MKTG 556 | Session 6 | Managing Laggards: The Importance of a Deep Sales Bench

MKTG 556 | Session 6 | Managing Laggards: The Importance of a Deep Sales Bench - 2019 Jeffrey P. Boichuk, Raghu Bommaraju, Michael Ahearne, Florian Kraus, and Thomas J. Steenburgh Introduction: Sales leaders often threaten punishment to manage poor performers (i.e., laggards), but little research has explored the effects of such threats. This study fills that gap by examining an intervention called the "bench program" through a field-based quasi-experiment and a randomized lab experiment. In the field, the company involved informed salespeople in treatment districts that a trainee would replace them at the end of the year if they failed to meet their quota and finished last in their district. Difference-in-differences analyses of matched treatment and control groups show that the bench program had an immediate and lasting effect on performance. Additionally, laggards improved more than higher performers, and salespeople with larger advice networks improved more than those with smaller networks. A lab experiment compared the bench program with a program that carried the same firing threat but without any replacements in sight. Performance in the bench program surpassed that in the firing condition, indicating that the vividness of a threat can enhance its deterrent effect.