#519 How To Motivate Or Demotivate Your Sales Team | Niels Brabandt
How To Motivate Or Demotivate Your Sales Team | Niels Brabandt
Motivating a sales team is not a matter of charisma or short-term enthusiasm. It is a matter of structure, incentives, competence, and evidence-based leadership. In this week’s leadership podcast and videocast, Niels Brabandt examines why many organisations unintentionally demotivate their sales teams and how decision-makers can build sustainable motivation instead.
The Myth of the Motivational Speech
Many leaders still rely on motivational speeches. While these may create temporary energy, they do not deliver sustainable performance. Modern sales environments require systems, not slogans. Sustainable motivation is structural, not emotional.
Onboarding Defines Performance
Professional onboarding must be structured and documented. Providing PDFs and recorded videos is insufficient. Sales professionals require insider knowledge: proven phrases, effective triggers, and real-world approaches that convert. Without this, uncertainty arises and performance declines.
Incentives Shape Behaviour
When organisations fail to reward knowledge sharing, they create so-called ‘druid knowledge’. High performers retain insights because sharing them reduces their own success probability. Effective leaders align incentives so that collaboration becomes rational and rewarding.
The Danger of Arbitrary Goal Changes
Changing targets mid-year without objective justification destroys trust. When sales teams exceed expectations and are punished with higher targets, motivation collapses. Goal adjustments must be evidence-based, not opinion-driven.
Strategy Over Chaos
Frequent shifts in priorities create what is often described as the ‘flavour of the month’ syndrome. Sales teams lose direction and confidence when leadership lacks a coherent strategy. Clarity and consistency are critical for sustained performance.
Leadership Requires Credibility
Sales professionals immediately recognise when leaders lack real-world experience. Authority in sales leadership is earned through competence and evidence, not hierarchy.
Professional Qualification Matters
Sales training must combine scientific evidence with practical experience. Generic models and unsupported frameworks undermine credibility. Decision-makers must ensure trainers meet the highest professional standards.
Conclusion
Niels Brabandt demonstrates that motivation in sales is engineered through structure, fairness, expertise, and strategic clarity. Organisations that ignore these principles will inevitably demotivate even their strongest performers.
Niels Brabandt
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More on this topic in this week's videocast and podcast with Niels Brabandt: Videocast / Apple Podcasts / Spotify
For the videocast’s and podcast’s transcript, read below this article.
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Contact: Niels Brabandt on LinkedIn
Website: www.NB-Networks.biz
Podcast and Videocast Transcript
Niels Brabandt
Motivation. You probably know that's important. And when it comes to your sales team, well, regarding your sales team, of course, you need a motivated sales staff. You need a motivated sales force. And you know, when they're not motivated, they're not going to bring results. Especially salespeople talk with each other very often, and when they become a bit negative about everything, things go south very quickly.
Niels Brabandt
However, very often we see that sales staff gets professionally demotivated, not internally, not by themselves, but by leaders in the organization. And that, by popular demand, I received a ton of emails regarding this, and after this became a certain critical mass, I said, "It is time to talk about how to professionally motivate or demotivate your sales staff." So here we are talking about exactly that.
Niels Brabandt
When we talk about professionally motivating or demotivating your sales staff, one aspect is of crucial importance. When you now say, "I am the person that steps in front of them, giving them the pep talk," that is 1990s motivation. When you think you're a good speaker, and just because of giving them a pep talk which motivates them poorly for 24 hours, you are able to motivate your sales team, that probably lasts for a day or two. However, it is not sustainable motivation. Sustainable motivation works massively differently compared to how it worked 10, 15, 20 years ago.
Niels Brabandt
And the first aspect you have to deal with is when you have a sales team, and you probably know from your own sales career, when you entered the business, it was of crucial importance how do you actually get onboarded. And you probably heard that phrase, "Oh, you know what? Here are the yellow pages. Make some calls. Oh, by the way, oh, you want to know everything about the product? Yeah, look, we have this PDF here. You can read this. And we have these prerecorded videos. And then, you know, my door is always open, and good luck from here." That is not professional onboarding.
Niels Brabandt
Professional onboarding means everything is structured and everything is documented. And by the way, this is and, not or. Both need to be fulfilled. Many organizations have an onboarding which is, let's say, a bit on the fly, which I think in sales is still okay-ish. However, it doesn't really offer one aspect which people want to know. People want to know what are the phrases I have to use? What are the triggers that clients really want to hear? What are the approaches that actually really work?
Niels Brabandt
This is insider knowledge. If you do not offer insider knowledge, the opposite of that is druid knowledge. Druids, these are people who know a lot about the organization and how to sell the products. However, they say, "Look, there is no incentive." When I now tell someone my secrets, it means nothing else than they take part of my market share, and I actually get punished for that. So why should I help anyone getting a foot into this industry when I simply want to make ends meet and earn my own money?
Niels Brabandt
So you need to be able to incentivize that people give access to insider knowledge. Be aware of that fact, because only when people have a share in what people actually get out of this, when people say, "Hey, look, when I onboard something, what's in it for me?" except the usual phrase, "Aren't you interested in having nice colleagues?" Well, there's a difference between nice and competent colleagues. So some people will simply say, "Look, the person is still nice, even if they're wildly incompetent, and then you fire them in five months' time, and I'm just going to onboard the next one." Well, onboard them in high commerce.
Niels Brabandt
So what then what you need to do then is when you offer them a proper onboarding, and of course, digital learning is part of that, but you cannot fully replace an onboarding just by digital learning. Onboarding needs to be professionally done with insider knowledge from real-world experience, and then people need to be motivated by proper goals. And quite often I see that goals are done the following.
Niels Brabandt
And this is what I now tell you. This is a word-by-word quote from a leader. There was a sales team that achieved their sales goal in October by a massive amount of over-hours because the team was really motivated. They really wanted to hit that sales goal quickly, and they wanted to hit it as hard as they can. And they did, and they wanted to celebrate. So they said, "We hit the sales goal in October," and the answer of management was, "Oh, well, the goal was too low then." And when you think this is bad, it gets worse from there.
Niels Brabandt
What they did was they changed the goal within the year and said, "Look, we're going to change the goal. It's plus 20% from here." And by the way, the annual bonus, you only get that when you achieve the new goal. And that is negative goal adaptation. Goal adaptation might happen when something suddenly happens where you say, "Look, it suddenly became massively easier to sell that." Let's say you have a class on data protection. You sell online classes, and suddenly the state in which you live decides that it's mandatory for every employee in every organization to take one of these classes. From there, it becomes massively easier. Doors are wide open in organizations because they say, "Okay, we must have your product. It's not something which is somehow which we can or cannot take. We actually have to take it."
Niels Brabandt
Then you can adapt goals when suddenly laws change, when regulation changes, when suddenly everything becomes easier by proof, not by personal opinion. Because when people simply say, "Look, this random adaption of goals is something which very often is called flavor of the month," but people say, "Look, in January, they say we need more new clients, so we go for new clients. In March, they say, "Oh, look, we have more new clients, but the existing ones didn't get enough calls, so now we go for all the existing clients." Oh, by the way, from May, we actually have to focus on the new products because you didn't sell them enough. And from July, no, you have to sell the existing ones. And oh, by the way, from August, we have packages, and from November, we have Christmas presents and specials, and you have to sell them.
Niels Brabandt
So basically, every morning, people arrive and think, "What is the management board's flavor of the month this time?" And that is when suddenly the whole board becomes a joke for the employees. And the reason, by the way, for that is very, very simple. People tell sales what to do without having any kind of real-world experience. You will very rarely meet salespeople who say, "I tell the CFO how to do their job," because they say, "Look, I have my sales job. You have your CFO job. We are all happy, so we do our thing." However, very often, management suddenly interferes with sales jobs without having any experience.
Niels Brabandt
And by the way, how do you figure out if you do not have enough experience that actually you should talk about sales? Have you ever met these people who say, "Look, I have a client appointment. Could the leaders please stay away? Please?" Because as soon as we have a meeting with clients and sales staff, meaning sales leaders are around, well, leaders in high commerce, someone from the board, well, they say they always give things away. We usually don't give away. They conduct speeches. They conduct talks with clients in a way we would never conduct them. They have a very wrong structure. They have no idea how to do it. However, they pretend that they can.
Niels Brabandt
So how to make things better? Number one is you need people with real-world experience who onboard your people. And of course, I know there's a different price tag for people who are actually experienced, but you need to be able to give it to your staff that actually people know this is someone who's been there, who has done that. And also, very important, if you do not have the experience, which is perfectly fine, maybe it's not your job. Maybe you're the owner, or you are the CEO, or you are the CMO, or you're just someone else, a technical lead, whoever you are. If you do not have the experience, please do not pretend that you have.
Niels Brabandt
Salespeople don't pretend that they are better than tech staff, especially when you, for example, work in SAAS, Software as a Service. People don't pretend that they know the code better than the people who actually wrote it. However, sometimes you have leaders on the board who say, "I know it all," and they talk to everyone as if they knew it better. When you make a claim, you need to have the factual backing. When you never sat in that seat, and I can tell you, I have a sales background. I, as many others, got into sales by pure coincidence. And when I started cold calling, I very quickly learned, "Okay, this is a numbers game. You really have to hit the phone hard," and I learned it the hard way. However, the factual backing here, very important, is that you have the real-world experience.
Niels Brabandt
And on top of that, because now we get to an important point, when you want to professionally qualify your people, please, please check for the fact that professional qualification by sales trainers is actually given. Because what we often see is, "Oh, we have an amazing sales trainer. You know how it is? It's the best made from the CEO. So here's your sales trainer." And then they take out their PowerPoint slides, and what they usually do is mass stereotyping. They say, "Look, I don't have any factual backing, no scientific evidence, but here are the four types of clients: client A, B, C, D," often aligned with colors or animals or any kind of other made-up metaphor, which doesn't help anyone to get anywhere.
Niels Brabandt
On top of that, usually they say, "Oh, there are certain kinds of salespeople. These are the four types of salespeople. These are the four types of sales staff. These are the four types of speeches. These are the four." There is always X number to Y, seven steps to getting five new clients, whatever it is. It's all made up. And I have to be straightforward here. It's made up nonsense. Back in the days, sales training often led to the point that people said, "Look, you're going to make it somehow. Here's my input," and then we were all fine. We do not have time or money for that anymore.
Niels Brabandt
When you want to have sales staff or professional sales trainers, get at least a call where you get to know them, where you check, are they actually able to deliver on the promise? Do they have scientific backing and real-world experience? Not or, but and. They need to have both today because especially in sales, salespeople have seen and heard a lot. And when you simply say, "Here's another opinion," they will say, "Yeah, I just put it to the others, and I will do exactly as I have done before." When someone has some really new insights from the field where they say, "I've been there. I've done that. This is the scientific evidence. This is how it works. This is how it does not work," then people are really grateful.
Niels Brabandt
However, professional qualification is a must. And when professional qualification is not given with sales trainers, people will very quickly say, "This is a person I'm not listening to," and by the way, rightfully so. However, when you do it well with great onboarding, inside knowledge, and proper goals, which can align if they need to, for example, by regulation, when really things became harder or easier, and then you adapt the goals, perfectly fine. When you have a great strategy which people actually can align behind, where they say, "I can see where this leads to," when they see our people have the real-world experience, we have people with experience, they have the factual backing, they have the professional qualification, they can actually help me to get somewhere, then your sales team will be highly motivated by all of that.
Niels Brabandt
And I wish you all the best putting this in action in your organization. And of course, you might now say, "Well, I have to talk a bit more about that." And of course, feel free to contact me anytime.
Niels Brabandt
First, of course, when you watch me on YouTube right now, leave a like here. Thank you very much for doing so. Of course, you can also subscribe to this channel. And of course, leave a comment here. I'm looking forward to having discussions with you.
Niels Brabandt
And of course, when you now listen to us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify, feel free to leave a review there, five stars. Thank you very much for doing so as well. And of course, recommend this channel to friends, colleagues, anywhere, online, offline. Thank you very much for doing so as well.
Niels Brabandt
On top of that, by the way, as promised, since the beginning of the year, I said we're going to bring out one leadership tip each day via the YouTube Shorts, as the name says, only available on YouTube. So it really pays off not only to subscribe to this channel, but put the little bell on there because this little bell actually means you get a short notification either on your smartphone or your laptop when a new video is online. I guarantee you one tip per day on average at least every day of this year. And so far, we're doing very well with that. And of course, you can also follow me on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.
Niels Brabandt
By the way, when you now say, "Look, we really need professional help. We need professional trainer, speaker, coach, consultant, mentor, project interim manager, fractional or more," then of course, you can feel free to get in touch with me, nb-networks.biz is my website. Looking forward to hearing from you there.
Niels Brabandt
By the way, you can also contact me via email. Often people say, "I have questions," or "I like to discuss something, but I can't do it in the comment section. It's too public. It's too specific about my business or our company." Feel free to contact me, nb@nb-networks.com is my email address. I'm looking forward to hearing from you there.
Niels Brabandt
And of course, we also have live sessions. If you want to get access to them, please go to expert.nb-networks.com. Put your email address in there, and no worries. There's only one email every Wednesday morning at 5:00 AM, 6:00 AM in the morning. Usually, you get full access to all the podcasts, video casts, articles in the English and German language. So it's fully bilingual. And by the way, in every single leadership letter mail, you receive the date, the time, and the access link when we have the next live session.
Niels Brabandt
We have at least one per month. One is coming up very soon. So feel free to sign up here. By the way, we do not communicate live sessions anywhere except there. So you need to be signed up for the leadership letter. We always have quite a number of bonuses and extras, which we only advertise on there and no one else. So it really pays off to be part of that.
Niels Brabandt
And by the way, if you'd like to say, "Well, we'd like to have a live session, but more for our business, for our sales team, for our leadership team, not for the others," just drop me an email. We get a bit private and then we do it from there and take it from there. And of course, you can follow me on social media.
Niels Brabandt
Feel free to connect on LinkedIn. Don't do the follow thing. Do a proper connect. I'm looking forward to hearing from you there. You, of course, can now also follow me on Instagram. Feel free to do so. Leave a like on Facebook if you like, if that's your preferred platform, and follow the whole content on YouTube. That really pays off as well.
Niels Brabandt
Of course, the most important thing always is what I tell you at the very end of this podcast and video cast: apply, apply, apply what you heard in this podcast because you will only see the positive outcome when you apply what you heard and learned in this podcast. Very important here, by the way, if you contact me, feel free to do so. Always happy to chat or discuss something very specific. Both is optional. Both is possible. Looking forward to hearing from you there.
Niels Brabandt
If you drop me any kind of message on any platform, I'm answering every single message within 24 hours or less. So I'm looking forward to hearing from you there. And at the end of this podcast, as well as at the end of the video cast, there's only one thing left for me to say: thank you very much for your time.