Why Your Underperformers Stay Stuck: The Compounding Cost of Uncorrected Misbehaviors

I've been learning about AI recently. Specifically, how these large language models like ChatGPT and Claude get trained. The process fascinates me, not because I'm trying to become a data scientist, but because it mirrors something I see every week when I work with sales leaders. And it's costing them hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost revenue.

Here's what I learned: AI training happens in two phases. The first is called pretraining, where the model gets fed massive amounts of data so it can recognize patterns and compress all that information into something useful. This phase is incredibly expensive. We're talking millions of dollars and months of computational power. But here's the interesting part: pretraining alone doesn't create a useful AI. It creates potential.

The second phase is called finetuning. This is where the model learns through conversational testing and corrective feedback. When the AI makes a mistake (misinterprets a question, generates something incorrect, or goes off track), engineers provide feedback to correct the behavior. If they don't? The misbehavior compounds. The model thinks it did the right thing and doubles down on the error in future interactions.

Sound familiar?

The $50,000 Investment You're Letting Compound In The Wrong Direction

You just spent $50,000 getting your new sales rep ramped. That's not hyperbole. Between recruiting, training, manager time, and 3 to 5 months of base salary before they close their first deal, the average investment in a new sales rep is $50,000 to $100,000 before they generate a dollar of revenue.

That's your pretraining. You hired them. You onboarded them. You gave them the deck, the CRM login, the territory, the product knowledge. You invested in the foundational data they need to succeed.

But six months later, they're stuck at 60% of quota, and you're not sure why.

Here's what actually happened: they learned something wrong in week two, and you never caught it.

Maybe they misunderstood the real problem you solve, so they're leading with features instead of outcomes. Maybe they think "urgency" means rushing through discovery, so they're skipping the questions that uncover real need. Maybe they interpret a prospect's silence as rejection, so they stop following up after one or two attempts.

Whatever the misbehavior, it didn't get corrected. And now it's not a gap. It's their identity. It's how they think sales works. And they're building every habit, every call, every deal around that wrong interpretation.

In AI terms, you skipped the finetuning. And now that $50,000 investment is compounding in the wrong direction.

Why Most Leaders Skip Finetuning (And Pay For It Later)

Let's be honest: onboarding feels like "the work." It's structured, it's front-loaded, it has a checklist. You know when it's done.

Coaching feels optional. It's ongoing. It's messy. It requires you to be in the details of how your reps are actually executing, not just reviewing their pipeline numbers in a weekly forecast call.

So leaders assume reps will "figure it out" through experience. They'll self-correct. They'll learn from wins and losses and adjust.

But here's the reality: experience without correction just makes you confidently wrong faster.

A rep who skips discovery and still closes a deal? They just learned that discovery doesn't matter. A rep who gets a "no" and doesn't follow up? They just confirmed that persistence is pushy. A rep who discounts to close? They just decided that's how you win deals.

You didn't correct the misbehavior in week two. Now it's month six, and it's locked in.

The Real Cost of Skipping Finetuning

Here's the math that should keep you up at night:

Initial Investment: $50,000 in onboarding (recruiting, training, salary before productivity)

Lost Revenue: If they're stuck at 60% of quota, you're losing $200,000 to $500,000 in unrealized revenue per rep, per year

Replacement Cost: If they don't turn it around and you replace them, the total bill is $97,000 to $115,000 when you factor in separation costs, recruiting, training, and lost productivity during the gap

The Frequency: Average sales rep tenure is 14 to 16 months. Which means many leaders are paying this replacement cost every 12 to 18 months per seat.

So here's the brutal reality: You spent $50K to get them in the door. You're losing hundreds of thousands in unrealized quota. And if you replace them, you'll spend another $100K to start over.

All because you didn't catch a $500 mistake in week two.

What Finetuning Actually Looks Like In Sales

Finetuning isn't complicated. It's discipline.

It's weekly 1:1s focused on behavior, not just results. Not "How's your pipeline?" but "Walk me through your last discovery call. What did you ask? What did they say? Where did you feel the deal stall?"

It's real-time correction, not quarterly reviews. If you hear a rep misposition your value or fumble an objection, you address it that week, not in their 90-day review. You say, "Here's what I heard. Here's what I think happened. Let's try it again this way."

It's pattern recognition by the leader. If three reps are all struggling with the same objection, that's not a talent gap. That's a finetuning gap. You haven't given them the corrective feedback they need to handle that moment differently.

In AI terms, this is the iterative loop. Behavior → feedback → correction → reinforcement. The model (your rep) learns: "When I do X, I get Y. When I skip Z, deals stall."

That becomes their operating system. And it compounds in the right direction.

The Compounding Effect: Early Correction Creates Long-Term Performers

Here's the interesting part: reps who get early, specific, corrective feedback don't just hit quota faster. They build the right identity.

They learn that discovery isn't a checklist. It's how you earn the right to propose a solution.

They learn that following up isn't pushy. It's how you demonstrate commitment.

They learn that objections aren't rejections. They're the prospect telling you what they need to believe in order to move forward.

This becomes their operating system. And every deal they run, every call they make, every objection they handle reinforces the right behavior. The performance compounds.

Meanwhile, the rep you didn't coach? They're still stuck at 60% of quota, wondering why nothing's changing. And you're sitting in pipeline reviews trying to figure out if they're coachable or if you need to replace them.

May I suggest the question isn't "Are they coachable?" The question is: "What misbehavior did we let compound?"

The Diagnostic Question Every Sales Leader Should Ask

If you've got reps stuck at 60 to 70% of quota, here's the hard truth: you probably onboarded them well. You gave them the product knowledge. You showed them the CRM. You handed them the deck.

But you didn't finetune them.

You didn't catch the interpretive error in week two. You didn't correct the misbehavior in month one. And now it's month six, and you're carrying underperformers who shouldn't be underperforming.

The cost of that gap? $200K to $500K per rep in unrealized quota. And if you replace them without fixing your finetuning process, you'll pay the same price with the next hire.

Here's What You Can Do About It

I built a diagnostic process to help sales leaders identify where finetuning gaps are costing them revenue. It's designed to surface the specific misbehaviors your reps have locked in (the ones that are keeping them stuck) so you can correct them before they compound any further.

If you're carrying underperformers you think should be closing more, let's talk. You've already invested $50K to $100K per rep. Let's make sure that investment compounds in the right direction.

Schedule a Sales Performance Diagnostic

You can do this. You will learn from it. And you will be pleased with the results.