When your entire strategy rests on the shoulders of a few, you’re not scaling, you’re surviving
“The strength of the team is each individual member. The strength of each member is the team.” — Phil Jackson
Every sales leader loves a top performer. They’re the closers. The rainmakers. The heroes of every quarterly business review. But here’s the reality no one likes to talk about: overdependence on your top performers is your biggest hidden liability. And you won’t see it, until it’s too late.
The “One-Engine Jet” Analogy
Imagine a jet with four engines. But only one is functional. The other three are underperforming or in maintenance mode. Would you still fly that plane?
That’s what many sales teams are doing today, relying heavily on a few to carry the many. And while that jet might take off today, it’s one failure away from a crash landing.
What Overdependence Looks Like in Sales
Let’s bring this closer to home:
- In a leading tech firm in Singapore, 72% of the pipeline revenue came from just 2 out of 12 reps.
- A medical devices company in Middle East celebrated its “President’s Club” member who single-handedly secured a $3M deal. But when she left? It took 3 hires and 6 months to even begin rebuilding momentum.
These aren’t rare cases. They’re becoming the norm and it’s creating a fragile ecosystem.
The Ripple Effect of Overdependence
- Delayed Coaching: Managers spend more time chasing quotas than developing their mid-tier reps.
- Morale Dip: Underperformers quietly disengage, knowing the spotlight only shines on a few.
- Forecast Flaws: Pipelines are skewed—healthy only if top performers show up.
- Talent Drain: Your best people feel overburdened. Burnout is inevitable.
What Great Leaders Do Differently
Satya Nadella once said,
“Longevity in this business is about being able to reinvent yourself or invent the future.”
The same applies to sales organizations. If your future is built only on the backs of your current stars, reinvention becomes impossible.
Great sales leaders build depth, not just stars.
How to Break the Cycle: From Spotlight to System
Here’s a 4-part framework to de-risk your sales strategy:
- Audit Contribution Ratios → Evaluate how much each rep contributes to pipeline, meetings, and revenue. Set red flags for 70:30 splits or worse.
- Coach the Middle 60% → Focus your enablement on the “quiet potential.” These are the reps who, with small shifts, can double your yield.
- Celebrate Progress, Not Just Peaks → Reinforce effort-based milestones. Reward behaviors that lead to consistency, not just the big wins.
- Codify Winning Behavior → Don’t let success live in silos. Build playbooks, share call recordings, and host peer-to-peer learning jams.
Wake-Up Call
Overreliance may look like excellence, until it becomes exhaustion.
When the top 10% become your crutch, the other 90% lose their reason to try. The result? A ticking time bomb disguised as “high performance.”
In My View
I’ve worked with organizations where losing one sales star set them back 9 months. Not because others lacked talent but because the system never required it from them. The truth is, when you elevate one person, but not the process, you build fame, not a foundation.
Ask yourself: If your two best reps resigned today, would you still hit target?
If that question makes your stomach turn, it’s not too late. Start building a team that flies with all four engines.
Let’s stop flying on hope. Let’s fly on systems.
Curious how to build consistency across your team? Reply or reach out. I’d be happy to walk you through what’s working in organizations just like yours.