We have a critical company metric, sales close rate, that depends on both our marketing team bringing in qualified leads and our sales team closing them. How do we assign single-seat accountability on our weekly Scorecard when two different departments directly impact the outcome?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

The short answer is that you cannot have dual ownership of a single metric. If two people own a number, nobody owns it. To solve this, you must look at your Accountability Chart and separate the components of the process. Marketing owns the generation of qualified leads. Sales owns the closing of those qualified leads. If you only track sales close rate, you are blending two different functions. Instead, split this into two distinct leading indicators on your Scorecard. First, create a metric for Number of Marketing Qualified Leads, which is owned by your marketing seat. Second, create a metric for Qualified Lead to Close Conversion Rate, which is owned by your sales seat. This forces the sales team to only measure their conversion of leads that actually fit your target criteria, while marketing is held accountable for the volume of good opportunities they pass over. This separation ensures that when a number goes red, you know exactly which seat to look to during your Level 10 Meeting. It stops the finger-pointing and allows you to use IDS to solve the real root cause, whether it is a lead quality issue or a sales execution issue.