Sales Team Challenges and Skill Gaps [Research Report]
Sales Team Challenges and Skill Gaps
[Research Report]
[Research Report]
[Video Recording]
[Research Report]
Whatâs the most overlooked factor in sales growth? Your frontline sales managers.Â
They influence every deal, every rep, every forecast, and yet about 60% of new managers report they never received training when they stepped into leadership.
Letâs stop looking past the obvious. Your frontline managers are the secret to scaling sales growth.
If you want more reps hitting quota, more deals converting, stronger forecasts, and less burnout across the board, it starts with your managers. Not your tech stack. Not your latest AI tool. Not another rep enablement platform (though these are important and we love them, check out our friends at Allego).
Iâve worked with thousands of sales teams and hereâs the hard truth. Most companies are investing in everything except the role that has the biggest impact on team performance and revenue growth.
And when we flip that, the results are massive. We’re talking 20 to 47% increases in rep conversion rates. And we didnât even touch the rep. Just by developing their manager.
So if youâre planning for growth, keep reading. Because managers arenât a bottleneck. Theyâre your biggest growth engine.
Change is part of growth. Reps switch teams. Territories shift. Comp plans evolve. But in the middle of it all, your frontline managers keep the team focused, engaged, and aligned.
That only works when theyâre supported.
Too often, every manager ends up running their own playbook. Not because they want to, but because theyâve never been shown what âgoodâ looks like. And even when you have playbooks, they donât get translated into everyday actions and team rhythms.
Hereâs where the cracks usually show up:
Consistency is what turns momentum into real, scalable growth. And it starts at the manager level.
Give them the tools to:
Even tenured managers benefit from this kind of clarity. One enterprise team we worked with had over 10 years of management experience and still walked away from this training saying, âI wish Iâd had this years ago.â

Most sales managers were promoted from rep roles. And as reps, their entire world revolved around winning. So when things get tough, what do they fall back on?
Closing the deal.
They hop on the call. They take over the demo. They second-voice the close. Itâs not bad intentions, theyâre just doing what worked for them. But when a manager becomes the deal hero, the team stops learning.
And thatâs when reps leave.
The revolving door hurts growth. Every open seat is lost pipeline. Every green rep takes months to ramp. Every exit chips away at morale.
What helps? Redefining the manager role and giving your leaders a new toolkit.
Because a manager who builds skill, confidence, and trust is someone who retains reps, not replaces them.
READ: Build Your Sales Manager Cadence (& Save Time and Stress)
We all love to say coaching is the silver bullet. And it is. But only when itâs done well.
Real coaching moves the needle on performance, confidence, and retention. But too often, what we call âcoachingâ is just a pipeline review in disguise.
If youâve ever listened in and heard:
Then chances are, your managers need support here.
The most common trap? The Mini-me. Thatâs the manager who coaches every rep to be a version of themselves. It works for the one or two reps with the same style. Everyone else gets frustrated, disengaged, or overlooked.
Good coaching is consistent, rep-centered, and rooted in skill development, not deal rescue.
Thatâs why we donât treat coaching like a one-hour workshop. Itâs now a six-hour, three-part course here at Factor 8. Because shifting behavior and building confidence takes time. And when it clicks, reps perform. They stay. And they grow.
READ: The Best Sales Coaching Questions Ever
Letâs be honest. The biggest miss isnât the manager. Itâs us.
Weâve skipped the basics. We assume managers will figure it out because we did. We prioritize tech over training. We fix people problems with process or platform investments.
But if you want more reps to hit quota, you donât need a new tool (yet). You need stronger conversations first.
That comes from skilled, supported, confident managers.
Most reps today get a sliver of what they need in onboarding. Then theyâre tossed five tools and a quota. Theyâre still learning the basics. And the person who owns the rest?
Their manager.
So letâs invest in them. Train them. Coach them. Give them a framework, a cadence, and a community. Make development part of the rhythm, not a one-time event.
Because your reps arenât going to grow if your managers arenât growing too.
Managers are the secret to scalable revenue growth. Letâs stop hoping they figure it out, and start helping them knock it out of the park.
AI is transforming how sales and enablement leaders work, but not every tool is worth your time. The real win comes from using AI to cut through busywork, speed up planning, and empower your team to perform at their best.
In this Sales Shot webinar, I sat down with Helen Fanucci, Rose Paik, Casey Calkins, and Dr. Richard Conde to cut through the noise and share the AI strategies that are actually working.
Here are the AI tools, prompts, and use cases worth stealing (and what you should skip).
The biggest takeaway from our panel? AI is already drastically changing the game for sales and enablement leaders, and not in a distant future way. Itâs helping them cut hours of work, make better decisions, and focus on the human parts of their job that matter most.
Helen shared a genius way to scale call reviews. Instead of sifting through hundreds of recordings, she uploads batches of transcripts into ChatGPT to surface competitor mentions, objection patterns, and whether reps are locking in next steps. Itâs like a virtual coach doing the analysis for you, so you can spend time actually coaching.
Prompt to steal:
âHere are 20 discovery call transcripts. Create a table summarizing top objections, competitor mentions, and whether a next meeting was secured.â
Another smart move came from Rose, who built her own âcloneâ using Gemini. This persona enforces the companyâs tone, writes in an active voice, and ensures content is clear and consistent across teams worldwide. The result is scalable sales training that actually sticks.
Prompt to steal:
âYou are a sales enablement expert. Write onboarding instructions in an active voice, using customer-centric language at an 8th-grade reading level.â
AI can also help sales managers think faster and coach smarter. By feeding pipeline data into ChatGPT, Casey uses it to surface coaching priorities, the same insights an experienced leader would draw out, but in minutes instead of hours (grab Caseyâs free AI toolkit for 6 AI prompts sales leaders need).
Prompt to steal:
âYou are a frontline sales manager. Analyze this pipeline report and highlight three coaching priorities for my next one-on-one.â
Richard is taking a different angle by using AI to power better top-of-funnel strategies. He pairs Claude with Crystal Knows to understand buyer personality types, helping him craft outreach messages that feel personal, not spammy.
Prompt to steal:
âHereâs my target persona and their LinkedIn profile. Write a personalized outreach message that matches their communication style.â
These arenât hypotheticals. Theyâre working right now. The leaders using AI this way arenât just saving time; theyâre leading smarter.
READ: Best AI Tools, Tips, And Prompts For Sales Prospecting
AI isnât here to replace coaching (or training), but our panel proved it can make coaching a whole lot more impactful. By letting AI handle the heavy lifting behind the scenes, leaders are freeing up more time to actually coach and connect with their teams.
One of the standout examples came from Helen, who built a custom Love Your Team bot to help leaders role-play tough performance conversations. Managers can pick a scenario (easy, medium, or hard), practice with the bot, and get scored on how they did. Itâs a safe way to prepare for conversations most leaders dread.
Prompt to steal:
âYou are an underperforming rep. Role-play a tough performance conversation with me and grade my responses.â
Rose is embedding AI directly into enablement the right way: skills first, AI second. Her team uses NotebookLM to create an interactive, searchable knowledge base from training content. Reps can ask it questions, generate FAQs, and even turn the material into podcasts in multiple languages, making learning easier to access and retain.
Prompt to steal:
âBased on this training content, create an FAQ for reps that focuses on what they need to do, not just what they need to know.â
GRW also came up as a powerful tool for role-play coaching, giving reps a safe environment to practice calls and get real-time feedback based on proven sales frameworks (like the Factor 8 COACHN Model).
Casey encourages leaders to train their GPT to think like them. By feeding it prompts that teach their leadership style and decision-making frameworks, managers create a digital âthinking partnerâ they can lean on for coaching plans and tough conversations.
Prompt to steal:
âHere is how I coach and communicate with my team. Learn my style and use it to draft coaching plans for these three reps.â
AI works best when it reinforces fundamentals instead of replacing them. Richard uses it for pattern recognition in sales scenarios, helping reps see what makes deals successful before they automate a thing.
Prompt to steal:
âAnalyze these sales scenarios and identify patterns in what led to successful outcomes.â
The bottom line? AI makes coaching and training more scalable and personal, but it only works if you use it to strengthen (not sidestep) the human connection.

AI is only as good as the guardrails you set around it. The panel made it clear that using AI safely and effectively isnât optional, itâs table stakes.
Privacy and data control came up first. Casey stressed that leaders must lock down privacy settings before letting teams run wild with new tools. Without clear guardrails, you risk exposing sensitive information.Â
Prompt writing was another critical theme. Richard shared that the best outputs come from clear inputs: provide context, be specific, and always state your desired outcome. âBad prompts get bad results,â he said. Thatâs why he often uses Claude to refine his prompts before sending them to other AI tools.
Helen showed how simple prompts can turn messy CRM data into clean, actionable summaries. Instead of spending hours in spreadsheets, she asks ChatGPT to create a table showing seller progress against objectives, giving her an instant snapshot of where to focus.
Rose brought it back to basics: start with the customer, not the tool. AI is there to help you serve buyers better, not to replace thoughtful strategy. When teams lead with AI instead of empathy, they risk losing the human connection that closes deals.
The message from all four leaders? The tools will not save you unless you teach them who you are, control what they see, and use them to make your work and your relationships stronger.
VIDEO: 8+ Critical Things Sales And Enablement Leaders Need To Know About AI
One of the best parts of this session was hearing the little hacks leaders use to save time without cutting corners. These werenât big, shiny tech demos; they were practical shortcuts anyone can use.
NotebookLM was a fan favorite for Rose, who uses it like an interactive playbook. Instead of digging through static training docs, her reps can ask it âhow do Iâ questions and instantly get answers. It can even generate FAQs or spin training material into podcast episodes in multiple languages, making learning accessible and easy to consume.
Casey shared how she teaches leaders to train ChatGPT to think like them. By feeding it prompts that define their leadership style, tone, and decision-making process, they turn it into a virtual assistant that knows how they would respond. This saves managers countless hours on repetitive tasks like drafting coaching plans or preparing for one-on-ones.
Richard uses Claude to sharpen his prompts before sending them to other tools. He calls it a âprompt coachâ because it helps him ask better questions, which leads to better outputs everywhere else.
Helen keeps her workflow lean by asking AI to summarize CRM and call data into quick performance snapshots. Instead of pulling endless reports, she gets an at-a-glance view of whatâs working and whatâs not so she can spend her time coaching, not crunching numbers.
Fathom was another fan-favorite for turning meeting recordings into clear, actionable summaries, so leaders and reps can skip manual note-taking and focus on next steps.
For me, Oliv is the standout AI tool for saving time. I raved about it during the webinar, sharing how it delivers all my pre-call research straight to my inbox. No digging, no scrambling, just everything I need ready to go before the call. Oliv’s AI agents handle the admin grind behind meetings, from updating CRM fields to building follow-ups and proposals. For leaders, it automates forecasting and pipeline reviews, keeping everything accurate without the manual chase.Â
These hacks may seem small, but together they save hours each week and keep leaders focused on what really moves the needle.
When it comes to AI, thereâs no shortage of shiny new tools, but only a handful are truly moving the needle for leaders. The panel didnât hold back on sharing their favorites and the ones theyâd leave behind.
For writing and content creation, Claude was a unanimous favorite. Both Richard and Rose rely on it for everything from drafting social content to formatting training materials. Richard even uses Claude to help craft better prompts, giving him cleaner outputs faster.
On the enablement side, Rose swears by her custom Gemini persona, the âRose Clone,â to enforce tone and consistency in every piece of training content. She pairs it with NotebookLM to turn training materials into interactive, searchable resources that reps actually use.
For leaders coaching teams, Caseyâs toolkit is full of must-haves. She loves using ChatGPT to analyze pipeline data, surface coaching priorities, and act as a sounding board for tough management decisions.
The session also spotlighted presentation tools worth bookmarking. Richard uses Napkin and Beautiful to quickly create clean, high-impact visuals, and pairs them with Canva for easy team collaboration. These tools make it faster to produce presentations that actually engage audiences without spending hours designing slides.
Not all tools got glowing reviews. Helen warned against relying on AI to write prospecting emails or LinkedIn outreach. Tools that blast generic messages do more harm than good. Her advice? Skip the automation here and pick up the phone. âCalling is back,â she reminded us. (We donât think it ever went away đ).
The panel also flagged a common mistake: blindly trusting AI outputs. Whether itâs using ChatGPT to summarize CRM data or leaning on any tool to draft content, accuracy isnât guaranteed. Every AI output still needs a human eye before it goes out the door.
The takeaway? Tools like Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini, NotebookLM, and even quick-hit design tools like Napkin and Beautiful are worth the investment because they solve real problems. Tools that replace personal outreach or encourage copy-paste shortcuts? Skip them.
The session wrapped up with a clear message: AI is here to stay, but how you use it determines whether it helps or hurts.
Helen reminded everyone not to let AI erode trust with customers or teams. Human connection still wins, and AI should support (not replace) that.
Richard sees the next wave already forming. AI agents acting like digital employees are coming fast, and theyâll change how leaders think about efficiency and staffing.
Casey urged leaders to focus on amplification. Use AI to make what you do best even better instead of trying to automate it all away.
And Rose left us with the simplest but most important reminder: no AI tool fixes bad fundamentals. Skills come first. Layer AI on top to scale and reinforce, not as a shortcut.
The future of sales and enablement isnât human vs. machine. Itâs human with machine, and leaders who embrace that balance are already pulling ahead.Â
When I asked the panel if AI would replace sellers, the chat blew up with a resounding âNO.â That moment sparked an important reminder from Casey about how we should approach AI:
Here are the top AI tools from our panel and how theyâre being used to save leaders time, improve coaching, and scale enablement:
Our audience came ready to share their own favorite tools. Here are a few worth exploring:
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Lauren Bailey, known to many as âLBâ, is a sales leader, enablement leader, and entrepreneur and founder of 3 successful brands: Factor 8, providing front-line job training for inside sellers and managers, The Sales Bar, a subscription-based virtual sales training platform, and #GirlsClub, a community and development program helping more women earn leadership positions in sales.
Lori Richardson is a sales process and leadership expert who helps mid-sized company leaders build top sales teams through the right people, processes, pipeline and leadership moves. Lori is a sales coach at Harvard Business School for their MBA students, hosts an award-winning podcast, and is author of “She Sells – Find, Hire, and Retain Great Women in B2B Sales” Founder of Score More Sales, you can find her @scoremoresales on most social platforms.
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