Everyone loves to talk about the upside of tech sales: big OTEs, uncapped commissions, Presidents Club trips to the Caribbean.
But here’s the part nobody puts on LinkedIn:
A lot of this game is pure luck.
Product-market fit. Timing. Your territory. The AE who got a book of business 3x bigger than yours… with the same quota. Seen it. In a publicly listed tech giant, not some startup circus.
Customer Success? Don’t get me started.
Half the time nobody knows if they’re account managers, support, or “churn firefighters.” I’ve seen 30%+ of CSMs out with burnout. Why? Because great service costs margin.
And longevity? Forget it.
You can crush quota for 4 years straight, win Presidents Club, and then suddenly your golden accounts get “redistributed” and boom, you’re on a PIP.
The hypocrisy is real too. A colleague of mine (AE + mom) got passed over for promotion because “she has enough on her plate with her kid.”
Meanwhile, the same company is posting “family values” on LinkedIn. Yeah, okay.
And then there’s the quota reset.
Every. Single. Quarter. Back to zero. For some reps, it’s smooth sailing. For most, it’s trench warfare.
No wonder top performers either:
- Go into management (spread the luck factor across a team)
- Or start building side projects hoping for an exit
Ryan from RepVue has done us all a favor by shining a light on which companies actually set their reps up for success and which ones are just grinding people into dust.
What’s the solution?
I don’t have all the answers, but I know what needs to change:
- Fair ramp goals
- Realistic & transparent quotas
- Equal territory allocation (+Lead distribution)
- Quota reduction when you’re on vacation (seriously…)
What do you think needs to change in tech sales?