- Dan McKee
- Nov 19
- 5 min read
Most sales reps need 12–18 months to ramp. Firing them at 90 days kills continuity, destroys pipeline, and crushes revenue. Here's what great leaders do instead.
You're Firing Your Sales Reps Too Early (And It's Killing Your Revenue)
I keep seeing the same pattern with clients: A new enterprise sales rep joins the team. At 90-120 days, they're not consistently hitting numbers. Leadership starts questioning if they made a bad hire.
By month 6, the rep is gone or on a PIP. The cycle repeats.
Here's the problem: You're making decisions based on binary outcomes instead of understanding the context of what's actually happening in your business.
The Uncomfortable Truth About Sales Ramp Time
Industry data shows the average ramp time to full productivity for an enterprise SaaS sales rep is 12-18 months. Not 90 days. Not even 6 months.
Let's do the math:
Months 1-3: Learning product, market, process (0-25% productivity)
Months 4-6: Building their own pipeline (25-50% productivity)
Months 7-9: Closing first self-sourced deals (50-75% productivity)
Months 10-12: Approaching full productivity (80-100% quota)
If your sales cycle is 6-9 months (common in B2B SaaS), a rep needs to:
Learn everything (2-3 months)
Build pipeline (3-6 months)
Move deals through the full cycle (6-9 months)
That's 11-18 months mathematically before they're consistently closing deals they sourced and worked themselves.
The Real Cost of Impatience
When you judge a rep at 90-120 days based on closed deals, you're not evaluating their capability. You're evaluating an impossible timeline.
And here's what this costs you:
1. You Kill Continuity (Your #1 Revenue Accelerator)
Our data across hundreds of companies shows that sales reps with 24-36 months of tenure in the same company and territory consistently outperform objectively "better" sellers with just 12-18 months tenure.
The numbers are stark:
Reps with 3+ years tenure generate 167% more annual revenue than those with less than 1 year
Companies with above-average retention show 18% higher gross margins and 12% higher profitability
Industry average tenure is 16-18 months—which means most companies never benefit from their reps hitting peak performance
When you fire a rep at month 6 and start over, you're resetting the clock. You're guaranteeing you'll never see the 167% revenue lift. You're choosing to perpetually operate with underperforming reps.
2. You're Making Bad Decisions Because You Lack Context
Leaders make bad decisions because they lack context. Context is the deep understanding of the specific circumstances that properly inform decisions.
When you look at a rep’s numbers at 90 days, you’re missing the context:
Are they building pipeline activity? (leading indicator)
Are they progressing opportunities through stages? (process indicator)
Are they getting meetings with the right personas? (qualification indicator)
Do they understand the product and can they run effective discovery? (competency indicator)
Are they coachable and improving week-over-week? (trajectory indicator)
Binary outcomes (closed deals) at 90 days tell you almost nothing about whether you have a good rep. They tell you that your rep is exactly where they should be on the ramp curve.
This isn’t just a sales problem—it’s part of a much larger leadership trend. Leaders across industries are making snap judgments without the context required for good decisions, and it’s fueling what we call the Continuity Crisis: The $8.8 Trillion Productivity Problem. When leaders rely on surface-level metrics instead of understanding trajectory, development, and operating conditions, they unintentionally create churn, instability, and massive performance drag.
“The real cost of poor leadership decisions isn’t turnover, it’s the $8.8 trillion global productivity loss caused by broken continuity.”
If you want to understand how context transforms leadership decision-making, read:
3. You Hurt People
Here's what happens when you judge a rep prematurely:
They feel the doubt. They know you're questioning them. Their confidence erodes. They start looking for other jobs as a safety net. They disengage. They underperform. You fire them. You were "right."
But you created a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Great leaders don't judge people by binary outcomes at arbitrary timelines. They create the conditions for success, provide the context and coaching, and evaluate trajectory over time.
What High Achiever Leaders Do Differently
The best leaders we work with operate from a different framework:
1. They Set Realistic Expectations
They tell new reps exactly what the ramp looks like:
"You'll struggle for the first 3-6 months. That's normal."
"Your job in Q1 is to learn, not to close."
"We'll measure you on activity and pipeline development, not closed deals."
"By month 9-12, we expect you to be approaching quota. By month 18, you should be exceeding it."
This honesty creates psychological safety and allows reps to focus on building the foundation rather than panicking about short-term numbers.
2. They Measure What Matters at Each Stage
Months 0-3: Activity metrics, product knowledge assessments, discovery call quality
Months 4-6: Pipeline generation, meeting-to-opportunity conversion, qualification rigor
Months 7-12: Deal progression velocity, win rates, average deal size
Months 13+: Quota attainment, revenue per rep, expansion revenue
They're rigorous about measurement, but they're measuring the right things at the right time.
3. They Create Context Through Operating Cadence
They don't wait until a rep is failing to have a conversation. They run:
Weekly forecast reviews to understand what's in the pipe and where deals are stuck
Bi-weekly territory reviews to assess pipeline health and coverage
Monthly one-on-ones to build the relationship and understand challenges
Quarterly strategic check-ins to align on trajectory and development
This cadence creates continuous context. You're never surprised by failure because you see it coming and intervene early.
4. They Protect Continuity Fiercely
They design compensation that rewards tenure. They protect territories so reps can build deep relationships. They celebrate reps who hit 2, 3, 5 years. They talk openly about the compounding returns of staying vs. the reset cost of leaving.
They know that their best reps 3 years from now are the ones they hire and develop today. So they're patient, rigorous, and committed to seeing it through.
For the talent side of continuity, another great resource is our Hiring Higher Achievers video.
The Question You Should Be Asking
At 90-120 days, don't ask: "Is this rep any good?"
Ask:
"Are they doing the activities that will create pipeline in 90 days?"
"Are they progressing in their understanding of our product and market?"
"Are they coachable and improving week over week?"
"What obstacles can I remove to accelerate their development?"
"Am I creating the conditions for them to succeed?"
If the answer to these questions is yes, give them time. If the answer is no, coach them or change the conditions.
The mindset shift is the difference between default leadership and leadership by design: Leadership by Design
The Bottom Line
You can't build a high-performing sales organization by churning reps every 12-18 months. You build it by:
Hiring well
Onboarding rigorously
Coaching consistently
Measuring contextually
Protecting continuity
The signature of mediocrity is chronic inconsistency—in your team, your process, and your expectations.
The signature of high achievement is giving your people the time, context, and support to become the 3-year tenured reps who generate 167% more revenue.
Your best sales hire isn't the one who closes a deal in month 3. It's the one who's still with you in month 36, dominating their territory because you had the wisdom to see past the binary outcomes and understand what was really happening in your business.
Stop firing reps at six months. Start building the continuity that drives real revenue growth.
Your Next Revenue Breakthrough Starts With One Good Decision.
At High Achiever, we help leaders build the decision-making frameworks and operating systems that turn good reps into high performers—without the constant hiring-firing cycle. Your next revenue breakthrough starts with one good decision. If you want practical clarity on hiring, onboarding, coaching, or continuity, let’s spend 30 seconds together. No fluff. No pitch. Just straight, senior-level guidance.
