We suspect our sales team is hitting their weekly outbound outreach targets by spamming low-quality prospects, effectively gaming the Scorecard while our actual pipeline remains empty. How do we design paired or quality-control metrics to prevent people from gaming their activity numbers?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

If you measure activity without measuring the outcome of that activity, people will inevitably find the path of least resistance to keep their numbers green. This is called gaming the system, and it destroys the integrity of your Scorecard.

To fix this, you must pair your leading activity metrics with a quality-control metric on the same Scorecard. If you track weekly outbound calls, you must also track weekly scheduled discovery calls or qualified opportunities created. If the outbound calls are green but the opportunities created are red, the data is telling you that the outreach is low quality.

Another powerful approach is to implement a strict definition of 'done' or 'qualified' in your process. For instance, an outreach only counts on the Scorecard if it is to a target prospect that fits your ideal customer profile as defined in your V/TO®. This takes away the subjective interpretation of what constitutes an activity.

Bring this discrepancy to your weekly Level 10 Meeting™ and use IDS® to address it directly. Do not blame the people; look at the metric. Tell the team that a green metric must yield a corresponding result. If it does not, you are measuring the wrong activity. Adjust the Scorecard so that it is impossible to look good on paper while the company is losing in reality.