Why 72% of Sales Reps Miss Quota: The Participation Trophy PTSD in the C-Suite

Around 16 years ago, our son was crushing it on his Single A, 7-year-old baseball team.  As the season drew to a close, we were notified that there would be an awards ceremony at the field and Michael would be getting an award.  We were excited!  Even at 7 years old, we knew his baseball skills were advanced as he out-hit and out-fielded every other 7-year-old on the field.

The day of the awards arrived and of course, we were the first to arrive. When the ceremony began, they announced that the entire team, 12 boys, had earned awards and handed each of them the exact same trophy.

Participation Trophies

That’s when it hit me. I had heard about Participation trophies on the news. This wasn’t anything like when I was a kid.  Back then, being presented with a trophy actually meant something.  Nope.  This was the new way of building self-esteem:

• Don’t hurt anyone’s feelings
• Make everyone feel great about participating
• Diminish the value of the kid or kids that played like all-stars
• Give the kids who sucked a false sense of their abilities

To be fair, as Michael grew older and continued to out-perform others, he earned his fair share of legit trophies and continued to earn that kind of recognition in college. But the story isn’t about him or the trophies he earned; the story is about the kids who got participation trophies and learned that if you just showed up, even if you couldn’t play well, had no skills, didn’t care, spent your time looking at butterflies, clouds, or with your hand in your pants, you would be recognized and rewarded.

Baseball Hall-of-Famer Yogi Berra once said that “80% of success in life is just showing up.”

These days you get a trophy for it.

I apologize for the long intro to the analogy but somebody had to tell the story to the 80% of you that showed up to read this.

From the Ball Field to the Salesperson in the Field

Depending on whose study and data is being reviewed, statistics show that anywhere between 57% and 72% of salespeople failed to hit quota last year.  The 72% number wouldn’t be acceptable to me even if 72% did hit their quota.  The statistic that isn’t reported, and for which I have no accurate number, is the percentage of the 72% who failed to hit quota, that were terminated as a result.

Since I’m at a loss, I asked Grok (from Xai) if the answer was out there and Grok reported the following:

Hey Dave, oh man, this one’s a classic sales world head-scratcher—I had to scour a bunch of reports and studies to get a solid read on it. The 49-72% range you’re throwing out lines up with the wild variation in quota miss rates across industries (like 57% from Salesforce/Forbes stats, or up to 72% in some surveys). But the kicker? Of that big chunk who miss, only a tiny slice actually get shown the door for performance.

From what the data shows, it’s super low—like, under 10% at most, and often way closer to 2-5% of the underperformers getting terminated. For example, in average sales orgs, just 2% terminate reps after one bad quarter, while underperformers see 5%, and even high-fliers only hit 18% of companies pulling the trigger that quick. They can’t just axe half the team (or more), so most get coaching, quota tweaks, or just grind on with reduced pay. Another angle: about 26% of total sales rep turnover ties back to missed quotas, but that’s a mix of firings, quits, and restructures—not pure terminations. Bottom line, companies bake in some failure ’cause firing everyone would tank the whole operation. Wild how the system’s rigged that way, huh? 

New Sales Acronym

So there you have it. Under 10%.  Participation Trophy Stifling Determination or PTSD.  That’s my third new acronym this month.  Last week I wrote, Is Your Sales SCAM Leaving a SCAR on Your Sales Team?

I believe the Participation Trophy mentality is a mind virus that has seeped into and taken over in company sales organizations.  It stifles risk-taking, accountability, performance, standing-out, winning, recognition, and more.  Can’t sell?  Keep your job anyway.  Not as good as everyone else?  Get promoted to sales manager.  Fall short again?  Receive a pay raise.

I know.  When I was the CEO at Objective Management Group I was responsible for the processing of more than 2.4 million sales assessments. Those salespeople were measured in 21 Sales Core Competencies and 50% of them out and out sucked.  Not even close.  And since most of those competencies each had several attributes, we’re talking about 250 data points per salesperson.

All because of getting participation trophies when they were kids.

Participation trophies ruined business!  The people pushing for this are trying to do away with competition, merit and rewards.

Fight back.

In 2026, set realistic quotas, not the ones your board needs to hit their goals, but the ones that achieve realistic growth.  Let the entire sales team know on January 2, that quota achievement is a requirement for continued employment.  You will provide them all of the tools (technology), support (training and coaching) and direction (excellent sales leadership) they need for success, but it’s up to them to get the job done.

Watch what happens when the country club membership is about to expire!

As always, if you need help, feel free to reach out to us or drop me a line.

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