
Mark Hunter :
Numbers can cover up a Lot of sins. Numbers will cover up a lot of sins. And we as salespeople are guilty of putting them in. We put numbers into a system just to make us feel good. We put numbers into a system to help our manager feel good. You see, again, what we’re doing is we’re all just playing a game of being a spreadsheet jockey. This is why I’ve got to challenge the why. I’ve got to dig down deep.
Mark Hunter :
So if the salesperson can’t articulate specifically what the questions are that they asked, what did they hear? What were the follow up questions? Who are they talking to? What makes them valuable? What makes them so critical? And understanding the urgency and understanding all of these pieces, you are not going to have a prayer enclosing your number. And what’s going to happen is the only way you’re going to wind up closing your number is if something just randomly falls out of the sky. And two, and that’s not how I’m going to build my business. You see, here’s what I want you to do. We get into trouble on pipeline reviews because all we want to do is review the numbers. And my goal as a sales manager is to review the why behind the number. This means that coaching should replace reporting. Hey, if you’re liking this, I do hope that you leave me a quick review on your favorite podcast app, widget, whether it be Spotify, Apple, whatever.
Mark Hunter :
Leave a quick review right now. Right now. Do it. Okay, let’s talk about this whole coaching should replace reporting. I’m dead serious on this because here’s the whole thing. I’m going to be better off as a manager. If I look at a salesperson’s numbers and I take one set of numbers for one account and I drill down with them on that. Then if I to try to do a broad brush across all of them because if I do a broad brush along all of them, I’m never poking the bear enough, the salesperson enough to really get the facts.
Mark Hunter :
And what I found is this. If I can take one account and really start to unpack it. And what I mean unpack, I mean walking through each scenario you could encounter. So you ask them the questions what I’ve shared with you so far in this podcast and you say, okay, let’s start role playing, let’s start playing this out in terms of how are you going to respond to this? And you put something on table, you challenge them in coming up with the next five questions, the next ten questions, you, you continue to push them in finding ways to be prepared for every scenario. Now, what I like about this, and I’m only going to have time to probably do it to one account. That’s all. I’m going to have time because I’m going to go so deep. But what I’m doing is I’m conditioning the salesperson to be able to do this themselves.
Mark Hunter :
This is what’s absolutely key, because here’s what I found. If I can condition them to do this themselves, what’s going to happen is now they’re going to do it themselves. But if all I do is superficial, they’re never going to drill down deep. Two things come out of this. One, the salesperson now understands how to critique themselves, which is absolutely huge. That is a gift to. That is worth everything. But the other piece is this.
Mark Hunter :
They begin to develop a better sales process, because the sales process they use is a direct result of what you coach them on. So if you coach them through these examples, an example I love to use is don’t walk through this by telling them what to do. No, no, don’t. You role play it through with them and you challenge them and. And you. And you continuously hit them with different questions, different challenges, different problems. Because what you’re doing is you’re trying to prepare them not to get it right. Yeah, I said that.
Mark Hunter :
Not to get it right, but to never get it wrong. Now, I credit Nick Saban with that. He’s the retired coach at the University of Alabama, what, seven national championships? Yeah. He always said that practice was about not to get a play right. But we’re going to keep running it until we never get it wrong. You see? And what I found is this. If I can take you as a salesperson and do a deep dive on one specific account, I will be much better off than superficially glossing over all of them. Because if I gloss over all of them, the salesperson then learns how to really gloss over everything that they’re doing.
Mark Hunter :
Yeah, but if I take one and drill down now, the account that I pick is going to be an important one. It’s going to be an important one. It’s going to be a key piece of it. But you know that if you get that right, you’re there. Now, the piece that I’m trying to get to. With your quota, your pipeline review is this. I can’t have my salespeople developing a number that gets to 100. I can’t.
Mark Hunter :
I can’t. Because if I have, we’ll say I manage eight salespeople and they all have numbers. That are going to get them to 8% or, you know, get them to 100. Not all those eight people are going to hit their number. If one or two fall short, I fall short. I’ve got to create opportunities. I got to challenge my salespeople to sit there and say, I want you to deliver it 100% plus, because I need that. Because I need you to think bigger than the challenge that’s there.
Mark Hunter :
And in future weeks, we’re going to dive into this because I’m going into a series here of trying to demonstrate to you sales leaders how to lead with integrity. Because this, this. This is really what it’s all about. It’s. It’s leadership and performance, and it’s about doing it with integrity. And it comes right out of my book, Integrity first selling. But see, what we’re doing here is I’m trying to set up my salespeople to where they don’t deliver to 100%, but they deliver to 110, 120%, because that’s going to have them more likely hitting at least 100%. And it’s also going to cover should one or two people fall short.
Mark Hunter :
Hey, I do this episode twice a week. One like this, where we unpack a single topic. Second one with a subject matter expert. Do me a favor. Leave me a review on your favorite podcast app. Hey, reach out to me. Also, if you’re having a sales kickoff meeting, we need to talk. I’d love to come in and share with you.
Mark Hunter :
Let me talk to you. As management group, I do this a lot. Hey, my name is Mark Hunter, the sales center. I do it because I want to help you see and achieve what you didn’t think was possible. Great selling.
