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Our model that has worked really well is giving financial incentive on sales goals but employment is based on behavior goals. For example, you need to make 50 calls a day is a behavior based goal, but closing 5 deals a day is a sales goal.

If you don't hit your behavior goal, then it's grounds for termination anyway. But if you're hitting your behavior goal and are getting crushed by everyone else in sales, then you either have a bad fit, or you as a manager should listen more closely and see if you can coach the employee. Our best couple salespeople were great behaviorally and doing all the right things, but just needed some coaching on closing. Obviously, if sales continue to lag, then you have to terminate, but from my experience, having a hard line like that can be bad for your culture.

We also don't terminate immediately, we put people on performance improvement plans for 1-2 months. At that point, the employee needs to shite or get off the pot, and at the end of the 1-2 months, employee has either quit because they can't cut it or they make it because they realize they have what it takes to succeed. Because of this structure we almost never "fire" someone.

You're a healthcare guy, right? What kind of quotas?

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We also don't terminate immediately, we put people on performance improvement plans for 1-2 months. At that point, the employee needs to shite or get off the pot, and at the end of the 1-2 months, employee has either quit because they can't cut it or they make it because they realize they have what it takes to succeed. Because of this structure we almost never "fire" someone.

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It is important for your company to have a policy in place similar to this to avoid any liability issues associated with terminating an employee also.

I've seen this not take place at previous companies and it's a recipe for a crap show if the employee chooses to take action against their termination.